The Dream Gatherer

by Kristen Britain

  “Where are all the guests?” she asked Miss Bunch.

  “Why, right here in the tower.”

  Trying to say it as politely as she could, Estral said, “There are only four of us.”

  “The others are here.” Miss Bay raised the lantern to eye level. “Or soon to be here with the light of the draugmkelder.”

  “Draugmkelder.” The word flowed unfamiliarly off Estral’s tongue. It did not sound like Old Sacoridian or any other language she had encountered. “What is a draugmkelder, and what does it have to do with party guests?”

  “It’s a dream gatherer,” Miss Bunch said.

  Well, that explained everything. “I’m afraid I don’t understand.” She followed the sisters over to a wall hook from which they hung it. Miss Bay opened one of the tin panels to access the wick while Miss Bunch retrieved a candle from a sconce with which to light it.

  “It gathers dreams from sleepers, most usually from people you know, which is most enjoyable. And through the dreams we can draw the dreamers to us and visit with them no matter how far-flung they may be.”

  “Father once tried to explain it to us,” Miss Bay said. “He told us it creates a thinning between the realms of sleep and waking, but I’m not sure he really knew how it works himself.”

  At first Estral could only stare, but the sisters did not tell her they were having a joke on her, or that it was just a legend. No, by their demeanors she could tell they were utterly serious. She took a breath and tried to remind herself she’d seen and heard some pretty strange things herself. How much stranger could a draugmkelder be?

  When she collected herself, she asked, “Do we have to be asleep for it to work?”

  Miss Bunch applied the candle flame to the lantern’s wick. “Now how could we light the lantern if we were asleep? Or enjoy any of Letitia’s delicious cooking?” The flame seemed to die for a moment, but then it flared. When she removed the candle, the lantern glowed. Instead of giving off an oily scent, however, it smelled of an exotic spice or herb.

  “What is that scent?” she asked. “I can’t place it.”

  “Pleasant, is it not?” Miss Bay replied. “A little like sandalwood, but not. We are not sure what it is. The draugmkelder comes from far away. Father traced it as far as the Hasjii people of the great sands of the desert lands. The Hasjii are far-ranging traders. But the lantern itself probably came across an ocean or two before it arrived into Hasjii hands.”

  The lantern continued to glow brighter, and when Miss Bunch closed its door, it cast constellations against the wall, constellations Estral did not recognize, but must depict the sky from wherever the draugmkelder had originated. As for the Hasjii traders, she’d heard something of them, but even the Fioris did not travel deeply into the desert lands.

  “What happens now?” she asked.

  “We await the dreamers,” Miss Bay replied, and she settled herself into a cushioned chair. “Could take a while.”

  Estral still struggled with the whole concept. The party guests were to be dreamers drawn to—through?—the draugmkelder from who-knew-where by their dreams.

  Miss Bunch eased into another chair near her sister. Estral was too restless to sit around and wait for the “guests” to arrive. “I’d like to climb to the top of the tower, but I see no stairs.”

  The sisters chuckled.

  “There are none, dear child,” Miss Bunch said. “The tower is a folly after all. There are no steps and no upper floors. It is quite hollow. Our father used to call it his sorcerer’s tower, and when mother was not holding one of her galas, he would come out here to sit and think.”

  “Or stand by the pond to throw stones into the water,” Miss Bay said, “as males are wont to do.”

  “Help yourself to wine and food,” Miss Bunch said. “Letitia has outdone herself. The festivities will commence eventually.”

  Estral glanced at the table. Stickles was shoving a meatroll down his gullet. Not feeling particularly hungry herself, she glanced once more at the light of the draugmkelder playing against the wall, and then left the tower and found a rock to sit on next to the pond and listened to the very ordinary spring chorusing of frogs.

  How long would it be before dreamers started appearing? She was not sure she wanted to see into someone else’s dreams. She was intrigued by the notion, but it also struck her as intrusive. Dreams were private affairs, the innermost visions of one’s unconscious mind. Many felt dreams were filled with symbolism that reflected the dreamer’s state of being in waking life. Did she or anyone else have the right to breach so private a domain?

