by D. Fischer
CHAPTER TWO
TEMBER
DREAM REALM
Yanking my hand from Erma’s, I bend over, coughing and wheezing with no relief. I steady myself, placing my hands against something solid and rough to the right of me. My vision is still blurry though dark, and I blink several times, waiting for it to refocus. Erline’s portals are brutal to a body. I imagine if I were sucked into a tornado, it would feel the same.
The black fades as small retreating dots, and I attempt to focus on my surroundings, on the jagged edges digging into my palm. My lips firm, feeling as though they’re bunching into a tight rose.
Supporting my weight is black, jagged rock. The stone sparkles bright, lighting the otherwise dark space around me. They’re like stars adorning the night sky with endless, moving twinkles, but there are trillions of them. The Milky Way holds no comparison.
Sweat trickles down my forehead, but I disregard it, rubbing my index finger in small circles along the shimmering, rough, rock wall. My breaths come heavy, and I straighten my spine, expanding my torso, and step closer to examine what’s before my eyes. I scrape a nail against one of the many sparkles. It detaches from the rock with ease, like a mote of dust, and I bring it closer to my eye, tip my head to the side.
“Careful,” Erma mutters behind me. “Ingest that dust, and you’ll hallucinate. Angels aren’t built for dreams.”
I turn to face her, bringing the speck with me. “This is dream dust?”
She grasps my hand and leans forward, blowing it off the tip of my finger. It twinkles, floating like a feather, before it rests against the matching black rock beneath my feet.
“Yes,” she says with simplicity before twisting back to the group.
Her movements are graceful and elegant, something I’ve taken for granted until now. It’s such a small trait, yet I’m hyper-aware. I lost something, something I love, and due to the loss, my mind’s eye is becoming more focused and sharpened, noticing things I didn’t before. The finer details I’ve been missing are a hammer to my gut, an unnamable emotion I thought I’d never experience.
Taking in a shuddering breath, I release it, expelling some of the non-existent pressure that’s metaphorically swelled around my aching heart.
Erline and Corbin are yards ahead, already marching to the destination they have in mind. Kat’s bare feet dangle from Corbin’s cradled arms. Each step he takes jostles her calves, and her feet sway to the movement. The black paint on her toenails matches the rock surrounding us.
Another pang stabs my chest, my guilt so thick it constricts my lungs. It’s a sharp, invisible knife that my brain has conjured, reminding me of my betrayal.
That is two people I’ve let down in such a short amount of time. It’s an emotion that feels like I won’t survive as it consumes my heart. They’re new to me, all these feelings. I feel naked, as though I was skinned alive and there’s nothing left but bones. Yet, I’m the one who caused all of this. I am to blame.
I swallow, my chin jutting out as I attempt to expel the knot that’s formed there. Shaking my head, my brown curls tickling the curve of my neck, I take in my surroundings, focusing on anything else but what my mind is forcing me to endure.
We’re in a cave or what seems like a cave. The tunnel is long but tall, several people’s length, and it curves at the top. Large, spiked rocks protrude from the curved ceiling, giving it a perilous appearance, as though those spikes will drop and be our demise.
The surfaces that make up the walls aren’t smooth but instead, jagged, bumpy, yet hold much beauty and character. These tunnels are mined works of art.
“What is the black rock?” I ask, my voice a whisper.
“Inferaze,” Corbin answers.
I turn to the group. “Inferaze?”
Erma nods. “Like coal, only…different.”
I purse my lips and catch up to the group in a jog. Every sparkle, every speck of dream dust, lights our way as we walk down the tunnel, each mote a tiny sun, and the Inferaze the night sky. The contrast is breathtaking, a cave that can’t be replicated.
My head swivels, absorbing the details of the tunnel, before I look at my shoes silently treading the solid ground. I frown and stop mid-step, my foot falling soundless. The surface surrounding my shoes is lit – bright white surrounding the edges like a puddle of light. I spin, glancing behind me.
