Looming above him was a creature unlike anything he had ever seen, a creature whose face writhed beneath a sheet of flames that licked but never seemed to consume his features. Even his red-slitted eyes and the fangs that sliced through his mouth were ringed in flame, but in the very center of his eyes, just within the bottomless slit, was a fine, cutting sliver of deep blue ice. And when he opened his mouth to howl out his demands, his forked tongue was tipped with daggers of the same mind-numbing ice.
In every direction, as far as he could see, there knelt other creatures, some large and hideous, some small but with eyes remarkably vicious, some with cruel faces surprisingly human, some no more than wraiths somehow caught in a flash of light and endowed with a permanent shape and substance. And dangling from the flaming, ice-tipped claws of their obvious leader was the mangled and bloody body of one large creature.
"Any more questions?" hissed the massive creature in the center, and as he listened he did not know whether he was burning to death in horrible agony, or whether his body had been plunged into suffocating ice.
There was no response to the dangerous question other than absolute quiet; not even the sound of a single breath or frantic heartbeat disturbed the silence.
"Then you know my commands. Now go!" boomed the creature, and even in his invisible watching he writhed, his body on fire and his mind gripped by ice. Around him the creatures stampeded as if in that moment their minds had been completely stripped away and their bodies had thrashed out of control. There was no sense of order, no discipline, as larger creatures crushed smaller ones in their frenzied charge, and smaller ones ripped at the larger ones' throats as the flood of bodies washed over them. Riding the crest of this monstrous wave were those less substantial creatures, but even as they sailed toward whatever shore awaited, sharp claws surfaced from below like sharks seeking prey, and dragged the expressionless wraiths back into the bloody depths.
Yet despite the seeming chaos, the wave of creatures flowed steadily forward, the creature of fire and ice wading in the center of the advancing tide. And caught up like a piece of flotsam, he too was carried helplessly along, carried until at last he could glimpse whatever end awaited the creatures, whatever end their fiery yet glacial leader had chosen. Ahead was a barrier rising like a cliff, but he could clearly see the light-filled fracture snaking up the stark bluff, as if years of erosion had worn the underlying foundation away, and a single crash of one giant wave could topple it completely. A wave that was fast approaching.
The wave struck with tremendous force, and with a single shudder, the barrier split fully open, and the creatures poured through the resulting gap, mouths frothing like foam on a breaking sea. From his place in the center, the creature of fire and ice roared as if in sudden and uncheckable hunger, and his giant paws swept out, lethal claws extended to swipe aside all those in his path. Forward he rushed, trampling and slashing, his eyes on something above and beyond the encroaching wave, his precipitous surge pulling along countless others in his wake. Including the single piece of helpless flotsam who saw it all and could do nothing more than float along. Powerless to stop, powerless to do anything other than watch, he now flowed through the gap directly behind the maddened creature, only to find himself tossed into a world that was disturbingly familiar, a world that would have stolen his breath away if he hadn't long ago lost it beneath the swelling waves.
Ahead he could see the bellowing creature advance on two lone figures standing hand in hand, but then all around him the rest of the wave broke upon the land and he could see nothing but the creatures pouring through the gap and spreading out in every direction. He was caught in the flood once again, but this time he found himself riding the crest that would soon crash down upon the land below. Against this unstoppable tide there stood only a handful of men and women, and as he was swept toward those doomed few, he saw himself, face set and feet braced as if that alone could keep him from drowning. And standing beside him was Mischa, the love he had waited for all his life only to lose so soon.
Sevor awoke with a terrified cry, bolting up so quickly that Mischa's head, which had been pillowed on his shoulder, was knocked to the ground with a thud. So intense was his fear, he didn't even notice or respond to her startled gasp, but he was still enough himself to change his panicked outcry into a coherent warning. "They intend to break through the Barrier at the Source itself!" he shouted. "We're running out of time!"
Around him everyone jolted awake with an abruptness that dispelled even the lingering memory of sleep. Five pairs of eyes snapped open as if they had never closed, but before anyone else could expostulate, Drew, who already had good reason to trust the reliability of Sevor's dreams, demanded urgently, "Is it happening yet?"
Sevor's eyes turned inward as he surveyed time unfolding in a way only he could see. "Not yet," he finally murmured, "but soon. Sooner than we can possibly get there. Although somehow we will get there."
"What is that supposed to mean?" Gyfree asked anxiously.
"I dreamed of us there, so that means we will be there, each and every one of us. The city itself seemed deserted, so not only will we somehow arrive in time, but we'll arrive in time for the townspeople to have the chance to evacuate. I just don't know how we're supposed to get there, because that helpful bit of information wasn't in my dream," Sevor explained with a sardonic smile, although his eyes were mournfully haunted.