  In any case, it was apt to take a while, though time at Seven Chimneys was . . . odd. She picked up a pebble, weighed it in her hand, and considered. It felt as if she’d been the guest of the sisters for days, not just an afternoon. It was like being caught in the haze of a long-running dream where time did not obey the usual rules, but slowed down or sped up according to the needs of those who dwelled there. It must just be, she decided, another eccentricity of the place.

  She shrugged and tossed the pebble into the pond breaking the still surface. It wasn’t just males, she thought, who liked throwing rocks into water. The reflected light of floating lanterns wrinkled with the ripples her pebble produced. She yawned and was casting about for another pebble when a luminous blue-gray haze materialized in the air before her.

  Dreamer

  Estral sat up with a start thinking she’d fallen asleep and was dreaming, but she felt awake enough. She pinched herself to make sure.

  “Ow!” Yes, definitely awake.

  She watched in amazement as the luminous cloud that was floating before her disgorged dozens of fluffy winged kittens that took to the air as if it were the most natural thing in the world. It had to be the work of the draugmkelder. She laughed in delight at the aerobatics of the kittens as they fly-pounced on one another or chased their tails, and meeped and meowed as they played. A couple batted at real fireflies and she wondered how dream creatures could interact with the waking world like that.

  It must be through the mind’s eye of the dreamer, she thought, but of course she didn’t really know. She was pretty certain, however, she knew who the dreamer was. But what did she do now besides enjoy the antics of the kittens?

  “Call to him, child.”

  Estral almost fell off her rock, so startled was she by Miss Bay’s sudden appearance at her side.

  Call to him? And then what?

  “Call to him,” Miss Bay said again, “and he will join us, or he will not.” She stuck her cane out so a kitten could perch on it. Her usually stern expression was broken with a smile of delight.

  The kitten then leaped into the air to chase after its siblings, and Miss Bay slowly made her way back toward the tower.

  So, Estral just had to call to the dreamer and he would appear. Or, he would not. She cleared her throat, and feeling a little self-conscious, called, “Alton! Alton, are you there?”

  The kittens flew in a gyre until they were no more than a blurred vortex that turned, once more, into a drifting haze.

  A little disappointed, she tried again. “Alton! It’s me, Estral!”

  Nothing happened except that the haze dissipated. Her disappointment grew for she had not seen Alton, her lover, since early winter when she’d slipped away from the encampment at the D’Yer Wall without telling him. She’d taken the coward’s way out and left him a note informing him of her plan to travel north in search of her father. It had been a terrible thing to do, leaving like that, selfish, but she knew he would have tried to stop her, which would have led to arguments and much unpleasantness. And, worst of all, the temptation to stay put.

  She called out again, but to no avail. She waited and waited, but just when she was ready to give up, a transparent figure came stumbling out of the dark along the edge of the pond. Barefoot and hair tousled, and wearing only a n
ightshirt, he looked disoriented.

  Estral leaped to her feet. “Alton?”

  “Where did the kittens go?” he asked. “I’ve got to follow the kittens because of the test.”

  “What test?”

  “Mathematics.” His voice was like a tired sigh. “I keep having to take this test even though I’m no longer in school. Need to find the kittens . . . ”

  “The kittens have left,” she replied.

  He came to an ungainly halt in front of her. “Where have they gone? I’ve got to take the test.”

  He was still caught in a dream state, she thought. “Are you really here?” She reached out to touch his face and her hand passed through it, and yet . . . it did not. She could almost feel the warmth of his skin and the scruff of beard on his chin, but could not firmly touch him.

  He mimicked her and tried to touch her face, but his hand passed through her. “I’d better go take that test.”

  “Alton,” she said, “don’t go. This is more than a dream—you’re at the estate of the Berry sisters. Do you remember Karigan talking about them? They’re having a party. You are here through your dreaming. You are really here!”

