ã€ŠDream Merchant Amelie [A Magical Realism Short Story] [Complete]ã€‹


 Chapter 1 - Selling Courage

    ¡°Thank you for your patronage,¡± I remark, as the gruff-looking man nods without a word and turns to leave, ambling out the front door in a gait I know so well.

    Mr. Vincent Hovst, a regular of mine since 5 years ago; his pockets are deep, and past the questions of utmost practicality, he doesn¡¯t convey to me many pleasantries. But I know all of his secrets in a way that would have his romantic partner storm off if they ever knew. In fact, he has two partners in love: one is his wife in the waking world of ours, and another woman more perfect than his wife ever was, conjured in the world of dreams which I sell to him. And this dream sells incredibly well.

    I hug the pile of Denaros on the counting table and gather them close, clattering the glinting gold of coins into a measured box. Come morning, my assistant Jules will neatly count them up for me with his power over metal ¨C though from the looks of it, it looks like Hovst has given me an extra twenty in tip. Jules and I will split half of the tip to get something extra from Marnie¡¯s shack ¨C perhaps join in a few matches of cards amongst the drunkards ¨C and return home. Jules will be empty-handed, of course. I will return with a hundred in the meantime. What then should I do with those? Allocate them to our stockpile for more Eisen? Try out the new Taro from the Ministry? Or should I just go all-in and return with a thousand instead ¨C

    The door rattles open and in strides a young man with a stylish overcoat, his wheat-colored hair slicked back impeccably and frosted gently by the powdery snow outside. He races in so fast that my guards, posted outside in unassuming clothes, only put their hands on his shoulders right before he reaches the counter, the Quans on their wrists about to come ablaze.

    One look in the young man¡¯s eyes is all it takes for me to size him up. He¡¯s not a threat ¨C just rich and boisterous. I hold up a hand to dismiss my guards. They eye him with relative suspicion, loosening their grips and extinguishing their Quans.

    The young man speaks breathlessly.

    ¡°Bravely you descend, through the heavens of dusk.¡±

    Ah, a new client. I answer. ¡°And gravely I ascend, through the mortal rain.¡±

    ¡°Yet lacking my wings, I cannot soar,¡± he answers back.

    ¡°So weather you must, the storm and strain,¡±

    ¡°But wish for it not, the giver of wings.¡±

    ¡°To whom would you beseech for wings of thine?¡± I ask.

    The young man pauses, racking his memory, his syllables stuttering. Then he gets it.

    ¡°To ¨C to the white owl of Serien, gracing the heavens from twilight to dawn.¡±

    Not bad at all, I muse. The speed and near-flawless delivery of his side of line speaks to me of his intelligence and betrays his desperation.

    I fold my hands and lean in. ¡°Welcome to this side of the world. I see Maestro Ophelia led you to me.¡±

    ¡°Are you Dream Merchant Amelie?¡±

    ¡°In the flesh in this desert of the real.¡±

    ¡°Thank the MAHANIR. I only have about an hour ¨C maybe 50 minutes at most. I heard you can give motivation. Courage. Inspiration. Boldness. All that.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯ve heard correctly,¡± I speak in casual airs.

    ¡°Oh, that¡¯s great, that¡¯s great!¡± he exclaims, seizing my hands and gathering them in his palms. My guards immediately reach for his shoulder, but I simply utter a soft ¡®fura¡¯ from my mouth, which cleaves him from me with a sizable breeze, fluttering my hair.

    ¡°Some distance, if you may,¡± I order casually, adjusting my straight bangs of black and repositioning my impeccable bun. ¡°I¡¯ve yet to be acquainted with your name.¡±

    ¡°Oh, sorry, sorry. I¡¯m Reynauld. Can¡¯t say my last name, it¡¯s a bit... private.¡±

    I chuckle a little on the inside. Nothing can ever be private from a Dream Merchant in this line of work, Mr. Reynauld.

    ¡°Good to have your acquaintance, Mr. Reynauld. How may I motivate you today?¡± I ask, lightly cocking my head, sizing him up at a single glance.

    Worry. Listlessness. Timidity. They¡¯re written all over the way he enunciates his words and the way he stands.

    ¡°Well, yes, um, hoo ¨C hah ¨C how do I say it ¨C it¡¯s for a negotiation. In one hour.¡±

    ¡°I understand that this upcoming negotiation is quite important?¡±

    ¡°Yes, yes of course! Most certainly.¡±

    ¡°And you are in need of courage?¡±

    ¡°Yes, exactly.¡±

    ¡°Is this your first time with a Dream Merchant?¡± I ask, a standard opener for a new client anywhere.

    ¡°Well yes ¨C actually no.¡±

    ¡°Which is it, Mr. Reynauld? Every second we waste is every second your courage is denied its muster,¡± I inquire, closing my books shut.

    ¡°When I was a little kid, yes, once. To remove a recurring nightmare. But that was the only time.¡±

    Oh dear, this wasn¡¯t going to go the way he expected. No wonder Ophelia referred him to me. To meld with a person¡¯s Kaha ¨C the shape of their soul ¨C usually was a process requiring an hour at the least. Several hours more if they weren¡¯t already acquainted to the process by which we Dream Merchants melded with their consciousness in the first place. That was, unless...

    ¡°I see. The process of acquainting with a completely uninitiated client takes several hours. Even up to a day. Based on current circumstances, I¡¯m afraid what you¡¯re asking is a pretty tall order,¡± I reply.

    ¡°Wait, wait, wait, everyone said that. But I can manage it. I can manage it. I¡¯m sure of it. I said I was a little kid when I first engaged with a Dream Merchant, but I remember the steps clearly.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m iterating it for your own sake, Mr. Reynauld. If you can be sure that you are open enough for me to incept the dream you desire in less than an hour, I can avail your request.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s perfect. That¡¯s perfect! I am sure of it.¡±

    ¡°I can make no guarantees,¡± I say, despite knowing full well that I actually can if I tried - but a disclaimer in this line of work is needed for more than just habit. And disclaimer I need to issue, because I would need something extra: Eisen.

    ¡°I would like to engage your services, Maestro Amelie,¡± he says, extending his hand. Well, if he so wants. The fact that he didn¡¯t ask for a quote on how much it would cost was a testament to his desperation.

    And desperation equals money. I take his hand and shake it heartily.

    ¡°No time to waste,¡± I say, jumping to my feet and striding past the counter with my new client in tow, nearly dragging him along. ¡°Jules! Need you in the Garden.¡±

    My assistant Jules¡¯ head pops out from behind one of the bookshelves, in his hand a ladle. ¡°Will be right there!¡± he says, dumping everything to dash and nearly tripping on the books, the alchemical instruments, and vines protruding on their way down to the heart of my establishment.

    I chant softly to throw open the several curtains of green, and descend a flight of mossy stone stairs lit by yellow antaric spotlights. Reynauld and I pass a set of doors at the landing, bearing us down and closer to the subterranean center of my building complex, through a small passage flanked by bookshelves, and out of a spacious wooden gate into a large clearing.

    Reynauld turns his head this way and that as I stride with him in tow towards comfy hammocks suspended from the branches and vines on the ceiling. The entire chamber was a nature-repose; it was in the shape of a circle, some 20 yards in diameter, with a tall ceiling. Small birds which I kept chirped by the side branches, tuning down their song with a silent hush from me; moss and flowers grew around the sides in carefully arranged-pots, the air infused with the fragrance of petrichor, the scent of the soil after rain. A mellow, hazy light of warmth emanated from the carefully installed antaric spotlights above, camouflaged among the leaves of interior trees, shining down to make this subterranean garden a picture of veritable paradise. Since I¡¯m holding Reynauld¡¯s hand, I can feel his heartbeat slow little by little ¨C a far cry from the skittish rhythm he had up at the counter.

    Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

    ¡°Make yourself comfortable, Mr. Reynauld,¡± I instruct, as I motion him to take his recline upon a comfortable hammock in pine-green. He takes off his shoes and, with some gentle adjustments, manages to position himself into the hammock, swinging a little.

    ¡°Do I need to do anything else?¡±

    ¡°Not yet. We will be starting in a few seconds.¡±

    Jules sprints over with a bar of Eisen. I plop myself down into a velvety armchair next to the hammock, and crack the crimson bar in two, letting loose a powdery cloud of red. A spark from my fingers is all it takes for it to set alight, making a light puff as it burns up into a red haze that I inhale deeply.

    Oh, it is so good.

    The world in my vision comes alive in a multitude of colors. Every color becomes more radiant, every edge sharper until I can see even the outlines of the cells of my plants. The spellsongs float up from my memory into my immediate consciousness, ready to be sung; my veins feel pricked by ice and fire, all the while my mind hones its focus to a razor¡¯s edge. It¡¯s been a year since I¡¯ve done Eisen, outlawed in the Republics by the order of the President, but goodness, what power we folks are denied.

    I close my eyes, and can see the radiant lines that separate the living from the inanimate. The stone floors below the armchair are muted and dull, while Reynauld and Jules standing behind me are outlined by weaves of white as if trembling in the moonlight. I dismiss Jules with a motion of my hand, and turn my focus towards Reynauld, my heart awakening to the size and shape of his soul.

    ¡°Take my hand, Mr. Reynauld.¡± His hand brushes mine. Our fingers entwine.

    Both of us have our eyes closed now.

    In the beginning, only a soft, velvet black drapes my vision where his heart should be. But as I wait, holding Reynauld¡¯s hand in mine, the pulse of our own hearts becoming known to each other, I hear a trickling of a stream emerging from the silence. I see a droplet of water in the far-off distance, trembling, wavering, racing like a raindrop down a window to one side and then to the other, observing me like a curious little critter. His Maht ¨C the element at his coming of age ¨C is water. This is going to be manageable, easy, even: those with souls of water are eager to become and take shape.

    Reynauld should¡¯ve seen the wisps of my soul too, because his raindrop recoils in the shock of the unfamiliar new, and rushes back as if to run away. I call out gently to Reynauld in this half-waking, half-dream state, dropping the prefix of ¡®Mister¡¯.

    It¡¯s alright, Reynauld.

    We¡¯re speaking soul-to-soul, outside the boundaries of social confines.

    I¡¯m not someone who will hurt you. I¡¯m here to help you grow. You are not being chased by anyone or your past.

    His soul still wavers. The raindrop that represents the core of his being is ever on edge. It¡¯s hard to take his mind off the upcoming negotiation he has, but he must try his best.

    The world you are in is timeless, suspended in slumber. Here, you are not being chased by dues and wants of other people. You can feel free to be who you are.

    And with that line, Reynauld¡¯s raindrop slows to a crawl, and instead, the curious little blob seems to look back towards my voice. Like a critter, it stops its retreat; taking the shape of a little squirrel, it looks me up and down from afar, cocking its head, brushing its face and tail. I hold out my palm for it to arrive.

    Ever so cautiously, the water-squirrel that is Reynauld¡¯s soul inches closer. It sniffs the fragrance of my fingers and tests the palm of my hand, poking it, putting its tiny paws and feet on it, hopping off, then hopping on again, precious minutes transpiring in the world outside.

    I occlude the sensation of urgency I feel with my heart, shuffling it away into the dark where Reynauld cannot see. I am a beacon here; what my state of mind is, it will be the state of mind for those that I am melded to. I cannot risk it startling Reynauld¡¯s soul.

    I see the water-squirrel¡¯s tiny heartbeat soften in rhythm as it snuggles up to the warmth of my Kaha and rests upon my outstretched hands. It ruffles its tiny nose and whiskers as it squeaks, turning its head this way and that, its beady eyes of acute and alert intelligence trying to read my thoughts.

    I lean in my ears within this boundary between the waking and the dreaming, listening to the whispers of Reynauld¡¯s soul. At first, the words it enunciates is unintelligible to me, but it¡¯s because I still cling onto the language of human construct. I let them go, letting the words and grammar I know so well fall away, and in my ears enters a new kind of speech, one which does not need logic or reason to be understood. Words from Reynauld¡¯s heart arrive into mine, and the more I hear, the more I feel the threads of meaning surface from the black; they tug at my intuition and instinct, making their meaning known like words said from a dream, words which make sense without a need for justification.

    And as I sit there ever-still, my heart open, the words from Reynauld¡¯s water-squirrel form themselves into threads of gold, shaping into constellations on the firmament of our imaginations. As I listen on further, my eyes gently closed, the words of the little squirrel-sprite manifest themselves into distinct waters and waves, gather into anvil clouds of epic repose, and to earth and craggy rocks amidst a tempestuous sea. The three-heads of a hydra ¨C a monstrous sea creature ¨C wrap themselves into being with the threads cording like bandages upon their skeletons, emerging from the stormy waves, their scales of green adamant and steel reflecting the rapidly fading sun, their jaws and serrated teeth bared towards Reynauld, his lonely figure cowering amidst a rocky outcrop. The threads envelop and wrap themselves into distinct objects and beings until every corner of the painting that is our shared dream is filled with vivid color and motion, of substance and texture.

    So this is his dream. His state of mind. He¡¯s facing down against a monster that he has no hope of defeating, and that¡¯s what made him seek me out.

    To incept in him indomitable courage, I need to do two things precisely: One, to help him reshape the image of himself, and Two, to help him defeat the monster. For that, I myself require a costume change.

    I suspend the scene and Reynauld in it with a brief spellsong from my lips, and clad myself in a armor of silver and diamond, radiant with the glinting sunlight, entering the sphere of the dream itself. My hair loosens from its bun and comes down to my waist in flowing lustrous black ¨C I don on my forehead a circlet befitting an empress, my straight bangs cut and fluffing up in volume. I turn my eyes from a color of violet to luminous cyan; in my hand I conjure a lance of light, eight cubits long, enough to dwarf a grown man.

    I dress Reynauld in the dream with an armor of blue and gold befitting knights, pauldrons glittering with such force that gazing onto them would banish all darkness; I loosen his hair from that impeccable but suffocating slick into loose and strident waves; I make him muscular, bulkier, and don him his boots with a flick of my finger, metal plates coming together and into a spiked toe that could crush mountains with a kick.

    ¡°Continuare,¡± I enunciate, as the scene resumes, and Reynauld unfreezes. He jolts to his senses, panicking at the scene unfolding before him, his gaze darting from the sea to the monster to the lone outcrop amidst the ocean where we were perched. He doesn¡¯t yet know how he¡¯s dressed, let alone that he can conjure as much strength as he desires in this dream world of my craft.

    He speaks in panicked grunts.

    ¡°What, where, who ¨C¡± he stutters, stumbling on his feet.

    I grab his hand.

    ¡°VALIANT REYNAULD, KNIGHT OF THE SEAS!¡± I call to him, conceiving in him a quality he never knew in himself. ¡°Too long hast thee walked amidst shadows. Too long hast thee been stalked by nightmares of late, haunting thee so and reducing thee to a mere wisp of thyself! But fear no more, for Dame Amelie hast come to reaffirm thine courage!¡±

    Reynauld¡¯s hand instinctively tightens in my grip.

    ¡°Knight of the Seas? Me? Who am ¨C who am I supposed to be?¡±

    Perfect.

    I snap my fingers to pause the hydra while revealing the length of a mirror amidst the sea-spray, reflecting Reynauld¡¯s image in full glory to himself. He looks taken aback, recoiling a bit because who he sees in the mirror seems not to be the timid himself he knows, but he touches his face and pinches his cheeks to feel real pain ¨C pain that I make, of course. He feels his metal armor, cradles its sturdy plates; astonishment seizes him as he stands with mouth agape, movements of his head fluttering his hair in triumphant waves.

    Strong. Handsome. Heroic.

    The creases around his eyes, initially squeezed in fear, begin to vanish. He flexes his fingers, opening and closing his hand in his metaled gloves, engraved with patterns of the sun and the stars. He glances at his boots, lightly putting his feet down to feel the earth quake beneath his step.

    Protected too.

    ¡°I am... a knight?¡± he asks, not taking the gaze off himself. The corners of his mouth begin to relax.

    ¡°Always was,¡± I reply, taking his hand and pulling him up to where I am. ¡°A Knight of our King.¡±

    ¡°How long was I gone?¡±

    Fantastic.

    ¡°Fifty years.¡±

    ¡°Fifty?¡±

    ¡°Indeed. Cursed by shadows that haunted thee, thee were bound to a dreamless sleep where the Sun does not reach. The shadows took thy memory, banished thee to oblivion! At great cost, across three days and three nights, I have rescued thee from their evil.¡±

    ¡°What of the monster that stands before us?¡±

    ¡°In thine absence, monsters of their ilk began to run rampant,¡± I enunciate with clarity. ¡°We fought them bravely, and are holding them at bay, but we have not been able to vanquish their all-mother. For that, we need thy wisdom, thy power.¡±

    ¡°And their all-mother is ¨C¡±

    ¡°The creature that rears in front of us.¡±

    ¡°Why must I be the one to do it? Couldn¡¯t you have done it yourself?¡±

    ¡°Few knights of the King come close to thy power, Knight Reynauld. We have been waiting for thy return, and that is why I have been sent. We need thy power to split the sky and sunder the seas. Thou hast done it many times before ¨C and thou shalt do it again. I have frozen this monster in time for only a moment, but to vanquish its evil, we need thee.¡±

    At my words Reynauld¡¯s lips tighten in silent determination. His eyes assess the hydra monster ahead of him, suspended at my will by the force of my command. He does not remember fully of being a Knight ¨C after all, it is an idea I conceived within his psyche ¨C but thrust into this dream where he is the strongest, most capable, and most wanted by the peoples of whom I speak, he begins to believe.

    He speaks. ¡°You speak words of courage. Yet, how do I know if I possess the strength still?¡±

    ¡°You need only to grasp your weapon,¡± I say, briefly peering into the thoughts from his childhood and adolescence, flooding my mind with his memories. An image of a warhammer springs into my consciousness. He¡¯d played around with a toy warhammer ever since he was five, but when he had brought it to school, his jealous peers had broken it and thrown it away. The warhammer he once had was painted yellow and navy.

    And so in Reynauld¡¯s hand I place a warhammer twelve cubits long, its handle longer than my own lance, the hammerhead itself weighing a thousand pounds. Engraved in gold and navy blue, humming a tune like that of an ancient chant, it is doubtlessly a weapon of the divine. Now, Reynauld is to wield it, and with it, triumph over the creature that represents his fears.

    An unmistakable change comes over Reynauld¡¯s eyes. It is almost as if he has rediscovered a part of himself that he¡¯d lost long ago. As he tenuously grasps the shaft of his warhammer and brushes the gleaming metal, feeling its sturdy weight upon his fingers, the hazy cloud of his eyes begin to disappear, his hair brightening in color, the creases in his world-weary forehead becoming taut.

    He begins to smile.

    Something tells me it¡¯s been his first smile in a long while, ever since he was thrust into his line of business by his father just 3 years ago, a memory which also rushed into my cognition ¨C a business in which he was unwilling to partake. He had always wanted to be an explorer, but was denied the path due to the cruelty of circumstance.

    Now, he has a chance to change it.

    Reynauld sets his eyes upon the hydra. I raise my lance.

 Chapter 2 - The Ups and Downs of Amelie Marceau

    ¡°On your left!¡± I exclaim, as Reynauld stridently ducks beyond the snapping maws of the hydra, and issues an uppercut with the warhammer that thunders across the heavens.

    The monster¡¯s head explodes on impact, rarefying to fine mist. I repel the corrosive blood away with a command from my knightly self.

    ¡°Another on your side!¡± I issue my assistance, cleaving another of the hydra¡¯s jaws in two with my lance of light before it can seize Reynauld¡¯s dream-body. The hydra roars its primal scream through the tempest. Another one of the hydra¡¯s heads rush towards Reynauld, which he can barely deflect with the head of his weapon. Though his warhammer is stately and divine, it is proving unwieldy in close quarters.

    Time to give him some more control.

    ¡°Reynauld! The weapon is bonded to your soul and will. Change its form if you must.¡±

    There is very little hesitation from Reynauld as he conveys his thoughts to the weapon, a conveyance which I can feel in the weaves of the dream. The warhammer¡¯s handles shorten to the length of a chair leg, and on its end, a length of burgundy fabric appears. He wraps the fabric around his hands and begins spinning the warhammer. The velocity of its rotation sends out shockwaves out and around to the tempest and the seas of our dream sphere.

    The hydra¡¯s heads, grown back now to six, cleaves space in its snapping stride towards us. Serrated teeth bared, three of its heads lunge at us ¨C

    With a release and a bang, Reynauld slams the head of his mighty hammer into the first, obliterating it ¨C and without taking a second to waste, throws it like a boomerang to the other two, golden lightning issuing forth from its advance. It atomizes the second head and then cleaves the other head in two, and returns to Reynauld¡¯s hand, giving us temporary reprieve from its onslaught. We regather the rain around us as we witness the hydra regrow its heads ¨C more than the last. With a distending sound of crunches and squelches of expanding flesh, the hydra¡¯s heads explode out forth from the cross-sections of its neck, its form serpentine across the flashes of black lightning from the overcast skies. Brief images of people ¨C faces that Reynauld knows in his subconscious ¨C flash across the countenance of the hydra¡¯s heads, a man with beard and glasses, another with a moustache, and many others both men and women of various features. They leer at him and shout him names, insults, and words that would destroy anyone¡¯s self-esteem.

