Chapter Twenty: Dream Storm
The storm was so large when it finally broke that it could have covered Avalen a hundred times over. It rolled across the kingdom like a wave; none would be spared its touch both in the short- and long-term. The storm touched the lives of the power dreams who lived in their mighty fortresses and it touched the dream of the lowliest worm wriggling through the snow-covered dirt of Avalen.
The dream storm came with four kinds of rain. That of water, so much that it drowned those it touched. That of fire, so hot that it burned those it touched. That of plague, so virulent that it caused sickness in those it touched. The last was the rain of sorrow and all those caught in it would lose their senses; their minds and eyes would become vacant for there was room in there for naught but woe and such melancholy cannot fuel the life of a dream.
In a whimsical frenzy the spinning fingers of fire touched down on the green lands of Avalen, in their wake leaving ashes from which no phoenix would rise.
In the west there lived a badger walker called Blake Tanner. He'd been a dream in Avalen for many years. He built his own home in the woods, crafted with his bare hands over the decades. His pride and joy was his wine cellar for, where his brethren preferred the taste of berry mead, for Blake there was no sweeter nectar than the wines of the Kagairn Vineyards. Blake retreated to his cellar as the storm hit. He was an old badger who slipped on slippery steps as he made his way down. He was an unconscious badger walker as he lay there and the rain poured and filled the cellar to bursting; Blake Tanner would drink no more.
At Torabane the unthinkable happened. The tumultuous roar of the giants was drowned out by something louder. A storm to drown the rage of the giants is a storm that comes but once an age. From above the arches which had no doors the giants pulled down heavy concealed defensive barriers. They sealed off the mountain which shook now not beneath their footsteps but from the endless fire and lightning which scorched its side for hour upon hour. Within the battered peak Prince Karmalaine sat, his thoughts becoming one with the storm as he waited with the titans for the light to come again.
Esmay Chelldakken was a teacher of dreams in a school house on the banks of Lake Lana. The school house taught mainly ferret dreams for many of them lived nearby, though the odd beaver dream and even a couple of Squirrel Walkers could be seen attending on brighter days. In Esmay’s school house they learned the history of Avalen, as well as the geography and the flora and fauna of Avalen. She also taught those that were capable basic dream weaves.
Esmay Chelldakken lived in a small comfortable room attached to the back of the school. It afforded little protection from the storm and as the fire-rain fell the old wooden building went up swiftly, the flames consigning the teacher to ash along with her school and the hopes she taught there.
The coach carrying Princess Esmerel from Fenn was still on its long road to the east when the storm struck. They had veered off the solid stone path of the Eastroad for fear of flooding but the road now taken was one of dirt, dirt which turned to mud and sludge in the rain. Soon the horses could do nothing but strain against the whip and the wheels would not turn a full circle again.
Rekulen pulled the Princess from the carriage and they made for the trees. Though the Princess could see no safety in the trees in truth she could see little of anything, so she had to trust her kidnapper and protector, into whose firm warm hand she placed her own. They came upon a mighty tree around whose trunk a giant could not have wrapped his arms. Rekulen shouted some words as he leaned against the trunk and there opened a door from which a warm light glowed. Inside were smiling faces with pointy ears who made Esmerel welcome and sheltered her from the dream storm.
Eddin was a blacksmith in Sandagga, the desert city from which the drake walkers hailed. Eddin was not a dream given to fear so when the storm struck he carried right on hammering. Sparks flew and the furnace roared, but dream storms are not as random as they might seem, and Eddin was to pay for his foolhardy bravery. For as his hammer struck a mighty final blow on a new collar for a fire drake a bolt of lightning flashed through the air like a fiery finger of accusation and retribution. The whole of the forge was lit by it and Eddin the Brave would hammer no more.
In Archaven the clouds were buffeted in a way which many of the younger angels had never seen but Arcturion did not move from his throne and those who lived in the city of light were reassured by him. They knelt in contemplation and prayer to the god of all dreams. They weathered the storm with the faith which they themselves were a product of. All bar Godwyn, the lonely son; he still lay on his own cloud, being lifted up and down as it shifted in the hurricane winds which blew across the land and the sky of Avalen.