  “This is another dream and you are a ghost.”

  “No! You are really here with me at Seven Chimneys. I mean, sort of.” She’d missed him so much and truly wished for him to be there with her. She reached for his arm, felt that warmth again, and instinctively pulled with both her hands and her mind. He stumbled into her and shed translucence like a vaporous cloak. He turned completely solid in her arms.

  “I am dreaming, aren’t I?” he asked in a groggy voice.

  She placed her hands on either side of his face and kissed him soundly.

  Afterward, sounding a little more awake, he said, “If this is a dream, I like it. Feels real.”

  She kissed him again to convince him. She had to steady him when they at last parted.

  “How is this possible?” he asked. “I was asleep in my cot, dreaming . . . ” He glanced about wide-eyed, and scratched his head. “Now I can’t remember.”

  “You were looking for flying kittens because you had a mathematics test.”

  He frowned. “I dream about that test all the time, but the kitten part is new. Guess it’s because Midnight has begun to nest.”

  “That is wonderful news!” It had been hoped that the gryphon pair—Midnight and Mister Whiskers—would produce offspring to help protect the D’Yer Wall from incursions by denizens of Blackveil Forest. She flung her arms around him and they hugged for a long time. “How I’ve missed you!”

  “Me, too.” When they parted, he said, “Explain this all to me, what I’m doing here, what this place is.” His expression was one of awe as he took in the lights bobbing on the pond, and the tower looming behind them.

  “I can’t say as I understand everything myself, but I’ll try to explain.”

  They strolled the paths around the pond hand-in-hand as she told him how she had arrived at Seven Chimneys, and about the sisters’ draugmkelder. When that all sank in, he questioned her about her adventures in the north as he’d heard only sketchy details. She did not know how many circuits they made of the pond, but when she finished with her father’s death, he just held her. She did not cry but found comfort with him right there, something she’d yearned for, for so long, her face pressed against the warmth of his shoulder. The magic of the draugmkelder was truly a gift.

  “How long do we have?” Alton asked. “I mean, I assume I’ll get sent back at some point.” Then he looked down at himself. “Glad I decided to wear something to bed.” They laughed.

  “I don’t know how it works,” she told him, “how you go back or when. Or if. The sisters have been quite vague on the particulars.”

  “Maybe I’ll have to go to Selium with you,” he said.

  She would love nothing more than to have him by her side as official mourning for her father began and she assumed the title and duties of the Golden Guardian. There would be ceremonies and eulogies, and important people from all around Sacoridia and other lands who would gather to bring her their condolences, and to stand witness to her investiture. It would be overwhelming, but his presence would make it bearable.

  He leaned toward her and said, “I’d like to meet the Berry sisters. Karigan told me about them, but I don’t think I ever quite believed all she said.”

  “This way.” She took his hand once more. “When you see them, you’ll believe.”

  She led him into the tower and was surprised to find it full of people and noisy with conversation and laughter. All the guests appeared to be in some form of night dress, though one portly gentleman had borrowed the table cloth to drape about himself. A few figures were hazy and transparent as Alton had been when he first arrived. Children chased after someone’s dream of dragonlike lizards that spouted tiny flames as they leaped and flew through the crowd. One transparent figure glided above on air currents, arms spread wide in flight. Estral spotted Stickles, who was sure and solid and undeterred by the commotion around him. He had not left the table and currently gripped a drumstick in one fist and a wedge of pie in the other.

  “There they are.” Estral pointed to where the sisters presided over the affair like enthroned queens, guests clustering around them as supplicants. The guests parted to let Estral and Alton through. When Miss Bay finished speaking to a distinguished man in opulent silks, Estral said, “Miss Bay, Miss Bunch, this is—”

  “Oh, don’t tell us!” Miss Bunch said, nearly bouncing in her seat.

  “It is obvious,” Miss Bay told her.