    Our challenge grows in difficulty, and it¡¯s decidedly perfect. For Reynauld to believe in this dream and be convinced of the memory of his courage, the conflict he faces must be grand and worth conquering. The fire of one¡¯s bravery shines most radiantly in the face of the impossible, and should Reynauld be able to overcome the impossible, he will have a long-lasting antidote against all manners of situations in the waking world that instill fear. From the client¡¯s point of view, experiencing an incepted dream and emerging from it is quite analogous to coming down with the flu, and defeating it to gain immunity. The longevity of this immunity comes down to how well the Dream Merchant can craft and sell this dream, among its many factors the conflict, narrative, the environment, and its inhabitants.

    Reynauld is shot across the sky and into the sea as the hydra slams him full force with its many tails. I let him feel the full force of the impact, but dive after him to ensure that he surfaces. He does, though barely ¨C he is trying hard to keep the falling rain out of his eyes, his teeth gritted in determination, the waves engulfing the both of us in its rogue crests. The hydra, stretching the many coils of his heads and tails, extends its wings to blot out the Sun. The image that Reynauld witnesses seems nigh-undefeatable.

    But is it really so?

    ¡°Knight Reynauld,¡± I advise him, ¡°The all-mother of monsters cannot be defeated through ordinary means.¡± I haul him out of the sea, flying into the sky again so we can better assess the battlescape. ¡°Its form is of a hydra. In order to vanquish it for good, we must destroy all of its heads at the same time.¡±

    ¡°How?¡± Reynauld asks warily, in his eyes a flurry of calculations.

    ¡°Your weapon and yourself are capable of dealing more than just primitive blows,¡± I assure him, ballooning his confidence. ¡°Your powers, though having been sealed for quite a time, are still with you. You need only a memory of your past, and you shall know what to do.¡±

    ¡°Which memory do you speak of?¡±

    I suspend the dream sphere and let my vision rifle through the pages of his past. The landscape changes and shifts around me as I drop myself in for a visit in the streets of a city, a school, a park, at home, at the dinner table, among his books, next to his bed, along the toy-rack where his warhammer was kept. Next to the toy-rack is a small notebook ¨C his diary perhaps? I open it, flip them through their many dates and numbers, their actual contents having faded long ago from his recognition even in his subconscious. School assignments are always quickly forgotten. But something catches the corner of my eye ¨C a gleaming piece of paper stuck between the folds of his bookshelf ¨C highlighted in radiant yellow outlines. I pry it out to see its contents.

    ¡®My Royal Retinue, Super-Secret,¡¯ the piece of paper states in bold letters on top. Surprisingly, the letters haven¡¯t faded ¨C so it¡¯s something he still knows in his subconscious. All I need is to remind him of what follows that header.

    Throwing a cursory glance, I make out sketches of three different animals of various kinds ¨C all of them chimerical and not a single animal that neatly fits into real ones ¨C that Reynauld had come up with when he was a child. The other sketches are fuzzy.

    Only these three could be of use.

    "Lightning buns!

    Icekiratops!

    Suncrow Atenis!"

    They¡¯re childlike, but full of wonder and delight. With the imaginations that these little sketches and their names can conjure, Reynauld can triumph over this evil.

    I hoist myself back out from the memory of his childhood bedroom, emerge next to Reynauld¡¯s paused form, and unfreeze the time of our dream sphere against the hydra.

    ¡°The memory of your royal companions, which you¡¯ve used to bring judgment to the likes of this hydra, many years ago.¡±

    ¡°My royal companions...¡± Reynauld trails off, his warhammer crackling in his hand.

    ¡°Do you, perchance, recall your companion formed of lightning and fur?¡± I hint, regathering my lance of light, shaping it into a more luminous form.

    Recognition bursts forth from Reynauld¡¯s gaze. His pupils constrict, his purpose made clear.

    Reynauld immediately transforms the warhammer in his hand to a mighty greatsword, curved in an arc, surging with arcs of crackling yellow sparks. He takes to the heavens; I rocket towards the sky with him in tow, cleaving the gray clouds, sighting the hydra below.

    Without my guidance, for he likely needs none now ¨C Reynauld lifts his greatsword up, and from its gilded reflections bursts forth a mighty giant rabbit with the paws and tails of a cat, with thick and huggable floppy ears, just like it was in the sketch. It twitches its nose as it licks Reynauld from head to toe, snuggling up to it.

    My lance extinguishes. Reynauld is beginning to take active control over this dream. I can wrest it back, but why would I? It¡¯s going better than I expected.

    ¡°Buns!¡± says Reynauld, taking the fluffy gold creature for a big embrace. I witness their reunion from afar.

    Reynauld whispers to it, and little by little, arcs of golden lightning begin to surge and crackle around its fur, standing on their ends. It sights the hydra below.

    Reynauld, with a bit of effort, reshapes his greatsword into a lustrous icy spear, taking off its long tip and throwing it into the sky.

    A giant creature resembling a rhinoceros ¨C but with a large bony shield of ice on its head and a long tail that ends in a spiky ball ¨C somersaults into existence and lands atop the clouds, making their anvil ends puff out. It stretches and yawns, shaking its head.

    ¡°Kira!¡± Reynauld says, flying over to hug it, but Kira extends one thick leg and holds him away, making a minuscule ¡®hmpf¡¯. It¡¯s clearly not happy that it¡¯s been abandoned for too long!

    But a few seconds of cajoling here and there, and Kira leans its ears ¨C where are its ears? ¨C into Reynauld¡¯s speech, sighting the hydra below. It rears up on its hind legs and back down again, ready to fall like a meteor to slam the hydra full-force, waiting for Reynauld¡¯s command.

    But not all is done, because Reynauld takes to the blazing Sun overhead, disappearing for a few moments, and arrives on the neck of a colossal crow wreathed in fire, possessing three legs. The atmosphere sizzles with its arrival; just its wings dwarf both the creature named ¡®Buns¡¯ and ¡®Kira¡¯!

    His royal retinue is all assembled. Buns and Kira both angle themselves down at the direction of the hydra. Buns towards the hydra¡¯s heads, Kira at the hydra¡¯s torso. Reynauld himself, on what must be his Suncrow Atenis, gathers his reins.

    He sounds the charge.

    Buns and Kira both cleave the clouds into space as they rocket like meteors towards the maws of the hydra below.

    The hydra makes a deafening roar as it threatens to swallow Buns and Kira just a few hundred yards away.

    ¡°BUNS, LIGHTNING SCAR!¡±

    And instantly, air and space sunders in two with a rift of golden lightning, expanding so fast into thunder that for a second, I ¨C the conjurer of this dream ¨C cannot hear. The rift of the golden lightning bisects the heads of the hydra in two, and before it can regenerate, Reynauld issues another spell.

    ¡°KIRA, MEGA FREEZE!¡±

    The suspended raindrops around the hydra gather explosively across its torso and the severed cross-section of its necks ¨C and in an instant, solidifies into massive blocks of ice with jutting crystals, luminescent in their glow. The hydra flails the exposed length of its necks, trying to smash the ice on its tips so the heads can re-emerge, but Reynauld has another spell loaded and ready, issuing his command as he and his Suncrow Atenis descend like a brilliant comet from the sky.

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    ¡°KIRA, BUNS, KEEP IT IN PLACE!¡±

    Immediately, the ocean at the hydra¡¯s knees gather into a thunderous whirlpool of monstrosity, gathering all caught in its path like leaves in a waterfall. The whirlpool hews the rocky outcrop from where we began, crumbles it to dust in its serrated frosty blades, and immobilizes the hydra in place with arcs of lightning thundering into the sky. The rushing vortex, towing the air above into a tornado of rain and frost, gathers the necks of the hydra into a tight bundle.

    ¡°EAT IT WHOLE, SUNCROW ATENIS!¡± Reynauld commands without wasting a beat, his voice overwhelming every single raindrop in the air, whereupon the Suncrow Atenis opens its beak ¨C no a jaw ¨C no a gigantic maw ¨C and immolates itself in blistering flame. It parts the clouds with Reynauld on its neck and displaces ten thousand tons of air, rushing past us, dwarfing the hydra in size, and devours the necks and remaining heads of the hydra in a singular, titanic chomp, the rain vaporizing and sizzling away by the force of the blast. Kira and Buns both dodge out of the way.

    But the hydra isn¡¯t done yet, because it lengthens its tail and slaps Reynauld hard in a last ditch effort, cleaving his armor in two and throwing him off Suncrow Atenis ¨C and yet, Reynauld has all he needs to take it on. I make space between the hydra and myself, as Reynauld commands his royal retinue to take to the skies.

    ¡°BUNS, KIRA, ATENIS ¨C SHOW THEM YOUR POWERS COMBINED!¡±

    The three crater the ocean as they take to the heavens and into the void, and not mere 5 seconds later, a brilliant flash of light rends the upper skies.

    The hydra flails about, trying desperately to regrow its heads. It almost succeeds in restoring a portion of one neck, then another, and another, but ¨C

    I look up and my eyes grow wide.

    The descending meteor of blistering blue flames is probably going to engulf me too, and I definitely have no intention to be caught in the blast, let alone try to alter it for it could ruin Reynauld¡¯s narrative in this dream. I immediately call the winds to carry me far, far away, as far as I can while also witnessing the impact of the divine that will atomize everything in miles ¨C and turn my head.

    I hear Reynauld¡¯s last chant in my consciousness.

    ¡°LET THE HEAVENS FALL.¡±

    All world becomes white as snow as the meteor slams into the struggling remainders of the hydra ¨C the world seems to pause on its own accord. And as my eyes adjust, a fireball of blue and violet shocks forth into existence, devouring the sky, sea, and the seafloor in its path. It utterly atomizes the hydra, rendering it to dust, while the fireball rarefies the air in its explosive punch outwards, painting a streak of shockwaves across the clouds and the sky that I can see. I cover my ears in great satisfaction as the thunders of the upper deep arrive where I float, rending its shock through my bones.

    Holy MAHANIR, Reynauld. You had it in you all along! All you needed me to do was show you the way by restoring your memories! Talk about an easy inception! Or was it because I had taken Eisen?

    A crater sizzles into being where the hydra once was. I regather the winds to bring me there.

    Reynauld lands like a shooting star in the middle of the crater, a fist driving into the earth where no sea now lies, with Buns, Kira, and Suncrow Atenis landing behind him. Buns scratches its ears with its hind legs as Kira narrows its eyes to glance at Suncrow Atenis, who is blowing surreptitiously on its head to melt the snow and licking it like ice-cream.

    Reynauld glances up at my figure, a smile on his lips and courage on his brow, his armor radiant and gleaming, the memories of his courage restored at last thanks to his childhood companions.

    ¡°Glad to have you back, Sir Reynauld.¡±

    * * *

    Both Reynauld and I jolt awake in the Garden where everything began. He rolls out of the hammock and plants his feet firmly on the ground, looking at his hands, his head and face drenched in hot sweat. He glances around, coming to his senses, his mouth opened wide in a mixture of astonishment and wondrous marvel. He breathes deeply several times, checking his self, his arms, the suit which he wears.

    I check my pocket watch. 47 minutes to the clock, since the dive. I get up and proceed towards him.

    Reynauld straightens himself up and flexes his arms, looking to the gardened ceiling, closing his eyes to savor the scent of the air. He opens them again, an aura of absolute resolve sizzling from his gaze. He sees me approaching and dauntlessly takes my hand. There is a warm strength to his grip, and as his heartbeat reaches mine, they drum and assure me before mine has a chance to assess it.

    He leans close, his brow lowered, his features sharp.

    ¡°Thank you, Maestro Amelie ¨C you¡¯ve unlocked the memories of my greatest companions. Kira, Buns, Atenis. I sought to remember them, to dream of them, but could never remember them ever since the desert of this world took it away. They¡¯d accompanied me on adventures and journeys. They¡¯d given me courage when I was little, and I had given them too. What awesome joy to see them again, knowing they have always been by my side! You¡¯ve given me everything I need, and more.¡±

    His words no longer have a stutter to them. They flow in rhythm like the words of a statesman, a General, a President. The timbre of his voice is deep, mellifluous, and resonant like the Knight which I made him out in my dream.

    I break into an involuntary smile, tightening my hand around his. ¡°The pleasure is mine, Mr. Reynauld. Should you need me again, I¡¯ll be here.¡±

    ¡°Thank you,¡± Reynauld replies, briefly kissing my hand, striding away in swift rhythm to gather his overcoat from the wooden hanger by the subterranean gates. He puts them on with a flourish, taps his shoes once, checks his pocket watch, and climbs the stairs.

    I follow after him for the more mundane conclusion to this session ¨C payment.

    ¡°What amount shall suffice for you, Maestro Amelie?¡± Reynauld asks, his eyes set on his carriage and entourage of guards waiting outside.

    I quickly calculate the sum in my head. One hundred per hour for an inception service, rush order, so times two, giving two hundred. Add the cost of Kaha-melding with a first-time client, plus the cost of Eisen, which is additional hundred-and-fifty plus two hundred, which gives us... five-fifty.

    ¡°Five-hundred and fifty Denaros, Mr. Reynauld,¡± I declare, expecting a guard of his to enter and pay me, since he appears not to have that sum of coins on his self.

    ¡°Nonsense!¡± chuckles Reynauld, tapping his chest. ¡°A figure too poor. Do take this instead,¡± Reynauld says, opening his coat jacket and confidently taking out a single, glimmering gold coin so giant and pure that my eyes pause at the sight.

    A thousand-Denaro coin. The last time I saw a thousand-Denaro coin was nearly seven years ago. Only a handful has ever been minted by the Reserve Bank of the Republics, people say.

    Reynauld sets the coin down for me on the counter.

    Jules leans in to inspect its inscriptions. From its minute etchings and folds, both of us spy the prized engraving of 99.999% marking that distinguishes it as the purest form of gold everywhere. From just its weight in my fingers, there¡¯s no doubt it¡¯s the genuine thing.

    ¡°Are you sure, Mr. Reynauld? This is almost double the bill.¡± I look up to confirm.

    ¡°My luck charm and prized coin from since I was a child. You have given me something more valuable than luck: a dream of myself as I always was, and of the royal retinue I¡¯d made. It is only fair for you to be its next cherisher.¡±

    ¡°If you insist...¡±

    ¡°Now then, I have a negotiation to win. I bid you adieu, Maestro Amelie.¡±

    ¡°May your dream carry you true,¡± I whisper to his leaving.

    He makes a gentleman¡¯s bow, and valiantly marches past the door, strides past the snow, his overcoat billowing behind him. One motion from his hands, and his retinue of guards in the waking world board his carriage along with him: to a new future, they depart.

    * * *

    ¡°8,665... 8,666... 8,667... ¡° Jules counts over the hum of the ceiling fan. It¡¯s the morning already ¨C but I haven¡¯t been able to get an ounce of sleep. The Eisen I took the night before has disturbed my own dreams.

    ¡°Aw, damn...¡± he murmurs under his breath, clattering the coins in an effort to recount.

    ¡°Wha¡¯s the matter?¡± I ask, clutching my throbbing head, shimmying myself up to the counter table.

    ¡°We¡¯re still short. Short of seventeen-hundred...¡±

    ¡°What?!¡± I exclaim, getting up so fast that I bang my knee on the table. I make a loud yelp, my head swimming with both pain from my knee and nausea from the Eisen. ¡°There¡¯s ¨C¡± I stutter, massaging my knee that¡¯s sprouting with fresh purple, ¡°Mr. Hovstad¡¯s sum from 3 days ago. Did you count it?¡±

    ¡°3 days ago? He came in yesterday night...¡±

    ¡°Yesterday night? You sure?¡± I ask, my memories tangled with both the real and imagined.

    ¡°Sure as grass is green and kindness is good! Don¡¯t you remember?¡±

    Oh yeah, Mr. Hovstad. Then Reynauld. That¡¯s the reason I took Eisen ¨C that¡¯s the reason why I¡¯m in this state right now.

    ¡°...I ¨C okay, it¡¯s coming back to me, damn the MAHA I ever take Eisen again...¡±

    ¡°I keep telling you not to take rushed jobs!¡± Jules admonishes.

    ¡°Hey! He was desperate. I could¡¯ve taken him on and I did. Complaining doesn¡¯t pay the bills.¡±

    ¡°We are still short though.¡±

    ¡°By how much?¡± I inquire, stumbling my way to the counter of coins.

    ¡°About seventeen hundred.¡±

    ¡°Why in the ¨C why?¡±

    ¡°The New Year? The interest¡¯s doubled,¡± Jules sighs, clutching his head and palming his face, peeking a glance at my languid figure with bedridden hair. My usual bun¡¯s been loosened into hair that comes down halfway to my back, and my bangs are all over the place. I look like the image of a witch in children¡¯s tales of old. Actually, maybe not an old hag ¨C perhaps a ghostly maiden, more like.

    I bang the table. ¡°So all that effort yesterday wasn¡¯t worth a fish¡¯s tail?¡±

    ¡°Still worth something. Still closer,¡± he reassures for fear I am going to tear something out. ¡°But we¡¯re not going to be able to foot the bill by tomorrow. We¡¯re going to need at least 10 clients coming in today, but it¡¯s...¡± he pauses, looking up at me, ¡°you are...¡±

    Jules was right. I was in no condition to push myself as hard as I did yesterday. An earsplitting headache throbs between my temples ¨C I can feel each heartbeat in my head, and all I see is a blur. I couldn¡¯t even remember the events of yesterday a moment ago. My hands are cold and clammy in the wintry chill, twitching in the aftermath of the Eisen I utilized the night prior; it¡¯s like a hangover, but much worse. Everything bad about consuming Eisen kicks in slowly and more intensely, making itself known as punishment to those that abuse its otherworldly quality.

    I draw some water out of the air by instinct and freeze it, putting it between my head, collapsing to the sofa.

    ¡°What¡¯s the exact amount we¡¯re missing?¡±

    ¡°Seventeen-hundred and thirty-two.¡±

    That required seventeen hours of work at the bare minimum. Fewer hours if the clients wanted a more difficult service, but that was no guarantee.

    ¡°Did you pay the guards already?¡± I ask, my voice coming out in raspy breaths.

    ¡°Yeah...¡±

    ¡°How about yourself?¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t yet...¡±

    Damn it. Jules hadn¡¯t even taken the money for his own share and we¡¯re still short.

    ¡°What do we do?¡± Jules asks. ¡°You can¡¯t push yourself any further...¡± he murmurs, voice trailing off.

    I clutch my head. Maybe it was time to take the plunge. The after-effects of Eisen were almost debilitating to occasional users like me, but the more regularly one consumed it, those negative effects would ameliorate to the point one would become immune. The tradeoff was that addiction would be practically inevitable. And any withdrawal would result in nothing short of carnage. Stay away from it, my parents had made me promise long ago. I didn¡¯t want to abuse this power. But having used it out of desperation a few times, I know what strength it can afford me.

    At the same time, I knew what not being able to pay dues to the Bloods meant for us. The last time, a year-and-a-half ago, we came short of three hundred Denaros when the Bloods paid us a visit. They broke everything and ransacked the place, and tore up and burned all the plants in our garden below. That was our first strike. They left us physically unharmed, but that was for a good reason: for them, we are sheep, and our wool can be harvested. Injured sheep don¡¯t make good wool. Nevertheless, they threatened us that the second strike would see our entire shop being repossessed. I knew I shouldn¡¯t have taken their loan three years ago to get started as a Dream Merchant. Every day was like pouring water into a pot with a broken bottom, hoping for it to fill.

    Perhaps now was the time for me to take the plunge into Eisen for real. I would become addicted, sure, but that meant I would gradually come to feel none of its bad effects as my body and nerves adjusted. It would make me a better Dream Merchant, perhaps the most demanded Dream Merchant out of every single republic that existed. Then I would be filthy rich. And when I¡¯m rich, I won¡¯t have to worry about how to get my supply of Eisen.

    I shakily stand up to stride to the basement.

    Jules must¡¯ve seen my thought in my eyes, because he immediately bolts up and stops me in my tracks, arms outstretched. ¡°No, just no. I know what you¡¯re thinking, but if you do, there¡¯ll be absolutely no way out.¡±

    ¡°...better than becoming homeless, no?¡±

    ¡°We won¡¯t become homeless. We¡¯ll ¨C we¡¯ll sell everything we don¡¯t need at the moment, we¡¯ll sell that remaining Eisen bar!¡±

    ¡°We can¡¯t sell those without the permission of those filthy Bloods.¡±

    ¡°MAHA damn, you are right...¡±

    It was between a rock and a hard place. Then a thought strikes my head. ¡°Marnie¡¯s. Marnie¡¯s. We go to Marnie¡¯s.¡±

    ¡°And play poque?¡± He asks.

    ¡°Precisely,¡± I say, nearly losing my balance from my swimming head.

    ¡°You are not in a state to merchant any dreams and you want to play poque?¡± He asks, incredulous.

    ¡°Poque requires a different skill. I don¡¯t need to use my head. But I need you.¡±

    ¡°We need to place bets. What¡¯re we going to be betting with?¡± he asks, arms folded.

    ¡°Our eight-thousand... whatever it is,¡± I recount.

    ¡°And if we lose it all?¡±

    ¡°The same result. The shop becomes repossessed. EXCEPT!¡± I holler, banging into the wall mid-stride, trying to get my coat on, ¡°With poque, we have a chance to pay off this month¡¯s dues. Whereas without it, I would say we don¡¯t have that chance. A chance is better than no chance, right?¡± I inquire, as my vision turns to black and I feel myself falling to the floor.

    Jules catches me with a soft chant of air before my head slams on the wood.

