Severed Veil - Tales of Death and Dreams

by Bethany A Jennings

  Soul travelers would glint golden like dust motes on the Aetherworld’s canvas. I see none. My hopes sink. Please, my love. I risked my life and left everything for you, I plead. Don’t abandon me now. In the dreams, Nyam promised to come to me in the Aether and lead me to the border, to freedom.

  What if the dreams weren’t real at all? What if it was just my heart, longing for the lover my master sold to another trader three years ago?

  Gossamer wings unfurl from my back, lifting me. I smile, and suddenly the Aetherworld feels warmer for it. At the very least, I will be free. Then I will be able to harness these powers and take them into the real world too. Until I cross the border, my master’s spells hold me back from full command of the Aether.

  A figure appears over the hill. My heart leaps—and then chills. This isn’t another soul traveler. It’s a striding, breathing man, coming over the knoll above where my body sleeps. He is no elf, no Aether warrior.

  Panic stabs through me. Until the elixir wears off, I’m helpless in the physical realm. My limp body is hidden well enough in the grass to escape the eye of a casual traveler, but if he is a slave hunter…

  Light catches on a hunter’s medallion pinned to his upper arm, and the Aetherworld crusts over with the ice of my terror. No.

  He stands at the crest of the hill, scanning the landscape with a hand on his knife. Then he plows his way down the slope, into the vale. Perhaps if I remain in the Aetherworld long enough, he’ll just pass me by…

  I’d be almost as helpless with soul and body united. What could I do against a hunter?

  My arms and legs tingle. The otherness that separates soul and body is tangibly dissolving. In a moment I’ll melt back into oneness. I thrash in the Aether, desperately hoping against hope that with no training, no assistance, despite the limiting slave spells, I might take my gifts through the crossing. With wings I could escape him! On those tired feet, I am doomed.

  He’s within yards of my still body now.

  I frantically cling to the wings in my mind, willing them to stay on my body.

  But then I sift through the gap again like sand, soul trickling back to reunion with my body. The wings dissolve. I moan in despair—and my heart leaps in terror.

  The sound left my physical lips too.

  The hunter bears down on me before I can rise.

  “Please!” I scramble backward in the grass. “I’m just a traveler—just a—!”

  His powerful hand pinches around my arm. “You lie, elf.” He speaks the name of my enslaved race with contempt, and painfully flicks my pointed ear for emphasis. “Playing in the Aetherworld, are you?” He tears the vial from my hand.

  “No!”

  “Does your master know you stole his elixir too?” Like a wave too powerful to resist, the hunter drags me toward the road.

  My legs burn to bear my weight, but I’m drowning in a sea of sorrow broader than the expanse of the Aether, and I barely feel the pain. Master will bury me in spells so deep that Nyam will never find me again, even in dreams.

  A shadow darkens the ground ahead.

  The hunter shouts in surprise. My gaze whips toward the hilltop.

  Nyam descends on the hunter with a shout, hair flying, blades of Aether magic flashing like sunlight in his hands.

  The hunter shoves me aside, and I slam into the grass with a gasp. Above my head, he unsheathes a glinting blade, ready to strike down Nyam as he comes—

  But I hook my foot around the hunter’s booted ankle, and yank. He stumbles sideways. His blade falters.

  And Nyam embeds a sun-bright sword through the man’s chest.

  The hunter crumples to the earth. Nyam releases the swords from his hands, and they vanish like sparks into the air.

  I gape.

  I’d almost forgotten what he looks like outside the shadows of the Aether. Dark hair curling to his strong shoulders. Bronze skin a shade darker than mine. Dark eyes with that lively spark in their depths. And gentle, calloused hands, now both held out to me.

  I take his hands—and leap up to kiss his perfect mouth as his warm arms warp around me.

  When I finally step back from our embrace, I tilt my head up to look at his face. “I thought you said only souls could travel in the Aether!” I exclaim, still holding his hands tight. “How did you get here?”

