Dreamlander

by K.M. Weiland

  Chapter Eleven

  Chris blinked his eyes open, expecting to still see Orias’s face. But the Cherazim was gone. As a matter of fact, so was the entire forest. It had worked. He was awake again. But he wasn’t anywhere he recognized.

  Instead of trees, he stared at soaring oak rafters. He blinked, trying to orient himself.

  Two things were clear. One of those things was that he could no longer taste the bittersweet wrak steam. The other was that the back of his head felt like someone had clubbed him. Which, come to think of it, someone had.

  Gingerly, he turned his head. Sunlight from a wall of picture windows speared his vision, and he squinted. He was lying on a leather couch, his feet propped up on a maroon throw pillow. Across the room, the windows offered a view of a white-capped lake that went on and on. Directly in front of him, a marble fireplace took up at least twelve square feet of wall, crowned by an oil painting of a mountain sunset. Wherever he was, it was swank.

  He raised his head and immediately wished he hadn’t. Pain thudded at the base of his neck, and black spots smoked up his vision. He lowered his head again and eased a breath past his clenched teeth. Just at this moment, his dream almost seemed preferable. At least whoever had clunked him in the head hadn’t also kidnapped him. He wasn’t tied up, and this didn’t exactly look like a South Side cellar.

  He swung his legs to the ground and eased himself upright. The whole room swirled, so he let himself hold his head between his hands until the worst of the pounding subsided. That’s when he realized his hand was buzzing. In his palm, the Orimere glimmered.

  He jumped and dropped it. The fist-sized stone clattered onto the wood floor. In the broad daylight, it was just a milky rock, streaked occasionally with a flicker of lightning. But where had it come from? It couldn’t have just materialized.

  Scattered all around the floor were the strange clothes he had been wearing in the dream—as well as everything else he had been touching when he’d fallen asleep. His heart pounded. Nausea from the concussion swirled in his head, and he forced himself to breathe slowly.

  He looked down at himself. He was wearing the T-shirt and cargo pants he had put on back at Mike’s this morning. Maybe he hadn’t been asleep after all. Maybe he’d been wandering around Chicago in some kind of daze, wearing those crazy clothes and hallucinating the whole bit with Orias and Rotoss.

  Across the room, a door clicked open. He snapped his head back up and shoved the Orimere and all the clothing under the couch. He had zero desire to try to explain any of that stuff right now.

  Three men entered. One was a stocky, gray-haired man wearing a rumpled tie and a CPD badge on his belt.

  The second was tall, blond, with angular features and an iron gaze. Judging by the buzz haircut and the bulge under his suit coat, he was hired muscle.

  The third man was the first to speak, his voice deep and full. “You’ve awoken.” He looked in his mid-forties, his brown hair and close-trimmed beard shot through with gold. Broad shoulders stretched the pin-striped navy of his expensive blazer and led into an equally powerful chest.

  He crossed the room, smiling without showing teeth, and held out his hand. “Mr. Redston, I believe? You’ve had a rough day of it.” He had the grip of someone who worked out on a regular basis. The serene slant of his mouth said he was accustomed to viewing life on his own terms, or not at all.

  Chris forced himself to sit upright, ready to stand and scram if he needed to. “How’d I get here?”

  “Apparently, you were the victim of some random violence in Mr. Garnett’s neighborhood.”

  “You’re a detective?”

  “No.” The man rumbled a laugh. “This is the detective.” He gestured back to the rumpled-tie guy. “Detective Dean.”

  The man shuffled forward. “I’m just here to get your statement. You know who hit you?”

  He thought back. His memories of the shooting were clear, right up until he’d been smacked in the head and sent hurtling into his dreams. But he hadn’t caught so much as a glimpse of his attacker.

  He shook his head. “No, I didn’t see him.”

  Dean scowled. “So you got nothing for me, is that what you’re saying?”

  “I’ll let you know if I remember.” He felt his pockets. “Was I robbed? What happened to me? How long have I been out?”

  Dean scribbled a few notes in his little pad. “No, you weren’t robbed. And if you can’t tell me, then I have no idea what happened to you, although our best guess is the original shooters were maybe trying to take out their only witness. Even though you didn’t see hardly nothing.” He paused his scribbling to glare at Chris. “And you’ve been out for a long time. Say about six hours.”

  “Six hours? Where am I?”

  The bearded guy smiled. “This is my home. The police allowed me to take care of you. I thought it might be best if you had personal supervision. Also, I thought you might like to talk about your experience after you woke up.”