 Chapter 3 - At Marnies

    It is just past noon, and Jules and I find ourselves in strident march towards Marnie¡¯s Shack, a pub by the shores of the inland sea. Its haphazard architecture clamors for attention by the low-rising cliffside with foamy waves, one side of the three-storey shack nestled by the stone bank, and the other supported by various wooden and corrugated iron beams jutting out from the waters. It¡¯s an eatery and a pub, and an inn too, seeing the comings and goings of at least two hundred denizens within its bosoms every hour, run by a feisty and brutish but friendly middle-aged woman whose name graces its signboards. For a ten minute walk from my shop, the scenery is a welcome change as the houses and stores of various roofs clear up on the western side of the city of Serien, marred only by the overcast sky.

    ¡°AHOY! Amelie!¡± Marnie exclaims over the crowd as I enter through the door. ¡°Haven¡¯t seen ya in ages! Ya doin¡¯ a¡¯right?¡±

    ¡°Hi Marnie,¡± I answer sluggishly, shuffling my way towards her to place a drink.

    ¡°What¡¯s with those bags under ya eyes?¡±

    ¡°Just tired.¡±

    ¡°Tired? Got not ¡®nuff sleep?¡±

    ¡°Something like that.¡±

    ¡°Y¡¯er flower shop doing well?¡±

    ¡°My flower shop? Oh ¨C¡± I pause, recalling that I¡¯ve told everyone that I¡¯m running a flower shop so I can make it a cover for my Dream Merchanting business, ¡°I guess I can¡¯t really complain, haha, ha...¡±

    ¡°And Jules too!¡± she sights him, grabbing him by the shoulder and pulling him for a peck on the cheek like a doting mother from behind the counter. Her red mane-like hair sports minute tendrils of fire. Her Maht is Fire, after all, with a personality to boot.

    ¡°Hi Marnie, good to see you. It¡¯s really been ages.¡±

    ¡°A good look¡¯er and you spend all day working! You should show y¡¯er face more often, lad!¡±

    ¡°Anyway,¡± Marnie continues, leaning in mischievously so only I can hear, ¡°ya two have been together for how long now?¡±

    She nudges my chest with her elbow, eyebrows raising and lowering.

    ¡°Why does it seem like you want us to get married?¡± I retort in jest, arms folded. ¡°He¡¯s only my assistant, you know.¡±

    ¡°A looky handsome good young man as ¡®only¡¯ an assistant! For 3 years straight! Or! My, my, y¡¯er trialing him for a bit before ya take him on? Amelie ya sly nymph, ye!¡±

    ¡°What? No... that¡¯d be super weird. Anyways, I know my way around stuff, Marnie, I¡¯m twenty-seven...¡±

    ¡°A perfect age to get together for realsies, then!¡±

    ¡°Oh stop it,¡± I remark, brushing her ruddy hand aside, ¡°is there a poque game on right now?¡±

    ¡°Right now? It¡¯s on al¡¯ the time. What¡¯s gotten into ya, Amelie?¡±

    ¡°Oh, right...¡± I stammer, shaking my head. ¡°It¡¯s, uh...¡±

    Marnie¡¯s expression darkens. She lowers her voice, leaning into me with an expression of a worried mother. ¡°Wait... don¡¯t tell me ya¡¯ve been doing Eisen, are ya? I know that expression anywhere. Those bags under ya eyes and that look of cromulent despair,¡± she remarks. ¡°This why ya want to play poque? To pay someone?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s not really what the word ¡®cromulent¡¯ means...¡±

    She caught on with such speed about Eisen that I find my answer catching in my throat.

    ¡°And not Eisen, no, would hate to do that. My mum and dad made me swear not to. Poque¡¯s just for another bill I¡¯ve got to pay.¡±

    ¡°Oh, a¡¯right...¡± she trails off, wiping a series of mugs with her washing cloth, clearly noticing the two brown briefcases that Jules has in his hand. ¡°Anyway, ya in a peckish mood? Seeing ya¡¯ve dropped by once in a blue moon, the eats are on me tonight.¡±

    ¡°No Marnie, I can¡¯t have you do ¨C¡±

    ¡°Oh, shut up, Amelie. What ya in the mood for?¡±

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    ¡°...Some Sole meuni¨¨re?¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s ma girl. And for ye, Jules?¡±

    ¡°Just some fish and chips. Thank you.¡±

    ¡°SOLE MEUNI¨¨RE AND FISH AND CHIPS!¡± Marnie roars into her jumble of copper and brass tubes, shaped like a speaker and protruding towards the kitchen. She closes her eyes and feels their metal network up the various parts of her shack, feeling for empty spots. ¡°Eh, the second floor¡¯s got ya. Should be a table free near the seaside. Have fun!¡±

    We bid her our thanks and are on the way off when ¨C

    ¡°Oh yeah, and Amelie! If ya want to play poque, today¡¯s ¡®un ain¡¯t on the second, it¡¯s on the third!¡±

    ¡°Thank you!¡±

    ¡°So,¡± Jules leans in on our way up the wooden stairs outside, ¡°no change to our plan?¡±

    ¡°No change. You¡¯re going to be my eyes. And you¡¯re going to signal me through here when to hold or to fold,¡± I answer, flashing the Tenaliton ring nestled snugly on my finger.

    Tenaliton. A pretty heavy metal. It was incredibly hard to manipulate from afar, let alone vibrate. Jules was the only person I met who could do so.

    So naturally, this was going to serve as our advantage.

    ¡°Remember the steps?¡± I inquire to make sure.

    ¡°One short vibration means you can make a better hand than the ones next to you. Two short vibrations means their hands are better than yours. One long vibration means there¡¯s someone with an equal hand as you do. Two long vibration means I couldn¡¯t see the other people¡¯s hands. You decide when to hold or fold, right?¡±

    ¡°You¡¯ve got it,¡± I say.

    ¡°Do be careful,¡± cajoles Jules.

    ¡°It¡¯s only seventeen-hundred we need to scrounge. We¡¯ll be fine,¡± I assure him, as the food arrives on our table. ¡°Go get changed.¡±

    I shuffle my way to the poque table where five others are already in the midst of a game. The dealer of the house, Vascomb, flicks an uneven eye towards me under his spectacles.

    ¡°Spectators to the back, please.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m here to play.¡±

    He looks up again, adjusting his spectacles to take a closer look. ¡°You understand this is real Denaros?¡±

    ¡°Why wouldn¡¯t I?¡± I affirm, clinking my two briefcases of coins.

    ¡°Very well, this game¡¯s almost over, we¡¯ll get you in.¡±

    * * *

    It¡¯s not what you don¡¯t know that gets you ¨C it¡¯s for you know for sure that just ain¡¯t so, my father once told me.

    And his words toll like truth as I step shakily down the wooden stairs, my briefcase empty. I thought I had read everyone on that table. The red-shawl woman, the brawny man, the skinny man, the frog-mouthed man, the impeccable gentleman with the beard, even the Dealer himself. Jules¡¯ diligent information relays through the Tenaliton ring gave me the upper hand for 21 straight rounds, slowly making the Denaros we needed to pay off this month¡¯s dues to the Bloods, lest our shop get repossessed with us thrown out into the street.

    It was late afternoon, and I had studiously scrounged a net sum of 1,480 Denaros, winning some, losing some, but having climbed probabilistically in my favor thanks to Jules alerting me via the Tenaliton ring. Just 220 Denaros more awaited me and Jules in fulfilling the payment to the Bloods. Just one more match, perhaps.

    But I lost it all to the impeccable gentleman with the beard.

    Jules waits for me to clear the landing and get outside for a clear air before he grabs the briefcase to feel its weight.

    ¡°Amelie, what in the MAHA happened? Are you ¨C are you crazy?¡± He gestures wildly, trying not to howl.

    I cannot even say sorry. The loss of nearly ten-thousand and hundred Denaros makes me feel as if someone took a bat and swung it at my skull. We had only needed two-hundred and twenty more.

    I huddle down onto the raised wooden platform.

    The brawny man from the matches before marches without knowing, taking a swig from his cigar. He spots me and Jules together, briefcase in hand.

    ¡°Wait a minute...¡± he says, eyes narrowing in recognition. ¡°I saw you¡¯s sitting at the spectators.¡± Without warning, ripping off an unlit metal lamp and throwing it at Jules¡¯ direction.

    Jules stops it by instinct mid-air.

    ¡°Why you ¨C you Metaler! You used the ring on her finger to help her cheat, didn¡¯t you?¡± The brawny man strides, grabbing Jules¡¯ lapel, driving a fistful of fire into his face. Jules dodges and ducks out under him.

    ¡°I OUGHT TO THROW YOU INTO THE SEA, YOU THIEVES!¡± He roars, rushing at me with a full tackle which I cannot possibly dodge, but two figures dressed in black trip him over mid-sprint, making him wedge his shin against the doorframe.

    ¡°What the ¨C what in the Naraks are you ¨C¡±

    ¡°You¡¯ve got the wrong man and woman,¡± says a bald burly man dressed in black, towering over the brawny man.

    The brawny man, holding out his fists, holler at the new adversary, getting up. ¡°You their guard or somethin¡¯? You wanna go right now? YOU WANNA GO?¡±

    ¡°If I was, you¡¯d be dead. Now you either have a choice to run off and shut up about the whole thing, or I throw you into the sea.¡±

    An absolute aura of menace emanates from the giant, burly man. At his words, the brawny man¡¯s eyes dart back and forth between me, Jules, the giant man, and the smaller guard in black spectacles blocking his way from the exit.

    ¡°You ¨C you both ¨C¡± the brawny man stammers, assessing his choice.

    ¡°Should I also mention that you have no proof of this ring business you accuse the two of?¡± says the black-spectacled man, raising to reveal two piercing eyes of violet. ¡°We can take it to trial if you want. But that¡¯ll cost you money and time. You don¡¯t really have those two on you, I think.¡±

    ¡°I ¨C we ¨C this ¨C¡± the brawny man stutters, his rage fizzling away. ¡°Fine. You all little corrupt knuckleheads keep dancin¡¯. One day everything will catch up to ya!¡±

    He gets up and shoves past them both, muttering angrily as he bolts out of Marnie¡¯s by the far side, his ego bruised.

    ¡°Lady, the Madam is looking for you,¡± says the giant guard dressed in a black suit, helping me and Jules up by the arm.

    ¡°Marnie?¡±

    ¡°No, we are not her guards,¡± the bespectacled man answers, making a gentle bow. ¡°We are retinues of another distinguished guest here. Please, if you may, follow us.¡±

    We hesitate a bit.

    ¡°It¡¯s not in your disfavor, miss,¡± he assures, motioning us between himself and the giant guard behind us. ¡°Now then.¡±

 Chapter 4 - The Request for Immortality

    The guards lead us through the bustling second floor of Marnie¡¯s shack, down to the first, and to a private dining chamber recessed away on the east side, with an open air railing facing the sea. The sea breeze ruffles our hair as we enter, and so does it for what appeared to be a woman in a navy shawl, seated a quarter clock away from us and facing the waves outside.

    To my surprise, there is no dining table here.

    Two more guards of moderate statures stand next to the woman and move aside as the door opens.

    ¡°Ma¡¯am, the person you have asked us to bring.¡±

    ¡°Thank you,¡± says the unnamed woman, gathering her shawl and smoothing out her dress, standing up and turning to face me and Jules. Jules stands some way behind me, taking off his hat and taking it to his chest.

    She uncovers her shawl and places it with care, seeming to float around her neck in the wind spray of the sea.

    She has a hair of natural gray tinted blue that comes down in waves, ending around her shoulder in thin wisps. It¡¯s styled elegantly with a small bun at the rear, with a gold hairpin sticking through it. Sapphire earrings, shaped in trapezoid gold frames, grace her ears. She is dressed in an elegant navy muslin dress.

    Her brilliant eyes of cyan, wrinkled around the edges in what must have been exhaustion, pierce my own dark violet. Subtle wrinkles carve across her face, a feature which adds rather than subtracts from her beauty; in her youth, she must have turned nearly every head on the street.

    Her voice is elegant and refined, coming through with a spry clarion.

    ¡°Bravely you descend, through the heavens of dusk,¡± she whispers.

    A new client? Here? I¡¯ve never had someone request me outside the shop ¨C because none knew me...

    My mind clamors with a mixture of complete loss and a roiling feeling in my gut of something new.

    ¡°...And gravely I ascend, through the mortal rain.¡±

    ¡°Yet with clipped wings, my son cannot soar,¡± she intones.

    ¡°So weather he must, through the vines of earth,¡± I answer back.

    ¡°But wish for it not, the giver of wings.¡±

    ¡°To whom would you beseech for wings of your son?¡±

    ¡°To the white owl of Serien, who can banish the night,¡± she answers, an expectant gleam in her eyes.

    Both of us stand still as the waves ruffle our hair ¨C her gray-blue around her shoulder, and my bangs fluttering in the wind with the bun intact.

    I was really not in the mood to take on a new client. Not five minutes ago I had lost everything I owned. Neither did I have the ability to merchant any dreams right now.

    But it doesn¡¯t harm to listen to a request, so I gesture down.

    ¡°I understand Maestro Sophia led you to me?¡±

    ¡°She has,¡± she answers quietly, relief settling over her face. Her tense eyes relax. ¡°A pleasure to meet you, Maestro Amelie Marceau,¡± says the woman offering her hand. It¡¯s cold to the touch, but strong in its grip. ¡°I am Minerva Cartier.¡±

    ¡°The pleasure is mine,¡± I say, most of my thought still on my disastrous and shameful loss at the poque two floors above.

    ¡°Please, do sit,¡± she says, where her guards immediately bring a chair for me. Jules remains standing behind me, hands gathered.

    I gather my coat and take a cautious seat. The guards bring forth a small round tea-table with an elegant trim and glass cover.

    ¡°Some tea?¡± She asks.

    ¡°If you... I would be delighted,¡± I say, as she pours a deep tea the color of persimmon onto a porcelain cup in front of me. She pours her own, setting the spout towards her.

    ¡°Regarding the matter of a dream I have been seeking,¡± she continues, laying down her cup after taking a slow sip, ¡°no other Dream Merchant has been able to create.¡±

    ¡°I understand the matter pertains to your son?¡±

    She nods, slowly. ¡°Yes. My son, Ren¨¦ Cartier.¡± She pauses, looking towards the great inland sea just beyond the railings on her left, as if it had answers.

    She closes her eyes for a moment, then turns to me again with her voice solemn and low, minute trills evidence of breaking. ¡°Ever since he was little, he has been sick.¡±

    ¡°What kind of sickness?¡±

    ¡°Of a long, pernicious kind,¡± she sighs. ¡°One which wastes the body. It¡¯s been years since he¡¯s had any strength to walk.¡±

    ¡°Oh...¡± I trail off, my hand over my heart.

    She closes her eyes.

    ¡°I¡¯ve tried many doctors in vain. But all say that my son¡¯s sickness has no known cause: rather, they believe it is an affliction of the mind, caused by a belief that he cannot envision a world where he is healthy and happy.¡±

    ¡°What may have caused this belief?¡±

    ¡°Grief,¡± she answers, eyes laden with memories of time. Minute etchings of the scars of time come across the forefront, catching the thin rays of the afternoon sun coming through the spring sky. ¡°He was very close to his father. But he passed away a few years ago. Not shortly after, the sickness set in.¡±

    ¡°I am sorry to hear that.¡±

    ¡°I had brought in many doctors, each prescribing many cures. But very little has had any effect except sunshine and ample air, which seems to slow the progression somewhat. I looked for the possibility of other cures, but none now remain in the field of medicine. And lately, his condition has taken a turn for the worse. That is why I came to you.¡±

    ¡°I see. If it¡¯s an affliction of the mind, then a dream could be a cure?¡±

    ¡°Precisely, Maestro Amelie.¡±

    ¡°And what dream do you have in mind?¡±

    ¡°The dream of Immortality.¡±

    Immortality ¨C that¡¯s a first.

    Minerva continues. ¡°It¡¯s been long since Ren¨¦ had any hope. He can no longer remember when he used to be able to run across the fields of grass, nor splash in the summer sea. He does not remember the fragrance of fresh bread, nor the taste of strawberries. It¡¯s been long since the world held any color to him. I can see it in his eyes that he awaits only for the end to his suffering, to drift off to sleep. He responds only to my own calls for him.¡±

    ¡°I see...¡±

    ¡°Buffeted by his body, he sees himself as someone who is destined to die. But I want him to think otherwise. I want him to see himself as someone who has a strength to push through ¨C someone who believes that he is full of life, that he can live forever if he willed it so. I want him to believe in himself.¡±

    ¡°In which case, it is not immortality per se, but confidence?¡± I reiterate, puzzled by the semantics of her request.

    ¡°No, sadly,¡± she answers back, glimmers of labor and fading hope in her eyes. ¡°Other Dream Merchants have tried to incept in him confidence and failed. Confidence only skims the surface. If you are able, I want you to incept a dream that will fundamentally change the way he thinks of himself.¡±

    How exactly, I want to ask. I had taken on requests from clients far and wide before. Dreams of courage, love, freedom from nightmares. Even a dream that they loved mathematics, for a certain student at an academy. A dream to remove their fear of heights, or their fear of small spaces. A dream that they were rich and wealthy in their past life, so they were going to try their best to recreate that in this life of theirs. But all of those dreams shared two common factors: that what I incepted in them could manifest in this waking world if they attempted hard enough, and whichever negative aspect of their personalities they wanted to erase I could erase, because things like the fear of heights or fear of small spaces, or fear that nobody liked them were all in their head. But not a concept like Immortality, the concept of being able to live forever. Such a thing was logically impossible to accomplish in the waking world, no matter how hard one tried. Immortality was a myth, in which case, any Dream of such a myth would also fail. I do not think Minerva has thought her request through. And I must say, the wealthy are quick to make these kinds of requests, thinking that Dream Merchants can bring any myth to reality with the help of capital.

    How do I let her down on this...

    ¡°I must admit a Dream of Immortality is a very tall order,¡± I reply, being careful not to refuse her on the spot.

    ¡°How much would it take?¡± she asks immediately.

    ¡°Pardon?¡±

    ¡°How much would you ask for your services?¡± she inquires, her brilliant eyes a mix of acute intensity and melancholic wandering.

    ¡°Well, it¡¯s not really a matter of how much ¨C¡±

    ¡°If you would excuse my rudeness, would it be sufficient to cover for your recovery in the poque game upstairs?¡±

    I pause to gather my thoughts, and speak my mind.

    ¡°Frankly speaking, I would need more clarification on what the dream of Immortality entails. Your exact goals and criteria, in addition to what your son wants. Exactly how he is ailing and what his everyday condition is like, and how malleable he is to believe in dreams. I understand he is quite young?¡±

    ¡°He turns nine this month.¡±

    ¡°Right. The younger the child, the more likely they are to believe in the strength of the magical, the conjured. But this immortality...¡±

    I ponder.

    ¡°Dreams are only as effective as the intention behind their creation. It requires an equal part in the dreamer¡¯s desire to believe in that dream, to manifest it into reality. Things like courage, catharsis, or romantic interest, I can merchant to my clients without too much trouble, because those things are not contradicted by the physical state the client is in. Even a cowardly man can be taught to be courageous, to be encouraged, if a few dreams makes him believe that he has overcome insurmountable odds before.¡±

    ¡°But a person always awakes, no? If the dream is fantastical, they will not believe that they¡¯ve actually done those things,¡± Minerva replies, cognizant.

    ¡°That¡¯s what logic would have you believe,¡± I reply, ¡°but it¡¯s not that the client must believe in that they have done these things in reality. It is to restore in them the feeling, the memory, the emotions necessary to make them cherish it again and know how sweet it tastes. Confidence and courage, love and desire. Many people lose these things as they are buffeted by cold realities. But provided they can remember how great it felt to actually be one, this inspires in them the strength to carry forward.¡±

    ¡°Then why is a dream of immortality difficult to achieve?¡±

    ¡°Because the dream of immortality applied in your son¡¯s case will mean that, every time he wakes up from his dream and is confronted with the reality, it will be even more crushing by contrast. His body will fight against the very notion that he is strong. When I inspire in a person courage, their body and physical form does not counteract this notion of courage they have in themselves, because courage comes from within. Fake it till you make it, people sometimes say, and in many cases the state of the mind rules supreme over one¡¯s success. But people are also products of their environment. Concepts like immortality and health are intimately connected to the state of bodies and how well the client feels. This is why I think that incepting a dream of immortality to your son will be a very difficult undertaking.¡±

    She cups her hands as if to pause her speech. Her eyes shimmer with glimmers of tears. ¡°I know, I know, I always suspected that, yet no dream merchant so far took the initiative to delineate their reasons for rejection...¡±

    ¡°I am sorry to hear that.¡±

    She looks down at the floor, dejected. Though my head is still in the money I¡¯ve lost and the consequences of tomorrow, I can¡¯t help but feel a tinge of regret at addressing her too plainly just moments before. Or just making her out to be one of those fastidious clients.

    ¡°Regardless, Maestro Amelie... I still want for you to try your hand at this dream of immortality. You are my son¡¯s only chance.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s a difficult call, ma¡¯am...¡±

    ¡°If it isn¡¯t too much trouble for you, could I ask you to do something for me?¡±

    ¡°...What do you have in mind?¡±

    ¡°I know this dream is very challenging to achieve, let alone incept successfully... Maestro Sophia before you spoke plainly that she did not have the ability to do so, and so did all other Dream Merchants, though without explaining kindly like you did. I needn¡¯t ask you any further on such a dream depending on the results of my next request.¡±

    Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

    ¡°An inception?¡± I wonder, my mind darting to how much I can get out of it.

