Shadows of the Lost Sun

by Carrie Ryan

  Since when had her cat’s voice become familiar to her? Marrill shook her head, marveling at how easily she’d grown comfortable with the craziness of the Pirate Stream.

  But then she realized what she’d just heard, and she bolted upright. “Did I just hear that right?” she asked. Fin nodded, grinning widely.

  Triumphant, Marrill spun to face Ardent. The wizard blinked, still staring at the cat. Then he let out a laugh. “The Shell Weavers of Oneira—brilliant! And this will give us an opportunity to cross another wizard from Meres off our list. Just so happens that Tanea Hollow-Blood’s Dream Garden connects directly with the Shell Shoals.”

  He stood, thrusting a finger into the air. “Coll, tell your first mate up there to set us a course for Oneira.”

  Marrill threw up her arms in joy. She’d known there had to be a way if they just didn’t give up. “We’re going to the Shell Weavers!” she cried. “Whoever they are.”

  “We’d better make it fast,” Coll interrupted, his voice somber. He’d plucked the Map from Marrill’s fingers and pointed, holding it out for all of them to see.

  Just on the edge of the expanding hole torn through the middle of the Map, just on the brink of the Lost Sun’s growing devastation, sat a little round dot. Next to it, in letters already crinkling, were the words SHELL SHOALS OF ONEIRA.

  CHAPTER 12

  Dream Shells

  While Remy set a course for the Shell Shoals of Oneira and Marrill took her cat downstairs to find him some treats, Fin pulled Fig aside. Finally he had a chance to confront her without anyone noticing.

  “You’re the reason the Rise found us at Margaham’s Game,” he said bluntly, crossing his arms. “You spied on us.”

  She lifted her chin, holding her ground. “I told you I’d help you find your mom.”

  Fin’s eyes narrowed. “You wanted to help the Rise steal the orb.”

  She glanced away and shrugged. “If I’d wanted to steal the orb, I would have.”

  “That’s exactly what I’d say if I was trying to steal the orb.” He shook his head. “You know I can’t trust you.”

  She winced. “I know.”

  That she accepted it so easily surprised Fin. He’d expected her to deny it. To try to convince him to give her another chance.

  “I’m guessing you came back to the Kraken to finish your mission?”

  She shifted, clearly uncomfortable. “That’s not the whole reason.”

  He lifted an eyebrow.

  She sighed. “I stayed behind to protect you, by order of Vell and the Crest.”

  He burst out laughing. “Protect me?” The excuse was so absurd he couldn’t believe she thought he’d buy it. “Why would they care if anything happened to me?”

  She looked at him, frowning. “You really don’t know how this works, do you?” He remained silent, waiting for her to explain. She blew out a breath. “The Rise and the Fade are… connected.”

  “I picked up on that.”

  “No, I mean…” She seemed to struggle for words. “We are their literal weakness. We’re the reason they’re unbeatable. Because they have no weakness so long as we exist separately.”

  Fin struggled to understand. “So if something happens to me…”

  “If you die, Vell becomes vulnerable,” she told him. “All that weakness goes back into him. He can then be beaten, or even killed.”

  “Oh.”

  Suddenly, the emotions Fin had been pushing away since learning about Vell and his mother, all the pain he’d bitten down since he first learned he was no one, rushed in at once. His deepest fear was true. He really was no one. He was just a vessel for someone else’s weakness.

  He dropped his chin to his chest, trying to swallow back the emptiness that threatened to overwhelm him. “You’re here to make sure nothing happens to me so Vell stays safe.”

  When Fig said nothing, he took that as confirmation. But then she sighed and leaned against the railing beside him. He could just barely feel her arm brushing against his. “What’s it like to have a friend?”

  He blinked, surprised by the question. “Why do you ask?”

  She lifted a shoulder. “I’ve just never really had one before.”

  Fin almost choked. “You have an entire army of friends,” he pointed out. “You know, the ones that boarded the Kraken with you? And then came after us at Margaham’s Game?”

  “Just because they can remember me doesn’t mean they’re my friends.”

  “What about your Rise?”

  She let out a soft chuckle. “Think you could ever be friends with Vell?”