Godwyn paid little attention to his own fate for his angel eyes were focused far down below, in Fairvane. The children had been playing their games when the storm struck. Godwyn watched as they struggled back into the town where they were gathered up in the arms of their parents. They were taken down into storm cellars or rushed out to some natural caves in the edge of town, for the tornadoes were carving a path of destruction across the land which would soon touch the idyllic town at the end of the angel road.
Then there was a scream. Godwyn’s eyes focused on its source and there he saw the lone child, clinging to the bough of the tree into which he'd climbed during their game of hide and seek. The boy’s wailing clawed at Godwyn’s conscience for his father had been strict on his instruction not to leave the abode of the clouds during the storm which had come so suddenly from the Dream Sea.
But the screams of a fearful innocent cut through the obedience to the rules of his father and master. Another bolt of lightning struck the muddied ground near the tree in which the boy sheltered but this was not of the storm for when the bolt hit the angel materialised. Outside of the protection of Archaven Godwyn felt the full force of the storm, the wind was so powerful that it threatened to pull the wings from his back. He folded them in as tight as possible and went to the sorry looking tree in which a sorry looking boy hid.
Godwyn reached up into the tree and plucked the boy from its embrace. He dared not fly back up to his father’s abode for his wings would not suffer such a strain. Nor could he ride the lightning back up into the clouds for such was the nature of the protective wards around his home that such a method could only be used going out of Archaven, never going in.
So with the child in his arms Godwyn ran across the fields and into the town. There he saw a man-dream staggering alone through the empty streets bellowing a name which was lost to the wind. When he saw the boy in Godwyn’s arms he ran forward with relief on his face despite the fury of the storm. The dream took the child from Godwyn’s arms and started to run back into town. He turned and saw that the angel did not move. With one hand he beckoned and Godwyn followed. They ran to an open storm shelter where many concerned faces peered out.
The doors closed behind them and Godwyn saw the faces of the score of dreams who huddled there, lit by candlelight and fear. In this place would Godwyn stay and shelter from the storm, concerned for the words of his own father, comforted by the words of the grateful father whose dream he'd saved.
Tang-Sool and Layalanuine had been picnicking when the storm hit, on a hill near Lake Norel, for Tang-Sool had it in his mind to take Layalanuine’s hand, to be part of a spiritual union that could stretch forward into the ages. He had a ring of pure dream-crystal in his pocket; it cost him all he had which was nothing compared to the worth of that which he would gain in life with the dream he loved.
But before the question could be put forth the storm washed over them. The red-checked blanket blew over the horizon as did the glasses from which they drank and the platters from which they ate. Hand in hand they ran down the hill together, but the storm resented their love and the grip was broken. Tang-Sool watched as his love was carried into the air and into the lake whose waters had risen to fifty-foot waves with the wind which stirred it. Her purple dress disappeared beneath the water and Tang
-Sool could do naught but drop to his knees and let the water wash over him, a drowned love was a love still and preferable to the nothing he'd left behind.
In the Gold Castle of Lyrilia, Infenael Geddon stood on a balcony. The waves of the Lyr Sea were equal in measure to the height of the castle in which she stood, but she barely saw the storm. Her eyes stared through it and her mind saw even further, all the way to Fenn where her father had fallen in a maelstrom of treachery. Both storms had come as predicted, and in their fusion was her desire for vengeance born. She would have stayed there and allowed her anger to grow, to be fed by the dream storm, but her mother’s cold hand touched her shoulder and she retired to security inside the Gold Castle. In the darkness of its vaults she would feed her hatred with the shadows.
Potter Malian was a ferryman who trudged the Spinning River just north of Entlewood. He had plied the choppy waters reliably for fifty years and crossed the river ten thousand times but now he was on his final crossing. The storm struck at the midway point, his specially shaped oars were all snapped and his many long arms which held them were also broken. The thirty-foot oaken pole with which he'd pushed his ferry and its cargo away from the dangerous rocks of the Spinning River splintered to nothing and Potter Malian sank in despair down to the deck of the ferry.
