Angels and Elves- Act I

by William Collins

  In his very first lesson, Evan had been convinced the Master of Dreamwielding was a ghost, until Elijah had filled him in. Li’Azar was no less creepy than a ghost would’ve been, however.

  He remained seated and with his eyes closed as they all entered. His milky white hair fell either side of his face, matching his unnatural white skin. His lips were thin and blue, and his ears were pointed.

  Only after all the trainees had been assembled for several minutes, did Master Li-Azar acknowledge them. “Today is dream day.”

  Evan exchanged confused looks with Brooke and Jed.

  “Um, could you elaborate, please Master,” Sabine Silcorn said, looking at Li-Azar with reverence.

  The ice elf continued to survey them, but it was if he was looking through them all. Li’Azar was very thin, almost frail-looking, but his voice was surprisingly deep and sultry, resonating throughout the chamber. “Does anyone remember what I said when you first came to seek my knowledge, forty-eight days ago.”

  Evan wracked his brain. Around two months ago, shortly after he’d first become a Mid-Realmer, he and his friends had started Dreamwielding classes. On that first day, Li’Azar had mainly scolded them on how difficult dream magic was, and how dangerous. But Evan had no idea what his exact words had been.

  “Uh,” said Xavier. “That you wouldn’t let any of us dreamwield until we proved we weren’t fools?”

  The Master sighed in consternation, though it sounded more like a hiss to Evan. “Not quite. I proclaimed that my senses told me none of you would amount to much.”

  Yes, much less insulting. Evan thought, before realising Li’Azar might know how to read his mind.

  The ice elf’s slender brows knitted into a scowl, as if he was irritated that he had to train them at all. “Dreamwielding,” he began, “is a magic unlike any other. Unlike other areas of sorcery, dreamwielding can be performed by any Realmer, but only a few can enter the world of dreams without losing themselves. Fewer still, can Dreamwield like I can. None of you will be able to enter the dream realm without my instruction.” Li-Azar paused, taking in their vacant expressions. Dreamwielding also allows you to roam the realms, after a fashion, and is pivotal in preparing you for missions, understand?”

  The Venators nodded, murmuring assent. Evan felt as uncomfortable as he always did in these lessons, but several girls, Sabine among them, were hanging on to Li-Azar’s every word.

  “So far,” the Master continued, “I have not permitted you to enter your dreams, as none of were ready. But today, I shall allow some of you to attempt it.”

  Excitement buzzed through the Venators at this, as well as a thrill of fearful whispers.

  “Some of you may still foolishly think that with magic anything is possible, but in the dream world it truly is. The ability to levitate amongst the clouds could be yours if you so desire, the ability to grow your body taller than this castle is possible, anything you imagine will become a truth. But you must remember others can dreamwield also. Dark-Venators have attempted to boycott our own dreams and injure or slay us that way. Do not fear-” he spoke sharply as several students muttered to one another in shock. “For I shall be with you. We will start by entering the dream plane where Veneseron exists, so you will not be travelling far. Obviously Veneseron is blocked from all outside dreamwielders. Many of you will desire to see your families once again perhaps.”

  “Really no way,” Xavier cried as more than a dozen people gasped.

  “Yes,” said Li’Azar. “You can see only, you will not be able to interact with your loved ones.”

  “Do demons exist in the dream realm?” A generously proportioned Venator named Porgree Galwitz asked.

  “No, demon’s minds are far too moronic to consider the concept of dreamwielding. Powerful Dread Lords have been known to enter, however, and dream spectres will always be a threat.”

  Li’Azar had mentioned the spectres in previous sessions, explaining that they were the remnants of dreamwielders who’d died whilst on the dream plane. Evan was curious to know more about these spectres, but also creeped out.

  “Now, I assume the rest of you can remember what I’ve already told you in previous sessions.” Li’Azar sighed. “Because I loathe long explanations, unlike the waffling Gettelung, and I’d rather not go through it again.”

  “Shots fired.” Jed grinned over at Evan.

  “So, I hope you’ll recall what I told you about easing yourself onto the dream plane. Now, split up into pairs and decide who should enter first. None of you are skilled enough to wake yourself up yet, so your partner will wake you when I command.” Li’Azar waved them away.