"You definitely dreamed that they will breach the Source rather than any other section of the Barrier? You're sure it wasn't the weakened area where Drew broke through?" persisted Gyfree.
"I may not be from here, but I know your world relatively well. In some ways better than you do. There is only one place in this world where a city juxtaposes the Barrier."
"Does everything you dream always come true?" Gyfree questioned.
"As far as I know," Sevor admitted unhappily.
"What exactly did you see?" Mischa asked intently, her hand instinctively reaching out to give his a reassuring squeeze.
Sevor shuddered, and his eyes grew even more haunted and distant. "There were more Figments than I could count. Thousands upon thousands of them. In their center was a Figment larger than the rest, a Figment with burning skin. When the first wave of Figments broke through the Barrier, he suddenly charged forward, rushing to the front. And once he broke through the gap opened by the others, he rocketed directly toward Gyfree and Drew."
There was an uncomfortable silence, the silence of those who don't want to hear unpleasant yet unavoidable news. Then Gyfree inquired roughly, "Did you see a beautiful woman? A woman carved from ice?"
"No, but there was ice in the eyes of the fiery Figment, and ice tipping his tongue and curving from the ends of his claws. On the outside he burned, but deep inside, he seemed made of solid ice."
Drew shivered as if touched by the ice in her Figment's eyes. "He must have defeated her," she stated bleakly.
"No!" blurted Timi as something deep within her stirred, something new that whispered of other possibilities. "Don't assume anything. Gyfree's Figment was ice, just as Drew's is fire. If the Figment Sevor dreamed was both fire and ice, then there may be more here than we can easily understand."
Timi's words fell with a weight that pulled at them all, dragging them into another dark silence which was finally broken when Peyr quietly asked, "What else did you see?"
"I saw us standing there as the Figments charged. Then I woke up."
The same question was in all of their minds, but only Mischa had the courage to whisper, "Did you see any of us die?"
"No."
"Then I suppose we have a chance even if we don't know what that chance may be," Mischa stated flatly. "But I'd still like to know how we're supposed to get from here to there."
A buzz that sounded suspiciously like laughter suggested, "Perhapz you are forgetting uz?"
In surprise all eyes turned toward the two hummeybees who had quietly perched overhead on the lowest branch of a tree. "But there are only two of you and six of us," Mischa expostulated. "You cannot carry us all."
"There are only two of uz here," buzzed the smaller hummeybee, "but there are far more than two of uz."
"But there's only one way to reach your world," protested Gyfree, "and that is through the nightmare that stretches across its path."
Sevor cleared his throat before the hummeybees could buzz out a reply. "I already told you that Drew dreamed that world, but what I didn't tell you before is that she dreamed that nightmare as well. And since she is connected to it in a way that no one else can ever be, she has always been able to survive it."
Drew flinched as if she suddenly felt a blast of unbearable heat, and wrapping his arm around her, Gyfree declared, "I don't care where the nightmare came from; she's not going back through that hell again. There must be another way."
"There iz another way to reach our world," droned the larger hummeybee, its sharp black eyes drilling into Drew, "at leazt for you, Dreamer. You choze the hard way before. But there iz an eazy way too. The way you uzually vizited when you were zmall."
"But I don't remember that way," Drew whispered.
Sevor leaned close, his eyes intent on Drew's stricken face, his own nightmare momentarily forgotten. "When you dreamed the hummeybee's world into existence, it became your refuge from the nightmare, a refuge you sought so often that you left the two forever connected to one another. For you, and you alone, that world exists as the only way to escape the nightmare, and even now your connection to it is so strong that all you must do is dream you are there. Just dream of the world you created, and you'll slip through the heat without feeling a trace of its touch."
"Yez," the large hummeybee buzzed excitedly, "that iz the eazy way. And you muzt go there again both for uz and for yourzelf."
"You gave uz a choize. We chooze to ztay here, in thiz world. But we would prefer not to ztay alone. Bring uz otherz, and we will help you. We will carry you. We will fight with you. We will give you the chanze you need," finished the other hummeybee.
In this place each tree bloomed with every single shade of flower, the colors soft and almost translucent, blossoms hanging in the branches with the same ethereal glow as a rainbow arching hazily in the sky. It was a world of muted colors, with shadows as velvety as the petals that drifted like a summer snow from the trees. A world that had never known autumn, and had only recently, for one brief moment, felt the icy touch of winter. Spring melted into summer here, and summer melted back into spring, so there was always something blooming, and always something preparing to bloom. And always something winging from blossom to blossom, buzzing with busy delight.