He turned and looked through the steamed windows where the hundreds of dreams he'd been transporting were peering out in hope. That hope faded as the ferry span and sank into the furious waters of the river. No foot would make it to the opposing bank which could have been on the other side of an ocean for all the good it would do them.
In the nest at the top of the Tower of Mirgarden, Draxes the Dragon King sat and watched the storm. The countless wings which had filled the skies around his home had been dispersed down into the various levels of the tower to ride out the storm. As he looked out images appeared in the sky and he saw his kin Cyra with a golden spear driven through his head, the arrogant angel standing above him like a conqueror. Draxes had experienced dream storms before, he knew that they granted images of the past the present and the future. In addition to the death of his kin he saw other things.
The Dragon King saw a woman in a throne room, cloaked figures held her and used her blood to paint words on a wall. He saw a wall come tumbling down. And above all the chaos he saw a jackal and a raven fight to the bitter end; they did it all before a chair in the shape of a lotus, but the chair was empty and there was no one to keep the jackal and the raven from clawing and biting at each other. Draxes considered closing his eyes and waking up in Fiurdein. The fire beneath the mountain in the mortal universe would be calm and soothing, but he knew that he could not wake from his dream while the dead dream of his silver kin was un-avenged. So he watched the storm and the flurry of images which came with it, pasts obscured, a distorted present and a future that may be just a dream.
Stovil was a ten-ton-troll who lived in the ranges of Trellem. Large trolls make large targets for the cruel lightning which scorched the rocks and felled the trees around his home, so Stovil had shrunk himself down to the smallest size possible. He gave thanks to his ancestors who bred with the shifters of shapes, without the ability to morph in size he would surely have presented too large a target for the storm to have resisted striking him many times over.
Hunkered down as small as possible he sat beneath an outcropping of rock with rain dripping from his tusks. As he sat there with the dream storm destroying parts of the world around him he thought of his cousin Ilich and wondered how he fared. It had been many days since anyone in Trellem had seen him and Stovil was concerned for the fate of the legend of the troll people.
At Bloodren many of the demons howled and shouted back at the storm which boiled over them but their anger availed them nothing in the face of the implacable strength of the storm. The futile fury of the demons would not save them and the fingers of fire reached down and smote them just as they had smitten the rest of Avalen. The gigantic floating rocks of Bloodren on which they built their bone-yard fortresses were burned and smashed to pieces by the dream storm.
Gulgazish and the demon horde were not spared for the storm was equal in the devastation it dealt across the kingdom of dreams. Even as they lay siege to the Lair at Eredyss they were also besieged and forced to shelter at the foot of the mountain with the stone face of the jackal above them, from which the rain poured in waterfalls formed by the curvature of the jackal’s eyes.
The vast shutters around the Mercurial Chambers had been closed. The Tallow-Bears in their thousands had rushed onto the floors of the chambers to pull the gigantic metal doors closed in order to protect the dreamers who lay within, oblivious to the storm which raged around them. Even the giant trees which held them could not resist the wind which carried the storm, they swayed to and fro and the chambers swayed and shook with them. Clowen held onto the empty round circle in the Mercurial-Pelegon where the dreamer had lain and not for the first time he cursed the fact that he and his comrades had not seized the dreamer before he left the chamber. He dropped his silver scythe in order to grip the stone circle with both hands, so strong was the swaying of the tree beneath them.
Sansahar, Eredyss, Trellem, Valtyriel, Sel Fereden, Cortiune, Kelenestra and Mohep: There was nowhere across the vast regions of Avalen which was not affected by the storm. The full force of the cataclysm, however, seemed to focus on Fenn, the eternal city at the heart of Avalen. From the fruit shops to the towers of Fenngaard it did not matter. Fire fell from the sky, lives were lost, histories erased and hearts broken. Down in the Howling Cavern the fallen princes, Allayne and Drayen, listened to the storm. There was little comfort from the irony that their imprisonment had in fact kept them safe. Down there they were just two more prisoners and no amount of tears would bring them freedom or return their father to them.