  “But what about dream spectres?” Xavier asked, worry invading his voice. “I don’t wanna’ get trapped in the dream plane forever!”

  “Hush,” said Li’Azar sternly, his frosty gaze sweeping over Xavier and the several other Venators showing their fear. “A dream spectre is an imprint of dreamwielders whose bodies died whilst their minds were in the dream plane. Spectres rarely take notice of anyone.”

  “But I heard the spectres are drawn to magic like magnets,” Xavier persisted. “Doesn’t that mean--”

  “Silence, child,” Li’Azar snapped. “Yes, magic gets dream spectres attention, but as none of you are strong enough to use sorcery on the dream plane, you don’t have to worry.”

  “Oh, great,” Jed said. “So we can’t defend ourselves with spells?”

  “Infernal children,” Li’Azar muttered under his breath. “If you’d paid attention in my former lessons, you’d know only incredibly skilled dreamwielders can make use of their sorcery whilst dreaming. Besides, I shall protect you from harm, as long as you obey my instruction. If any of you decide to go wandering in the dream realm, I will leave you to the long sleep. I won’t put everyone’s lives in danger to save one of you.”

  Evan guessed the long sleep meant death. Where the dreamwielder was unable to wake up and he slowly died. His fellow Venators realised this too, as there was a fresh outbreak of scared murmurs.

  “It’s okay, everyone,” Sabine said. “Li’Azar said you’re safe as long as you stay close to him.”

  “Instructor’s pet,” Jed muttered.

  Evan wasn’t sure what to do, but he saw his fellow trainees head to the bedrolls, where one of the pair would lay down, and the other sit by their side, so he and Jed copied them.

  “You can go first.” Jed grinned at him.

  Evan smiled. “Aww, you’re scared?”

  “No way,” said Jed, “I’m just… a light sleeper. It’s best if you try it first.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” He chuckled, laying down on a bedroll and staring at the dreamcatcher above. Evan didn’t know much about normal dreamcatchers, but he was sure they weren’t carved out of elvish white wood like these, or set with a glowing drey stone in the middle. Li-Azar had told them the blue drey stones were enchanted with the spell which would allow their minds to enter the plane of dreams.

  “All of you who have chosen to enter first, begin taking deep regular breaths, clearing your mind of all other thought.” Li-Azar’s deep voice echoed off the walls.

  “We’ll start by concentrating on the exact same place so that I can watch over you all at once. Everybody picture Veneseron’s Banquet Chamber. Concentrate on every tiny detail you can remember. Imagine in your heads that you are standing there this very moment.”

  Evan pictured the vast hall, bordered by long tables heaving with masses of food and with its many stone benches for the Venators to sit.

  “Now, I shall perform the Somnius spell upon you individually to put you to sleep. You shall arrive in the Banquet chamber at intervals, so do not panic. Simply wait until we are all gathered.”

  Evan kept his eyes closed, but could hear the swish of Li’Azar’s blue cloak as he wandered the room, putting Venators to sleep one by one. Abruptly, he felt Li’Azar pass him by and lightly brush his shoulder.

  At once, he felt himself drift into sleep, like being given
anaesthetic in the hospital before an operation. One moment he was lying on the bedroll, picturing the Banquet hall, the next he found himself actually standing in the hall.

  The room was usually filled with over a hundred Venators at any given time. Yet now, Evan stood completely alone, the total silence pressing in on his ears.

  A second later, Sabine materialised, staring around in astonishment.

  “Wow, this is even better than I thought it would be,” she exclaimed, before spotting Evan. “Li’Azar’s incredible, isn’t he?”

  “Uh, sure.” Evan looked around himself, noticing now that the very edges of the hall trembled and blurred, reminding him he was inside a dream.

  Two more Venators materialised next, then three more after that, all of them speaking excitedly in hushed tones. Xavier was the last in their class to pop into existence, nearly falling over as he regained his balance.

  “Play around a little bit.” Li’Azar suddenly appeared, lounging at one of the many stone benches. “Visualise changing your clothes, even alter your faces if you wish.”