In a dream Drew walked once more beneath the brimming trees, and around her swarmed a hive of excited hummeybees, droning as one, "It'z her, it'z her." And dreaming she showed them another world, a larger world, a world with many flowers, but more scattered, a world with many colors, and not all of them pastel. A world of not just spring and summer, and not just hummeybees.
"Will you come help us? Will you join the other two?" asked the dream Drew.
Many of the hummeybees buzzed away, their wings scattering rainbow light that melted into the trees. But some of the hummeybees stayed, and some of these even buzzed, "Yez, we will come. It iz time for a change, zo we will come." And wrapping her dream arms around them, and pulling them into herself until their buzzing filled her mind and their black and yellow stripes pressed against the backs of her eyes, she soared back on the wings of her dream, and on waking set them free.
Surprisingly it was Mischa and only Mischa who balked at the thought of being flown by the hummeybees. She stood defiantly, hands on hips and feet far apart, but a shadow of memory that reminded Drew of a nightmare drained her eyes and washed the color from her face. "I can't do it," she pleaded. "I just can't."
"But you did it before," protested Timi, "didn't you? Isn't that how you got to Peyr's so quickly?"
Mischa shuddered and the shadow darkened in her eyes. "It was horrible," she whispered. "He didn't even warn me, but there was this strange smile on his face as he looked out into the distance, and then suddenly this giant hummeybee swooped down and grabbed me by the shoulders. I wanted to kick and scream, but I couldn't because somehow I knew he would be unhappy if I did. So I hung from the hummeybee like a bemused Dreamer, and we soared higher into the air, far from the ground, but not above the trees. We swerved wildly through the trees, and branches lashed across my face as we sped by. I couldn't see where I was or where I was going because everything was a blur. I've never felt so helpless or so lost."
"It doez not need to be that way," buzzed a dainty hummeybee as it flitted back and forth across Mischa's vision. "If two are carrying you inztead of one, it will be eazy to fly above the treez. It iz a pleazure to fly zo high. It iz beautiful to zee the land zpread out below, to zee all the bright colorz dotting the land like rainbow ztars in a green zea."
"Nizely zpoken," droned the larger of the two original hummeybees with a sound that sounded suspiciously like a seductive purr. "Your wordz are az lovely az your wingz."
A surprised and delighted laugh escaped Timi as she watched the two hummeybees circle each other before disappearing into the branches of the nearby trees. "Amorous little things," she murmured. "I had no idea. What exactly were you up to, Drew, when you created them?"
Drew flushed, but before she could answer, Sevor interjected with a wry smile, "She was simply up to creating actual life. The hummeybees may have started as Figments, but when Drew connected them to a real world, they became average, mortal creatures. And to survive, mortal creatures have to procreate." Then wrapping an arm around Mischa's tense shoulders, he droned in his own seductive purr, "Perhaps we can soar together too."
"Not now!" snapped Mischa irritably.
"Well, you may be right about that. We can't do anything until our ardent escorts return."
Turning in the curve of his arm, Mischa scowled dangerously up into Sevor's teasing face. "What are you talking about?" she growled.
"When we leave, just wrap your arms around my waist and hide your face against my back. There's no reason the hummeybees carrying me and those carrying you can't fly that close to each other. They have remarkable maneuverability in flight."
"Yez, we do!" buzzed another hummeybee as it performed a triple somersault in midair.
Mischa moaned, then closed her eyes as if that alone kept her from being violently sick. "Very well," she sighed, "I'll give it a try. But I'm warning you now. I don't care if it does make you unhappy. I'm reserving the right to kick and scream to my heart's content."
"I wouldn't want it any other way," Sevor replied with his usual crooked grin.
Spread out below was a colorful and brilliant world that reminded Drew forcibly of an illustration in a children's picture book. Tiny towns dotted the crayon green land, the buildings small blocks of primary colors outlined in what appeared from so high above to be bold black lines, each house or store painstakingly shaded as if by a child's tireless hand. Around these boxes of startling hue were specks of people circulating, each one like a pinpoint of color dabbed on to a page with the tip of a Magic Marker and then somehow set free to wander about. At first these bright drawings of towns seemed few and far apart, with nothing but construction paper slabs of green, blue, and brown in between, but the farther Drew and the others flew in the grasp of the swollen hummeybees, the more of these towns appeared, and the larger they became. Soon there were curling ribbons of brown swirling gracefully from town to town, as if the artistic child had grown playful when completing a book of connect-the-dots. And if anything, the colors grew even more intense and even appeared waxy, as if that same child had worked each crayon down to a stub coloring and recoloring the same small blocks.
