Daniel, Blue, Kai, and I were preparing for our inter-dimensional journey by reviewing Sandman’s notes. Along with his Dream Catchers, Dream Compasses, and the glowing sand to recover Mauvrey and Mark, the sleepy, jovial man had given us a small dossier about the different realms in Dreamland. He’d kept a record of his travels there and his notes were invaluable for first-time Dreamland travelers.
The four realms of Dreamland were constructs of everything that every person who’d ever existed had seen, heard, and imagined. When a person was asleep, the journey of his or her mind through Dreamland was tailored to things that he or she had experienced. However, if people like us physically went into Dreamland, we could encounter anything—a blend of everyone else’s experiences in addition to our own.
Specific characteristics made the realms unique. Nightmare was rooted in people’s fears, hates, and insecurities. Enigma held a hodgepodge of nonsense—a great inter-dimensional hub where random stuff from people’s brains hung out in an infinite number of mash-ups. Sweet Dreams was where everyone’s hopes, dreams, and fantasies dwelled—obviously the best realm in Dreamland. And then there was the Wanderers’ Void.
You know those nights when you have dreams you can’t remember? Or the nights you believe you may not have dreamed at all? Those were the nights your mind spent in the Wanderers’ Void. It was a part of Dreamland where your sleeping consciousness got so trapped in internalized stresses that your mind couldn’t widen to let anything else in. If my Pure Magic didn’t force me to dream of the future, I’d probably spend a lot of nocturnal time in this realm.
My friends and I were presently perusing a section of the dossier where Sandman described the different hearts of each realm. A Dreamland realm’s heart was its most powerful part—where dreams were the strongest for sleeping minds and where we physical travelers were most vulnerable to illusions. A knock at the door caused us to glance up.
“Dinner will be ready in five minutes,” Divya said, stepping inside the library. “Chance asked if I would let you know. Blue, it is your shift to watch over Mauvrey in the tower. I’ll bring your food up.”
“Thanks,” she said, getting up from her chair. Daniel also stood, stretching.
Since the attack on the castle, my friends and I had been taking shifts hanging out in the tower with Mauvrey for added peace of mind. The rebels may not have been after her, but the mere fact that they’d gotten to her tower had put us on edge—it meant the antagonists could do the same thing.
Blue headed out of the library; Daniel was behind her until he realized Kai and I hadn’t joined him. He pivoted. “Aren’t you coming?”
“I was going to read a bit longer,” I replied.
“I’m not hungry,” Kai said. “I’ll stay too.”
My friend shrugged and left us alone.
“You weren’t hungry at lunch either,” I commented, turning to the description of Sweets Dreams’ heart: The Hypotheticals. A gust of more potent wind blew through the library—fluttering a couple pages of the dossier away. Kai got up as I reached for the pages and put them back in order.
“We don’t all enjoy food as much as you do,” she said as she pushed down on the frame of a window to close it.
I chose to not take that as an insult. “True,” I said. “But I was only wondering if something is wrong.”
“I don’t think you want to know what I’m feeling, Crisa. You and I decided a while ago that we weren’t going to be close.”
The chillier tone got my attention. I glanced up from the dossier as Kai shut another window. I leaned back in my chair and folded my hands. “Also true . . . But I thought we’d been through enough recently to move toward a better relationship. You can’t tell me that after surviving attacks, sharing a room, and doing magic training that your feelings about me haven’t changed at all. I mean, you’re here now, aren’t you? Hanging out alone with me? I guess I thought we were cool.”
Kai let out a hollow laugh, which curdled my mood. She crossed her arms and leaned against a bookshelf, looking at me coldly. “We are not cool, Crisa. All those things we have gone through together have only made things worse. And I stayed behind just now, and haven’t had much of an appetite, because I’ve been building up the courage to confront you.”
I stiffened. “Confront me about what?”
“What you’re becoming,” Kai responded sharply. “You’re losing to your Pure Magic and don’t even realize it. Some of our friends might, but they make excuses because of their friendship with you. I don’t have that clouding my judgment.”
“Well, lucky for you,” I responded, sarcasm and my own coldness slipping through. “I’m not losing to my Pure Magic, Kai. I know you think you’re morally superior to me and judge me for my choices, but nothing has changed since Century City. You still have no idea what I’m going through and frankly, I don’t have to waste my time trying to get you to understand. I have a lot more going on than you could possibly hope to comprehend.”
“Typical chosen-one syndrome,” Kai scoffed. “You have all this power and have done so many unique things that you think you’re above everyone else.”
“I do not think that,” I argued, standing and pressing my hands against the table. “If I did, I wouldn’t have been the one to suggest the peace talks with the commons.”
“Two minutes after you suggested murdering all of them,” Kai countered.
“I obviously changed my mind about that.”
She shook her head in disbelief. “Again, two minutes later. You can’t tell me you don’t see something alarming about a powerful person who flip-flops between homicide and peace faster than someone can eat a waffle.”
I paused. There was something wrong with that. Still, it didn’t give Kai the right to condemn me. Who made her the moral authority? What obstacles had she ever faced that would give her a fair ability to judge me and my choices?