    ¡°No, a retrieval,¡± she answers back. ¡°No Dream Merchant has been able to retrieve the name of the little stuffed animal my son used to play with as a toddler. Unfortunately, he lost it a long time ago on a picnic, and no replacement has been able to make up for it. Perhaps if he is reminded of the name, he could be a little happier... restore in him those joyous times...¡±

    ¡°I see, a retrieval request...¡± I ponder. ¡°I surmise I must meet your son then?¡±

    ¡°No, actually... I recollect that he did tell me the name before, a long, long time ago, during bedtime and everywhere, but all the years of grief from my husband¡¯s death and Ren¨¦¡¯s illness, I¡¯ve forgotten it from conscious recollection. But deep down there, I am confident it exists.¡±

    ¡°So you would like me to meld with you? To retrieve the name of the stuffed animal through a shared dream?¡±

    ¡°Yes.¡±

    ¡°When would you like this...¡± I trail off, cognizant of the fact that I won¡¯t have a shop tomorrow.

    ¡°Now. If you can.¡±

    ¡°Now?¡±

    ¡°And here.¡±

    ¡°Here, at Ms. Marnie¡¯s shack?¡±

    ¡°Would that be too much trouble?¡±

    ¡°No, no, it¡¯s just ¨C¡± I pause, hearing the waves crashing on the craggy rocks below the platform, ¡°the environment leaves some calm to be desired.¡±

    ¡°I do feel calmer among the waves, Maestro Amelie.¡±

    I am close to objecting, because this also requires my focus and comfort, but my mind is seized with a protest not to lose this client.

    ¡°As you wish,¡± I say. ¡°Oh, ma¡¯am, another thing, I must say this wouldn¡¯t be without the necessary charge ¨C¡± the word ¡®charge¡¯ leaving a dirty taste on my tongue.

    ¡°No, no, please do not mistake me for a miser,¡± she assures, her hand over her heart. ¡°In fact, I was just about to inquire more about the poque game which you were in.¡±

    ¡°The poque game, yes...¡± I murmur.

    Wait, now I realize she¡¯s mentioned it once before. How did she know about that? Was she waiting the whole time I was upstairs so I could finish doing what I was doing?

    ¡°Do you need to recover from the game?¡±

    ¡°I..., yes, I frankly do.¡±

    ¡°If you would excuse me for intruding on your loss, may I ask how much?¡± she inquires, motioning her hands to her guards to wait outside.

    I wait until they exit.

    I say. ¡°Ten-thousand and one-hundred.¡±

    ¡°Would it put you at ease if I helped ease the sum in its entirety? So we could proceed with our retrieval uninterrupted?¡±

    ¡°The entire ¨C the entire sum...?¡± I was about to holler YES OF COURSE, HOLY MAHA, WHY WOULDN¡¯T I, THANK THE DIVINE, but I had dignity I wanted to maintain. ¡°That would be too exorbitant an amount, although I do need it for urgent purposes...¡±

    ¡°I would not put it past the Bloods if that is what you require the sum for, Maestro Amelie,¡± she speaks with a gleam in her eye. She knows. She¡¯s probably been on the other end before.

    ¡°Would you take this service for ten-thousand and hundred?¡± she reiterates, leaning in, expectant. ¡°Should you be successful in your retrieval, I will provide that amount immediately after. Should you not be, I will still provide you half of that amount as my gratitude. Does this sound amenable to you?¡±

    I think.

    ¡°Yes.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°Jules, could you wait outside?¡±

    ¡°Of course,¡± he says, cognizant of the motions. He feels a little relieved too. If I succeed here, then we would be able to save the shop from seizure by the Bloods.

    ¡°Please do not disturb us,¡± Minerva affirms to the guards. They make a nod and shuffle outside, gently closing the door behind them.

    The open-air chamber is occupied by just the two of us now.

    ¡°Before we begin, Ms. Minerva ¨C¡±

    ¡°Please, no need for too high a formality. Just Minerva is fine.¡±

    ¡°Before we begin, Minerva... I understand you¡¯ve melded your Kaha with many Dream Merchants before?¡±

    ¡°Yes. Numerous times. So it will not take long for you to meld.¡±

    ¡°I see. Please make yourself comfortable,¡± I reply, hoisting my chair closer.

    Minerva closes her eyes, and I do mine.

    Her hand brushes mine. Our fingers entwine.

    A gentle velvet black drapes my vision. There is nothing but emptiness stretching for miles and miles, utter black. The sounds of the waves below the open-air chamber and the salty fragrance of the sea fade away into the world of the liminal.

    As I wait, holding Minerva¡¯s cold fingers in mine, the pulse of our hearts become known to each other. Hers is a slow, rhythmic beat that sounds as if she¡¯s weeping. An immediate melancholy suffuses me. My warmth and heartbeat begins to flow into hers, making a melody of a hymn.

    As I wait, I begin to hear the crackling of earth and metal in the distance. I see a droplet of silver metal in my vision, glimmering and trembling, gathering into the shape of a bird, growing wings and pinions, materializing into a form of a mourning dove. Unlike Reynauld¡¯s own Kaha ¨C the shape of his soul ¨C Minerva¡¯s does not hesitate as it flies the distance towards me and lands in my outstretched palm. Minerva¡¯s Maht, her Element at her coming of age ¨C is Earth. It coos softly in my ear.

    I hold her closer to listen, and the threads of her mournful singing unravel immediately to form constellations in the sky. As I suspend the human insistence of grammar and logic, immersing myself in the song that Minerva¡¯s soul confides in me, the lyrics begin to take on their own form, stretching from notes of a hymn into golden lines that grow taut. The threads expand and structure themselves into a hazy, yellow sky, the ground at my feet begins to materialize into the surface of smoothed sandstone tiles, and threads fall from the constellations to give structure to where I stand. Numerous lines fall and creak and crumble into shape with the sounds of bricks being laid on top of one another, falling like blocks, except it¡¯s gigantic blocks of sandstone ¨C falling below me as it establishes a great tiered city that grows larger as it descends in altitude, making where I stand the topmost tier. The city proper stretches miles below where I stand. The architecture finishes arranging itself in the style of a classical temple, flanked by statues of unknown figures ¨C probably people Minerva knows ¨C and concludes with a wilting garden and a fountain without flowing water where I walk.

    A harsh, yellow Sun pierces through the haze and hits the back of my neck on the summit of this city. Unlike the case with Reynauld, Minerva is not with me in this dream.

    As I glance away and peer some way down to the city below, I notice that it is burning with scattered fires, ash ascending in long columns of smoke. I look further out into the distance to see a wasteland stretching as far as the eye can see, its ash-ridden plains punctuated only by the occasional corpses of umber trees. Low-rising mountains of equally featureless measure shoulder the landscape. There is nothing to be retrieved there.

    I turn my gaze back towards the tier on which I stand. Smooth sandstone tiles lay at my feet, forming what must be a triangle-shaped garden that tapers the further it moves away from the center of the city. It is flanked by a colonnade of numerous pillars, reaching from the pointy-tip of the triangle all the way to its base. In the distance, some hundred yards away at the base of this triangular garden, I spy a large wrought-iron gate, most likely leading to the interior of the city and the mountain on which it is drilled into.

    A Memory Archive, is what Dream Merchants called it. It usually was in the form of towns, villages, or cities, where you could enter individual houses or buildings to witness a certain memory unfold. This was Minerva¡¯s Memory Archive, one that was more vertical than horizontal. Its suffocating landscape and post-apocalyptic vision told me everything I needed to know about her state of mind. She has been suffering for a long time, and in Memory Archives such as these, powerful negative emotions were likely to lurk in the form of eldritch horrors.

    I speak the words to let the vision of my dream-self materialize, my hair once again flowing out the back, my bangs drifting in the wind like a classical priestess-turned-warrior. I command a spear to take form in my hand, but to my surprise, only a broken wooden shaft materializes instead.

    Uh-oh.

    I did not have full control over this Dream. This meant I could not change its aspects or bend it according to my will alone ¨C there is an essence of reluctance, resistance, to it changing shape at the behest of others. This was common for people with a Maht of Earth, but as I continue to conjure a spear and other viable weapons to see them sputter or turn to dust, a pang of concern skewers my heart. No one in Serien could wrest control of dreams better than I did, perhaps ever. To see my power stemmed like this meant that Minerva¡¯s memory and will ¨C and her melancholy ¨C is inconceivably strong.

    But there is another way around this.

    Dreams resisted weapons because they were objects that persisted in the dream for a long time. However, temporary objects ¨C such as fireballs, ice, or even gusts of air, could manifest briefly. I could use this to defend myself against any horror or monster that came at me from the interior of the city on my way to retrieve her memory of the stuffed animal her son once loved.

    I briefly let a spark and flame arise from my palm. Their radiant heat strikes my face. I shoot shardlings of ice ¨C they knock off the stone from the pillars. I drive forth a fistful of air ¨C its scatters the leaves of bushes and trees and ripples the water on the still fountain.

    I could more than defend myself.

    I stride gingerly towards and past the wrought-iron temple gates, entering the heart of the city.

    * * *

    The air is infused with the acrid scent of mold and petrified air. A great, empty hall of fallen statues without faces enter my vision. Distant echoes and garbled noises of crackling stone race up the walls.

    Beyond them, I scout great staircases with each step nearly twenty yards wide, descending in spirals forever and below to the depths of this city-mountain. There was no other way I could go ¨C the destination ¨C or the name that had to be retrieved ¨C lay there in the dark.

    I gingerly step forward onto the first step.

    It crumbles.

    I attempt to leap to the other step, but it crumbles as well. I race down and down and down, as the walls become alive with a multitude of colors. I spot the projected image of a baby¡¯s face, laughing in the summer sun, as her mother and father cradles her by a picnic table, their swims by the beach, and the splashing of colors. Minerva¡¯s earliest memories ¨C when she herself was a child.

    I run breathlessly down the crumbling steps as the stone disintegrates right behind me, always and following, taking me through the archive of Minerva¡¯s youngest memories. It is such a rush that I cannot fathom all that I am seeing.

    But a full three minutes of this, and I find myself at a tier below, another layer.

    And before I can take my breath, I hear a screech from above.

    A gigantic crow with fuligin feathers and crimson eyes dives into where I stood, cratering the stone. I managed to duck just out of the way, but the crow snaps its beak at me, the air vibrating on its own accord. It fires off its razor-like pinions of utter black, scraping off my armor, beginning to turn transparent by the force of Minerva¡¯s dream.

    Just as I expected, I thought.

    I fire numerous shards of ice shardlings at its crimson eyes, which nicks its glossy surface and makes it scream. It claws at me, which I mostly dodge, but the tip of its fourth claw nicks me in my priestess¡¯s dress, carving a bloodied string across my chest.

    I feel blood issue forth. A stinging pain skewers my body.

    An injury. Normally, I can heal this in an instant, but as the state of bodies are also persistent objects in a dream, if a dream resists, I cannot recover.

    I cannot tarry.

    If I am injured here, I will be forced out of the dream. If I am killed here, then my consciousness may be forced into a catatonic state ¨C a coma.

    I spy an open patch of feathers below its wing, and hurl a lustrous lance when it opens its wings.

    The demon-crow breaks it into two by twisting its legs sideways, arriving, and hurls it back at me, which I dodge. The lance smashes into the carved engravings of the dimly-lit interior, hewing off rocks.

    This was going to be harder than I thought.

    Recalling the memories of battles arts which I gleaned from a previous client of mine, I launch myself at the crow-demon, somersaulting out of the way of its snapping beaks.

    Temporary force.

    I duck from underneath and hew the rock with the rocket of my advance, and temporarily pool all my imagination into the tip of my fist.

    1,000%, divided over 0.1 seconds of impact.

    My fist meets the crow demon true, and the force is of such quality that I blast the sinews off the demon, cleaving its wings.

    It screams and wails, its good wing trying to cover the stump, but I hurl myself up to its giant head, and spear its brain by stabbing it with a rapidly vanishing lance.

    The demon clatters to the ground and vanishes in miasmic smoke.

    That was one down. If this was the case, I was sure I am going to have to fight a demon at each level of the memory.

    The stuff I do for Denaros, I wonder, as I leap down to the next spiraled staircase sending me further down, the stone steps crumbling behind me.

    Images of sunshine. Memories of rain. The wedding between Minerva and her husband. Ren¨¦¡¯s birth from tip to end. I descend and descend, witnessing the various memories that have been guarded behind each demon. And at each level, a new demon appears: a centipede, a badger, a lion.

    Though I try, my arms and legs are cut and nicked and bruised without my armor which this dream resists. I become more tired, covered in grime and dust, my hair splattered with the blood of every negative emotion that chains Minerva¡¯s memories.

    And yet, I make it to the bottommost layer of the city ¨C or at least what appears to be the bottommost layer, because there is no more staircase that leads down. Instead, a giant, circular rim, a foundation floor engraved with many letters that I do not recognize, greet me.

    I land upon it, almost cratering the floor.

    There is a giant gate just ahead.

    I creak it open and stride forward, eager to retrieve whatever was hidden behind these deepest recesses of memories.

    And suddenly, all the great chamber and hall turns utter black.

    A deep, rumbling voice resounds throughout my consciousness which I am unable to stop.

    ¡°GO BACK, FAIR TRAVELER.¡±

    ¡°Who halts me thus?¡± I holler, pointing towards the tenebris clouds taking shape.

    ¡°If you seek what I protect, you will cause Minerva to suffer. Is that your wish?¡± It speaks in undulating tones.

    ¡°Why would she?¡±

    ¡°Because there are some memories which are best left untouched.¡±

    ¡°And you are her unconscious?¡± I inquire, still turning this way and that to find the source of the noise.

    The black clouds begin to gather into numerous scales, and thread into a long, unified body without wings, resembling a serpent ¨C no, a dragon with iconography from another Empire, far from where I live. Its head takes shape into the visage of a wolf¡¯s, a tiger¡¯s, and a deer¡¯s, with combination of all of their features, dwarfing my size. It can easily swallow me whole.

    It pushes it giant nose and snout into mine, its horns stretching back, its green mane waving though there¡¯s no breeze.

    ¡°Take me as whatever you may, but if you wish to retrieve the name of the little stuffed Celendir I protect, you must pass my riddle.¡±

    A Celendir. A great animal with jaws strong enough to bisect trees and a lumbering body with surprising speed ¨C a snout and head of a wolf, ears somewhat resembling a rabbit¡¯s, with a body like a giant bear and rhinoceros combined, and a fluffy tail leaning more towards flat than cylindrical. It was the national animal of the republics in which I lived. It was very popular as a stuffed animal for little children, owing to their fluffy, and somewhat adorable features when sized down.

    ¡°A riddle, you say?¡±

    The dragon nods once, unblinking, staring directly into my soul.

    I reply. ¡°Very well. A riddle I shall take.¡±

    The dragon rears away, speaking directly into my mind, taking to the subterranean sky in a coil. It enunciates the riddle.

    ¡°I am the thing that speaks in the night. I kill, I inflict grief. I make those afflicted with it unable to sleep. None who have had me survive, for the date of death awaits them all. I cause their hearts to beat without thinking, to commit errors in their ways that escapes all reason. Every person shall experience this, and no mortal can escape my claws. Yet everyone treasures and waits for the day I ensnare them, and cherish the moment I strike their hearts. What. Am. I?¡±

    I deliberate. Something which everyone has, and one which appears as a curse. Yet, everyone wants it ¨C almost as if they do not know what it brings. What does everyone have? Mortality. No one wants mortality. What else? Life. Does everyone want it? Some say life is a curse. Not everyone wants it. What else? Time. It brings death to all, and everyone wishes they had more. But that does not explain why people cherish the moment it strikes their hearts. Then it must be a double edged sword, one which brings equal joy and equal death and that was ¨C

    ¡°Love.¡±

    The dragon descends in a coil, clouds of black and white gathering around it. It then uncoils, revealing the lone figure of the little stuffed Celendir toy.

    The little stuffed animal, patchworked and threadbare in many places, hops its way to me. It chirps, stretching its little legs and paws.

    ¡°Where¡¯s Ren¨¦?¡±

    ¡°You can get to him, but first I need to know your name.¡±

    ¡°My name? Has Ren¨¦ forgotten? Oh no...¡± the little Celendir mewls, its ears drooping. ¡°It¡¯s been years, so I guess I understand... I¡¯m Ferris. Will you bring me to him?¡±

    ¡°I cannot promise that I will do. But he will come find you. For sure.¡±

    The dragon makes an undulating sigh.

    ¡°You do not know what you do,¡± it admonishes. ¡°Reckless descender to the morass of memory. But you possess a strength and wit like no one else,¡± it remarks. It drifts to me and places a two claws on my chest, crinkling my bloodied priestess garbs. It¡¯s not enough to hurt me ¨C instead, a sensation of warmth flows into me. Not the scorching heat like the apocalypse outside, but a gentle warmth like the afternoon Sun.

    ¡°Very well. Return to the surface, descender to this place, the answerer of my riddle. Let your heart be true, and let your second descent on your own accord accompany a greater truth. Seek to save Minerva.¡±

    It dissolves into a thousand flecks of paper as I am shot upwards from the great, darkened circular halls, with the little Ferris in my arms.

    Keep my memory.

    As my consciousness dissolves within the dream, I inhale deeply.

    Cold evening air stings my nostrils. As I open my eyes, hazy and wet, I see the Sun has tucked itself beyond the horizon of the sea.

    We¡¯ve been here for hours.

    Minerva awakes from her slumber as I gently shake her awake. Her glazed eyes catch the light of the lamp beside us. She looks to me, mouth parted.

    Ferris, I tell her.

    A second. Then she cups her mouth. The next thing I see, tears begin to descend on her cheek.

 Chapter 5 - Minerva and her Son

    I awake the next morning, my memories thick with what the dragon had said and about the dream of Immortality that Minerva wished her son to have. The name Ferris rings in my mind.

    Jules and I studiously prepare the sum of 10,300 Denaros in our briefcase, the other 200 scrounged from various places like our socks and forgotten coat pockets added onto Ms. Minerva¡¯s amount. The aftershock of the Eisen I took two nights before has almost faded away. I feel clear now. Alert. The clock reads 7:59am.

    And as the hand strikes 8:00am, the door bursts open, and in comes three men dressed in deep burgundy suits.

    The leading man puts his hand forward, the sigil of the Blood Syndicate engraved in the Quan on his forearm. Flakes of dry blood and Eisen flutter from it.

    ¡°Ten-thousand, three hundred. Florist.¡±

    I hand the suitcase to him, keeping my expression blank. Jules sighs.

    He takes the suitcase, his underlings taking it immediately from his hands in sycophantic deference. They lay it out on the counter, and studiously arrange each denomination of coin into their appropriate values.

    The two men give a nod to the man. The man takes the signet ring of his finger and dips it in dark red ink, pressing it upon an envelope.

    ¡°Your record.¡± He says, not waiting for me to take the letter before turning away and striding out the door. The two men follow behind him to the next shop, the next victim.

    I wait for them to exit fully, and let out a long, exhausted sigh.

    ¡°Another month¡¯s dues. Paid.¡±

    ¡°Yeah,¡± says Jules, collapsing to the floor. ¡°I almost thought we wouldn¡¯t make it.¡±

    ¡°Me too,¡± I say, getting up and re-doing my hair in my usual style that looked a bit more presentable. My violet eyes stare back at me in the mirror. They are minutely bloodshot.

    A rollercoaster of events transpired the days before.

    ¡°Some coffee?¡± I ask first, feeling of tinge of guilt at not being able to give Jules his share. I¡¯d have money to pay his wages four, five days or so.

    ¡°Much appreciated,¡± says Jules, shuffling outside to pluck the morning¡¯s newspaper from the basket stand. He comes in as I pour two long cups of dark coffee out onto an Einspanner cup.

    ¡°Wow, Amelie, would you look at this?¡± he says, pointing to the front cover of the newspaper.

    My eyes grow wide at the first word.

    ¡°REYNAULD ARTAFEX and ALEXANDER HERIZ make LANDMARK DEAL to build a new AQUAJET PORT in SERIEN.¡±

    I read further.

    ¡°Surayasna 18<sup>th</sup>, 1844.

    Reynauld Artafex of Artafex Shipping Co. and Alexander Heriz of Illium¡¯s Heriz Steel & Ironworks Co. has struck a landmark deal yesterday, the Serien Herald reports. Involving over 38 million Denaros, the trans-republic cooperation between Serien¡¯s Artafex Shipping Company and Illium¡¯s Heriz Steel & Ironworks will usher in a new era of integrated shipping and transport across the two republics. Among the plans announced yesterday are the opening of a new AQUAJET port and undersea rail in Serien, the first of its kind, allowing for a twenty-fold increase in cargo and goods traveling in and out of the city. A new sub-marine industry estate will also be constructed by the AQUAJET port, allowing for Serien¡¯s maritime industries to readily ship valuable minerals mined undersea. The projected contribution of this deal to the economy in the Republic of Serien is estimated to range from 480 million to 1.1. billion Denaros over the next 30 years. The Serien republic council is considering awarding the title of Archon of Industry to Reynauld Artafex for his deal in contributing to Serien¡¯s continued prosperity and growth. Apart from...¡±

    I put the newspaper down, mirth returning to my heart. Suddenly, my eyes do not feel dry anymore.

    It is not the first time one of my clients have gone on to make a good name for themselves in the world. But it¡¯s the first time that a client who I took without too much promise turned out to revolutionize the future of my entire republic. That night when I took Eisen was worth it. Completely.