It was a beautiful land, and one that truly did feel untouched and undefiled, just as if some innocent child had indeed brought the many colors and shapes to life. The only exception Drew had seen had been the house she herself had brought to this place, for when they had passed over it ages ago, it had appeared like a dark blot in the midst of so much color, oppressive and even sinister, and as far from the creative hands of a clear-eyed child as possible. Yet for all its nightmare horror it had saved her as it always saved her, and it had saved all the others as well. And staring down at the loathsome stain she had brought to this unsuspecting world, she had finally understood that the house was the way it was for it was exactly what she had always dreamt it to be; it wasn't something that had long haunted her dreams, but something she had brought to the dreams that haunted her. It was dark because its darkness blocked all eyes but hers, oppressive because its bulk weighed heavily on all spirits but hers, sinister because its job had always been to trap and destroy whatever creatures pursued her so that she would not be required to face or destroy them herself. So she would not have to kill, or risk being killed. She had not dreamt it infallible, but even the one Figment who always managed to elude the house and follow through the tunnels had been defeated every time before, for at the very least the house had always bought her the time to wake up. Perhaps that was what rendered the house so dark and oppressive now; in this world there would be no waking up from the house itself, and no escaping from whatever nightmares the house could not hold. And the darkest and most sinister thing of all was that this brightly colored land was about to change, had in fact already felt the first twinges of change, and from here on might actually need the house just as she had always needed the house.
Drew's thoughts remained as dark as the house even as she sped over the brightly patterned land, and when her eyes moved from the once again dwindling number of towns below her dangling feet, she saw that Gyfree's face, suspended between the legs of two giant hummeybees flying side by side with those carrying her, was as dark as her own. At the sight of his blindly staring eyes, her stomach clenched and her heart faltered, for she could clearly recognize that he was desperately holding a nightmare at bay. But there was no keeping this nightmare at bay; they were flying directly into it, flying into it knowing in advance that it might swallow them whole. Knowing that if they failed to dream their way out of it, it would sap all the brightness from this world. And knowing that even if they could dream their way free, they still might awake in two different worlds, one on either side of the waiting Source.
With a jolt the hummeybees holding her began to spiral downward toward the town directly beneath her feet, their wings beating with a furious hum as they slowed their descent, their bodies corkscrewing through the air so that they wouldn't lower her too quickly to the ground. Her eyes were filled with the flashing iridescence of their vibrating wings, and her ears were filled with high-pitched thrumming, and then her feet were touching the warm pavement of a street and she was blinking up at buildings that seen up close reminded her even more forcibly of storybook illustrations. Behind her she could feel Gyfree land, but she could also feel that his attention was drawn by something far different than what had drawn hers. Turning around, she let her eyes follow the path his had already taken down the street and through the town, passing by other brightly colored buildings, and stopping abruptly where the street ended, or perhaps began. There was no barrier she could see as she had seen the shimmering hot Barrier that had imprisoned Timi's Figment, yet there at the end or beginning of the road was a bright blue sky touching the ground, the intense blue rising directly from the earth and arcing far overhead to curve over this world like a giant bowl. Beyond that depthless blue there was nothing, not even a distant cloud, for there was no distance. There was sky, just like the sky where she had entered this world, but here there was a difference, for hanging in the sky with the same two-dimensionality of a child's drawing was a fat white streak that also held nothing. The Source.
Dreams within dreams within dreams, and she had moved from one to another and then always back to the dream of this world. Yet this was the place where all the dreams might come to an end, where at least this dream was supposed to come to an end. And if she somehow lived but this really was still the end, and not perhaps another beginning, for her there might still be dreaming, but her dreams would never be the same, and would never again bring her to a world worth awakening in.
The watchers watched, and what they saw the others who used their eyes saw as well, but what they learned they still learned alone. Their eyes never wavered from the two Dreamers, for those other eyes would notice even the slightest lapse, but they watched more than the others cared to note, so what they saw, and what they heard, was far more. They watched the hummeybees, and they learned why these creatures had escaped the limitations that held them bound, that even held their masters bound, and they learned what they would need to also be free. A world. A world of their own. A world to anchor them firmly in place so they too might truly live, and when they grew weary of living, truly die. And since they would never be gifted a world, perhaps they could steal one. But for now they must still watch, and they must still learn.