  Nyam grins. “Come!” He leads me toward the top of the hill, and my legs carry me, sore but filled with the new strength of hope. “I couldn’t leave you to travel on your own,” he says. “So I came on foot.”

  A shiver runs through me. “If the hunters catch you again—”

  “They won’t. And if they do...we’ll be ready.” His eyes glint at me. “I can start teaching you to use your powers now. With your hand in mine, you don’t need potions. You don’t need dreams.”

  I blink, and my mouth falls open. The Aetherworld suddenly stretches out before us, even as we run. Its folds shimmer iridescent, filled with a relief and happiness I have never seen there before.

  Nyam and I are together. And freedom is waiting.

  Joy floods my veins. My feet fly lightly across the grass as, for the very first time, my delicate dragonfly wings unfold in the warmth of the sun.

  HOPEBRINGER

  I am Hopebringer.

  Ray of sunlight cutting through a dark place.

  Golden, set up on a stand.

  Reflective.

  They see what they want in me.

  And I was happy

  to step into this role,

  to meet expectations,

  a symbol of life,

  of hope,

  of deliverance.

  I doubted,

  but something inside me

  was so confident,

  so certain,

  that I was Hopebringer,

  that I had that capacity, that essence inside of me—

  but now I’m not so sure.

  Because the more they trust,

  the more they hope,

  the higher I rise,

  the greater the stakes—

  the darker I become.

  Optimism rusting over,

  turning to ash.

  I’m a golden veneer,

  I’m a deceiver,

  A false savior.

  I am lost.

  And if I could find the words,

  I would tell them:

  Please,

  no,

  it isn’t me—

  You want Another,

  One so strong,

  so capable,

  so unbreakable,

  not this shell of a man

  breaking under the weight of the chains that some consider glory.

  I can’t bear it.

  Too heavy.

  I can save no one.

  I am scarred, flawed, shattered.

  But here I am.

  Here I stand, in the flesh.

  Alone, save in Spirit—

  that Spirit inside me.

  If I am His hands and His feet,

  then what does that make me?

  Where does that leave me?

  Is this what it means,

  to be a broken vessel?

  DREAMSKIP

  To those who feel unheard, and those who dream of courage

  I sense Harriet entering my dream before I see her.

  Suddenly everything is too loud, too sharp, looming around me. Broken glass scrapes under my shoes, and when I glance down, streaks of blood blossom across my arms and hands. The busy theme park in my dreamscape dissolves away—now I stagger half-naked down an empty hallway that’s closing in on me like a trap.

  Fear squeezes its fist around my heart. This is the part where I want to wake up.

  I have to make myself stay long enough to talk to her.

  I turn to all sides, hunting for my schoolmate. Dreading how she might manifest this time. “Harriet?”

  “Milo.”

  And there she is in front of me, her shoulders crooked, her hair a mess
of dark chaos, her nightgown drenched in red. Scrapes and bruises mottle her pale face.

  This is even worse than last night.

  Through the veil of sleep, I’m vaguely aware of my teeth clenching, my heart racing, my sweat dampening my sheets. I’m on the verge of waking. I have to talk fast. “Harriet, you’re dreamskipping wrong again.”

  Tears stream over her bruised cheekbones. “Don’t leave!” She trembles, blood dripping from her hair. “You’re the only one who can save me.”

  I shake my head, trying to appear firm and brave, even though all I want is to run away to reality. “You can’t bring your dream into my dreams like this. That’s not how skipping is supposed to work. You’re projecting your fears and giving me nightmares.”

  “It’s not a projection. I need you.”

  “If you’re scared, then wake yourself up!”

  She whispers back, her blue eyes wide. “Waking up is worse.”

  My fear sparks into irritation. “What is going on? I wish we could just talk this out during the day.” I haven’t spent much time around the kids in the special ed class, so I don’t know why, but Harriet is mostly nonverbal in real life, among other things. Discussing this in person is probably impossible.