    Every time the newspaper reads a name of my client, it is an affirmation that my work ¨C despite all its questionable aspects ¨C can help people. Many times at night, I stay awake at what had become of my clients who asked for various things. Husbands who wish to love in secret another woman of their dreams. Wives who wish to love in secret another man, infinitely more generous and romantic. Burly men haunted by nightmares of loss, wanting to feel youthful again and go on adventures across various worlds imaginary. Young, affluent women wanting to have confidence in how they look and are perceived by others, wishing to live a reincarnated life in their dreams where they are empresses. I merchant dreams because I want to help them, I do. But there are some whose requests escape my ability ¨C or rather, escape the logic of the world. Though I can craft and sell these dreams, I cannot change an aspect of reality that is immutable. I can only help them along to make them realize it themselves. I can only show them the door.

    Minerva¡¯s request drifts into my mind.

    She was suffering a lot. And yet, I do not think that the dream of immortality is something I can take on a whim. As a challenge without a deadline, yes. But the life of a child is involved. And what was it about the dragon saying that she will suffer more? Is oblivion of memory the best for her? Why may that be? Perhaps her son would recognize the name and feel worse for something he cannot have? Maybe that was it¡­ but if the dragon was her unconscious, then...

    * * *

    The wheel of time hands its reins to spring. It¡¯s been a full month in the calendar of the Republics ¨C a full 45 days ¨C and Jules and I¡¯ve been busy at work trying to scrounge enough sum again to pay off the Bloods. A full month from that fateful Sunday, on the date of our payment, the door opens once again.

    But instead of the three men who usually come to collect our dues, it¡¯s instead the ¨C

    The bearded gentleman from the poque table.

    He sights me in a mixture of surprise and curiosity, and so do I. Jules next to me recognizes him too, but he turns his gaze away, pretending to work on something else.

    He takes an envelope from his suit pockets, handing it to me. I spy the signet ring of the Blood Syndicate on his finger. There is a Quan concealed underneath his suit.

    ¡°Open it,¡± he says. I chant softly to let a swish of air cut it open.

    Out drops a letter.

    ¡°To Amelie Marceau, Florist

    Corner of 37<sup>th</sup> and West Canal Ave

    This is an acknowledgement that all your outstanding loans to us have been paid as of Serayasna 15<sup>th</sup>. This relieves you of the duty to make payments every month to us. We thank you for engaging in our service and wish to partake again in ventures of business.

    With great pleasure,

    Montserrat¡±

    I cannot believe my eyes. The entire loan sum ¨C worth 22,000 Denaros ¨C have been paid off? The loan sum whose compound interest had made us gasp for breath?

    ¡°I did not expect you to scour enough to pay,¡± the impeccable gentleman says, dipping his signet ring in dark red ink and impressing it upon the bottom of the letter. ¡°A shame, really. Your performance at the poque table was mesmerizing indeed.¡±

    There is a gleam of disappointment in his eyes.

    ¡°May your paths cross us again,¡± he says, turning to leave.

    May our paths NEVER cross again, is what I want to say, but I hold my speech as he saunters out the front door, hopefully for the first and the very last time.

    Jules and I make no word for a while. Then we break into cheers and hugs.

    ¡°Holy crap, I can finally get paid on time! Yes!¡± Jules exclaims, pumping his fist, going downstairs to pick up a bottle of champagne we bought a year ago.

    We pour one out for each of us on a glass and smash our glasses together when a rattling bang shakes the front door.

    There is a mailman in blue outside, even though it¡¯s a weekend.

    What gives?

    ¡°Come in,¡± I gesture wildly, and he enters.

    ¡°Ms. Amelie Marceau?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s me.¡±

    ¡°Thank the MAHA. Here¡¯s your package,¡± he says.

    ¡°Wait, we are not expecting any ¨C¡±

    ¡°Sorry, gotta go. Can¡¯t get paid tonight if I don¡¯t deliver all of them on time. Private delivery!¡± he shouts, racing out the front door and taking off with his cart of packages with a jet of fire behind him.

    ¡°What the...¡± Jules says, chuckling.

    I gently slice the package open. Out comes a letter and what looks like four train tickets. Written in an elegant cursive handwriting, the addresser begins:

    ¡°Dear Maestro Amelie,

    It has been a long time I¡¯ve had the chance to feel happy. And my son too. With the name for the stuffed Celendir you recalled ¨C Ferris ¨C we were able to get a stuffed animal that looks exactly like it and name it in its honor. I haven¡¯t seen my son this happy in years.

    Thank you for taking on my request that night of a month ago. I have paid off all of your outstanding loans to the Syndicate; you are free from your debts. May the FOUNDERS grace you protection from their schemes going forward.

    Speaking of which, may I trouble you to visit us at our cottage by the sea? It¡¯s in Argent, an hour¡¯s ride by surface rail from Serien proper by the breezy coast. I¡¯ve included a ticket here for you and your assistant Jules as well ¨C including their returns. My son would very much like to meet you.

    Please follow this address:

    7 Roundway, Hill-by-the-sea, Spellsong District, Argent.

    I would be most pleased to meet you again.

    Warm regards,

    Minerva Cartier¡±

    I look to the ceiling, breaking into an involuntary smile.

    ¡°Jules, shutter the shop for the weekend. We¡¯re going to Argent.¡±

    * * *

    All around us the flowers bloom. The Festival of Flowers have been held just a few days ago across the entire country, and it¡¯s easy to see the reason why. The vibrant reds and violets of tulips flutter and dance in the spring wind as the train rushes past with us inside. Their fragrance drifts through the open windows on our little compartment, with just Jules and I, admiring the sights with a cup of tea. I brush my fingers on the fluffy, verdant grass as tendrils of foxtails and reeds bow and waltz past my nails. It feels as if all the world is alive.

    I haven¡¯t been on a trip in years, cooped up in an endless cycle of creating and visiting other worlds as an author of dreams in my shop. No matter what, it seemed there was a fixture to the real that you could not beat. The train glides over the landscape of meadowy terrain, shallow lakes reflecting fluffy clouds overhead, and rivers of pristine blue.

    ¡°Do you think she will ask you about immortality for her son again?¡±

    ¡°I haven¡¯t a clue,¡± I reply. ¡°But no matter what, we¡¯ve still got to thank her.¡±

    ¡°A cottage by the sea, how scenic! Perhaps to get more Sun?¡±

    ¡°With hope,¡± I remark, closing my eyes to breathe in the scent of spring. There¡¯s another half-hour ahead to Argent.

    We alight at a cozy little station flanked by olive trees beginning to shed their winter fur into something befitting the greenery of spring. Their own flowers haven¡¯t bloomed yet ¨C it¡¯s too early for that for olive trees ¨C but their green is welcome nonetheless.

    There are only half a dozen on the platform who alighted with us. We wave soft goodbyes as we stroll past the smoothed stone platform down to the cobbled street. We sight a hill in the distance from afar, and a small white cottage on it overlooking the sea.

    It¡¯s a twenty-minute walk, but every step feels buoyant to us. Our coats flutter about in the cool spring breeze, with the morning Sun tickling our hair. It¡¯s not long until we arrive at the foothold of the cottage grounds ¨C the cottage hill ¨C surrounded by peach trees in the perimeter.

    A spectacled butler emerges from behind one of the peach trees to greet me. I recognize him from Marnie¡¯s shack when he doubled as a guard.

    ¡°Maestro Amelie Marceau!¡± He says, gingerly taking my hand for a gentle shake. ¡°It is a pleasure to meet you again. The cottage is some way up the hill, just a three-minute walk. Ms. Minerva very much welcomes you.¡±

    He accompanies Jules and I as we stroll our way up, taking our briefcases. As we approach the cottage, we see it¡¯s two-storied ¨C composed of scenic wood planks painted white and peach; the slanting roof tiled gray and blue is adorned by a single spire-like cone of light brick. The architecture is very much in a romantic style, from back when form and function did not clamor over beauty and sense. I see two terraces that open out in view of the great inland sea below to the west, wind-bells chiming in the sea breeze.

    If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

    The wooden planks of the cottage landing creaks as we step forth. The butler gently pushes the door open.

    Minerva¡¯s face lights up. She is dressed in an elegant white silk dress, her hair in a loose bun by her head.

    ¡°By the MAHA! Maestro Amelie, you¡¯ve made it ¨C¡± she exclaims, pulling me into a soft and brief embrace. ¡°I hope the travel here hasn¡¯t been too difficult?¡± she asks, parting reluctantly.

    ¡°Not at all unpleasant. It¡¯s great to see you again, Ms. ¨C¡± I catch myself in my formality, ¡°Minerva.¡±

    ¡°Do come in,¡± she gestures, taking us into the spacious living room with open windows and balconies. She dismisses the butler at the doors and personally pulls out two reventerie style chairs with meshed backs, adorned with patterns of flowers and fruit. She waits for us to be seated at the tea table, already decorated by scones and cucumber sandwiches.

    ¡°Any tea grasps your fancy?¡±

    ¡°Oh my...!¡± I gasp. It is evident that hours of effort have likely been invested into the presentation. ¡°I am honored,¡± I reply. ¡°Shall we try the Serien gray?¡±

    ¡°May I suggest the Empyrean Harmony?¡±

    Each cup of Empyrean Harmony ¨C a royal tea from the Empire of Jin ¨C was worth eighty Denaros or more. To refuse such an exquisite gift would be tantamount to blasphemy.

    ¡°I¡¯m in no position to refuse,¡± I answer, my face contorting minutely into an expression of awe and mild discomfort at the scale of her invitation.

    It takes several minutes until all of us get seated over some tea. Jules is seated quietly near the southern edge of the table, having introduced himself as assistant once again, taking care not to take my limelight away. I am seated by the west, facing east, and Minerva, just opposite myself.

    ¡°You¡¯ve prepared all for us in advance! How did you know we were coming?¡±

    ¡°To be frank, I did not know. But I did hope. I¡¯ve prepared each afternoon for your expected arrival.¡±

    ¡°I apologize for arriving this late, and not on the Festival of Flowers...¡±

    ¡°Not at all, Maestro Amelie. The package must have arrived later than expected,¡± she says, taking a long sip from her tea. There is still an air of awkwardness that hangs between us two. Three counting Jules.

    ¡°How is Ren¨¦?¡± I gently inquire.

    ¡°Your recollection of Ferris lifted his spirits. Quite substantially so! The sun and the breezes have been doing him good favors as well. Though he¡¯s not yet on a path to recovery, I feel we¡¯ve stopped his sickness from advancing further for now. Thank you. Thank you so, so much.¡±

    ¡°It is my pleasure,¡± I say, hand over my heart. I didn¡¯t expect the recollection a single name to hold this much weight. What a power it held for Minerva and Ren¨¦! Warmth bubbles up in my chest.

    ¡°Ren¨¦¡¯s currently asleep, but I will check on him in a few moments to see if he¡¯s ready to see you.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°Ren¨¦?¡± Minerva whispers, softly creaking open his bedroom door on the second floor atop the staircase landing.

    ¡°Mum?¡± flows a boy¡¯s gentle, melodious voice.

    She opens the door to let us in. I make a little wave, followed by Jules.

    The little boy¡¯s sight catches my next words in my throat. He is thin and emaciated, and pale that I can see the minute webs of his veins come through in purple. His hair ¨C which must have looked a rich navy-blue mixed with gray, are patchworked in many places on his scalp. His legs, observing from the outlines they make under the bedsheets, are too thin for a boy his age, close to bone. He¡¯d probably lost the ability to walk a long time ago. But contrary to his physical state are his gentle, glimmering eyes of gray-blue, big and round on his slim face and thin frame. A stuffed Celendir toy ¨C the same I saw in Minerva¡¯s memories ¨C are tucked under his bedsheets just next to him.

    Ren¨¦¡¯s visage breaks my heart.

    He sees me enter; his eyes grow and crinkle in a warm smile.

    ¡°Ren¨¦, this is Maestro Amelie.¡±

    ¡°Maestro Amelie...?¡±

    ¡°Nice to meet you, Ren¨¦,¡± I say, taking his hand gently. Though bony, a genial warmth emanates from his palm.

    ¡°Oh... I didn¡¯t want to make you come all the way here...¡± he croaks, a little shy.

    ¡°Not at all. I was happy to make the travel and see you. How are you feeling?¡±

    ¡°Mmm... not as bad when there was snow. Thanks for getting Ferris back,¡± he says, hugging the Celendir deeply. He flops and pets its rabbit-like ears. Memories of the little hopping Ferris in Minerva¡¯s dream call out to me.

    ¡°Ren¨¦¡¯s had a measure of warmth restored to him,¡± Minerva bubbles.

    ¡°How did you find Ferris?¡± Ren¨¦ asks, trying to steady himself sitting-up on the bed. His bony legs fail to cross.

    ¡°Well, it¡¯s a bit of a long story... may I?¡± I ask Minerva.

    She makes an affirmed nod. The wrinkles on her face seem to fade momentarily as she settles down to hear my story.

    * * *

    ¡°...So I told the dragon, ¡®love¡¯. Love was the answer to its riddle. And to my great delight, it released Ferris. It came to me and whispered its name!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s awesome!¡± Ren¨¦ exclaims, pumping his fist, but his next words are punctuated by deep, whooping coughs that make his chest recoil. He grips his chest hard underneath his pajamas, and hack into the tissue that his mother gives him.

    ¡°Oh dear, oh dear, Jules ¨C¡± I whisper, ¡°fetch some water downstairs for us.¡±

    ¡°Right away.¡±

    There seems to be no end to his cough, but to my utmost relief, it subsides after a minute. Though Ren¨¦ makes an effort to scrunch it up and give it back to his mother, I can all too clearly see the smattering of blood on it.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry...¡±

    ¡°No, no, don¡¯t be!¡± I answer. ¡°It¡¯s not your fault at all, not anyone¡¯s...¡±

    Ren¨¦ sighs and sluggishly grips his sheets. He makes a feeble effort to smile.

    Though his mood has lightened as of late, his physical condition is just as dire. I shake my head without knowing, glancing down at my feet, my eyes moistening without notice.

    ¡°Maestro Amelie...¡±

    ¡°Hmm? Oh, just... just Miss Amelie is okay,¡± I say, trying not to show my tears lest he feel sorry for something which he has no control over.

    ¡°Miss Amelie... I really love your story. Your stories. Are you coming back?¡±

    Minerva glances at me, expectantly. ¡°Well, she¡¯s here for a visit today, but Maestro- Miss Amelie is really busy most of the time, but...¡± she pauses, catching her breath, ¡°mum will talk to her, okay?¡±

    ¡°...Okay,¡± nods Ren¨¦, drifting into his pillow.

    A knock on the door. "Come in, Dr. Louis," says Minerva, as a middle-aged doctor with a bushy beard and round spectacles enters with a stethoscope and a medicinal satchel.

    He looks taken aback. "New guests! Pleasure to meet you," he says, giving a little bow.

    "Dr. Louis, this is Maestro Amelie. She helped Ren¨¦ recall Ferris."

    "My gratitude to you," Dr. Louis remarks, shaking my hand. "It''s been quite the help."

    He lays his hat to the side and begins his work, his expression transforming into a mixture of pity and dejection as he turns to face Ren¨¦.

    The wind bell chimes. We close the bedroom door behind us.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry about Ren¨¦, Minerva.¡±

    Minerva doesn¡¯t articulate any words other than an occasional nod.

    ¡°It¡¯s okay. Thank you for coming all the way out here. I appreciate it. And thank you for telling him about how you found Ferris. I think it will help your spell last a little longer.¡± She enunciates, her voice tremulous in a mixture of worry that will never end.

    I can¡¯t tell whether I should inquire further or just let the silence be. My heart¡¯s torn between returning and hearing further. But hearing Minerva and Ren¨¦¡¯s stories ¨C I¡¯m not sure whether I would have the strength to not take on this request.

    Ren¨¦¡¯s little smile comes into the forefront of my consciousness.

    ¡°About Ren¨¦...¡± I trail off. Minerva looks up briefly, expectant. ¡°I am still not sure whether I can take on your previous request. A request for a Dream of Immortality. Does it still stand?¡±

    ¡°Of course, Maestro Amelie, I understand... but yes, it still stands. Has your mind been swayed at all?¡±

    Notwithstanding that Minerva has paid off all my debts to the Blood Syndicate ¨C a substantial sum of twenty-two thousand Denaros and some more that I am indebted to her by default ¨C I cannot keep Ren¨¦¡¯s feeble smile and bony legs out of my mind. All of my clients who I¡¯ve helped thus far have been those privileged enough to walk and want ambition; to dream of things which could be very well considered offshoots of vanity. But Ren¨¦¡¯s dream ¨C or at least what Minerva is requesting ¨C is to have the privilege to walk in the first place. The blessing to be normal, which everyone takes for granted. I realize that my contribution to the world as a Dream Merchant has catered to those at the pinnacle of most things, but never those dispossessed whose cries went unsung.

    Perhaps it was time for me to make my title as Maestro ¨C as a Dream Merchant ¨C mean something more than just enriching the already rich. Perhaps it would be right for me to take on the challenge in creating this dream of Immortality for a little boy who doesn¡¯t remember the taste of strawberries nor the freedom that everyone else enjoys.

    In order to do that, I need to understand first where Ren¨¦¡¯s grief comes from. Minerva did mention that her husband ¨C Ren¨¦¡¯s father ¨C passed away when Ren¨¦ was young. How much impact did this have on Ren¨¦¡¯s psyche? How significantly was he affected, immediately after? Knowing those things would allow me to probe a little deeper into the cause of Ren¨¦¡¯s sickness, a sickness of the mind, and help him overcome it. One step away from death was one step closer to immortality, after all.

    I open my mouth.

    ¡°Minerva, if you don¡¯t mind me asking ¨C may I meld with you again? I would like to revisit your memories. See Ren¨¦ if I can. Try to search for the source of his ailments.¡±

    Minerva¡¯s eyes light up in relief and mirth. ¡°You mean you will accept my request?¡±

    ¡°I cannot give my word to you yet as a Maestro. But I will see what I can fathom, and even if I do not accept in the end, I will be able to provide you something helpful to make Ren¨¦ feel better. Would this be alright for you?¡± I inquire to confirm. ¡°It¡¯s the least I can do for my gratitude.¡±

    Minerva nods profusely. ¡°Yes, yes, of course. I would appreciate your dive.¡±

    We lay back on our chairs, the warm wind caressing our arms and necks. The distant fragrance of the sea, mixed with blossoms of peach, drift from some way below us. The surf washes the rocks in rhythm from afar, humming the rhythm of a lullaby.

    The wind bell chimes and our fingers entwine.

    The mourning dove appears in my vision; and as I listen to it, I find the world materializing again in the sphere of dreams, the city-mountain of sandstone and many tiers falling into blocks below my feet.

    I lightly land atop the topmost layer again. It¡¯s the same as I remember from a month ago. The skies are still hazy; a sickly yellow sun shines a putrid light onto the yellowed landscape. The only difference I see is that the columns of ash and smoke that used to rise from the tiers of the city below are absent. The fires have subsided.

    My hair is loosened from its bun into a flowing priestess¡¯s locks out back, my bangs fluttering minutely in the wind. I envision myself in a simple but practical armor of bronze, and it flickers into existence on my torso and chest, covering my shoulder.

    Not bad.

    I conjure a simple spear and grip its wooden shaft. Unlike the first time I was here, it doesn¡¯t flicker out of existence immediately.

    Minerva is unconsciously giving me more control of her dream. I welcome it. The effect of finding the name Ferris has had this much a change, and I breathe a sigh of cautious ease. My work did have meaning.

    I stroll into the recesses of the giant gate at the topmost level, bringing me into the mountain. Once again, it opens to a dark hall the hue of deep teal, shadows draped in many places. But this time, the air that wafts from below is not of a pungent quality ¨C rather, it¡¯s fresh, reminiscent of citrine perfume. Perhaps the negative emotions that haunt her have subsided for the time being, or at least suppressed.

    I spy the wide and colossal spiraled staircases leading me down into the morass of memory. At each layer before, I had fought a demon. Hopefully, not this time. I step onto the first stair, expecting it to crumble, but find a surprising sturdiness and solidity to its support.

    I descend the steps, one by one, looking through the memories once again. Multicolored frescoes of Minerva¡¯s younger days come alive in a kaleidoscope of images at first, arranging themselves into coherent reels which I can comprehend.

    Minerva¡¯s youngest memories as a toddler. Fragmented in many places, but from her perspective, shows her father some distance away in a brightly lit garden, holding his arms wide open as if to welcome her embrace. Minerva ¨C with a careful wobble ¨C waddles her way, one brave step at a time, towards her father, almost falling, almost stumbling ¨C but bravely marching on all the same. Her father reaches out to her and hoists her up, laughing and chuckling along with Minerva¡¯s own little giggles. From her perspective, I witness her hoisted up atop her father¡¯s neck and shoulder, looking far into the distance painted with mountains of blue and their frosty caps. Daffodils and tulips wave in gold and rouge, letting the wind waltz over and under them. Her mother in the distance with a sun-hat picks them in a bundle, waving to Minerva and her father.

    I descend.

    The next memory is Minerva at school. She is at the nurse¡¯s office. She had been chasing squirrels around the yard with her friends, and was climbing a tree when the branch she was on snapped and plummeted her to the cobbled footpath. A handsome boy had run to save her ¨C a boy with a hair of charcoal navy ¨C but her arm hit the stone first. Tears run down her cheeks with the throbbing stings of her broken left arm. The nurse puts it in a cast, wrapping the bandages and sliding a thick splint under, admonishing her with words that by now have become unintelligible. The boy asks if she¡¯s okay. She says ¡®mmm-hmm¡¯. Would she climb the tree again? Yes.