With every stride we have taken, our feet have left the evidence, like a bread crumb trail, in the same brilliant glow. It’s as if applying pressure to the Inferaze brightens the specks, merges them together. I look a little farther back from where we started, noticing how the prints fade, and I heave a sigh of relief. We can’t be conspicuous if we’re leaving a trail that’ll lead right to us. Not that this is a mission of secrecy, but it’s best to find Sureen before she runs. She’s known to flee like the defenseless coward she is.
“Tember!” Erma barks.
The muscles along my neck bunch, and I grind my teeth. Whirling back to the group, I jog to them. Her voice should have echoed through the open space, but it’s as if the Inferaze absorbed it. It makes me question: What is the purpose of this magical rock? What can it do?
Erline tilts her head, her chin touching the point of her shoulder. Her long white hair ripples against her back. “Keep up, or I’ll send you back.”
Erma’s eyes snap to mine before they wander along the rocks, roaming its surface but not absorbing the detail. Her arms sway slightly beside her as if she doesn’t want anyone to know she fights an internal war. She doesn’t want to be here. She detests Sureen; this I know.
All the nights we shared a bed, she would tell me stories, and each one would end with Sureen’s name passing her lips with a snarl. Not only is Erma uncomfortable with where we are, she’s uncomfortable with my sacrifice, even in the face of my self-absorbed missions. It’s crass of her to forget my very purpose, to want me only for herself. It’s a hint of jealousy, and she’s angry about having such emotions. I believe she places this blame on me. I do deserve the full brunt of her silent, vindictive wrath.
A rumbling along the cave wall causes our group to stop in its tracks, wary. It travels down the tunnel, the roar of the rock running its length like ripples of an earthquake. The walls visibly vibrate, and I glance up, watching the questionable, deadly spikes.
“What’s happening?” I ask, raising my voice above the sound while keeping the fright from my tone.
Erma sidesteps to the tunnel wall, placing her palm on a ridge of protruding black rock. Her eyebrows dip and she swivels back to Erline, questions on the edge of her twitching lips.
“Don’t fear,” Erline begins, her eyes running the length of the tunnel. Her inspection halts when a portion of the wall ripples like still water after a gentle poke. “It’s the cave’s magic. Sureen’s magic.”
The wall transforms before my eyes, each rock folding back in on itself like the churning of vicious, angry clouds.
I clear my throat. “She knows we’re here?”
“No,” Corbin supplies. “It’s another pathway, conjured here for the purpose of mining.”
Sarcasm in the face of danger drips from my lips. “How do you know?”
He stretches his neck, impatience straining the muscles that line his spine. “Must I be forced to share all my knowledge?”
The archway fully forms, the rocks ceasing their movement, and the rumbling quiets, leaving behind echoes of vibrations inside my eardrums, stiff, like an over-flexed muscle.
DYSON COLEMAN
DEATH REALM
Rubbing my hands up and down my bare arms, my teeth chatter, slamming against one another. I huddle in the corner of my cell, trying to contain my own warmth. Oddly, there’s a draft that floats through this dungeon, seeping between the bars of my cell like a slithering snake.
Reaper’s Breath moved like this, only visible. It was always a warm welcome to see that creature, to have something constant. It was a familiarity in a place filled with sorrow and death, of
people and beings unable to move on because the after-life holds nothing for them. But I haven’t seen Reaper’s Breath since the night I was thrown in here. It abandoned me, finding me a lost cause within its own agenda.
I quickly scratch the back of my neck, agitated. Maybe I am. Since I couldn’t, and can’t, lead a rebellion against its creator, I can only come to the conclusion that it chooses to stay away because I no longer benefit its uses. I’ll probably be dead soon anyway. That frustrates me – to be abandoned and discarded.
Cursing under my breath, I drop my hand and hug my legs tighter against my torso. I guess I’ll never know. I should stop worrying about things I can’t change and instead, focus on survival so I can find a way out of this hellhole. Literally.