So the watchers watched as the Dreamers were carried far through the sky, and they watched as they touched feet to the ground again. And without blinking they watched as their Dreamers turned their eyes warily upon the white slash that marked the Barrier's most vulnerable yet strongest point. Most vulnerable because it was the easiest to break through from the other side. Strongest because it was the most difficult to move beyond. Then the eyes that watched through the watchers' eyes sharpened, and then those other eyes thrilled, and the watchers knew that their watching would soon be over. At least their watching for those other eyes. And in their own avid watching the dog's heart fluttered and the woman's arm trembled until the shaking that consumed them both had assumed a single rhythm that bound them not just in watching and not just in learning but also in waiting.
As the watchers saw the Dreamers turn toward the Source, so did the demon and his epidermal ice queen, and the sensual shiver that seized them both nearly buckled his knees. It was time, finally and irrevocably the time they had anticipated with a yearning even greater than their craving for each other. All of their deceptions had succeeded. They had deceived all existing Figments into sacrificing themselves in the mistaken belief that they would share in the conquering of countless worlds. They had deceived their Dreamers into believing that an army was being sent against them, when in actuality the army was only there to break through a Barrier held impassable against him and her, and to rush through in a deluge too overwhelming for the Source to pull back. Even if the entire army was destroyed in the first assault, they would already have served their true purpose simply by shielding his body in their midst, by closing around and hiding him just as his fist had closed around and hidden her when she set out to kill her Dreamer, by sheltering him and her in a nightmare so vast and overwhelming that together he and she could not merely enter this world, but also reach and kill their Dreamers before the Dreamers fully realized what danger they faced. And finally, they had even deceived their Dreamers into believing that they were more vulnerable when apart, for both had nearly died when they had separated before. Little did the Dreamers realize that at this point he and she wanted them together, wanted to share in their simultaneous deaths not just for the thrill of one equally intense sensation, but because they wanted nothing to disturb the delicate balance of their arousing union; the death of either Dreamer before the other was a risk they were now unwilling to take, for neither of them any longer desired to overwhelm the other with a flood of power that might leave one of them alone in his skin, wandering through the void as just fire or ice, but never again knowing the exhilarating sensation of both.
There was fire licking across her breasts and fire plunging deep into her body even though her body was no longer there. Yet fulfillment would have to wait. There was ice racing up his spine and across his loins, and although she was inside him, just inside his skin, with no hands of her own, he could feel icy fingers squeezing his buttocks and pressing sharp nails into his shoulders. Yet fulfillment would have to wait. They had shared much, but for the pleasure to come, the pleasure they wanted now, the greatest pleasure they still had left to share, they would have to wait for the anticipated kill.
Stepping into the center of the eagerly milling throng, he boomed in a voice that made his army shiver in the incredible cold and gasp in the unbearable heat, "It is time. Together we will take this world!"
A burly Figment stepped forward, its eyes mad with a ravenous carelessness. "What reward will I receive if I kill the Dreamer or the Keeper?" it demanded.
A massive paw filled with fire and tipped with daggers of ice swept the Figment from its feet and shredded its body with one swift contraction. "Any more questions?" he hissed.
There was no response to the dangerous question other than absolute quiet; not even the sound of a single breath or frantic heartbeat disturbed the silence.
"Then you know my commands. Now go!"
And just as they had in Sevor's dream, the Figments stampeded.
Drew's eyes were riveted to the white slash in the sky, and she could almost feel it drawing her forward, down the road and into that gash of aching emptiness. She even started to move toward it, but a strong hand suddenly closed around her arm, and Gyfree spun her around to meet his anguished eyes. "Don't leave," he whispered so no one else could hear. "Please don't leave."
Eyes locked with Gyfree's, for a moment Drew felt as if they were alone, back in the room beneath the stairs, where no one else could ever find them and nothing could separate them. Then the moment was lost as people began to pour from the buildings, clustering around the visitors who had arrived in such startling fashion. Most of these people gathered around Gyfree, calling out his name and asking him questions that rang out and then vanished in the growing swell of noisy chatter. Bodies jostled against Drew as more people shouldered their way through the crowd, but even as she was pushed helplessly from side to side, Gyfree's hand never loosened on her arm. She felt as if she had suddenly been caught up in a dream that she had long avoided but never forgotten, a dream of drowning, yet it was not water rushing over her head and stealing the breath from her lungs, but a flood of people, and the only thing that kept her from sinking forever beneath the crowd was that hand painfully gripping her arm. Even now that hand was reeling her in, pulling her up out of the depths, and dropping her at the top of a broad stairway overlooking the upturned and wondering faces of the townspeople below.
"Quiet!" shouted Gyfree. "If you value your lives, you must be quiet!"