    I descend.

    The next memory on the walk is so vivid that I place my fingers on the smoothed, polished wall of the spiral rotunda, and find themselves splashing into the very moment it was taken. Minerva is incensed. She shouts at her mother, while her father tries to come between the both of them, trying to allay their fight. Her mother tells her that she will no longer date the boy named Hugo. Hugo, head drooping, stands outside with flowers splashed with rain, just beyond the front door that is half-open. His hair is of charcoal navy; Hugo¡¯s the same boy who had brought her to the nurse in elementary school. Minerva¡¯s father tries to say a few words to his wife, but before he can finish his words, Minerva throws down her teacup, shattering it on the floor. She rushes outside to run off with Hugo, but he is already gone.

    I drift through and descend through the steps of time, appearing amidst that wooden house.

    The next memory is that of Minerva in tears, holding a scrunched-up letter in her hand, the ink of its writer smudged by her falling teardrops. The letter reads ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡± Hugo has gone away to another republic, far far away. He says his father needs him there for a work with little hope of ever returning. Minerva bunches it up and throws it away, only to pick it up again and unfold it. She tucks it away into her diary, closing the pages, holding it close as she drifts off to sleep with the orange lamp still on.

    I descend further, the memory thickening to the point that I can touch and feel the world around.

    The next memory is Minerva working as an assistant florist, dressed in a bright yellow sundress with a wide-brimmed hat about to fly off her head. She arranges tulips in little pots by the canal, drawing with a large chalk the prices of her bundles of roses gathered next to her, marking it with a little face that smiles. A boat comes drifting down the canal with a rowman and a plainly-dressed young gentleman in gray. His hair is charcoal blue. Their gazes meet. ¡°Your name is...?¡± They ask, lips parted in mirthful surprise.

    Ocean waves splash across my head as the salt stings my eyes. I¡¯m on a ship. Sailors hurry past my figure. The next memory is that of Minerva and Hugo on a ship towards the Empire of Jin. Hugo mans the helm; Minerva right behind, charting the waves on a lookout. She is a navigator. She still wears the same wide-brimmed hat, her hair now in luscious locks of lucent gray falling to her waist. She gives Hugo a kiss, holding their faces close, lost in the moment between each other¡¯s eyes, Minerva¡¯s cyan, Hugo¡¯s gray, but a long mighty shadow drifts over the helm. The Great Gates of Jin, colossal stone towers stretching miles into the heavens, part the clouds and blots the Sun.

    The fragrance of the summer sea and blocks of tea waft up to my nose. ¡°Empyrean Harmony,¡± the crate reads. Minerva and Hugo, with minute wrinkles on their faces now, proudly sign the import paper on the deck of their ship, La Belle Dame sans Peur, reading a Denaro figure of 24 followed by four zeros. The Port of the Republic of Ascension bids the arrival of their ship with cheers and wows, the first to import the mightiest tea in the world into the republics. A young boy with cream hair and explorer¡¯s cape spots them with a spyglass. His eyes are full of stars.

    The next memory unfolds on the shores of a shining sea. Hugo holds up his son Ren¨¦, showing him the vista of a New Year¡¯s sunrise. Minerva gently takes Ren¨¦ in her arms, still a baby, drifting off to sleep on her heart. It¡¯s been a long night, with lots of fireworks. Minerva¡¯s gaze meets Hugo¡¯s, and they share in a kiss, the sun rising between their noses.

    The next memory uncovers by the gardened daffodils on a small stone cottage in the mountains. Tulips dance and flutter in the wind. Minerva holds out her hands in an embrace, her hair coming to her shoulder now, tied in a braid. A straw-hat rests in an angle atop her head. Ren¨¦ takes his shaky first steps, his father Hugo just behind him, ready to catch him should he fall. Ren¨¦ stumbles a little, but determined, pushes his fist into the grass, and gets up again. He takes one step with his right. Another with his left. His sight never leaves his mother¡¯s. Minerva pulls Ren¨¦ into a hug, cooing a gentle song. Hugo wipes the sweat off his brow, presenting to his son a little stuffed Celendir, bright yellow with floppy ears.

    The next memory is that in an elementary school. It¡¯s parents¡¯ day. The nurse, now old, giggles with Minerva as little Ren¨¦ strides into the hallways valiantly with his little collar-up shirt and suspenders, wearing a tie. Other children jokingly address him as ¡®o, good father, show us your ways¡¯. Ren¨¦ laughs. Minerva and Hugo stand at the back of the classroom as Ren¨¦ proudly raises his hands and is the first to answer a question. It¡¯s about the sea and ships.

    The scene materializes to a sandy arena outside. Ren¨¦ and his class are playing tagball, but is losing. The gym teacher pauses the game, and asks for volunteers from the spectating parents to join in and have fun. Hugo steps forward and takes the ball in his hands. ¡°I will be your champion,¡± he says, giving a wink. Minerva cheers at the top of her lungs.

    They win the game by 17 to 3.

    The next memory unfolds in the dim light of their dining room in a modest mansion. Minerva holds Hugo close in her arms. Dry trails from tears mark both of their faces. On the table, a bill, a piece of white paper, the sigil of a hospital. Little Ren¨¦ peeks out from his bedroom door. Hugo spots him and brings him close. They stroll outside, where the lights of Serien far below greet their eyes. The stars shine brilliantly overhead. Minerva watches over them, stirring a pot of tea. Once their tea, now theirs no longer.

    A shattering sound of glass explodes like a cannonshot upon my entrance to the next. As I step in cautiously, an atmosphere of blood-red assault my vision. Hugo shields Ren¨¦ behind him, arms outstretched, cornered against a wall. Three men in blood-red burgundy suits raise their Quans. They¡¯re here to collect their debts.

    ¡°Not my family,¡± he says. ¡°Not my son.¡±

    The men cock their head. The leader of them all steps forward, presenting a sigil from his ring.

    He presses his ring into a vial of dark red ink, and presses it upon the envelope, handing it to Ren¨¦.

    Hugo pleads.

    ¡°Not here.¡±

    ¡°Yes here.¡±

    A thunderclap and a bang.

    Hugo falls to the ground. Eyes glazed.

    A solitary tear descends from his eye.

    ¡°Daddy...?¡±

    As I try to wade through to the next memory, a cacophonous rumble pierces my ears. A gargoyle, a raven, and an owl all black perches themselves onto the stone pediments, framing the perimeter of this dream. Hollow sockets greet my gaze where their eyes should be. Their necks turn without sound as I proceed cautiously into the funeral.

    All the world turns to shades of ash, the only colors permitted the red of blood and the violence of blue. Clamors. Shouts. Minerva lets out hoarse screams, her face wrinkling overnight. The cyan jewel of her eyes drowning under the waves. Ren¨¦ sits still, his face hollow, droplets of hot tears turning into a river, until the Sun goes down and his tears run dry. The desert has come.

    A squeezing sensation wrings my heart as the memory dissolves and I wade into the next. Each step feels like fighting against a coursing river; or feeling like under suspended honey, my feet struggle to move forward.

    The landscape changes to that of Ren¨¦ alone on the porch of their mansion. He puts a strawberry into his mouth. The juices and seeds burst forth in his mouth like gangrified flesh. It tastes like one too. As his legs dissolve, bone and sinew remain.

    The landscape changes to that of Ren¨¦ with a fever, delirious with imagined monsters. His bedroom in their small mansion hold only a dim lamp by the side of a table. Rain splatters outside. Minerva is seated on a chair, face-down on the tea table with her arms sprawled on the patterned tablecloth, her hair loosened into a featureless carpet of gray with frayed threads of navy.

    Ren¨¦ cries out for his father, flailing, kicking the bedsheets away.

    Up on the ceiling, a wraith with black robes, holding a scythe.

    The reaper has come;

    The reaper has come;

    The reaper has come.

    Clouds of black smoke choke my throat and sting my eyes as the memory liquefies into tar and binds me to where I stand. I cannot move further. This is the end of the memory allowed to me.

    I dissolve my consciousness within the dream, loosening to tendrils of smoke that shoots upwards.

    I break through the cap of the mountain and into the sickly, yellow sun.

    * * *

    I open my eyes with a throaty gasp. I inhale deeply, savoring the scent of fresh air as if I¡¯ve been holding my breath for eternity. Minerva slides out of her chair, unconscious. I gently grab to steady her.

    So this is you, Minerva.

    I pull her into a hug as she awakes.

    ¡°Yes.¡± Is my answer.

 Chapter 6 - The Quest for Forever

    Save him!

    Save him!

    Why are you not doing anything!

    Go out there! Get the money! Save him!

    My father lies on his bed, breathing in pained rasps, holding me close with one arm the best he can.

    He is dying.

    ¡°Why are you going?¡± My ten-year old self asks, eyes red. I inhabit this self. I cannot act or say anything otherwise than the words I remember enunciating that afternoon, many, many years ago.

    ¡°Why are you letting him take you?¡± I cry, indignant, trying to shield my father from the awaiting scythe of the wraith draped in black on the ceiling above, tendrils reaching out like ink dropped into a pool.

    ¡°Because... I love you more than anything else in the world...¡± my father mutters, glancing at me with his single eye. ¡°And if I can choose to save you, I will choose it over... everything else.¡±

    ¡°No, NO, NO!¡± I yell, as the wraith begins to descend from the ceiling.

    ¡°You must go, Amelie... from the Labyrinth of Echoes to FOUNDER SERA¡¯s bridge in the sky, I will always be with you..¡±

    ¡°NO, YOU CAN¡¯T GO!¡±

    The tenebris wraith brings down its scythe upon his neck.

    But just before I can see it strike my father, a brilliant hand of white reaches forth and yanks me from the room.

    I scream, my voice hoarse, when I find myself come to my senses.

    The sounds of the waves reach me first before my eye registers it¡¯s a bedroom. The wind bell chimes.

    I¡¯m in Ren¨¦¡¯s bedroom, sitting on an armchair. I find his hand on my left.

    ¡°Miss Amelie ¨C are you okay?¡± He¡¯s nearly falling out of his bed in an effort to comfort me.

    I breathe in pained gasps, my chest heaving, my hair tousled like a witch. I look at him wide-eyed for a split second, but quickly finding embarrassment in my own nightmare, close my eyes and plop back.

    It¡¯s the one dream I cannot control.

    ¡°I¡¯m ¨C I¡¯m okay, it¡¯s nothing. Just something yucky,¡± I assure him. He puts his hand away and collapses onto the bedsheets, sluggishly turning his head painfully on the pillows.

    It was that dream again. But unlike the painful times where I had to sit through the entirety of the ordeal when my father was taken from me, from the moment of his death to the aftermath that followed, the nightmare was cut short ¨C thanks to Ren¨¦.

    He looks up to the plain white ceiling. He takes a deep breath.

    ¡°A nightmare?¡± He asks, making an effort to enunciate his words.

    ¡°You could say that,¡± I answer.

    ¡°What kind?¡±

    ¡°Memories of myself when I was little.¡±

    ¡°Do monsters chase after you?¡±

    ¡°Not really. It¡¯s just the same scene over and over again...¡±

    ¡°Oh...¡± he trails off, his voice croaking. ¡°One of those ones where you can¡¯t move?¡±

    I make a slow nod, staring into a thousand yards out the ocean. ¡°Yeah.¡±

    ¡°So you¡¯re like me too...¡± he says feebly, pulling his bedsheets to the edge, shuffling his body to lean to the side. He looks out to the sea.

    ¡°What¡¯s out there, beyond the sea?¡± He inquires, his voice mixing with the chiming of the clarion bells. ¡®It¡¯s so bright and shiny.¡±

    I shuffle the armchair closer to him so I can see his face and his gaze. His eyes are fixed on the seagulls in flight far in the distance, diving to catch fish, and soaring back again into the fathomless blue sky.

    ¡°All kinds of weird and interesting places. Lots of people wearing different clothes. Eating different food. Some even speak different words than we do.¡±

    Ren¨¦ stays still. ¡°Can you tell me more? About such a place?¡±

    ¡°Of course,¡± I say, opening a storybook by the side that I¡¯ve prepared for my visit. I¡¯ve read it over and again on the train ride to Argent, thinking of how I would unfold the vistas of the various pictures and photograms within.

    I visit Minerva and Ren¨¦ twice a week now. This is my seventh visit.

    Ren¨¦ turns his head minutely to my storybook, craning his ear.

    ¡°Today¡¯s going to be a story about the Empire of Jin.¡±

    ¡°The Empire of Jin?¡±

    ¡°Yeah! Your mother and father voyaged there a long time ago.¡±

    ¡°My mother and father...¡±

    ¡°Mmm-hmm.¡±

    ¡°...What¡¯s it like?¡±

    ¡°An Empire of red porcelain roofs by the setting sun, stretching as far as the eye can see. Hazy rivers and beautiful ships, palaces as big as our entire city. Would you like me to show you?¡±

    ¡°Yeah,¡± he nods, a brief mixture of giddiness and excitement coming over his countenance.

    ¡°Hold on tight.¡±

    We close our eyes. Our fingers entwine.

    Ren¨¦¡¯s Kaha ¨C the shape of his soul ¨C is a Celendir itself. They say the soul takes shape of whichever creature they resonate with the most, and for Ren¨¦, who sees himself in Ferris, it is a pleasant affirmation of his affinity. A baby Celendir ¨C with the snout of a baby wolf, body of a bear cub and fluffy drooping ears of a rabbit, jump into my arms. It is eager to speak, and eager to listen.

    This is a shared dream. As his words flow into mine, and mine into his, weaves of gold begin to outline themselves over the firmament of the heavens, forming into constellations in the comfortable dark sky.

    The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

    The constellations shape into the visage of mighty ships and sundering waves, and beyond them, great porcelain-roofed towers laying out in the tens of thousands by an estuary, the mighty palace hazy in the setting sun miles into the distance. Our way behind, the Great Gates of Jin tower as a monument to humanity, reaching to the very bridge and ring of the planet upon which we find ourselves.

    I crotchet them into existence one by one, their shapes materializing into tangible forms. Ren¨¦ isn¡¯t fully able to take his human form in this dream, instead nestling on my shoulder in his little Celendir form. We float softly down amidst the vermillion tiles, through the ropes with round red lanterns, and land onto a cozy street wafting with the steam from corner-shops and tiny eateries. My goal in the coming weeks is to help him take shape in this dream as a human ¨C in his own body ¨C so he can become comfortable in it, and also be able to exercise dream crafting. With little adventures like these, he will find himself wanting to explore, to do more, than having to be at my side all the time. And when that day arrives, Ren¨¦ will be one step closer to immortality.

    Ren¨¦¡¯s ears prick and flutter with excitement as we make our way out of that little street and out into a wide avenue, bustling with hundreds, sounds of laughter and haggling raising a symphony of choruses on our ears.

    ¡°There, do you see it?¡± I ask, guiding Ren¨¦¡¯s head and snout towards the great roofed palace in the distance.

    ¡°Mmm-hmm!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s where the Emperor resides. It¡¯s said his powers are so strong that he can push and pull the tides of every shore in the Empire, and that he can freely move the palace and crack and split the earth open whenever he wants.¡±

    ¡°Wow! Can we go meet him?¡±

    ¡°For sure. But first ¨C¡± I tickle him, making him giggle while I surreptitiously bring forth into existence a food stall behind us, ¡°What did you say you wanted to try?¡±

    ¡°The buns! The bao-buns from the story!¡±

    Bao-buns. What did they taste like? I rifle through my memory and fish a word out of my consciousness which I saw in the storybook. Sweet when filled with red beans; savory when filled with braised meat, and just plain if you wanted to dip the whole thing in a sweet, honey-milk.

    I raise three of each for us to try. Ren¨¦ bites into it, nuzzling into my hand, making a purr of deep satisfaction, scattering many fluffy fliers to float to the floor below the stall. The stall-woman laughs, and pats his head. She speaks in a language unintelligible to us ¨C well, I make her speak in a language unintelligible to us to keep up the story ¨C but I translate it for Ren¨¦.

    ¡°Where do you come from?¡± the stall-woman asks us, taking our silver taels, or at least, the most believable currency I can conjure in this dream. I actually didn¡¯t remember which currency they used in the Empire.

    ¡°From beyond the sea!¡± Ren¨¦ answers, nodding his head, climbing higher up my hair.

    ¡°Mythrise?¡± She asks.

    He nods.

    ¡°Which republic?¡±

    Ren¨¦ thinks for a moment, cocking his head. ¡°Mmm... Serien?¡±

    ¡°Oh! Inland sea! Many canals! Just like us!¡±

    Of course, an ordinary stall-woman in some street tucked away into the Empire of Jin would probably not know about Serien. But this is a dream, not the desert of the real.

    ¡°Very good. Very good,¡± she nods. ¡°We¡¯re having New Year celebrations tonight. Lots of fireworks. Don¡¯t leave until you see it!¡±

    * * *

    We didn¡¯t end up seeing the fireworks that night.

    I had to pull Ren¨¦ out because his coughs in the waking world had translated into the dreaming world, and the more he coughed, the more monsters summoned themselves into being. I shielded his eyes from their terrible eldritch forms.

    But today is a day where he could overcome that ¨C to banish the monsters himself.

    It is my 17<sup>th</sup> visit, nearly 9 weeks from when I¡¯d begun. All around us the chorus of cicadas dance and trill. The sea is of deep blue, the sky painted by mighty anvil clouds rising to meet the boundary between sky and the stars. Ren¨¦ and I sit by the grassy meadow, far away from the cottage hill and facing the wilderness, graced by forests of verdant green and flanked by snow-capped mountains.

    It¡¯d taken us great effort to come all the way out here, but with the help of a wheelchair and clever metalwork by Jules, we were able to race Ren¨¦ out to much satisfaction.

    But it all depended on what came next.

    ¡°Are you ready?¡± I ask, holding out my hand, my other holding the wide-brimmed hat eager to fly off from my head and into the wind.

    Ren¨¦ purses his lips and makes a nod. ¡°Mmm-hmm.¡±

    What I am going to pull is something called a reality translation. It¡¯s to mimic every single piece of environmental detail where the dreamer currently resides, and unfold the dream there, as if the dreamer was awake. I have practiced this particular dream for Ren¨¦ nearly half a hundred times. I am ready.

    As our hands entwine, a velvet dark drapes our vision. As Ren¨¦¡¯s little Celendir form dissolves into existence here, I stop the flow of time with a flick of my finger, keeping my concentration on it.

    Little by little, like an artist¡¯s painstaking brushstrokes, I illustrate the meadow and the forests and the mountains and the shining, flanking sea, and the anvil clouds drifting in their heavenly repose. I motion my arm to call forth the wind; I paint each ray of light descending from the sun to hit our back and necks, on my fair skin and on Ren¨¦¡¯s pale himself; I carry the scent of summer flowers and watermelons and pine into the scents, trembling their petals and budding fruit in the miles around, cognizant of each thread keeping them conjured. Just in front of us, I thread into existence a surprise for Ren¨¦, one which I know he would love. Every fur, every gleaming luster of its coat, great musculature and sturdy form, a set of brilliant eyes, heroic jaws and venerable ears, a tail more flat than cylindrical.

    I was ready.

    I unfreeze the flow of time. Ren¨¦ enters this conjured reality in his little Celendir form upon his wheelchair, facing back towards me. I let go his little paw, fixing my wide-brimmed hat, my black hair flowing out to my back in straight cuts.

    Ren¨¦¡¯s form sniffs this way and that, covering his eyes with his floppy ears to shield them from the Sun as he turns.

    But as he makes a cautious peek from underneath, he sights the surprise I made.

    Awaiting patiently in front of him, in full and magnificent form, is Ferris. Or rather, this is Ferris how he was in Ren¨¦¡¯s memories ¨C a full, adult Celendir, towering above the creatures of the world, freed from his shape as a stuffed animal. Ferris¡¯s great mane-like fur, heavy and resplendent, catch the light of the sun and gives off a lustrous sheen. A tiny patch of yellow fur by his side, where the name Ferris is crocheted, gives Ren¨¦ all he needs to know. The great Celendir breathes out, trembling the grass below, lowering his snout towards the boy¡¯s tiny form with venerable eyes.

    Ren¨¦¡¯s own eyes grow wide, hesitant, not believing the sight in front of him. He takes a tremulous step forward with one paw, another with his left, and hops out of the wheelchair, racing, racing, landing with a smack on top of Ferris¡¯s snout.

    ¡°Ferris! You came back!¡± he exclaims, teardrops pooling in his eyes. ¡°You kept your promise!¡±

    ¡°Of course,¡± answers Ferris, imposing his words in a deep rumble directly into Ren¨¦¡¯s mind. ¡°I told you I would cross mountains and seas and deserts to find you.¡± I carefully craft and place the words I conjure to Ferris.

    ¡°You liar,¡± jests Ren¨¦, ¡°you told me you¡¯d find me in mere weeks. You took years!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡±

    ¡°No, no, nothing else matters now...¡± says Ren¨¦, hugging Ferris closer.

    And as he opens his eyes, he finds himself human, standing with his own two legs, leaning into Ferris.

    YES! I exclaim quietly in my own head. It worked!

    Ren¨¦ cannot believe himself, so he stumbles back and is about to fall ¨C but Ferris steadies him with his large snout, hoisting him up again. Ren¨¦ attempts to put no weight on his legs, fearing that they would give way, but I impart a strength in them where he can stand on his own if he tries.