I glance around, seeing nothing but black, and frustration bubbles across my chest. Even with my shifter vision, it’s difficult to see past my neighboring cells. No ideas filter into my mind; my stomach’s grumbling and cramping, consuming my coherent thoughts instead.
In the cell next to me, Gan pulls me from my self-pity. I can hear him mumble to himself, words I can’t understand besides, “devil.” He often speaks in French, occasionally switching back to English when he isn’t worked into a bundle of smothering emotions.
When he gets like that, it works me up, making me feel as crazy as he is. It’s difficult to tell my own feelings apart from his.
I wonder what it’d be like to be him. What’s his story? What happened to him to make him this way? It’s obvious he’s been here for a while, and I’m positive he’s older than I care to imagine. Thinking about it makes my head throb. Even as I freeze to death, even as my stomach grumbles louder than his mumbling words, I pity him. Something bad happened to him, and I’m not sure if I want to know the truth behind his tortured soul.
I’ve tried working with him more, to get him to haunt the witch, but my efforts are pointless. It’s a dying dream to think I’ll ever make it out of here alive. He hasn’t listened to me since he rambled about a beast. Something about the beginning and the end? I rub my hands over my strained eyes.
“Oh, the freaking insanity,” I murmur.
My wolf is still and silent as the day he killed Aiden, his remorse and self-loathing smothering. Behind my closed eyelids, images pop up before I can squash them, his inner dysfunction my own.
Blood splattering stone. Screams echoing through the room. Vampire spittle slapping my cheek. The vibrations of my wolf’s agonized howl.
I drop my hands and open my eyes, forcing the past away before it swallows me whole.
How many days has it been? There are no stones here to act as a chisel, marking the passing of time against the solid wall. Not that I’d be able to. The death realm doesn’t have a sun. There’s no bright daylight passing to a darkening night. It’s a solidified yet continuous cycle of fog and misery. Besides, time passes differently in each realm. Maybe Kheelan created this realm that way on purpose. There’s no point in obsessing over time when you’re dead. Or maybe, it’s one more thing he can take away from us.
A smell reaches my nose, a foul one. I can’t work out what it is, but my stomach doesn’t care. Any scent smells good at this point, whether it’s edible or not.
Shifting my weight, I distract myself once more. “Come on, Dyson. Pull it together,” I growl. I refuse to end up like Gan. For my wolf, I can’t say the same.
I’ve tried to talk to my wolf, to get him to see reason, but he refuses to unbundle himself from a curled position inside me. He doesn’t want to exist. He doesn’t want to acknowledge what he was forced to do. I’ve never been so at odds with him in any of my lives.
How do I stir a wolf that wants to die and isn’t allowed to? He and I are one. If he dies, I die. There is no in-between. He can’t have it both ways, no matter how much I wish he could. More than anything, I feel terrible for wanting to give him what he wants. His emotions and trying to live with himself are suffocating and choke me right where my voice box should remain constriction free. But I can’t give in to him. Not when there’s hope, and that hope rests on a witch’s shoulders. I have to find a way to make her aware of it.
A whole new level of rage boils my blood. If only I could use that rage to heat myself. I begin to blame my wolf. While he’s dealing with his emotions, I’m dealing with the very real possibility of a second death. A circumstance I refuse to let happen.
Damn it – if he’d grow a pair, I’d be able to shift and save myself from all of this. From being . . . absolutely nothing. I shouldn’t blame him. But in this moment, as I dream of warm fires and hot food, I am.
Footsteps echo through the cells, the soundwaves coming from the tunnels that lead to the main floor. Voices follow, along with pleas from the other cells somewhere down here, but the new-comers are still far enough away that I can’t make out the words.
I slam my fist against the stone beneath me. It’s frustrating, being this helpless.
CHAPTER THREE
TEMBER
DREAM REALM
Bustling is an understatement. No words are spoken between each roaming Sandman as they walk through the newly-formed archway. They pass us with determination, heading back the way from which we came. There is an abundance of them, and we’re left with no choice but to scoot out of their way, hugging the wall while continuing to make our way to our destination.