  Evan looked down at his Mid-Realmer clothes and imagined that he was wearing his old school uniform from Elfort. Instantly, he was dressed in the black blazer and trousers, as well as the blue tie and small leather shoes. The shoes were even as scuffed as his old shoes had been.

  He saw Blake’s clothes alter to a grey hoody and baggy jeans in a flash, whilst Xavier was suddenly robed in a pink fluffy dressing gown and matching slippers. “Oh, how delightful.” Xavier wiggled his toes experimentally.

  Emi squealed, and he turned to find her in an exquisite ball gown and silver tiara. He then became distracted completely as he spotted Nova. She was chatting enthusiastically to Iris, having changed her clothes into a backless party dress. The light golden scales across her back glittered in the light, and her body…Evan forced himself not to ogle, as Brooke would say.

  He strolled up to one of the mirrors set between the weapons hanging on the walls. He imagined himself with glasses, and there they were, magnifying his misty grey eyes.

  The glasses disappeared, and instead Evan grew a curly French moustache, much in the same fashion as the Master Padrake’s.

  Xavier bounded up to look in the mirror beside him, still dressed in his pink fluffy dressing gown, but sporting spiky ginger hair now. Emillia soon followed, admiring her completely bald head.

  “The dream realm is a complete reflection of all the other worlds in existence. As you see the settings you have imagined for yourselves are entirely the same, except that you can see only each other. As the rest of the Venators in the castle are not dreamwielding, you cannot see them.”

  “But they’re here, right,” Sabine asked, staring at all the empty seats.

  “Hey, there’s one guy,” Evan’s classmate Nena called out.

  They all turned to see a Venator Evan recognised as Byron Binoshe. He sat at a bench, only with his head on the table as he slept soundly.

  “Yes,” said Li’Azar, “the fool must’ve dozed off whilst eating his lunch.”

  “So, we can see people when they’re asleep,” Nova asked.

  Li’Azar nodded. “For the time being, exceptionally skilled.”

  They all froze as a newcomer walked through the walls, a dream spectre.

  Chapter 7- Best Laid Plans

  The spectre resembled a teenage boy, except his body was translucent, but fuzzy at the edges. His face was almost more unnerving than the many demons Evan had seen, as it was completely blurred, the eyes and mouth indistinguishable.

  The spectre was completely silent as he walked slowly to one of the stone benches and sat down, motioning as if he was eating an invisible dinner. He wore a Mid-Realmer uniform, only the jacket was more of a frock and a top-hat sat atop his blurred face.

  “Ah, yes.” said Li’Azar. “Sir Walter Dodga. He attended Veneseron in the Victorian era of your home realm. He was much like all of you, yet he failed to listen. One night, Walter snuck into a storeroom and stole a drey stone, determined to enter the dream plane all on his own. To no one’s surprise, he got himself lost in the dream plane. He would’ve survived once someone found him in his room a day after he didn’t turn up for his training, trapped in a deep sleep. Spectres got to him before he could ever awake. He’d been a corpse for hours by the time anyone found him.”

  “Is he going to do that to us?” Porgree cried, edging to the back of the chamber, alongside the majority of the class.

  “No,” Li-Azar shook his head, looking like he’d rather be anywhere else. “I told you, spectres barely acknowledge others in the dream realm.”

  “What’s he doing?” Blake asked.

  “Replaying his daily routine,” said Li’Azar. “Dream spectres are forever stuck, living out the last day of their lives, oblivious. Walter Dodga is long dead, but a pale memory remains, haunting the dream realm for eternity.”

  “So, if one of us were to die whilst dreamwielding,” Evan said, moving closer to the spectre, “we don’t become a ghost or anything, but remnants of our memory lives on?”

  “Correct.” Li’Azar nodded. “The spectres are of little threat to dreamwielders, but do serve as a reminder of the potential consequences.”

  He stood only a foot away from the sitting spectre now. This close he saw that the fuzziness around the Venator’s outline was similar to television static. He was about to ask Li’Azar another question when the spectre suddenly lunged from his seat and dived straight toward him.

