“What is that, Mom?”
“Sand, golden sand that has the ability to do whatever you want it to.”
She looked up from the dust in her palm at me and smiled.
“Sand that can do what?” I said, knowing that it wasn’t as farfetched as it would have been a day ago, I’d witnessed it myself at the lake and saw how she’d stacked the food cupboards filled with goodies in a matter of seconds. Even Leigh told me what I was, but I really thought that it was just a dream. The image of Derek and Jake falling flat on their faces, snoring jumped into my mind. “Wait. Sand as in sleeping sand?”
“One of the things they can do.”
“So what, you guys ware like the Sandman?”
Mom laughed. “Sorry,” she said. “The Sandman is just a kids version of what we used to do, or let’s say he used to do. What the Seekers said are true. Revera does exist and it’s real.”
“Mom, you know how crazy this sounds, right?”
“I know.” She smiled.
“So what is it exactly we can do?”
“That’s a lot to explain with one cup of coffee. But I think the basics are needed. We are what people would call Dream Casters.”
Leigh told me the same and here my mom was confirming it. I wasn’t crazy. “That I got from Beavis and Butthead.”
Mom laughed. “Chas, they are far from Beavis and Butthead, that I can assure you. They are very smart and they will send others more scary than them soon.”
“So the place they spoke about, it’s real?”
“The dream world, known as Revera, yes. It’s real. For many millenniums, Revera was peaceful. It was ruled by three Somniums. They were what you would call the royals of this world, the best at everything, almost like gods. Magdalena Sodivic, Darius and Selene Faline. They were siblings. Then one day Magdalena’s sand turned dark. We don’t really know what caused it, but it started to have a different effect on Revera. Some of the smaller towns started to disappear and the Faline’s knew she had to be cast out. It only aggravated Magdalena more that they didn’t understand or try to understand and help her figure out how to control it, and she became so angry that her dark sand became stronger. To make a long story short, Revera was almost destroyed and Darius sacrificed himself to overpower Magdalena. She disappeared and through her bloodline, the Shadow Casters were born.”
“The Shadow Casters?”
“Who do you think creates all the bad dreams sweetheart? Doubt? Lost dreams?”
“You mean like nightmares?”
Mom nodded and she placed the golden sand back into the green bag.
“What does any of this have to do with my dream?”
“When Dream Caster children turn sixteen, they became Initiates. It always starts with the dream. The dream reveals what color sand you will have, and a couple of days later, it will start appearing.”
Couple of days later… I didn’t say it out loud. I got up and started to pace around. Leigh said that I could choose. This must be what he meant.
“What is it Chastity?”
I shook my head. “I was in a bad place, mom. Everything was dark, smelled awful, there was no sign of anything alive.”
Mom’s facial features changed and she looked sad, defeated. “It’s the Oblivion.”
A small smile played on the corner of my mind. “Yeah, I know. Leigh told me.”
“Leigh?” she asked. “Who’s Leigh, sweetheart?”
“The guy, in the dream. He helped me escape, kept a lot of Shadow dogs from me.”
“No,” Vinique shook her head. “The Initiation dream is something you have to go through alone.”
“Mom, if I had to do that alone, believe me, I wouldn’t be here today.”
Creases between Mom’s eyebrows appeared. She thought really hard about something. “It doesn’t make any sense. Did he tell you who he was?”
I shook my head. I wanted to tell her he was hot, but it didn’t seem like the right time.
“There were Nimgolians?” Mom asked another question.
“Are those the animals that turns into heaps of black sand when you shoot them?”
Mom nodded.
“They weren’t the friendliest puppies either.”
“Tell me about the dream.” She didn’t smile or giggle at all.
I closed my eyes and started to tell my mother everything. It was so vivid, I could still see it playing like a movie behind my closed eyelids. I stopped with the white light that appeared in the middle of a deserted square with millions of Shadow hounds that tried to rip out your flesh if they could. “My leg was badly injured when I woke up. I tried to clean it but my linen was soaked with a lot of blood. It’s why I chucked it in the washing this morning. When I woke up again, it was gone, which only freaked me out more.”
“Why didn’t you wake me up, sweetheart?”
“And tell you what?”
“The truth. I would’ve never sent you to school this morning and Beavis and Butthead wouldn’t have found us either.”
“So why is it bad that they know about us?”
“They’re like your father, good. Their dust is golden and they’re the only ones welcomed inside Revera. The Oblivion is no place for a Dream Caster, it was no place for a baby either.”
“A baby?”
She smiled. “Seventeen years ago a Shadow Caster fell in love with a Dream Caster. She almost killed him, and he would’ve died if it wasn’t love at first sight for him. His friends took him to a healer, and they saved his life, but he couldn’t stop dreaming about this girl.” She got up and went to the kitchen as she kept telling the story.