  Harriet sucks in a deep breath. Holds it. Lets it out slowly. “Milo, if you do not intervene, I am going to die.”

  “You keep saying this, but you haven’t told me how I’m supposed to ‘intervene,’ or when, or where!” I cry.

  Harriet opens her blood-stained mouth—

  The jarring blare of my alarm clock hits like a hammer across my brains. I awake with a gasp, drenched in sweat, squinting from the bright beams coming through my window.

  Crap. There’s no getting that dream back. I rip aside the bed sheets and stalk toward the bathroom, grabbing my jeans off the nightstand.

  It took me awhile to realize that Harriet was a fellow skipper. When she first started visiting my dreams, she always brought such a painful and warped perspective of the world with her. I thought I had effectively taught her how to control her skips—how to slip alone, seamlessly, into other sleepers’ minds, without dragging her entire subconscious into it. For any skipper, that’s a challenge. I thought I’d helped her master it.

  But here she is again, painting my dreams into worse and worse nightmares, leaving me shaken.

  I lean on the bathroom counter and sigh at my disheveled reflection. Things can’t go on like this anymore. I have to try to communicate with her in real life. Somehow.

  * * * * *

  I stride into school with forced determination.

  Jamin sees me slam my locker shut, and looks at me with one eyebrow quirked up. “What’s with you this morning?”

  My willpower shrinks a bit at the prospect of what I have to do. “Has anyone seen Harriet Linnow?”

  “Who?”

  I sigh. Nobody even recognizes her without the cruel nickname the other kids inflicted on her for her wild hair and unpredictable moods. “Scary Harry?”

  “I dunno, man.” His frown deepens across his dark forehead. “My girlfriend helps with the special needs group, and she mentioned Harry didn’t get dropped off this morning like usual. Why are you looking for her?”

  My stomach tightens. It’s hard to imagine discussing this with Harriet herself—who by day barely acknowledges anyone else’s existence—about how she’s shown up in my dreams all weekend, bloody and broken, begging for me to save her. Surely, surely she knows what she’s up to in her sleep. I remember all my skips! But she can barely form words. Even if I talk to her, how will I know if we really understand each other?

  Whatever’s going on...it seems serious. And she’s not here.

  I let out a breath from low in my gut. What if those bleeding wounds and disheveled clothes aren’t a subconscious fear or a cry for attention? What if she’s getting brutally injured, in real life, right now?

  I know where she lives.

  Urgency floods my chest, and I look Jamin firmly in the eye. “Tell the teacher I had an emergency and had to go.” I spin on the toe of my sneakers and sprint for the door.

  His bewildered voice echoes down the hall after me. “Milo?”

  I shove aside the school door and pelt down the steps.

  For five long blocks of sidewalk, my shoes madly slap the pavement. My mind reels with fears and possibilities, my throat burning from exertion, cold wind stinging my face.

  Anything could be happening to Harriet. I could be running headfirst into anything.

  And this isn’t a dream.

  I’ve skipped into the dreams of black belts—trained from them without their waking knowledge. I’ve visited the dreams of psychologists—sat quietly and listened to their lengthy rants. I’ve challenged a bully—in dreams, taught him a lesson he won’t forget. But out here, out in life, I’m still a weakling.

  Out of shape. Out of breath.

  Out of time to think.

  I scramble to a stop in front of the Linnows’ barred front door. The glass is cracked, the screen door behind it ripped. All the curtains are drawn. Something feels wrong about the whole place.

  Anxiety creeps down my spine, and I divert to the cinderblock wall alongside the house, where I quietly lift the latch of the gate and slip into the side yard, hoping no neighbor will call the cops on me. Once inside, I drop and crawl along the patio to the backyard, where I tuck myself between an unkempt potted shrub and a back window. Ever so slowly, I rise up until my eyes peek above the windowsill.

  Dark red smears stain the wall across from me. Broken lamps. Pictures ripped down from the walls. Is this Harriet’s room?

  My throat constricts. I cast my gaze across the bed.

  Empty.