  Evan fell back with a shout as several others screamed. He lost his balance and crashed to the floor with the phantom crawling on top of him. He instinctively summoned the fire element and threw his hand up, but no sorcery arrived. He remembered he wasn’t strong enough to use magic in the dream realm just as the spectre’s hands clamped down on either side of his head. Instantly, he went blind, his vision filled instead by a blurred nothingness. Evan tried to shout, but his mouth wouldn’t open. He tried to physically throw the spectre off him next, but found his body wouldn’t move either. He was paralysed, as well as blind and also deaf, considering he could no longer hear his fellow Venators or anything else at all.

  He worked himself into a frenzied panic as he realised how helpless he was. All he could feel was the wraith’s fingers on his head, which were slowly submerging into his skin, about to slide into his skull.

  *

  “What do you reckon they’re doing in there?” Jed asked Zeke, sitting beside the sleeping Evan.

  “Dunno’” Zeke shrugged. “But I bet it’s fun. I can’t wait ‘till it’s our turn.”

  “Fun, with Li’Azar? No chance.” Jed shot a quick glance the Master’s way to check he was still sleeping.

  Unlike the Mid-Realmers laying across the room, Li-Azar sat cross-legged in the centre of the room. His eyes were closed and he appeared to be meditating rather than dreaming, although Jed couldn’t even see him breathing.

  “Well, it looks like fun.” Zeke nodded down to Xavier, who appeared to be smiling as he slept.

  Jed grunted, not wanting to let on how much he wasn’t looking forward to dreamwielding. Dreams and anything else you couldn’t control freaked him out.

  He was debating whether to prank Sabine whilst she slept when Evan’s body abruptly went rigid and his head jerked from side to side violently.

  “Holy crap!” Jed jumped to his feet, looking wildly at the others for help. “What’s going on? Do I wake him?”

  Zeke looked as nonplussed as he did, whilst the other Venators reaction ranged from panicked mutters to checking their own sleeping partners were okay.

  Jed was sure Li’Azar had mentioned whether waking a dreamwielder would have negative effects or not, but he couldn’t remember. Idiot! You need to listen more.

  Evan’s body was still unnaturally still, whilst his head movements looked liable to snap his neck if they continued.

  He decided to gamble and bent down to shake Evan’s shoulders, screaming at him. “Wake up! Dude, y
ou gotta’ wake up.”

  He looked around desperately to Li’Azar whose eyes snapped open. Moments later, Evan’s jerking movements stopped and his body relaxed once more.

  Before Jed could ask Li’Azar what had happened, the Master had advanced toward Evan, unsheathing his dagger as he did so.

  “Hey…what the hell are you doing!”

  *

  The blurry blindness that obscured his vision suddenly dissipated as a bright white light broke it apart. Evan realised the spectre’s fingers were no longer on him even as he heard Jed roaring his name.

  With a gasp, he sat up straight, blinking rapidly as his sight returned. With immense relief, he saw he was back in Veneseron, in the training chamber. His fear returned, however when he saw Li’Azar standing over him, his weapon drawn.

  “What’s going on-“ Evan cut off as Li’Azar hauled him to his feet with one hand, whilst raising his dagger in the other.

  “Oi, get off him you madman!” Jed bellowed, throwing a bolt of energy at the Master.

  Li’Azar hastily whirled round, slashing the spell apart with his enchanted dagger so it fizzled to the floor.

  “Stop, fool! I must check if he’s corrupted.”

  Corrupted. Evan froze in shock as Li’Azar carefully felt his brow and stared into his eyes, still holding the dagger, ready to use it.

  “What’s going on?” Emi cried, her sentiment echoed by many of the other Venators.

  Finally, Li’Azar stepped away from Evan, sheathing his blade, but still glaring suspiciously at him.

  “Your skin is not cold to the touch, nor do your eyes show signs of filming over. I believe you are safe.”

  “Safe from what?” he croaked. “I have no idea what happened.”

  “I destroyed the spectre who attacked you the Clensise spell” said Li’Azar. “The only spell that will destroy a spirit. That was the white light you doubtless saw. The phantom paralysed your body, whilst trying to rip out your mind, so you’d become a dream spectre yourself.”