  Fin barked out a laugh. “Point taken.” He then turned, facing her. “One thing to know about friends: They look out for each other. And that’s what I plan to do with my friends on the Kraken. Even if that means protecting them from you.”

  She nodded. “I can’t stop the Rise,” she told him. “They won’t stop chasing you. It’s not just about the orb anymore, Fin. It’s about you and Vell. And what the Rise want, they will take.”

  Two days later, just when Fin thought they’d taken a wrong turn, just when he thought there was nothing to see, he blinked, and the Shell Shoals of Oneira appeared before him as if they’d been there from the moment of his birth and ever after.

  The shoals spread out before them in a low tumble of coral. In places, it rose up to damp plateaus that defied the water; in others it struggled with each wave, and Fin could scarcely tell where land ended and seafloor began.

  The Kraken slid through a channel that seemed carved just for them, then ground to a halt. Marrill joined Fin as they surveyed their destination. The coral swept around them in the semicircle of an atoll; it reminded Fin a little too much of standing on one of the rings of Margaham’s Game, and he shuddered. But that was the end of the comparison; the water in the central lagoon was blue and clear; the coral itself was a maze of sharp and smooth, high and low, rough and pitted.

  Tide pools collected all across the pocked surface of the atoll, and from the Kraken’s height Fin could see straight down into many of them. In the shallowest, miniature mermen raced iridescent minnows. In the deepest, spiny sea bishops held court in drip-sand cathedrals while spider-limbed lobsters tended their seaweed gardens nearby. A tiny boat bobbed unmanned in one; beneath it, a lumpy inside-out fish played dominoes with a sleek griffin-ray.

  The afternoon sun felt warm on his skin; the salt breeze gentle and inviting. Fin glanced toward the wall of black emptiness, chewing its way toward them along the horizon. This was just the edge of the void, expanding outward from the trail of the Lost Sun as he walked on toward Meres. Fin could only imagine what would happen when the Lost Sun reached his destination.

  Fin shook the thought from his head and forced himself to remember that the end of the world might be creeping closer, but it hadn’t made it here just yet. He should enjoy the place while he still could.

  The bang of the Kraken’s gangplank shook him out of his reverie. “Shall we?” Ardent asked, motioning to the ship at large.

  “I’m in!” Remy shouted, racing across the deck to join them. “I totally deserve a beach vacation.” She winked at Fin and Marrill. “Coll can watch the ship to make sure we don’t get swallowed up by the end of the universe while we’re sunbathing.”

  “Hold on there a moment, sailor,” Coll said, crooking a finger in the collar of her shirt and yanking her back. “Captains stay with their ships.”

  “That’s why you’re staying behind,” she pointed out.

  A smile played around Coll’s lips. “And why you’re staying with me.”

  “But the Dream Garden…” Remy protested.

  “Funny you should mention Tanea Hollow-Blood’s Dream Garden,” Ardent said, brightening. “While the main entrance is far, far away at Tanea’s house, it actually connects straight to the Shell Shoals. Tanea was quite adept at pushing the bounds of Stream travel. It was she who first hypothesized the transmotary vortex, if you can believe it!”

&nb
sp; “I cannot,” Remy said flatly. “Perhaps it’s better I stay with the ship after all,” she mumbled, dragging her feet as she joined Coll on the quarterdeck. “At least that way we can leave the engines idling and be ready to take off at a moment’s notice.”

  “Engines?” Coll asked, forehead creased in confusion.

  Remy sighed, and Fin stifled a smile, but it faltered when he caught sight of Fig sneaking her way to the gangplank. “You too, ensign,” he said, catching hold of her sleeve. “You’re also staying with the ship.”

  “But I’m supposed to be looking out for you,” she protested.

  He nodded toward Ardent. “That’s what the wizard’s for.”

  She lifted an eyebrow. “You’d trust me more on board than with you?”

  “Yes,” he answered without hesitation. He didn’t want to spend his entire time ashore looking over his shoulder for her. Besides, even if she wanted, there was no way she was getting that orb. Fin had spent quite a bit of time trying to poke holes in Ardent’s security, and it was impossible. He was quite confident that if the Master Thief of the Khaznot Quay couldn’t nick the wish orb, neither could Fig.