The noise of the crowd ebbed, but the suspiration of whispers and murmured questions still washed up the steps like the voice of a distant sea.
"I said quiet!" roared Gyfree.
A stout man with a flushed face shoved his way to the front of the crowd and portentously cleared his throat. "Gyfree, what are you doing here? What are those things that brought you here? And where is your father?" he demanded.
"My father is dead," announced Gyfree baldly, but the bleakness in his eyes had nothing to do with his father, and nothing to do with death, but much to do with the one thing he most feared to lose now.
The tide of noise withdrew so suddenly and completely that it felt as if the waves on that distant sea had frozen in midcurl.
"My father is dead," repeated Gyfree, "and the land has chosen me as the new Keeper. I know this may make some of you uneasy, but you will need to save your feelings for another time. If there is another time. I have already destroyed more than a dozen Figments who have invaded our world, and this woman, Drew, a powerful Dreamer from my old world, has destroyed just as many as I have."
"Did you say destroyed?" croaked the stout man.
"Yes. We have destroyed Figments, not banished them. But now there is an entire army of Figments headed directly toward this town. They will be breaking through the Source soon. If you are not prepared to stand against them, you must flee. There is time for you to all escape if you move now, but there is no time to waste."
Far away a wave of infinite darkness flowed toward the land, but here the tide receded, people turning and rushing away from the town, people gathering more people as they moved along, people spilling from homes and workplaces, people pouring over the edges of the road and across green fields as they streamed away. And side by side with Gyfree, his fingers bruising her arm, Drew watched them vanish as if into a dream. Or perhaps from one dream into another.
"I don't know how much time we have," Sevor announced tersely, approaching the Dreamers hand in hand with Mischa, Peyr and Timi directly behind, and a swarm of hummeybees hovering overhead. "But I don't think there's much."
"Then you should run now," Gyfree answered shortly.
"What?" snapped Mischa. "You expect us to just leave you here to face the danger alone?"
"I'm the Keeper. Stopping the Figments is my responsibility, not yours. I'm not even sure why I let you come this far."
"You let us come because you couldn't have stopped us," Mischa retorted with a gleam in her eyes. "And because the moment you knew you finally had no other choice but to come here, you were so worried about what would happen to Drew when she reached the Source that you were completely unable to focus on anything else."
The hand on Drew's arm tightened convulsively. "Well, I'm focused now, and I want the rest of you to run as far and as fast as you can. Take Drew with you. If I can stop the Figments here, and if I survive, then we can worry about what should happen next."
"I'm not leaving," Drew said flatly, although her eyes were far away. "This is my danger to face as much as yours. It is my Figment who leads the attack, my Figment who must be stopped above all others."
"I'm not leaving, either," stated Timi, voice as flat as Drew's and eyes far more keen. "I came on this adventure because I felt that I had an important part to play, and despite everything else that's happened, I don't feel as if my part has been finished yet."
"And I'm not leaving if Timi is staying," Peyr announced. "Nor would I want her to go. I also believe she still has an important part to play, and I believe just as strongly that she'll need me to help her."
"There you have it," Sevor interjected wryly. "We're all staying, and since I dreamed of myself here, I would never have it otherwise. But we are limited to time, so we need to prepare. Gyfree, you and Drew need to stay where you are, but the rest of us are supposed to wait on that hill over there," he explained, pointing off toward a spot just beyond the town. "That's where I dreamed us, so that's where we need to be."
"And what if we're not there?" demanded Timi. "How do we know that what you dreamed for us is the best choice?"
Sevor shrugged his shoulders and smiled helplessly. "I don't know," he admitted. "I've never been a part of anything I've dreamed until I dreamed of all of you coming to my world. I suppose I would be uncomfortable trying to deviate from a dream when everything I've ever dreamed in my life has unfolded exactly as I expected. When I have dreamed of something happening in my world, my dreams have always been right. Always. It hasn't always been possible to verify my dreams of other worlds, but since all of you are exactly as I dreamed you, I would say my dreams have been amazingly accurate. That may not mean anything now, and it certainly may not mean that what I dreamed is the best thing possible for all of us, but I can't help but trust my dream."
"I'm just not sure that there isn't a better strategy than standing out in the open," Timi objected, "whatever you may have dreamed."
A frown creased Sevor's brow as he answered slowly, "When I dreamed of the last group of Figments coming to attack us, my dream was a warning, and that warning was enough to save us. Yet when I dreamed of the upcoming attack, the dream did more than just warn me that the Figments would attack, and more than show me where. It showed me each and every one of us, and all in specific places. If there was no reason for that, my dream should have ended as soon as I recognized this town. That would have been all the warning we needed. But my dream didn't end there because it was trying to not just warn us; it was trying to guide us. Just like the dream that guided me to all of you."