“One day, he got his chance. She, on the other hand was surprised that he was still alive, but there was something about this guy that took her breath away. He wasn’t like the other Light Casters. He was kind and thought twice about who he killed.” She came back with another drink in her hand and looked at me. “In Revera, they teach all the Level One Light Casters about what they should do when they come face to face with a Shadow Caster. Destroy.” She looked back at the ground. “It’s been a war that will never be won. Still this Dream Caster went out of his way to be with the Shadow Caster. They would meet in secret and they fell in love. She fell pregnant and was scared of what Selene and her father would do with the fetus, so they tried to escape Revera.” She had tears in her eyes, something Chastity didn’t understand. “He didn’t make it, but she found a way out. He made sure of it, before he died.”
A tear rolled over her cheek and a horrible feeling made me feel as if my air pipe was going to close. “Mom, what aren’t you telling me?”
Mom looked at me. “Remember when I told you that your father was the saint?”
I nodded.
“I was the Shadow Caster.”
OKAY THAT WAS SOMETHING I SHOULD’VE SEEN BUT for some reason I didn’t. The story about my parents was a typical Romeo and Juliette story, the only difference was that Juliette fell pregnant in this one and she couldn’t die with her love because of her unborn baby.
We sat at that table, just staring at one another. I tried to make sense of this. Mom was a Shadow Caster. Something I knew wasn’t good. “Your father was so excited when I told him that I was pregnant, but a day later he was crazy with paranoia. Not knowing what you will be, or how we were going to raise you in Revera, so we decided to raise you in the Domain. It wasn’t easy because nobody could see Dream Casters in this world and we had to go through a lot of pain in order to become what people would call normal.”
She didn’t make sense at all, speaking about becoming normal and being invisible was kind of confusing so my mind skipped over that part and lingered on another.
“So I take it I’m not Dream Caster material?”
“I didn’t think you were going to become one, that is why I didn’t want to raise you like one.” She gave me another guilty look.
“So, I’m half good, half evil.”
Mom shook her head. “In Revera, there is no g
rey area. It’s either black or white. Good or evil, Chastity. That’s why I asked you what the color of your sand in the dream was.”
“Black is bad, isn’t it?”
Mom hold out her hand. The black glove was off and I just stared at it. Then a swirl of black sand started spinning like a whirlwind in mom’s palm. “I came from a very dark bloodline. One that would never forgive me if I ever had to return to the Oblivion.”
I nodded. “That’s why my sand in the dream was black, wasn’t it?”
Vinique sucked in a breath. Tears filled her eyes and then she closed them. She bit hard on her lower lip and I knew it was to keep the tears from rolling down her cheeks.
“But the sand at the lake was gold.”
Vinique’s eyes flew open. “What happened Chas?”
“I’m sorry I lied. I did get lost though, but it was because of me turning into some sandy freak.”
“Tell me everything and don’t leave a single detail out,” Mom said and led me over to one of the couches. We took the love seat and I started to tell her everything. How Clare was still mad at me and what happened that day at the lake.
“Derek really scared me mom, and then…” I took a deep breath. “ I thought my heart was going to explode, and I found golden light brown sand in my palms. I didn’t know where it came from or anything and when Mark went for me, I threw it in his eyes. Derek and Jake were next, and the sand just kept coming.”
“They all fell asleep?” Vinique asked.
I nodded with a slightly raised, worried eyebrow.
“And you’re sure your sand was gold in color?”
“It doesn’t look like Dad’s but I’m pretty sure.”
Mom sighed. “That’s good.”
“Leigh said I can choose. What did he mean?”
“I don’t know this Leigh you are talking about, but I’m grateful that he was there to help you through this.”
“Could this dream maybe be about you and Dad? Telling me that I am sort-of both.”
“I don’t know, baby.”
“Then how did he know, Mom? What did he mean by choosing?”
“I don’t know.”
“You think it’s what he meant?”
“Remember there is no grey in Revera. Only black and white. You can’t tell anyone Chas. I don’t know what they would do to you if they found out, but from the look on your father’s face and the way he acted after the excitement of the pregnancy was over, it’s not good.”
I sighed. This was all so confusing.
“Can you show me your sand?” Mom asked.
“I don’t know how to, Mom.”
She smiled. “Close your eyes and listen to my voice.”
I did what she said.
“Imagine yourself in a field with flowers. You are lying on your back and soaking up the sun.”
My eyes flew open. “Seriously?”
“Do as I say. Close your eyes.”
“Fine.” I closed my eyes again and think about the field with the flowers again. I imagined myself lying between tall grass with little purple flowers around me. The warmth of the sun started to make me feel tired, lazy.
“Clouds are busy moving in front of the sun, feel the slight change in temperature.” Mom’s voice carried on.
For some reason I imagined them dark. Images of the oblivion flashed in between the vision of me lying in the field, feeling lazy.
My heart started to rise.
“You hear a sound, it’s not the wind.”
It was a deep growl that I heard that night. It belonged to a shadow hound. My eyes flew opened and I found myself stranded in my vision. The clouds were dark, only a few of the sun beams streamed through them. The wind was blowing like mad. I couldn’t hear mother’s voice anymore and for some reason I was searching, scanning the grounds for …Leigh.
Something on my left caught my eye and my body swung around. I stared into the slobbery mouth of a huge beast, with long canines and black beady eyes. Low growls came from him and then he took a step toward me. His eyes didn’t leave me once. They were locked on mine and I took a step backwards.