  Chris frowned. “You’re a doctor?”

  The detective harrumphed in the back of his throat but didn’t look up from his notepad.

  “Not the kind you’re thinking.” The man pocketed his hands. “I’m a psychologist. Mr. Garnett’s personal therapist, as a matter of fact. Hence, my presence at the scene.”

  “I was out cold for six hours after a blow to the head, and you didn’t think I belonged in the hospital?”

  The man’s smile widened. “Not to worry, Mr. Redston. You were in good hands. As a matter of fact, I’m quite familiar with your condition.”

  Chris cast a sideways glance down at the bottom of the couch, just to make certain the Orimere wasn’t showing. “What condition?”

  Dean stuffed his notebook and pencil into his coat pocket. “If you think of something that’s actually useful to this case, you give me a call. And if you want to go to a hospital, go to a hospital.” He waved a hand at the doctor. “I’ll show myself out, Dr. Mactalde.”

  Chris froze. This was Mactalde? Mactalde was the shrink? Whatever he’d been expecting, it hadn’t been a professional in a power suit.

  The doctor chuckled at Chris’s expression before turning to the detective. “Thank you, Detective. Flores, show him out.” He gestured to someone behind Chris, and a short dark-skinned man with a shoulder-length shag haircut follow the detective to the door. Chris hadn’t even realized he was in the room.

  Mactalde turned back to Chris. “So now that we know each other, allow me to introduce Geoff Kaufman, who works for me,” he indicated the blond bodyguard, “and who will now go find you a glass of water and some ibuprofen, which I’m sure you’re in desperate need of.”

  Kaufman left without comment and closed the door.

  Chris’s heart started its pounding again, which only ratcheted up the pain in his head even more. He eased out a breath. What were the odds of this guy showing up for the first time right after Chris dreamed he was supposed to go looking for him? He closed his eyes and tried to separate reality from the memory of the dream. But his chat with Rotoss and Orias was still just as vivid as the words he had exchanged with the detective.

  Where could he start with Mactalde? What question could he safely ask without immediately looking like the Kook of the Year?

  He opened his eyes. “So if you’re Harrison’s therapist, then he was crazy?”

  Mactalde laughed. He backed up to the matching couch across from Chris and sank down on the middle cushion. “It’s true Mr. Garnett harbored more than his share of delusions. And, as a result, had his share of enemies. I understand you witnessed his unfortunate shooting.” His mouth compressed. “Seeing that kind of thing can shake even the best of us, and to be honest, you do look a bit shaken, Mr. Redston. Would you like to tell me about it?”

  Stay away from the shrink.

  Harrison’s scribbled message blinked in his mind. Harrison hadn’t mentioned anything about Mactalde being his therapist. He’d seemed to think the man had it out for him.
r />   “What did you treat Harrison for?”

  “That’s confidential, I’m afraid. However, I can tell you Mr. Garnett happened to mention you the other day. He said you were experiencing some of the same mental problems as he used to.”

  “And what are those?” Here it came. Schizophrenia, delusional paranoia, psychoses galore. They all seemed like prime candidates if Harrison’s problems were anything like his.

  Mactalde unbuttoned his coat and spread his arms over the couch’s back. His starched shirt pulled tight against his muscled chest. “I think it would be better if you told me. You’ve been experiencing something strange lately? A delusion of some sort?” He raised his eyebrows, waiting.

  When Chris didn’t bite, he continued. “You look to me like a man who doesn’t sleep well. And I know the look when I see it. Do you have nightmares?”

  Chris hesitated. But he had to tell Mactalde sooner or later. Only a few minutes ago, he’d agreed to “bring” Mactalde into his dreams. Now, sitting across from him, looking out onto what had to be Lake Michigan, the whole idea sounded about five miles beyond absurd. More like downright terrifying that any part of his brain had even considered it. Did they still lock people up in padded cells? If they did, he was about to turn into a prime candidate.

  “Yeah, I have nightmares. They feel like—” He forced the words out. “Like they’re real. And I almost find myself believing them.” He couldn’t quite squeeze a laugh past his dry throat. “In my dreams, they tell me I’m living two different existences. Is that what Harrison told you?”

  “More or less.”

  A knock sounded on the door, and Mactalde rose to let Kaufman in. The man deposited a glass of water and two pills on the end table beside Chris. Then, at a nod from Mactalde, he left.