    I make Ferris nudge him gently back on the grass. ¡°Oooh-woah-woah!¡± Ren¨¦ says, balancing himself, taking one foot back firm on the grass, and another, and another, each step becoming firmer and more assured.

    Lost in the moment, Ren¨¦ realizes the strength he has in his legs. He looks to his feet, his shins, his calves, his thighs, made whole again and beautiful. Not muscular by any means, but just like a normal boy¡¯s nonetheless. Ren¨¦ pinches his cheeks. I¡¯ve tuned the world to allow him to feel pain. Ren¨¦ bites his palm. It still feels real.

    Argent teardrops descend like pearls from his eyes. His chest begins to heave in roils of laughter, first a slow, muted giggle, then swelling to chuckles, and to great bawls. He raises his arms as if to embrace the sky and sun.

    And now that he could take his human form, now that he could walk again, Ren¨¦ could take control in this dream, in tandem with me.

    He breaks into a pace, then a jog, and into a sprint, as he runs face-first into Ferris¡¯s waiting body. He breathes deeply in his fur and puffs them out with his nose. He giggles, chuckles, feeling the cool grass under his feet and the caressing of the wind on his ears.

    Ferris lowers himself and nudges Ren¨¦ onto his back, shuffling. Ren¨¦ clambers up with some effort, grips Ferris¡¯s shoulder furs into thick bunches, and hurrahs his Celendir companion into a lumbering sprint, faster and faster towards the ends of the cliffs. Ferris¡¯s paws and claws float on cushions of air as they take to the sky, the stars their destination. I throw my wide-brimmed hat into the air like a frisbee, flattening out to a white carpet, and launch myself into the sky with them.

    The entire inland sea of Serien is reflected in our eyes as we take further and further to the sky. The sun vanishes at Ren¨¦¡¯s behest and out comes the glorious ringed moon, comets streaking across the sky, and thousands of little orange firelights puff into existence as the cities of night awake from their daytime slumber. The lands below all move and dance and wave their little lights.

    From behind and afar, I spy Ren¨¦ standing up on Ferris¡¯s shoulder, embracing the world.

    In this moment, eternity is his.

    And it¡¯s our Magic.

 Chapter 7 - Memories of Rain

    ¡®One day, I¡¯ll visit there myself. I know it. I know for sure.¡¯ Ren¨¦ had said that night we took to the skies.

    ¡°Ren¨¦, Ren¨¦! Ren¨¦! Oh, no, no, no! This can¡¯t be happening! Amelie! AMELIE, PLEASE!¡± Minerva screams. I bolt through the door.

    Ren¨¦ foams at the mouth, his body stiff, violently racking against the bedframe. The bedsheets are nearly thrown off with the force of his body¡¯s attempts to seize, unseize, and seize his musculature again and again and again and again.

    I feel the presence of horrors in his subconscious. Without a second to spare, I take out the Eisen bar I¡¯ve kept for emergency in my coat pocket, and crack it, inhaling deep. My inconveniences matter very little.

    I grip Ren¨¦¡¯s stiff and lifeless hand as I take the plunge.

    Where? Where? Where? I look this way and that, screams and wails issuing from everywhere and nowhere in this velvet dark memory.

    The landscape expands to accommodate me, becoming that of a city in rubble, with piles of scrap metal and corrugated iron doors dotting the barren hills and lands, all gray, though there are no frames. As I stumble my way through the iron, cutting myself on their rusted edges, a trill of a little Celendir pierces my ears. I turn my head to its source, and see a mass of churning black by the sides of what must be a warehouse, weeping with melting paint.

    I conjure a sword and shield, though it disappears from my hands ¨C but redoubling my efforts, honing my consciousness and my will over this dream to a razor¡¯s edge, I explode a lance of light into existence and hurl it full force into the center of that tenebris sphere.

    The lance skewers the cacophonous congregation of creatures all bent, and disperses to reveal a terrible sight.

    Ren¨¦¡¯s little Celendir form is ensnared in the claws of a raven demon and are being pecked and twisted and flailed. I conjure a mighty war-axe of frost and swing it into the neck of the raven demon, bouncing off like hitting steel ¨C

    Cleave it, 10,000% force!

    I swing it, and the world explodes around us as the strike meets true. The blade cleaves clean the raven¡¯s head, rarefying it into a fine cloud of caustic black. Its claws disintegrate around Ren¨¦¡¯s injured form, freeing him from its clutches.

    I kneel down to hoist him up in my arms, and as my skin makes contact, I¡¯m yanked into a vision ¨C a dream ¨C a memory ¨C which I cannot tell.

    I stand outside an abandoned warehouse, their windows plastered with faces of awaiting children, shaved and bald. All colors are in gray. The letter signs read ¡®E. J. Greenwood.¡¯

    As the shards of the world flicker around me, some letters on other signboards and features faded and no longer recognizable by conscious recollection, an intuition strikes me:

    This is a part of Ren¨¦¡¯s own Memory Archive. Through my weeks and two dozen visits, I¡¯d never seen this part.

    As I am forced by the currents into and around the warehouse, hundreds of children greet me, reach out to me, as if wanting me to take them home, to save them from this place. Their clothes are threadbare, their arms and legs gangly, their eyes sunken.

    Among them, is Ren¨¦.

    I yank him by the arm and pull myself out of the dream into the waking world. As I do so, the children yell.

    MANFRED!

    I come to my senses in cold sweat with an inhalation so deep.

    Ren¨¦ lies face up, eyes glazed. He still breathes.

    Minerva breaks into muted sobs of relief, embracing his body.

    I collapse onto the armchair.

    * * *

    The letters ¡®E. J. Greenwood¡¯ hang upon the fa?ade of what appears to be a warehouse in yellow and gray, with some umber brown brick meshed in the corners. Years of rain had melted down the painted outline of those metal letters, leaving them to drip in black rivulets. The sign seems to weep to passerby. Heaps upon heaps of scrap metal rise like hills next to the structure.

    It¡¯s a sorry sight.

    Shards of glass pepper the windowsills on the second and third floors, perhaps a quarter of the windows in disrepair; corrugated iron bars and meshed staircases jut out unceremoniously from the dilapidated exterior, drooping under their own weight. This is no place for respectful habitation. I find my mind wishing that the vision I saw in Ren¨¦¡¯s memories are just that: imaginations. It would be cruel to let hundreds of people reside here, let alone orphans.

    I push past those black, spear-like iron gates and briskly walk through to the yard. The trees here, which should have bloomed by now under the auspices of summer, are a sickly-white, with only a smattering of buds struggling to open amidst dripping branches.

    I put my hand on the main entrance and push it, but it doesn¡¯t budge.

    ¡°That entrance is blocked, whoever you are!¡±

    Someone calls from afar, making me flinch. I creak my head.

    The figure stands at the main gates in a navy overcoat, hair of wheat slicked back relaxedly. ¡°It¡¯s been that way for years. You need to go through the back,¡± he continues, standing with an inquisitive air, curious. And that¡¯s when I realize it¡¯s ¨C

    ¡°Mr. Reynauld?¡±

    ¡°...Hold on, you are...¡± recognition flashes across his expression.

    We approach each other in an unexpected reunion.

    ¡°What serendipity! It is you!¡± he exclaims, as we both briskly embrace. ¡°To run into you at a place like this ¨C what brings you to this town?¡± he asks, concern evident.

    ¡°The surprise is mine ¨C I¡¯m just here to find something.¡±

    ¡°Here? At the orphanage?¡±

    My voice catches in my throat. ¡°...The orphanage? This building?¡±

    ¡°Yes, E. J. Greenwood. I understood you knew about it?¡±

    ¡°No, yes, I mean, it¡¯s difficult to explain.¡±

    ¡°I see. Well, this town is not hospitable to visitors ¨C at least not at the moment where the Syndicate¡¯s running it as their turf. Are you here alone?¡±

    ¡°Yes. What about you?¡±

    ¡°My usual retinue¡¯s right behind me.¡±

    Half a dozen guards behind the trees dressed in plainclothes make a subtle gesture of acknowledgement as Reynauld turns, so subtle that I almost miss it.

    ¡°In places not too conspicuous. Look, it¡¯s not entirely safe out here, especially if you are traveling alone. It may have been a couple of years ago, but it presently finds itself in the crosshairs of many unsavory things.¡±

    ¡°What about you? Why did you visit?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m here to scout out a supplier. The deal¡¯s happening tomorrow.¡±

    ¡°I assume you are familiar with the town then?¡±

    ¡°Yes. Many of my father¡¯s friends are based in this area. I¡¯ve been here a couple dozen times.¡±

    ¡°Mmm-hmm...¡±

    ¡°I am off time at the moment to get some luncheon. What about you?¡±

    ¡°I have some tasks I need to attend to. In there, I think.¡±

    ¡°What tasks exactly?¡±

    ¡°I need to get some records. From whoever runs this place.¡±

    If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.

    ¡°Names of children? Who they¡¯ve been adopted by?¡±

    ¡°Kind of like that.¡±

    ¡°Well I am uncertain as to how amenable they would be in letting you see those, unless you wanted to adopt. Or unless you are from the Council or higher-up who can show their authority,¡± he remarks, glancing at his watch. ¡°How about I accompany you? I can help you find for whatever you¡¯re looking for.¡±

    That would be much appreciated. I had an uneasy feeling about this place ever since I stepped foot on its bounds. I could defend myself quite adequately with the Art of Air, but against an ambush or anything of that sort... why was I even thinking of anything like that? It¡¯s just an orphanage! Right...?

    ¡°If it doesn¡¯t trouble you, Mr. Reynauld, you are most welcome,¡± I say, feeling relieved, telling him the brief rundown on what I wanted to find. A record, a ledger, and whether I could find the name Ren¨¦ in it. Or Manfred. I say I''m leaning on finding the name Manfred first.

    He nods and motions his guards to stand by at the brick and iron perimeter.

    ¡°This front entrance is famous for not doing its job,¡± Reynauld jests, as he leads the way towards the back, walking in confident strides. ¡°Played around here once when I was a kid, saw adults entering and exiting through the back. I was curious so I tried to explore the building, but the front was locked.¡±

    He cautiously opens a rusty metal door on the back, streaked with misty waves. It¡¯s dark inside, but we make sight of outlines of several heads which turn in our direction.

    It¡¯s children.

    Their shaved heads catch the brief light outside as they gather around us, hands outstretched, feeling for our coats and hugging us close.

    So it is indeed an orphanage. But to keep their conditions like that....! I am a bit taken aback, almost recoiling from the eerie sight, but Reynauld pats the head of one.

    ¡°Can you show us to where the intendent is?¡± Reynauld asks.

    What must have been a girl nods without a word and pulls on our sleeves towards a hallway. They shuffle behind us to let us lead the way.

    We pass the dim hallway ¨C punctuated only by the light falling from the occasional windowsill, and pass into a large wooden door and gate. The boys and girls move away and retreat behind us as we creak the door open.

    A harsh man¡¯s voice drums off the cracks of the door.

    ¡°What did I say about sorting these correctly?!¡± he shouts, slapping a boy in the head with a folder. His reprimands echo off the walls and corrugated iron railings and stairs of the giant warehouse. The children look emaciated, dressed in clothes too threadbare for the cold of spring rain. A sack from a flour pack would make better protection against the cold. Their arms and legs are gangly and bony.

    ¡°And you, what¡¯s with your pace? Everyone here works hard to get bread on the table, and you want to eat for free?¡± A girl with a shaved head looks down onto the floor, trying not to cry. The superintendent ¨C the boss of this place ¨C picks up a jar from her low-stepped workbench and rattles the metal pieces inside. ¡°This ¨C shouldn¡¯t ¨C rattle! Understand?¡±

    ¡°Yes sir...¡± the girl croaks.

    The superintendent, not noticing us walking through the door, shouts over the sounds and noises of clattering metal and work.

    ¡°You think things out there are easy? It¡¯s harder than here!¡± he enunciates in a volume that makes the children flinch. ¡°Out there, Bloods prowl the streets, ready to pluck you one by one! If you don¡¯t pull your own weight here to support everyone else, then you don¡¯t deserve to be here! You deserve no home!¡±

    ¡°In time, people will come and consider you. But only if you can be loved! Would any parent want a child that lazes about and play, play, play all day? Put yourself in their shoes, for the sake of ¨C¡± he announces, halting his next words as he sights us.

    He changes his expression to an amicable countenance, lips grinning and frog-eyes narrowed in a false smile, fixing his dirtied cravat and adjusting his vest.

    ¡°Ah... esteemed visitors, I do apologize that you had to hear all of that.¡±

    We look at him in a mixture of sadness and disgust.

    Is this how you treat the children under your care, is what I want to say, but I don¡¯t want to needlessly antagonize him before¨C

    ¡°Is this how you treat the children under your care?¡± Reynauld asks indignantly, stepping closer.

    ¡°No, sir, no, this ¨C this is to ensure bread is on the table. The Council cut our funding, so we¡¯ve been on our own for the last couple years.¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s with those? What are they making?¡±

    ¡°Tenaliton. They¡¯re salvaging it from the metal scraps. Each piece they are able to salvage earns them money. We place that money into their private coffers so they can support themselves when they grow older or get adopted.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re running a workhouse, not an orphanage,¡± Reynauld threatens. ¡°I don¡¯t see any classrooms or places for them to run around as children.¡±

    ¡°You misunderstand, good sir, allow me to introduce you and your wife around to the ¨C¡±

    Wife? I want to blurt out, but in this situation, I surmise such a prejudice is useful. By pretending we are married and looking to adopt, we can fish information out of him as much as we want. Reynauld himself must have thought the same thing, because he lets the superintendent proceed.

    The superintended whistles a nosy bell to which the children stand. ¡°The gathering hall, in ten! Make yourselves clean!¡± he announces, in a gentler tone that is so obviously false that it makes me sick. Who knows how many years of abuse these children endured from this two-faced snake...?!

    The superintendent shows us around several classrooms with the barest of amenities, with chalk that seemed like last year¡¯s alphabet class etched into the chalkboard. I brush my hands to erase it, but it does not rub off. It doesn¡¯t even smudge.

    The superintendent looks at me, his head erratic at angles, pursing his lip and carrying on. He shows us around the indoor gymnasium, with rubber boards and seats cracking like earth under a drought. The walls are off-white, flaking off in several places in cracks. A jungle gym with yellow red and blue has paint peeling off, with rust in several places. Several corrugated iron staircases lead upwards to their quarters.

    Their bedrooms ¨C more barracks ¨C have such low ceilings that Reynauld and I have to bend to glance inside. Hay matting and straws and blocks of wood like pillows are strewn across the headrests of their poorly made beds.

    We grimace and nod our way down the stairs, through the gymnasium, and to the large hall where all the children have assembled.

    ¡°Hundred-and-ninety-two,¡± I whisper under my breath.

    ¡°So... any child takes your fancy?¡±

    The superintendent grins nervously, rubbing his hands together. I am wondering how I am to break the news that we¡¯re not actually adopting a child, rather to search, when Reynauld smoothly comes through with his speech.

    ¡°Yes, a child named Manfred, who came through here some time ago,¡± he replies, casually. ¡°He was adopted, but the adoptive parents unfortunately got caught in a crossfire between the Syndicate and the Council. The neighbors say he was returned here. We are here to take him home.¡±

    The many children waiting in the assembly droop their heads, shifting their feet.

    ¡°Manfred... Manfred...¡± the superintendent repeats, feeling the taste of the word on his lips. ¡°There was one boy named Manfred, I remember.¡±

    ¡°Is he here now?¡±

    ¡°Well, no, but if that¡¯s what happened, I¡¯m mighty sorry to hear that,¡± he remarks without an ounce of sadness in his eyes, shuffling his attention away for we are no longer profitable.

    ¡°How far back was he adopted?¡± I ask.

    ¡°Can¡¯t remember.¡±

    ¡°Can¡¯t remember?¡± Reynauld reiterates. ¡°Surely you keep records.¡±

    ¡°Those aren¡¯t for any eyes, I¡¯m afraid.¡±

    ¡°Any chance I can allay those fears?¡± Reynauld says, cocking his head.

    The superintendent narrows his eyes. He looks to the children, to us, and then back again.

    ¡°Dismissed! Recess until three,¡± he announces. The mass of children begin shuffling, downtrodden, out of the hall.

    The superintendent waits for the remaining last dozen children to trickle through, and turn to us.

    ¡°And what do you have in mind to allay my fears?¡± The superintendent asks, his eyes shifting for the gleam of a coin.

    ¡°We¡¯ll see when we get there, I suppose,¡± Reynauld comments.

    ¡°That isn¡¯t how this works,¡± the greasy superintendent objects, shrugging.

    ¡°Oh, I¡¯m afraid it does,¡± continues Reynauld, as casual as ever. ¡°I¡¯ve just halved your sum. Pray I do not alter it further.¡±

    ¡°Why you ¨C you want the records or not?¡±

    ¡°I do, of course.¡±

    ¡°Then, well, show me what you¡¯ve got!¡±

    ¡°Now until you show me those records first.¡±

    ¡°Ain¡¯t happening.¡±

    ¡°Last chance,¡± Reynauld says, his voice low and threatening. ¡°If you want something positive your way.¡±

    ¡°Get lost, you piece of dung!¡± The superintendent spits, smashing it with his boot. His back is to the gates, but as he turns, half a dozen men in plainclothes are blocking it, tapping their foot.

    The orphanage guards slide down the wall half-beaten. Reynauld¡¯s guards shake their head. The governesses peer from behind them, cupping their mouths.

    ¡°Your records. Please,¡± says Reynauld.

    * * *

    ¡°When did you manage to get them in?¡± I whisper into his ear, on our way to the office at the pinnacle.

    ¡°Oh, we have our signals. I told my general to step in once the intendent refuses my second offer.¡±

    ¡°How brilliant of you. Thanks.¡±

    ¡°Didn¡¯t break a sweat,¡± he says. ¡°Pick up the pace, will you!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s only a few seconds, damn it,¡± the superintendent swears, eyes flicking back to the entourage of Reynauld¡¯s guards behind us.

    He throws the doors open and furiously searches through the mountain of folders and piles, clearly without a care for organization. He fishes one out, looks through the other with quick hands, and then another, fumbling, sighing, muttering all the while.

    Reynauld raises his eyebrow, and so do I.

    ¡°Manfred, Manfred, where are you, you little cantankerous piece of ¨C AHA! This,¡± the superintendent says, shoving the file down at us, expectant.

    My hand shakes as I lift it upon spying names so familiar.

    No. 22    37 Surayasna 1841   Adopter: Minerva Cartier   Adoptee: Manfred A. Bastian

    I lay the file down. It corroborates my suspicion. In the seizure-induced nightmare, the name that the children yelled when calling out to Ren¨¦ was ''Manfred''.

    My head trembles. Breath catches in my throat.

    Something was wrong. To what extent I did not know, but something was indeed wrong. This is the first clue.

    The boy in the cottage may not be Minerva¡¯s biological son.

    I can barely give a nod of affirmation to Reynauld. We turn to leave the way we came. ¡°Come a time, I¡¯ll do something about this place,¡± Reynauld says. But my head¡¯s not in the mood, because all I can think now is why and how Minerva would choose to not tell me everything about Ren¨¦.

    * * *

    Minerva shifts in her seat, concern upon her brow. ¡°You saw something alarming in Ren¨¦¡¯s dream?¡± She asks me, seated across from her, whispering.

    ¡°Yes,¡± I whisper back. ¡°There is ¨C back when Ren¨¦ had the seizure, when I dream-dived, I saw memories of an orphanage. Ren¨¦ was in this memory. He held the typical features of a child at an orphanage. He was shaved and wearing threadbare clothes, and he was being chased by other children. He was crying, saying he didn¡¯t want to be abandoned. I think maybe his sickness has got to do something with it ¨C I don¡¯t know which exactly ¨C but I think he has this fear of being abandoned, and that¡¯s manifesting as the orphanage which he believes he is at.¡±

    ¡°A memory of an orphanage...¡± Minerva trails off. ¡°That can¡¯t be. He¡¯s my son. My biological son. We¡¯d not taken him anywhere nor abandoned him at a place, ever...¡±

    My heart squeezes. Either someone made up the records at Greenwood, or Minerva¡¯s not the one who adopted Ren¨¦ ¨C well, Manfred perhaps ¨C or Minerva herself is not telling the truth. I was still going to be referring to Ren¨¦ as Ren¨¦ to Minerva ¨C I was still far from seeing the whole picture. For all I know, Ren¨¦ in the bedroom upstairs could be the real Ren¨¦ still, and the existence of Manfred has been conjured up by someone who wanted to trouble the Cartier family. They were wealthy, so it wasn¡¯t out of the possibility.

    ¡°Please, Amelie ¨C why do you think he has this memory? Do you think the trauma of losing his father made him so? Felt abandoned by his father? And that¡¯s why he¡¯s ensnared in this nightmare?¡± Minerva asks, hand over her heart, leaning in so close I can see her eyes moisten with desperation tears. ¡°It¡¯s the closest thing we¡¯ve ever had to the source of his disease. Maybe if we can understand him further, maybe if we can coax out this nightmare and bring it to the light, we can remove it ¨C you can exorcise it! Maybe that could heal him! It should!¡±

    She enunciates her words with such hope and expectation that I am afraid to let her down. I still have to dive again. I still have to investigate further. I gently place my hand on her back and pull her close. ¡°Don¡¯t worry ¨C I won¡¯t let this chance go to waste. You have my word.¡±

 Chapter 8 - Veritas

    The mourning dove appears once again. It weeps.