Up above the fire-storms swiped at the palaces. The five smaller palaces lost many towers; those most tall and proud fell first. Fenngaard was not spared either and several holes were punched in it as the storm hammered with windy fire-filled fists upon it. However, a reluctant Arachnid King would not relinquish the Nested Throne on which he had gambled so much betrayal. He was alone in the Hall of Providence for his followers had scuttled to safety when the storm hit. The Hammer of Fenn hung useless in his hands, for it was a weapon aware of its strength and would not submit willingly to a new master.
Those few silver claws who had stayed in Fenngaard also sheltered, faring far better than their brothers aboard the royal fleet, it would be low in its strength when it finally emerged from the storm with Vulthian still at its head.
Amidst all this the dreamer stood with the jackal. The stone hound looked sternly out over the mountains of Eredyss and Anthony and Rostrom were just as stern in their composure. The storm brought them a reprieve from the onslaught of the demons. They did not speak for there was no sound that would be heard bar the thunder but they pondered, their fates entwined by a bargain which the talented jackal offered; one which Anthony both could not believe to be true but nor refuse even if it was a road to nowhere. It was a road of hope, one which he had not had the pleasure to walk in many years.
So for a time war was put on hold. Even the back-from-the-dead son of Fenn Geddon could not send his forces out into such chaos, so Arma, his grey knights and his nightmares stayed below the ground.
Kings and commoners, knights, fairies and dragons: The dreams of Avalen shared the same uncertain fate beneath the random destiny of the storm. This uncertainty of the future was not restricted to Avalen either. For on Old Earth a ten-ton-troll and a talented jackal also found themselves on a path that they could not have foreseen. They were led beneath the waves to a place lost in the legend of both worlds. The two remarkable fellows were not yet done with their crossing from places which are not to places which most definitely are, back and forth into the unknown with the dreamer who still slept, oblivious to the dreams so close by that he could have reached out and touched them.
Epil
ogue
Dashiel expected a headache as his mind emerged from darkness. His last memory had certainly been headache inducing. A dagger had struck him, he felt his own blood in his hands, sticky and warm. There was no magic in it, just his own fear of death. So he had lay there for a long time dying. Then the floor collapsed and he sunk into the ruins of the house along with the wood and the paint and the stone. Then there had just been darkness, for dreams did not have dreams. Had Dashiel been aware during such a time then he might have thought it death, a quiet, lonely and boring death that might endure for a very long time.
But now it seemed life had reared its head, for Dashiel was awake, aware and surprised that he did not have a headache. The pain he did have was centred in his chest. He remembered with a shudder the odd feeling as the dagger sunk in, firm skin, tough bones and a hard and noble heart were no match for sharpened steel. He was young, but he'd at least now learned that lesson, the hard way.
Upon waking he did not open his eyes. Dashiel was unsure if he was savouring the feeling of being alive or terrified of what he might see. He let his other senses stretch out and interpret what might lay around the corner for his vision. He lay on a bed, that much was certain, one far more comfortable than those allotted to apprentice Sentinels. The pillows were soft and thick and the mattress perfectly divided between support and comfort.
There was sunlight in the room. He could feel this warming the bare skin of his arms as well as shining in through his stubbornly closed eyes. There were aromas in the room, not unpleasant, a combination of the sweet smell of flowers combined with something else, a darker heavier scent of a drink which brewed somewhere there about. The sounds were the oddity, a rhythmic beeping noise which came from close to his head was steady and even in tempo and volume.
Taking several deep breaths Dashiel decided that the time had come to open his eyes. Before he could take that rather large step, however, he was interrupted.
“I know you are awake, you know”, said the voice. It was a sweet voice, that of a lady, a knowing voice of compassion. Slowly Dashiel forced open his eyes. They were reluctant for unbeknownst to him they'd been closed for many days. He slowly moved his head from side to side, his stiff neck complaining all the while. The beeping came from an alien looking machine by his side, all flashing lights and symbols, wires trailing from it which led to his chest, their ends hidden beneath the white overall he wore.
The bed was wide and long with metal bars on the sides. The light which bathed him streamed in through large open windows. Outside was a world of sunlight and greenery with the odd pond here and there. He saw a man standing with a tube from which water sprayed over a large flowerbed.