  I fiddle with my phone in my pocket. Should I call the cops? On what grounds? This girl keeps appearing in my dreams, sir, and telling me she’s in danger. Oh, and we haven’t really talked about it in real life because she can’t talk.

  I look back to the stains of red in the room. It looks like someone’s head has been bashed repeatedly against the drywall. I swallow. Who am I to be snooping around, spying, making these assumptions?

  She’s trusting me. She’s relying on me.

  Why me?

  Because she can only communicate in her dreams. And I’m the only one who knows—sometimes the people in your dreams really see you, really hear you. Even if nobody else can.

  Okay. Here I am, Harriet. I take a deep breath. Where are you?

  Glass shatters somewhere at the other end of the house. The hair on the back of my neck stands on end. I hold my breath.

  Then distant wailing. Pleading. A male voice growling back.

  I creep out of the bush, dial nine-one-one, and shove the phone back in my pocket on mute. Every muscle in me is clenched in fear.

  I try the rusty back doorknob. Unlocked.

  Buzzing with nervous energy, I ease open the door and step into a hallway. Drops of blood stain the beige carpet. Harriet’s?

  My throat tightens, but I keep moving. The sound of weeping grows louder with every step—and then the tinkle of broken glass scraping on kitchen tiles.

  “Shut it, you,” the male voice mutters. Vicious. Threatening.

  If only I had a weapon.

  I ball my hands into fists. The words of the martial arts teacher come rushing back. Tuck your thumb beneath your fingers, not wrapped inside them, or it’ll get broken. Angle your hand down, so when you punch you’re hitting with your first two knuckles.

  I reach the kitchen doorway.

  Harriet stands at the kitchen sink in nothing but a long pajama shirt, bleeding welts smeared down her bare, spindly legs, and massive knots in her hair. She moves in short, jerky motions like a zombie, like every step hurts, as she sweeps broken glass into a heap.

  I turn my gaze toward the man in the corner. Middle-aged, muscular, unshaven. He sits in an untied bathrobe, hunched over a bowl of cereal. A belt rests beside his dishes, like a man in an old western might
keep a revolver handy.

  Bile coats my throat.

  The man’s gaze leaps to me as I enter. “Oh—shit! Who are you? How did you get in here?” He jumps to his feet, snatching a knife from the nearby counter.

  Harriet startles and turns. Her distant eyes are like circles of blue ice in a face ringed with dark tangles. In waking life she’s never looked me in the eye before.

  The man seizes her by the hair. The broom clatters on the linoleum as she buckles under his hand, whimpering and clutching at her head.

  He sneers. “Come any closer and I’ll cut her!”

  I thought nothing would come out of me but a raspy, terrified breath. That there was nothing inside me but fear. But rage drives me—boils my soul to flames until the words come out with a roar. “If you don’t let her go, I will pound you into the wall!”

  In a millisecond he sizes me up—

  And I lunge.

  The next thing I know, I’m standing over his still body, my head light as air, my hands shaking and burning with pain. I stagger back and clock my head on the edge of the table as I collapse.

  Slowly, like a distant siren coming closer, Harriet’s wails reach my addled thoughts.

  Or is that a real siren?

  I lift my head, woozy.

  From the other side of the kitchen, Harriet looks up. She’s sprawled, quivering, still clutching her head among the shards of glass. Her ice-blue eyes fix on my face. Then on my arms.

  I look down and see blood.

  So much blood.

  Oh. Oh, God help me. I collapse on my back under the table. Help me, help me... Deep breaths, deep breaths.

  I can’t.

  I can’t.

  Darkness descends like a blanket thrown over my consciousness.

  * * * * *

  Harriet, did I die for you?

  It was worth it. You were worth it. None of this dreamskipping matters if I can’t use it for something good, like saving a life—

  “You didn’t die.”

  My muddled dream solidifies into a vision of a garden I remember from my childhood, and Harriet approaches through an arbor, wrapped in a blanket over a hospital gown.