  Her face fell. “That Dream Garden did seem pretty cool,” she complained.

  “Fin, let’s go!” Marrill called, waving for him to join her.

  He patted Fig’s shoulder. “I’ll make sure to tell you all about it.”

  He jogged across the ship toward Marrill. “Ready to save the world again?” he asked, waggling his eyebrows.

  She giggled and looped an arm through his. “As always!” And together they galloped down the gangplank and jumped to the ground beside Ardent. As soon as his feet touched the coral, Fin had to reel backward to avoid crashing into a man who he would have sworn hadn’t been standing there a second ago.

  “Slow your journey, little fella,” the man said. Fin took a second look at him; the man wasn’t human, definitely. He was slouched over a little too far, his face a bit too much like a snout. His skin was wrinkled, and at the same time a touch too smooth. “Welcome, strangers,” he said. “Name’s Yurl. I keep the Library of Dreams.”

  Fin looked around. “What library?”

  “Oh,” Yurl said. “You hadn’t seen it yet. Sorry ’bout that.” He jerked one long thumb back at the empty lagoon behind him.

  Fin looked, knowing full well nothing was there but water. So he was more than a little surprised to find the gigantic tower of coral reaching up from the heart of the lagoon like a massive, branching tree. Overhead, seabirds wheeled in an ever-circling flock. Fin was sure he hadn’t heard their cries just a moment ago, but now they filled the air.

  “Is it just me or does stuff keep coming out of nowhere?” Marrill whispered.

  Yurl answered before Fin could. “Yeah, stuff keeps coming out of nowhere. It’s the kind of thing that happens here. It’s kind of like this place is a dream place, or something like that?” He shrugged. “I never really followed the reasoning, but hey, I’m just a figment of your collective imaginations.”

  “Wait, you’re not real?” Marrill asked.

  Yurl giggled. It was oddly high pitched. “Uh, no. Just a projection of the Shell Weavers, like most of this place. Man, you guys really are new.”

  Fin studied Yurl, the man who wasn’t there. He seemed real. He seemed like a person. Did he have thoughts and feelings, like Fin did? Or was he all hollow on the inside, just an illusion set up so well that they couldn’t tell there was nothing behind those golden gray eyes?

  “It’s okay, Yurl,” Fin said at last. “I’m not real, either.” A part of him braced to feel those words tug at his insides. After all, the biggest fear in his life was that he was nobody, and now here he was, stating it as a fact. But oddly, it didn’t bother him. Somehow, acknowledging the truth he’d feared for so long just wasn’t as bad as being afraid of it had been.

  “Right on,” Yurl said. He reached over and gave Fin a very real-feeling high five. “Welcome, figment brother. Reality is stupid. You and I know.”

  Fin blushed despite himself. It seemed so weird, to be okay with being nobody.

  Yurl turned to the others. “So, you realies,” he said with a wink at Fin. “Come to make a donation, or just looking for a dream that suits ya?”

  Ardent stepped forward. “We’re here searching for the last bolt of dream ribbon, given to the Shell Weavers by the Dawn Wizard in the days of yore, so that we may repair the Map to Everywhere and save the Pirate Stream from the growing void created by the Lost Sun of Dzannin before he reaches the Font of Meres and undoes all of creation!”

  Yurl stared at him for a second. “All right. So… I’ll just mark you down for a browse, then.” He waved his hand toward the base of the great coral spire behind him. Fin noticed the holes in its pocked surface seemed just big enough for people to fit in comfortably. “How ’bout I put you guys up in shell number three and let you work all that out amongst yourselves. Sound good?”

  Yurl escorted them across the beach to the base of the coral tree, giving a well-rehearsed speech as they went. “Thank you for visiting the Library of Dreams, folks. The Library is one of the Pirate Stream’s greatest institutions. For millennia, the Shell Weavers have collected dreams from all over the Stream—and some say, even beyond. You never know what you’ll find in a dream.”

  As they drew near, Fin could see inside the pores on the surface of the coral tree. Each one, he realized, was its own little shell, all stuck together to form the larger whole. All of them were white, though some shone bright like ivory and others were dull as horn.