Their skin is as dark as night, camouflaging them with their realm, and their eyes are as luminescent as the twinkling specks of dust. The prominent muscles lining their faces are relaxed, void of curiosity and passion, precisely as they were designed. I envy them.
I tilt my head, speculating, watching them continue down the tunnel. They’re silent, like a predator, but they’re anything but. I’d wager they’re the prey - the prey of their creator, forever bound to do her bidding.
It is said Sureen draws her magic from the conjuring of dreams. The sandmen deliver the dreams in the form of dust to those who sleep, and it finds its way back, feeding her. I don’t understand the logistics, and I’m not sure I want to. The images that float through a human brain during a sleeping state travel back to this realm. That is all I know. It is not a lot of power in which dreams deliver back to Sureen, but it’s enough to keep her afloat I imagine.
The sandmen don’t care that we’re here. If an enemy came onto the Angel’s Ground on the guardian realm, a swarm would be escorting them and inquiring why they’re there. We protect our realm, our creator, and our kind. Not all but some.
Through the archway, huddled along the walls, short men use the smallest of chisels to gently scrape away the flecks of dust. Their height does not reach my breast, but their build is impressive. There are areas where the specks of sparkling dust have been fully removed.
While some gather the dust, others use large chiseling axes to chip away at the Inferaze, piling the chunks in the middle of the tunnel walkway. That answers my earlier question: there is a purpose for Inferaze if it’s being chipped and gathered.
Large rusted machines, the size of boulders and in the form of butterflies with their backs in the shape of a scoop, pick up the rocks. Their wings remain in an expanded position, and once they’re manually loaded, one short male presses a button, and a blue flame, almost clear, exits the bottom of the expanded metal wings. A rush of heat carries our direction, the temperature smoldering, along with the scent of burning sage. The machine lifts, hovering above the ground, and jets forward, traveling down the large tunnel with its load, rounding a curve and disappearing from sight.
We step through another arch, continuing this new path while my mind soaks additional knowledge and observations, compartmentalizing and categorizing. I’ve never been here before. I’ve never had a reason to enter this realm.
“Interesting,” I whisper to myself. I sidestep a haphazard pile, trying to keep my uneasy, churning stomach at bay. It flip-flops like a fish stuck on a sandbank. I have a terrible feeling, and I can’t seem to shake it. Every part of me wants to turn aro
und, to go back the direction from which we came, and not enter this tunnel which will surely lead us to the Dream Queen herself.
I care for Kat, and I want this spell to be lifted from her, but something about this plan feels off. A sense of dread overcomes me, threatening to halt my determination. I want to rip Kat from Corbin’s arms and run. Perhaps it’s due to my unease, based off the platform of the unknown.
My stride falls silent as I watch the short men mining this section of the cave. Each fragment floats in slow motion until it settles inside the burlap bag another holds, and each soundwave from the swing and connection of axe is absorbed by the walls. They sweat, they grunt, but it’s far quieter than it should be. The walls are the gravity.
The fascination of the Inferaze diminishes, replaced by a new object to study. “They’re Dwarves,” I whisper, slowing my pace.
Comparable to the guardian realm, I knew other creations roamed the realms, but witnessing it first-hand piques my never-ending curiosity. We were Erma’s second creations, taught abundantly in wisdom of the realms, however, not to the extent I had previously assumed. Creatures of other realms were part of our studies, but that was a long time ago for me. Perhaps the knowledge has been forgotten or evaporated until now.
The four tribes of elves were Erma’s first creations. Built for the same purpose as angels, they protect the grounds of her realm but nothing more.
As Erma and Erline’s relationship blossomed into true sisterhood, Erma wanted the elves to assist in protecting Erline’s realm. She had approached the elves to provide it, but they had refused and still do. They have no wish to leave our realm and their home.
No matter how much she begged, she didn’t wish to strip them of their will. Upon their refusal, Erma had no choice but to create more creatures: the angels. That choice was a double-edged knife, and Erma has been paying for it ever since.