  Mactalde drifted back across the room. He drew a deep breath, as if considering his words. “Are you aware that before the twentieth century, people believed our minds completely turned off while sleeping? Common logic leads us to believe that, at the very least, our brain waves should decrease during sleep.”

  Chris downed the painkillers and clinked the glass back onto its coaster. “Makes sense.”

  Mactalde stopped behind the opposite couch and leaned forward, both hands planted on the back of the seat. “Then perhaps you’ll be surprised to learn the exact opposite is true. As we sleep, our brain waves rapidly increase until they’re identical to the ones we exhibit when we’re wide awake. That’s a scientific fact.”

  Chris’s neck prickled. “What’s that have to do with my dreams?”

  “For all but a select few, dreams will never be anything more than a harmless, random conglomeration of ideas, thoughts, and feelings.”

  “And for the select few?”

  Mactalde’s smile deepened. “For them, dreams are everything. Their delusions become so strong, they believe, as you say, they’re living two existences. Eventually, their attempts to reconcile these two lives tear them apart.”

  “Like Harrison.” He tried to digest that. “So I’m going crazy?” Maybe he wasn’t so different from his dad after all. He looked up at Mactalde. “There are things that have happened, things the people in my dreams said. Like you—they said you would find me.”

  Mactalde shook his head. “Your dreams can only be constructed from the material your waking life supplies it. Did Harrison ever mention my name to you?”

  Chris nodded.

  “Then no doubt your mind sewed that mention into the tapestry of your dream.”

  It made sense. Wasn’t that what he had been telling himself all this time?

  “What about this?” He eased himself onto his knees and tugged his Lael clothes—tunic, trousers, heavy boots, even the money pouch—into the open. Last of all, his hand closed around the Orimere. The shock of it vibrated all the way up his arm.

  He pulled it out and turned around, hand outstretched. “You’re saying this came from my dream?”

  Mactalde straightened up from leaning on the back of the couch. “That, if I’m not mistaken, belongs to Mr. Garnett. Did he give it to you?”

  Chris drew himself up short. Had Harrison given it to him back at his house? Had he forgotten because of the concussion?

  “You’ve seen this before?” he asked.

  “Oh, yes.” Mactalde circled the couch to stand in front of him. “He calls it the Orimere. May I?”

  After a second’s pause, Chris passed it over. Mactalde cradled it in his palm and stroked it with the fingers of his other hand, as if it were a kitten.

  “Do you feel that?” Chris asked.

  Mactalde looked up. “Feel what?”

  “It’s kind of a buzz, almost electric.”

  A shadow passed over the man’s face, annoyance almost. Then he shook his head and handed the stone back. “No. I don’t. Possibly it’s a carryover from the dream.”

  “Is there any treatment for this?” Chris asked. He wanted to get out of here. He needed to go back home and sleep—or maybe not, since that was likely to send him straight back to dreamland. But, at any rate, he needed time to let the concussion wear off, so he could give this some logical thought and work out a plan of action.

  Mactalde dragged his eyes from the Orimere and tugged his lapels straight. “There are some drugs that may help, but as a psychologist I’m not licensed to provide them. You’d have to go to a psychiatrist for that.”

  “You worked with Harrison. What’d you tell him?”

  Mactalde took a deep breath. He seemed to be bracing himself. “There is one thing you can try. Very often, your brain will tell you what you need to do to fix it.” He stepped toward Chris. “Has your brain told you yet what you need to do to stop the dreams?”

  “Actually, yes. But it won’t work.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it’s impossible.” He lifted the Orimere. “It has to do with this. And you.”

  “How fascinating.” Maybe it was just his professional manner, but Mactalde didn’t seem surprised in the least. Or maybe he had been through this whole rigmarole before with Harrison.

  “I’m supposed to use this to bring you into the world of my dreams.”

  “Then let’s do it.” Mactalde crossed to the dry bar near the door. “Let’s pretend. If we can fool your brain into thinking you’ve accomplished what it wants, that may be all that’s required.”

  Chris frowned. It couldn’t be that easy, could it? But, then, did it really matter? What harm could come of giving this a try?

  “In my dreams, they say the Orimere only works when I’m asleep.”

  “Then how about a nap?” Mactalde brought a bottle of pills—sedatives judging from the label—from the bar. “A little rest would be good for that head of yours right now anyway.” He handed Chris the half-full glass of water from the end table.

  Chris accepted the glass and watched Mactalde open the bottle. The pills, white rounds scored down the centerline, fell into his hand. He closed his fingers over the tablets, then flexed them open once more.