“I’m not going to become evil, Kai,” I said after a moment. “I know that’s where you’re going with this.”
“No. That’s where you’re going with this, Crisa. Reining in dark impulses can only work for so long if they’re always there. If you don’t get a handle on yourself, and you continue on the path I’ve seen you enjoying . . .” She cut herself off, frowning and breaking eye contact.
“What?” I prodded.
She didn’t say anything.
“Come on, let’s hear it. You think you’re so wise because you’ve experienced conflict for a couple of months? Please. Tell me what the morally superior Kai reckons. If I don’t pull it together then what?”
Her eyes snapped up to mine and her words came out fast and clipped. “Then maybe we’d all be better off if one day something happened to you and you couldn’t resurrect yourself.”
I drew back and stared at her, my snark and sass shoved against a metaphoric wall by the brutality of the comment.
I knew Kai and I weren’t good friends, but I honestly thought we were friends in general. It was true I’d goaded her just now, but she literally replied that maybe the world would be better off if I were dead. That was messed up. Even more so given that this was a girl I’d trained, laughed, and studied with. I’d even lent her a necklace or jacket on occasion.
“That was not cool, Kai,” I said quietly.
Kai seemed to realize the gravity of what she’d said and looked down. The anger faded from her face as she folded her hands together. Then she took a deep breath and steadied herself the way I did sometimes.
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. I am stressed and scared, and I am—”
“Flip-flopping?” I replied coldly. Her apology was too late, and I didn’t really care what justifications she was about to spout to explain why she’d just said what she did. In time maybe I could forgive her; I’d said hurtful things to people before that I didn’t mean. But I would not be ready for that any time soon. She went too far.
“See how easy it is?” I bunched up Sandman’s dossier and then stro
de to the exit. At the door, I turned to look at her.
“The gray is a complicated place to live, Kai. Maybe reflect on that the next time you condemn me for trying to survive there.”
It was late, but I didn’t feel like going to sleep. If I was going to be venturing through Dreamland tomorrow, something felt wrong about getting extra Zs now.
At half past midnight, a gentle -tap-tap sounded at my door. I guess I wasn’t the only person awake from anxiety over the upcoming mission.
“May I come in?” SJ asked, peeking around the door.
“Of course,” I replied, sitting up in bed. I’d been fiddling absentmindedly with my SRTracker and was glad for the company.
“Are you nervous about tomorrow?” she asked.
“I am.” I slid my legs out from under the comforter so my feet hovered above the floor. “We’ve been to a lot of realms, but Dreamland is a whole new dimension with its own rules. Plus, losing twenty-six days while we’re in there is a lot. I’m worried about everything that could happen out here while we’re gone.”
“That is a long time to be away,” SJ agreed. “But I have been thinking that a break from this realm may actually be good for you. Lenore cannot reach you in Dreamland. There will not be any rebels or wars, so perhaps there will be no need for you to use your magic at all.”
I paused. The comment kind of rubbed me the wrong way, but I’d already had a spat with Kai and I didn’t want to go another round with SJ, whose opinion I actually valued.
“SJ . . .” I started. “I say this with respect, but I hope you’re not here to voice your concern about my power too.”
“What do you mean, too?” SJ sat on the bed.
“Kai gave me an earful today. She’s scared of me. And she had the nerve to imply that maybe the realm would be better off without me and my dark choices.”
SJ’s face tightened in surprise. “That is a bit cruel.”
“And wrong . . . right?”
“Of course it is wrong, Crisa. You are a good person. You just . . .” SJ sighed. “Honestly, I did come to talk to you about your magic. What you did proposing these peace talks with the rebels is amazing. But what you did before that, and what you have been doing for the Godmother Supreme . . . You have been killing people, Crisa. I think you need to take some time to reevaluate if that is the right move. For you. And in general.”
“I haven’t been killing people, SJ. I’ve been killing bad guys.”
“Bad guys are still people, Crisa. They are not faceless, nameless numbers you can destroy to balance out some abstract scale of good and evil.”
“Aren’t they, though?”
A passage of silence went between us. Eventually, I spoke my mind.
“I stand by what I said in the dungeon, SJ.”
“What you said in the dungeon hurt me, Crisa.”
I met my best friend’s eyes. I really didn’t want to push her away or offend her, but my opinions stayed the same. And while I wished we didn’t disagree on something so important, I wasn’t going to compromise my stance to make things easier between us.
“SJ, I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings,” I said carefully. “But you condemning my actions and views hurts my feelings. Killing the people that I have feels like justice, the act of a hero. You make it seem like a travesty, the act of a monster. I usually try to ignore what other people think about me, but your opinion means a lot, and I don’t like the idea of you, or any of our friends, seeing me in such a negative light. I wish you would try to consider things from my perspective.”
SJ stood and walked in front of me—not too close, but not far either. “I am trying, Crisa, but perhaps it is not possible for us to agree on this. Our experiences and views of the world are different. I can no more make yours change than you can make mine change. However, I will continue to encourage you to be more merciful and logical with your actions. Your idea to talk to the rebels was good. My genuine advice is to channel that calmer, bigger-picture version of yourself more in the future. The other, aggressive magical version of you . . . her decisions are questionable.”