  “Here you go,” Yurl said as they reached the base of the coral tree. One of the shells opened up before them, revealing an entrance to its own little pod. “The chambers are a bit tight here, but I think you can squeeze in. Hope you don’t mind.”

  “Oh no, that makes sense, certainly,” Ardent said, shuffling past Yurl into the nearest chamber, which was dull and yellowish like horn. Marrill gave Fin a worried look, but followed the wizard in. Fin shrugged and jammed himself in next to her. They wriggled around to fit in the space. Though it was tight, Fin was surprised to find that the inside of the shell was actually quite comfortable.

  “So, how does this work?” Marrill asked once they were settled.

  Yurl smiled a friendly smile. “Once the dreamer’s all good and snuggled up, the shell closes and you doze off before you know it. From that moment on, the Shell Weavers’ whole collection is open to you. And of course, if you want to have your own dream, a Weaver will come straight to you and gather it up to add to the Library.”

  “Spiff,” Fin yawned. “When do we start?”

  Yurl stepped back. As he did, his body seemed to fade away. The opening where he was standing was now closed, a ribbed wall of ivory shell sealing them in. Yurl’s voice trailed away, until it was nothing more than an echo.

  “You already did.…”

  CHAPTER 13

  Weaving Darkness

  Marrill loved the taste of it, but all the fudge made it terribly difficult to do a good backstroke. “You know, Mr. Penguin,” she said, “we’ve got a lot of eating to do if we’re ever going to clear up this hallway.”

  “Quite so,” Mr. Penguin ballyhooed. “Quite so!”

  And all of this made perfect sense to her, in the way that dreams did.

  Marrill closed her eyes, licking at her chocolaty lips. It was awfully easy to get distracted and forget she was actually here to find something. Something very important. She rolled her mind. Ardent. Right. She needed to find Ardent.

  “I need to find Ardent,” she said out loud.

  Mr. Penguin harrumphed in his way, sending out a geyser of bubbles from his pipe. “Let me see… Ardent… mmm, yes… magical sort of chap, that one?”

  Marrill kicked herself upright, treading fudge excitedly. “That’s the one!”

  Mr. Penguin rocked himself off his easy chair, slopping through the chocolate sauce over to a window that was really a painting. He pulled it o
ff the wall and turned it toward Marrill. It was an odd picture, even by dream standards: a little sea anemone, with monocle and top hat balanced on its tendrils, standing before a long, papery tunnel. “Try this one,” Mr. Penguin ruminated. “It’s one the gentleman you seek deposited previously, if I’m not mistaken.”

  Marrill breaststroked her way to him. “Thanks,” she said, savoring the last bit of chocolate on her tongue. She stared at the painting, unsure what to do with it. As she did, the anemone spread out its tentacles in a broad, radiant fan of color. The paper hallway behind him stretched forward in three dimensions…

  …and she was standing on the balcony of a high tower, out above a mushroom forest. Great gothic arches loomed against snowcapped mountains overhead, and a gentle breeze tousled her hair.

  She turned at the sound of glasses tinkling. There, at a table on the balcony, sat Ardent. Before him were stacks of bizarre delights: glasses full of mist, bowls of candy that glittered like diamonds, a braised shank of something that had claws. To one side, a cow with human hands played a soft melody on a harp. And at the other end of the table, dressed elegantly in a jade-colored gown, sat the wizard Annalessa.

  Marrill squealed with delight, leaping to give Annalessa a huge hug. “You found her!” she cried to Ardent. “She’s here!”

  Annalessa’s laughter was the tinkling of bells—literally. “Oh, Ardent. Did you not tell her you were coming to see me?” She looked down at Marrill. Annalessa’s eyes flashed with mirth. “I’m just a dream, dear. Left here long ago by that old man.” She cocked her head to the wizard.

  Ardent blushed. He held up his hands guiltily. “I’m sorry for sneaking away from you, Marrill. It would only have been for a moment, and you did seem quite enraptured by that erudite penguin and his fondue problem.”

  Marrill shrugged. She really had enjoyed swimming in chocolate. “So, what is this place?” she asked.