The room was spacious though sparsely furnished and all within it was coloured white. Dashiel surmised that he was in a hospital of some kind and he took a deep breath as he started to realise that he did not even know which world he was in. Had Mortiune and the others pulled him from the rubble of the dreamer’s house?
A little way from the bed was a small white table. On it sat a china pot of some sort. Next to that was a china cup in which there was a smooth dark liquid, steaming hot and probably responsible for the scent in the room, the one which mingled with the flowers dotted here and there on shelves.
Next to the table was a chair, padded green leather, with golden studs holding the material in place. On that chair sat the lady with the sweet voice. She was very beautiful. Not young, but far from old, a light of beauty shone in her that came from the very soul. Her blonde hair was tied back from a face which carried few lines. Her age was in her eyes instead, eyes which had seen too much and smiled too infrequently for many years. Those green eyes studied Dashiel as he took in the room. She lifted the china cup and sipped cautiously at the dark liquid inside it.
Dashiel closed his eyes again and tried to take stock. He'd been an apprentice Sentinel for ten years. His mother and father had wept as he left their house just off the Crystal Road near Whistlewood. He'd always regretted his last image of them being one of tears. He would have liked a smiling memory, instead whenever he tried to picture them there was only sadness, red eyes, frowns and sorrow. At first their unhappiness had confused him. They were the ones who allowed him to go with the old man, they were the ones who told him he had a gift and was going to a place where he would learn how to use it. As he'd got older he started to understand a little of their sadness, but Sentinels were forbidden from being parent-dreams themselves so he doubted that he would ever truly appreciate the difficult decision that they'd made.
As a young dream he'd been dazzled and amazed by Fenn and all the wonders of the first pillar. This amazement had been sustained by the things he'd learnt to do. Back in the village he'd weaved simple things for simple dreams. In Fenn he learned the limits of what he could do, which were few and often negotiable by a pioneering mind. Mortiune had been a brilliant teacher. All that he'd learned, all the progress he'd made, had led to his being chosen to accompany his teacher through the Brazen Gate to Old Earth on a mission which dreams would speak of for centuries, vanquishing the enemies of the King and returning order to a realm threatened by chaos.
The knife had cut through his naivety, his youth and his idealism. The new perspective which it had left him with was still forming, still drawing its own conclusions from the world around him. But the only thing being drawn now was a conclusion of confusion found in the green eyes of the mysterious lady whose company he kept.
“Don't you feel like talking to me?” she said, her cup clinking as she put it down on the table next to the pot.
“Where am I?” Dashiel said, his own voice sounded strange, so long had it been kept hidden from even his own ears.
“Meadowfield Hospital, Cambridgeshire. It's private”, she replied.
None of these places sounded familiar to Dashiel. He was loathe to ask the next question. “What world?” he said.
That made her chuckle, a delightful sound. “What world?” she repeated, “very amusing, there's more than one is there?” she said.
“There are many”, he replied with his eyes still closed, his mind trying to process a thousand different options.
“Well you, young man, are on Earth, as am I and as is everyone else I, should hope.”
Earth. They had not come back for him then. Dashiel took several more deep breaths trying to stave off the panic. “Why am I here?” he said, opening his eyes and meeting those of the lady in the room who still stared intently at him.
“Hmm, an interesting question and one which I was planning on asking you, if I'm honest.” She got up from her chair and walked over to sit on the side of the bed.
“You see, young man, my name is Juliet Hallow and you were pulled from the ruins of my old house. I have many questions that I would like to ask you concerning how it ended up like that, but there is one question which I would ask before them all. I'm wondering, can you tell me what has happened to my husband?”
The End
Acknowledgements
Many thanks to George (not the snowman) for his diligent editing. Thanks also to PK and LK for their proof-reading and input at various levels. A wider thank you to all those family and friends who have voiced their opinions on all matters from the front cover colour scheme to the inner working of the silver claw hierarchy. Without you the journey would not have been nearly as fun or worthwhile.
Oliver
Beyond the Dream Page 51