"That's enough for me," Drew stated softly, dreams rushing in and out of her eyes. Dream people pouring from houses then vanishing into the surrounding hills. The world of her dreams marred by a white gash that was like the harsh light slashing through her eyes when she first woke up every morning. The dream of a room beneath the stairs where strong arms and warm lips waited. Dreams within dreams until she couldn't quite recall what was real. But she could still feel what she thought felt real. Or at least she still dreamt she could feel the difference. "We have nothing left to trust in other than our dreams."
"And in uz," buzzed a familiar voice, and the companions all looked up at the larger of the original hummeybees. "If the man'z dream waz true, he zhould have zeen uz. We have come through a dream to help zave you. Where zhould we wait?"
Sevor's eyes grew distant, until once more he could see the wave of creatures crashing against the land and the pitiful handful of people waiting on a hill, and the lonely couple standing hand in hand in the shadow of a building, and this time, now that he had paused to recall every last detail, he could see the tiny dots of black and yellow flitting across the empty sky that stretched between the Source and the hill.
"You must wait in the sky overhead, between us and the Barrier," Sevor told the hummeybees. "And you must make yourselves as small as possible."
The hummeybee buzzed a distinct laugh. "We will wait az you zay, but you need not tell uz how bezt to fight. When we are zmall, we are quick. When we are unnotized, we ztrike without warning. We know how to fight."
A dream of a watercolor world floated through Drew's eyes. "In your world, you never had reason to fight," she murmured drowsily, and Gyfree's hand tightened its hold as if he was afraid that any moment she might slip from his grasp.
"Yez, but zometimez you dreamed uz fierze, juzt az zometimez you dreamed uz huge. Zo we have the power to be gentle or fierze, zmall or huge. You gave uz a choize, even then," droned the hummeybee fondly, its wings brushing fingers of air across her face in a tender caress. "Juzt az you may give yourzelf a choize zoon." Without another word, the hummeybee soared high into the empty sky, and with an excited buzz, all the other hummeybees followed.
"I think that's our cue," Sevor said tensely. "Places, everyone."
The others were barely out of earshot when Gyfree reached out his other hand and roughly turned Drew around to face him. "Stay with me, Drew," he implored, voice harsh with the same pain that darkened his eyes. "Don't let yourself be pulled away."
Drew blinked dreamily, then blinked again, her eyes once more sharply focused on Gyfree's face. "I feel so strange," she whispered, "as if I really have been caught up in nothing but a dream. You seem so real to me, but I'm not sure. Maybe you're just the best and most wonderful dream I've ever had."
"It's the Source," Gyfree explained urgently. "That's what it does. It pulls Dreamers back to their waking world. And it's trying to pull you away from me now."
"It feels like the morning light, telling me it's time to wake up. Time to wake up before the beautiful dream turns into another nightmare," murmured Drew.
"But it hasn't all been like a dream," insisted Gyfree, "and it hasn't all been beautiful. Remember the death of my father. Remember the Figments you fought and killed. Remember my Figment killing me. Remember the Figment that caught and nearly killed you. Remember all the pain and death, and you'll know this has been more than just a marvelous dream."
Drew gazed up into the intense golden brown eyes and lifted a hand to touch Gyfree's disheveled, rusty hair. "Help me," she cried. "I don't want to wake up. Even if it has just been a dream, even if the nightmare is about to take us all, I want to stay here with you."
Gyfree's mouth crashed down, his lips pressing hers open to steal her breath in exchange for his own, and caught tightly against his body she could feel his heart racing against hers, could feel her heart quicken to keep pace, could feel both hearts running as if they would never stop, running not away from something feared, but toward something desired.
Then a shudder ran through the ground beneath their feet, and their lips fell apart as their eyes were pulled toward the white crack in the sky that was suddenly spilling something viscous and black.
Timi and Peyr rushed hand in hand toward the waiting hill and scampered up its bank to stand panting side by side, eyes on the white scar of the Source. Once they had caught their breaths, Peyr wrapped an arm around Timi and pulled her into the crook of his shoulder. Then, leaning close, he whispered, "I know what you need to do."
Tearing her eyes free from the ominous Source, Timi blinked up at him. "What are you talking about?"
"You need to trust yourself," answered Peyr enigmatically.
Timi blinked again. "Now I'm truly confused. How is trusting myself going to make a difference here and now?"