Black smoke overpowered his back legs and they moved slowly up towards his front and then his entire face disappeared as the smoke came toward me.
My heart rose faster and faster and the sand appeared in my palm again. I looked down. “No!” It was pitched black, just like the hound.
The smoke came closer and closer and I crawled backward, until I found no more ground. The entire place that was once beautiful turned into soot and burned down trees. It was dark and black, and I struggled to breathe again.
I had absolutely nothing to fight against the dark that was trying to consume me, only the dark and black dust. Dust I didn’t want.
The hound jumped out of the black dust like smoke and I screamed.
“Chastity!” Mom’s voice yelled and my eyes flew open. I was back on the couch. My hand trembled softly and I pulled them through my hair.
Heaps of sand were on the couch, making me jump up. Her eyes still reflected horror as she stared at me.
“What happened?”
“I don’t know. One second you were still talking to me, the next I was there, literally.” I spoke fast without taking my eyes off the couch filled with sand. Light golden sand.
“That would explain the sand. It comes when you’re scared. We should try to make it come from will.”
“Mom,” I said. “My sand was black.”
Mom got up too and flung her arms around me. “It doesn’t matter. You’re sand is gold. Which means when they find us, they’ll take you to Revera.”
“When they find us? What do you mean?”
Mom let go of me and she backed a couple of inches away to look at me. Both her hands gripped my shoulders. “They will find us. It’s just a matter of time. Your father’s sand will protect us for now, Chastity, but it’ll run out and that’s when they’ll come.”
I just stared at her. I didn’t like that one bit. We would get separated and I would be alone. “So what are we going to do, Mom?”
“We’re going to train. You need to know how to wield your sand freely, without fear, you need to learn how to wield the things you need from the sand, and how to fight when danger comes.”
“Fight?”
“How do you think your father and I met? We were both Guardians.”
“I thought you said you were Dream Casters.”
Vinique laughed. “All of us are, but we are trained in the thing that we shine the most at. And what our family does best, is fighting, Chastity. We are fighters.”
MOM HADN’T BEEN JOKING WHEN SHE SAID WE WERE fighters. The first day when she showed me what it was she could do, I almost wanted to run away.
I always thought that Tim was the dangerous one in the family and if anybody wanted to harm us that he’d have chopped and kicked the living daylight out of whoever thought about it. If anybody told me a week ago that my mother would actually do the kicking, I would’ve laughed in their faces.
Now, it was a different story as she showed me moves where her hands broke through a block of concrete and kicked through wooden beams that splintered in half, daggers thrown into a target board, breaking targets with a long whip, things that would take me a lifetime to master. Not to mention how she wielded a weapon from her dark sand. The knife felt real, all the details were sculpted into the hilt. It even had a red ruby right in the middle of the hilt where the blade started. Something that I wasn’t good with at all.
“Chas, again!” Mom yelled as my golden sand was strewn all over the place creating long lines without a hint of a weapon or anything that resembled an object. It was just sand.
“Mom, I’m tired.”
She crouched next to me where I was kneeling on all fours concentrating hard on my golden sand. “You’ve got to concentrate, want it with your heart, mind and soul or you’re never going to wield anything.”
“Do you cast dreams like this too?”
“Can you show me?”
Mom’s eyes open wider. “NO! That I can’t and won’t do. I’ve told you before, Shadow Casters only create nightmares, the worst kind. What humans usually see is only about twenty percent of the real thing. It is why dreams have always been so vague. If you have to witness it as I would create it, it would be the full dose, it’s worse than Oblivion.”
“Then how am I going to learn?”
“Revera will help you with creating dreams. I can’t.” She gave me a stern look. “I can only help you with this, Chastity. Now again.”
I closed my eyes and thought about wanting my sand again. It was difficult, I struggled the first time with it, but I had to admit that the more I tried it, the easier it got. I saw it flowing freely in my mind, imagined its touch against my hand, the slight warm temperature, its golden color. Then I felt it flow freely, accumulating in the palm of my hand. I let it pour into a heap on the ground until there was enough to create something from it.
“Now imagine a dagger. See the sharp blade, the hilt.”
I saw the picture as I stared at her sand. “I got it.”
“Now concentrate on the detail. What does the hilt look like? Does it have a ruby, on it, snakes twirling around it?”
I liked the snake idea and imagined two snakes twirling around a copper hilt. I imagined what the leather on the hilt looked like. The soft touch with a suede feel to it. Two lines appeared again, but not a hilt.
I lost the picture in my head and took a deep breath. “This is hopeless.”
“No, it’s not. But maybe you’re right. If you’re getting tired there is no way you are going to conjure it. I suggest a two hour nap, Chastity.”
“Seriously?”
Mom gave me her a typical mother’s look. “Sleep, now.”
My body slumped as I got up from the ground and walked back to the cabin. I slouched all the way to my room that was on the upper level and fell onto my bed. Nowadays it felt as if I could sleep for an entire month. Two hours was nothing.
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