  “It is? No, no, let me guess.” Miss Bunch peered hard at Alton. “A striking young man, isn’t he. I don’t think he’s a pirate.”

  “Of course he’s not a pirate. Look at his hands.”

  Alton raised his hands so Miss Bunch could examine them.

  “Why, yes. Someone who works with his hands. A blacksmith, or maybe a stonecutter. But the Golden Guardian would not be with a blacksmith, would she. It would not be appropriate.”

  “It wouldn’t?” Estral asked.

  “Child, you are the Golden Guardian. You would need someone of like station to court you, so therefore he is a D’Yer. The D’Yers are stoneworkers and the lords of D’Yer Province. So I say this is Lord Quelvan D’Yer.”

  “Quelvan?” Estral asked, as surprised as Alton looked.

  “Did I guess wrong?” said Miss Bunch. “Are you actually a blacksmith, young man?”

  “Er, Quelvan was my great great grandfather,” he replied. “I’m Alton.” And he bowed.

  “Oh, my, it appears we’re a little behind the times,” Miss Bunch said. Her sister just looked appalled. “But I did get the family right.”

  Miss Bay squinted and leaned toward Alton. “I believe the boy is more than just a lordling who can cut stone, sister.”

  “Oh?”

  “Indeed. I would wager my eye tooth that this one is a Green Rider.”

  “I do not want your eye tooth, Bay.” Miss Bunch’s face wrinkled in disgust. “So it is not necessary to offer wagers. And I concur. Are you a Green Rider, young man?”

  “I am,” he said. “How did you guess?”

  “We’ve known enough Green Riders to have the scent of them, so to speak,” Miss Bay replied, “even though your arcane object did not travel with you.”

  “My arcane . . . ?”

  “I think she means your brooch,” Estral said. Green Riders wore winged horse brooches that, like Estral’s harp brooch, were their badge of office, but also augmented minor special abilities in magic that otherwise lay dormant. Alton’s ability was to put up an invisible shield of protection in times of danger.

  He placed his hand on his chest where his brooch was usually clasped. “How do you know about . . . ?”

  “We are quite aware of them,” Miss Bay
said, her eyes hooded.

  Few knew the brooches existed for a spell of concealment lay upon them. They were supposed to have been destroyed centuries ago by those who distrusted magic, but the Riders of that time had managed to hide them instead, thus preserving their special abilities. The Green Riders remained secretive about their magic for their personal safety, and because they were king’s messengers. If the populace knew the king relied on magic users to bear his messages, there would be outrage and upheaval, which would be bad enough during times of peace, but would be worse during times of strife, as now, when they were dealing with aggression from Second Empire and needed a united front. Estral could only guess the sisters knew of them from their father’s work, or perhaps one of the Riders they had known had confided in them.

  “But . . . ” Alton did not seem to know what to make of the fact that the sisters knew about Rider brooches.

  Estral poked him in the ribs. “You aren’t going to get any answers out of them,” she whispered. “Believe me. I’ve tried.”

  “Are you enjoying the party?” Miss Bunch asked.

  “What?” The change of topic threw him, which undoubtedly Miss Bunch intended. He swallowed hard, cleared his throat. “Oh, right, the party. It’s—it’s amazing.”

  The noise had not abated. There was much laughter and the clinking of wine glasses. Butterflies—no, fairies with butterfly wings—erupted from the mouth of a transparent dream man.

  “Who are all these people?” Estral asked.

  “Some distant relations,” Miss Bay said, “and old friends, like Prince Dakher over there.” She pointed to the gentleman in the fine silks they’d seen speaking with the sisters earlier.

  “You mean the king of Tallitre?” Alton said in astonishment.

  “Is he king now?” Miss Bay asked.

  “I did say we were behind the times,” Miss Bunch replied.

  Her sister ignored her and pointed toward a big bearded dream man smoking a pipe with a meditative expression on his face. Mushrooms sprouted at his feet and a barred owl perched on his shoulder. “And there’s that forester who takes care of the king’s woods this side of the village of North.”