“My decisions are questionable,” I stated firmly.
SJ tilted her head.
“It’s like Blue said. Magic Instinct is a combination of me and my power. We’re not separate entities, despite how all of us have looked at it in the past. Pure Magic never acts outside of my best interest and it connects to what I’m feeling. It is called Magic Instinct, after all. Moving forward, I have to finally accept that. I may not be a hundred percent me when Magic Instinct steps in, but I’m in there, and I could probably stop it if I wanted to. Maybe I haven’t tried in recent events because deep down, I believed what I was doing needed to be done.”
SJ looked like she wanted to say something else, but instead she lifted her chin, expression blank but for a tinge of sadness. She didn’t want to argue or compromise either.
“I will see you tomorrow,” she said. “Try and get some sleep.” She pivoted and strode to the door. As she reached it, I spoke up.
“I’m not wrong, SJ.”
My friend paused, then disappeared through the doorway, leaving me alone with my convictions.
he gray of the sky felt impending.
It was the night of the full moon and our journey into Dreamland. As I stared at the bulging, storm-bringing clouds, it was like my gut could sense the thunder about to shake up the world above, and the power shift about to rumble the one down here.
Our last day in Clevaunt put the heavy weight of responsibility and perspective on our shoulders. By the time we came back from this mission, nearly a month would have passed in Book. We could return to a better world—one where the rebels and higher-ups had made peace and their war was over for good. Or we could return to a realm torn apart by irreconcilable differences.
It made my head hurt with concern. The rest of the Dreamland group probably felt the same way, but we had to trust that the allies we were leaving behind would broker peace in the same way they were trusting us to free Mauvrey and Mark. I realized it was a lot to hope for; yet, the slice of me that was still inherently optimistic shone with enthusiasm over the thought of us all being successful.
I mean, what if this was the turning point? What if these story arcs we’d been living with the commons rebellion and getting Paige Tomkins’ memories and saving Mauvrey were the last in a series of strife-laden adventures? What if we won and things got better?
The sun was going down. Our Dreamland team—me, Girtha, Blue, Jason, Chance, Daniel, and Kai—hugged our friends goodbye. The last hug I needed to give was to my brother Pietro. He’d arrived at Darling Castle this very evening with Evette.
In addition to SJ, Gordon, and Marie, the commons rebellion was allowing us three more protagonist representatives for the Gallant Summit next week. We’d talked to Lenore about who else to include and her response had been surprising. Since she was selecting the higher-ups attending the peace talks, she conceded selection of the protagonists to us. Even now her words on the subject still shocked me:
“Miss Knight, the whole point of this exercise is to gather different viewpoints in the same room with the hope of finding solutions that fit all definitions of fairness. I understand the realm from a broader, shrewder, more cynical perspective than perhaps you and your friends do. If I selected the protagonist attendees in addition to the higher-up representatives, the viewpoints of our meeting would be skewed to my own. You and your friends may pick the remaining protagonists. You have been involved in this conflict a great deal, these talks were your idea, and given what’s at stake . . . When it comes to this specific instance, I know you’ll work in the realm’s best interest, and I trust you.”
She trusted me. She trusted me.
That was even weirder than her having respect for me.
With her blessing, it was easy to decide who to round out the protagonist team with—Javier, Divya, and Pietro.
I’d known for a while that my older brother didn’t h
ave a protagonist book and had told him the truth over the Mark Two yesterday. While he’d been taken aback, like Gordon and Marie he’d agreed to put aside any identity revaluation until later for the greater good. It was clearly easier for him though. He was adopted, so he’d always felt different from other royals. Past that, he was older, happier, and more settled in his life. He had everyone and everything he believed he needed. What difference did some stupid book make?
Lenore was ardently publicizing the peace talks to the realm so everyone—main character and common character alike—knew there was a ceasefire right now. That gave me some comfort. And Chance had gotten his parents to give permission for Pietro and Evette to stay with my friends in Darling Castle while the peace talks proceeded. The prince was right; they did understand acting in the greater good.
My friends and I were at Lucky’s barn at basecamp now. Pietro and I took a short walk as the others continued their goodbyes. “How’s Mom doing since Emma?” I asked.
“Don’t you two talk over the Mark Two every week these days?”
“Yeah, but it’s harder to gauge if she’s doing better like she says she is when I just see her through a tiny mirror for twenty minutes once a week. You get to be around her in person.”
Pietro sighed. “She’s sad, but she doesn’t let herself fall apart. She keeps candles lit for Emma in the throne room, and as of a few days ago she made the decision to have a space dedicated to Emma in our family mausoleum.”
“Oh, that’s a great idea,” I replied. “Emma was an important part of our family and should be there.”
“Mom hopes you can come to the dedication once it’s ready. We’ll hold off on doing it until you’re back . . .” Pietro gave me a sad look. Now it was my turn to sigh.
I glanced over to where my friends were assembled. My dragon lay half napping near them. Thanks to SJ’s potions genius, Lucky had healed from his injuries rapidly.
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