Peyr turned her around to face him, gripping her by the shoulders just as Gyfree was gripping Drew, and said with an urgency that also matched his, "When you absorbed your Figment, you regained all the powers you had detached from yourself. You know that, and so you've been very careful to rein in all your seductive powers, all your ability to entice and capture. You need to unleash those powers now and use them against the Figments."
The bewilderment in Timi's face was whisked away by an expression of horror. "I can't," she gasped. "What if I lose control? What if I can't rein myself back in? Then I'll be no better than my Figment was, and you'll be no more than just another helpless slave."
"Trust yourself," insisted Peyr. "I trust you because I know all those things you fear will never happen. But there has to be a reason you possess the powers you do, just as there has to be a reason you felt compelled to stay here. Don't you see? That reason is because you have the power to make a difference if you only trust yourself first."
Timi stared up at Peyr, but she no longer saw his strong and earnest face; instead she saw the perfect features of the Figment, his golden hair curling over his forehead, his blue eyes filled with all the glory of a summer sky, an alluring, irresistible smile curling across his face, and a horde of faceless, helpless people groveling at his feet. Then his face melted into her face, and a kneeling man looked up at her with hungry, slavish eyes, his features no longer anonymous, but the same as the man who only moments ago had looked down at her as he held her by the arms. Tears surged through her eyes to wash away the appalling vision, and she was again staring up at Peyr's strong, freed face. "I can't," she whispered.
There was no time for further urging, for at that moment the ground shook, and they turned their eyes to see a thick black flood gush from the Source.
Mischa didn't even wait to reach their destination before she pulled a knife from a sheath wrapped around the calf of her leg and handed it to Sevor hilt first. "I want you to have this. Just in case," she said with a twisted smile. "If we're fighting Figments, it might be better to at least have something to fight with."
Sevor replied with his own twisted grin, and handed her another knife from a sheath strapped across his chest beneath his shirt. "And I'd like you to have this. Just in case. Dreamers from my world don't believe in going anywhere unprepared, especially into battle."
"They sound very wise, the Dreamers from your world," Mischa remarked with a lightness that could only be forced.
"Mostly very foolish, actually," Sevor tried to tease in return, "since most of them don't go anywhere, prepared or otherwise."
As they reached the crest of the hill, Mischa turned to face him. Over his shoulder, she could see Timi and Peyr standing side by side, Peyr's eyes intent on Timi's upturned ones, their voices intense and hushed, and she quickly averted her eyes so that all she could see was the smile twisting Sevor's lips and the hopelessness in his eyes. "What is it like, your world?" she asked softly, and without even the shadow of an attempted smile.
"Dull, at least for a Dreamer like me. True Dreamers are as rare in my world as they are in Drew's, and although we dream differently in my world, our lives are also centered on our dreams. Even the weakest Dreamers prefer living through their dreams because it seems so much simpler than living themselves. And all the weak ones dream of are ordinary people living ordinary lives. Worst of all are the strongest Dreamers, for their dreams are filled with the richer lives of extraordinary people, people from worlds like yours who live each moment fully. Dreamers like that, Dreamers like me, can barely tolerate waking up because the worlds we dream are the only worlds we want to see, and the only people we can bear to touch are those we love in our dreams."
Mischa reached up her free hand to twine her fingers through the hair that curled at the back of his neck. "So instead of just dreaming, you found your way to me. I've never really thanked you for that. For coming here to save me."
Sevor caught her hand in his and held it tight. "You never needed to thank me. I came not just to save you, but to save myself. I've never lived as fully as I have in the short time I've spent with you."
"But now you may die," Mischa whispered, her eyes reflecting the nightmare vision that still haunted his. "Living may be better than dreaming, but dreaming must be better than dying."
Gently Sevor wrapped her in his arms, as careful to avoid the knife she held as he was careful not to nick her with the blade in his hand. "To a Dreamer like me, every awakening is death, and in my world I felt the pain of death every day of my life."
"Yet dying is more absolute than the pain of death."
There was no laughter in Sevor's eyes, but there was no longer complete despair either. "I've never feared dying. What's dying to me other than just another sleep, a sleep that doesn't bring the torment of unfulfilled yearnings in its wake? And what is death to you other than just another dreamless sleep? I would rather live, and live with you, but if death awaits us, then perhaps we will still be together in a quiet sleep untouched by the painful longings that are inseparable from both life and dreams."
Sevor lowered his head to kiss her, but there was no more time. The ground trembled, and they felt as if their eyes had been seized by the white gash in the sky as it bled poisoned darkness.
Sevor tightened his grip on the knife Mischa had given him, and growled, "There are things worse than unrealized dreams or dying. And here they come."