    I listen, and find the world crumbling into place in the sphere of dreams, the city-mountain of sandstone and many tiers falling into blocks below my feet. Blocks. Blocks. Broken blocks. Jagged. Carved. Crumbled.

    I land with a thud atop the topmost layer, almost as if pushed onto it. It¡¯s the same as I remember from a month ago. The skies are rife with a yellow smog; a growling yellow sun shines a caustic light onto the barren landscape. The only difference I see is that the columns of ash and smoke that used to rise from the tiers of the city have doubled in size. Immolation.

    My hair is loosened from its bun into a flowing priestess¡¯s locks out back, my bangs fluttering minutely in the wind. I envision myself in a simple but practical armor of bronze, but it does not flicker into existence on my torso and chest. My shoulders are made bare.

    I sigh.

    I conjure a simple spear, but find its wooden grains vanish from existence.

    Minerva is giving me almost no control of her dream. I do not welcome it. The effect of Ren¨¦¡¯s condition is threatening to destroy her psyche. Yet, in this moment where the emotions are the wildest, churning and roiling like wild magic, glimpses of an even deeper subconscious can reveal themselves. And that is why I am here ¨C to see the memories that Minerva rejects. To find the truth. I shall confront the Dragon again.

    I march into the recesses of the giant gate at the topmost level, bringing me into the mountain. Once again, it opens to a dark hall the hue of deep teal, shadows draped in many places. But this time, the air that wafts from below smells like the remains of a bloated corpse. I nearly retch at its dire quality. Whatever creatures I face will be at the peak of their power.

    I spy the wide and colossal spiraled staircases leading me down into the morass of memory. At each layer before, I had fought a demon. I step onto the first stair, and momentarily scream, as spikes skewer the soles of my foot.

    I conjure platforms of ice under my feet, to shield against the spikes on the stairs, only for them to disappear as quickly as I make them. I conjure them again and again, sparing me brief seconds, cycling them through so my feet won¡¯t be pierced.

    I descend the steps, one by one, looking through the memories once again. Multicolored frescoes of Minerva¡¯s younger days come alive in a kaleidoscope of images at first, vomiting themselves onto the walls of the descending rotunda into haphazard messes of dizziness.

    Minerva¡¯s youngest memories as a toddler. Shattered. Her father from some distance away at in a brightly lit garden, holding his arms wide open as if to welcome her embrace. Minerva ¨C with a careful wobble ¨C waddles her way, one brave step at a time, towards her father, almost falling, almost stumbling ¨C but bravely marching on all the same. Her father reaches out to her and hoists her up, laughing and chuckling along with Minerva¡¯s own little giggles. She turns to see her father, but he has no face. No eyes. No nose. No mouth. Someone has stolen it. She screams. Her mother in the distance with a sun-hat cuts roses, nicking her finger on their thorns. She swears.

    I descend, cautious of approaching demons. Yet, none assault me.

    The next memory is Minerva at school. She is at the nurse¡¯s office. She had been chasing squirrels around the yard with her friends, and was climbing a tree when the branch she was on snapped and plummeted her to the sides of an iron fence. A handsome boy had run to save her ¨C a boy with a hair of charcoal navy ¨C but her arm hit the fence first. Tears run down her cheeks with the throbbing stings of the open gash on her left arm, broken too. The nurse puts it in a cast, wrapping the bandages and sliding a thick splint under, reprimanding her with words that still stings to hear. The boy asks if she¡¯s okay. She says ¡®mmm-hmm¡¯. Would she climb the tree again? No.

    I descend.

    The next memory on the walk is so vivid that I place my fingers on the smoothed, polished wall of the spiral rotunda, and find myself being yanked into the very moment it was taken. Minerva is incensed. She shouts at her mother, while her father tries to come between the both of them, trying to allay their fight. Her mother tells her that she will no longer date the boy named Hugo. Hugo, head drooping, stands outside with flowers splashed with rain, just beyond the front door that is half-open. His hair is of charcoal navy; Hugo¡¯s the same boy who had brought her to the nurse in elementary school. Minerva¡¯s father tries to say a few words to his wife, but before he can finish his words, Minerva throws down her teacup, shattering it on the floor. The shards slice open her foot. She rushes to her room, but there¡¯s no gauze.

    I am pulled through and forced in the currents through the steps of time, appearing amidst that wooden house.

    The next memory is that of Minerva in tears, holding a scrunched-up letter in her hand, the ink of its writer smudged by her falling teardrops. The letter reads ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡± Hugo has gone away to another republic, far far away. He says his father needs him there for a work with little hope of ever returning. Minerva bunches it up and throws it away. It rests in the trash.

    I plummet further, the memory thickening to the point that I can touch and feel the world around. It sticks to me like slime.

    The next memory is Minerva working as an assistant florist, dressed in a bright yellow sundress with a wide-brimmed hat about to fly off her head. She arranges tulips in little pots by the canal, drawing with a large chalk the prices of her bundles of roses gathered next to her, marking it with a little face that smiles. A boat comes drifting down the canal with a rowman and a plainly-dressed young gentleman in gray. His hair is charcoal blue. Their gazes meet. ¡°Your name is...?¡± They ask, lips parted in mirthful surprise.

    Ocean waves splash across my head as the salt stings my eyes. I¡¯m on a ship. Sailors hurry past my figure. The next memory is that of Minerva and Hugo on a ship towards the Empire of Jin. Hugo mans the helm; Minerva right behind, charting the waves on a lookout. She is a navigator. She still wears the same wide-brimmed hat, her hair now in luscious locks of lucent gray falling to her waist. She gives Hugo a kiss, holding their faces close, lost in the moment between each other¡¯s eyes, Minerva¡¯s cyan, Hugo¡¯s gray, but a long mighty shadow drifts over the helm. The Great Gates of Jin, colossal stone towers stretching miles into the heavens, part the clouds and blots the Sun.

    The fragrance of the summer sea and blocks of tea waft up to my nose. ¡°Empyrean Harmony,¡± the crate reads. Minerva and Hugo, with minute wrinkles on their faces now, proudly sign the import paper on the deck of their ship, La Belle Dame sans Peur, reading a Denaro figure of 24 followed by four zeros. The Port of the Republic of Ascension bids the arrival of their ship with cheers and wows, the first to import the mightiest tea in the world into the republics. A young boy with cream hair and explorer¡¯s cape spots them with a spyglass. His eyes are full of stars.

    The next memory unfolds on the shores of a shining sea. Hugo holds up his son Ren¨¦, showing him the vista of a New Year¡¯s sunrise. Minerva gently takes Ren¨¦ in her arms, still a baby, drifting off to sleep on her heart. It¡¯s been a long night, with lots of fireworks. Minerva¡¯s gaze meets Hugo¡¯s, and they share in a kiss, the sun rising between their noses.

    The next memory uncovers by the gardened daffodils on a small stone cottage in the mountains. Tulips dance and flutter in the wind. Minerva holds out her hands in an embrace, her hair coming to her shoulder now, tied in a braid. A straw-hat rests in an angle atop her head. Ren¨¦ takes his shaky first steps, his father Hugo just behind him, ready to catch him should he fall. Ren¨¦ stumbles a little, but determined, pushes his fist into the grass, and gets up again. He takes one step with his right. Another with his left. His sight never leaves his mother¡¯s. But he falls backwards. Hugo is gone, whistling with his hands tucked in his pockets towards the mountains. Minerva makes a puzzled look.

    The next memory is that in an elementary school. It¡¯s parents¡¯ day. The nurse, now old, giggles with Minerva as little Ren¨¦ strides into the hallways valiantly with his little collar-up shirt and suspenders, wearing a tie. Other children contemptuously address him as ¡®a show-off¡¯. Ren¨¦ glowers at them. Minerva and Hugo stand at the back of the classroom as Ren¨¦ proudly raises his hands and is the first to answer a question. It¡¯s about the sea and ships. His answer¡¯s wrong.

    The scene materializes to a sandy arena outside. Ren¨¦ and his class are playing tagball, but is losing. The gym teacher pauses the game, and asks for volunteers from the spectating parents to join in and have fun. No one steps forward.

    They lose the game, 3 to 17.

    The next memory unfolds in the dim light of their dining room in a modest mansion. Minerva holds Hugo close in her arms. Dry trails from tears mark both of their faces. On the table, a bill, a piece of white paper, the sigil of a hospital. Little Ren¨¦ peeks out from his bedroom door. Hugo spots him and brings him close. They stroll outside, where the lights of Serien far below greet their eyes. There are no stars overhead. Minerva watches over them, stirring a pot of tea. Perhaps it was never their tea.

    A shattering sound of glass explodes like a cannonshot upon my entrance to the next. As I step in cautiously, an atmosphere of blood-red assault my vision. Hugo shields Ren¨¦ behind him, arms outstretched, cornered against a wall. Three men in blood-red burgundy suits raise their Quans. They¡¯re here to collect their debts.

    ¡°Not my family,¡± he says. ¡°Not my son.¡±

    The men cock their head. The leader of them all steps forward, presenting a sigil from his ring.

    He presses his ring into a vial of dark red ink, and presses it upon the envelope, handing it to Ren¨¦.

    Hugo pleads.

    ¡°Not my son.¡±

    ¡°Yes your son.¡±

    A thunderclap and a bang.

    Hugo falls to the ground. Eyes glazed.

    A solitary tear descends from his eye.

    ¡°Dad...?¡±

    As I try to wade through to the next memory, a cacophonous rumble pierces my ears. A gargoyle, a raven, and an owl all black perches themselves onto the stone pediments, framing the perimeter of this dream. Hollow sockets greet my gaze where their eyes should be. Their necks turn without sound as I proceed cautiously into the funeral.

    All the world turns to shades of ash, the only colors permitted the red of blood and the violence of blue. Clamors. Shouts. Minerva lets out hoarse screams, her face wrinkling overnight. The cyan jewel of her eyes drowning under the waves. Ren¨¦ sits still, his face hollow, tears having dried long ago. He¡¯s alone now. And he always will be.

    Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

    A skewering pain spears my heart as the memory dissolves and I wade into the next. Each step feels like fighting against a coursing river; or feeling like under suspended honey, my feet struggle to move forward.

    The landscape changes to that of Ren¨¦ alone on the porch of their mansion. He puts a strawberry into his mouth. The juices and seeds burst forth in his mouth like gangrified flesh. It tastes like one too. As his legs dissolve, bone and sinew remain.

    The landscape changes to that of Ren¨¦ with a fever, delirious with real monsters. His bedroom in their small mansion hold only a dim lamp by the side of a table. Rain splatters outside. Minerva is seated on a chair, face-down on the tea table with her arms sprawled on the patterned tablecloth, her hair loosened into a featureless carpet of gray with frayed threads of navy.

    Ren¨¦ cries out for his father, flailing, kicking the bedsheets away.

    Up on the ceiling, a wraith with black robes, holding a scythe.

    The reaper has come;

    The reaper has come;

    The reaper has come.

    Clouds of black smoke choke my throat and sting my eyes as the memory liquefies into tar and binds me to where I stand, but I resist.

    Last time, I was stopped here. But this time, I must go further. I need to know what happened to Ren¨¦. I need to know the exact sequence of events. What is beyond this point is what probably tarnished and dyed the joyous memories of her recollection into the writhing collection of nightmares. A person¡¯s state of mind can twist even the brightest of their memories into visages of trauma.

    The tar sticks to my throat and threatens to twist it.

    Fire. 10,000%. I burn, as my body becomes wreathed in flame, and the tar evaporates in an odious stench.

    Various tendrils and spikes of tenebris metal arrive at where I stand, their tips singing in the wind.

    Ice. Fire. Metal Earth Shard.

    I deflect them all, and cleave the ground with the fury of my advance.

    I spy the body of the white Dragon caught in a net, and on top, the nightmare guardians of gargoyle, raven, and owl pressing it down, intending to suffocate it.

    They come alive, conjuring up long pillars of metal that pummel my body. I cough blood. I break them with the arts I recall, and drive my fist headfirst into the head of the gargoyle.

    It issues a cacophonous scream as it turns to dust.

    I make a roundhouse kick to the head of the owl. It simply rotates his head, a full 360 degrees, and issues a screech that bursts my left eardrum.

    I skewer it with a momentary lance, leaving a hole through its feathered torso. The raven cleaves my forearm in half with its beak as I grab it and pummel it into the ground, until only sinew hangs off its tongue going ¡®blegh¡¯.

    The dragon breaks free from its weighted prison, ascending to the sky, facing me down.

    ¡°You come again, Descender.¡±

    ¡°I do.¡±

    ¡°I am the Keeper of the Gates. If you proceed past here, there is no going back.¡±

    ¡°I understand.¡±

    The dragon takes to the sky, and with its dancing coils in the morass of utter black, a heavy gate of circular metal materializes and creaks open.

    I proceed past it, and find myself in the same bedroom. Ren¨¦¡¯s.

    Minerva shakes Ren¨¦.

    ¡°...Ren¨¦? Ren¨¦?¡± she exclaims. ¡°Ren¨¦?! Ren¨¦! REN¨¦!¡±

    But he does not awake. His eyes are gently closed. I reach out to touch him.

    He¡¯s cold.

    All around me are the howling of wolves and the cacophony of slaughters. I proceed through to the next part of her dream-memory, getting cut by thousands of threads emanating, issuing, bursting forth from her psyche intended to keep everyone ¨C even her own consciousness ¨C out of this place. I regenerate my body as fast as I am cut, my flesh growing, cut, and regrowing in the thousands of places, blood sallying forth from my determined growls. I have to see the end of her memory to the present.

    Minerva holds the casket of her son day and night until no tears remain and no voice comes. She looks to the sky in prayer for the divinities, but they do not answer her. Her head is shaved.

    Just ¨C one ¨C more ¨C step! I roar, reaching for the handle of the next door, her last memory as far as my eye can see. I turn the round knob, and force it open.

    The red threads vanish. The howling stops.

    Hundreds of children are lined up at an assembly. This isn¡¯t the one, says Minerva, brushing aside.

    Another visage of a hundred children.

    Children in two hundreds.

    Children in thousands.

    Children in tens of thousands.

    Then suddenly, the hazy figure of the superintendent with the dirty cravat.

    Minerva points to a boy. He looks just like Ren¨¦.

    ¡°Manfred Bastian?¡±

    Minerva responds. ¡°Ren¨¦ Cartier.¡±

    I finally let go of the threads of my mind holding my soul together. I rocket up.

    * * *

    ¡°You again! What do you want? If you¡¯re not here to adopt or ¨C¡±

    I grab him by the lapel, Jules by my side.

    ¡°Manfred. Manfred Bastian. Did you make him sick? What did you do to him?¡±

    The children recoil in a mixture of surprise and ¨C from what I can spy at a glance ¨C furtive delight.

    ¡°Sick? Don¡¯t know what the Naraks you¡¯re talking about ¨C¡±

    ¡°Yes you do,¡± I say shaking him, standing so close. ¡°Laws mandate you keep health records for each child that passes through. You didn¡¯t show it to me the last time. You¡¯re going to show it to me now.¡±

    ¡°And what if I don¡¯t?¡±

    ¡°Then all of your dirty business here is gonna get reported after we smash your face in!¡±

    Jules cocks his head, briefly adjusting his sleeve so the intendent can see a glimmer of his Quan.

    ¡°The records... the records... damn it, the records...¡± he fumbles, shuffling away piles upon piles of binders and files.

    ¡°Medical... no, this is last year¡¯s... there... there and ¨C here!¡± He fishes out the folder. I snatch it away and peruse through the names of individual children adopted 3 years ago.

    Manfred, Manfred... there he is.

    His record letter in bold reads:

    No known medical conditions.

    A small, faded photogram fading at the edges show his face in more detail. I peer at it.

    The same eyes I remember. And yet, he is not thin. Not at all. He looks round.

    ¡°That¡¯s all I¡¯ve got! You can¡¯t be asking me for more!¡±

    ¡°We don¡¯t need to,¡± I say, rushing out the E. J. Greenwood with Jules.

    It ain¡¯t what you don¡¯t know that gets you ¨C it¡¯s what you know for sure that just ain¡¯t so.

    ¡°Damn witch,¡± I hear him mutter under his breath.

    Was I? Or was someone else?

    * * *

    Minerva¡¯s in Ren¨¦¡¯s ¨C Manfred¡¯s ¨C bedroom when we arrive. She is wiping the fever-sweat off him, helping him up from the bed so he can take a sip of tea.

    ¡°How is he?¡±

    ¡°Not any better. I don¡¯t know why so suddenly! It¡¯s all happened after that seizure and I¡¯m ¨C please, Amelie, could you do a dive again!¡±

    ¡°Right away,¡± I say. He¡¯s burning to the touch. ¡°M ¨C Ren¨¦. Ren¨¦. Can you hear me? Ren¨¦?¡± I ask, trying to split my conscious so as not to haphazardly call him by ¡®Manfred¡¯.

    No response.

    I crack the bar of Eisen without hesitation and inhale deeply. I entwine my fingers with Manfred¡¯s clammy hands. I cannot make him out. It is of such an arduous journey that the candleflame of consciousness flickers in and out.

    He stabilizes for the time being.

    I don¡¯t understand. Not even the doctor does. How can Manfred be sick? He is not being preyed upon by beings or monsters like this! People don¡¯t just fall sick ¨C his condition was stable just a week ago until this seizure began! I don¡¯t get it!

    And as the storm of thoughts cloud my mind, I see Minerva request me for more tea and water from downstairs.

    The night is falling. And I am in no position to sleep here.

    I take the pot and refill it with hot water, bringing it back ¨C but before I do, a sudden pang of irascible consciousness hits my mind.

    Has Manfred drunken any water? Any pure water to begin with?

    I¡¯ve never actually seen him drink a glass. There was a rare allergy called allergy to water, but that was exceptionally rare that the last patient I¡¯ve heard lived over a decade ago...

    I¡¯ve made no objections to Minerva¡¯s tea because I drunk it, she drunk it, Manfred drunk it, everyone drunk it ¨C but then again, if Manfred¡¯s sickness must have a reason, it could very well be that it originates from what he eats. And he does consume quite a lot of tea.

    The fact that Manfred was healthy ¨C even at the blasted orphanage ¨C speaks to his constitution. It¡¯s only after he was adopted by Minerva that he became sick. Perhaps it¡¯s what Manfred had been fed that he is sick?

    Suddenly, the teapot I¡¯m holding feels unright. As if a part of my mind knows something is gravely wrong. I lay it down on the dining room table again, puzzled, concerned. And as I notice the pattern of flowers on the teapot, and its minute spout, I notice something screaming from my memory.

    Minerva and I and Jules have always drunk out of a teapot with a spout that was chipped minutely at the end.

    This teapot is whole.

    By instinct, I open my goatskin flask and pour the steaming tea into it as a sample. Though I can¡¯t tell why, I know something is wrong, and it could be very well be this tea. This was only a suspicion, though.

    I open the lid of the pot. Just a block of tea inside. It greets me, arms folded. Completely ordinary.

    But ordinary hides many things under its guise.

    I empty the teapot into the drain, place a new tea block, and pour the hot one in. In the meantime, I bring water upstairs.

    ¡°Thank you,¡± Minerva says, not paying attention whether it was tea or water I held in my hand. She feeds it to Manfred ¨C Ren¨¦ ¨C argh damn it!

    Manfred opens his eyes. He is groggy, but thankfully, he is called back.

    The night is approaching. I cannot afford to stay. Not with this goatskin back.

    I rush to take the last train for the night.

    * * *

    ¡°This? The tea?¡± asks Jules, his brows furrowed. He takes the goatskin out and pours it into a pristine flask.

    ¡°I think so. Something must be wrong with the tea. I don¡¯t have any evidence, just a hunch. You can analyze it, right?¡±

    ¡°I can,¡± he answers, ¡°but it¡¯ll take time.¡±

    ¡°How fast?¡±

    ¡°By tomorrow morning. If I work through the night. Listen, are you sure that this is the ¨C ¡°

    I explain my reasoning to him, and my minute observation. Perhaps Minerva was careful not to let any foreign object or contact mar Manfred¡¯s tea, and reserved a separate pot for him. I could very well be spinning tales because I¡¯m paranoid. Maybe it¡¯s because of the Eisen I took. I can see and sense and feel everything small and minute. That¡¯s why I noticed that the teapots were different.

    ¡°Alright. I¡¯ll see what I can do.¡±

    Jules shakes me awake. ¡°Amelie, Amelie, you¡¯ve got to see this,¡± he says.

    The stoichiometric paper is tarnished black. My heart drops.

    ¡°What... what does it test for?¡±

    ¡°Varuviere of various kinds. Toxins.¡±

    ¡°And it¡¯s been...¡±

    ¡°I think you¡¯re right,¡± he answers, shaking his head, cupping his mouth.

    ¡°What the hell... this can¡¯t happen! This can¡¯t be! NOOOO!¡± I scream, falling back on the floor. ¡°No, no, this is incorrect, my goatskin is... maybe my goatskin is tarnished, it¡¯s ¨C I ¨C¡±

    ¡°Your goatskin is as fine as it¡¯s ever been. You¡¯ve never gotten sick by drinking from it. And you¡¯ve had it what, two, three years ever since you set up the shop?¡± Jules asks, shaking his head, rubbing the ridge of his nose, plopping himself down onto the chair.

    A nausea of the deepest kind begins to roil my stomach. Doubled with the effects from Eisen, I retch even though there¡¯s nothing to retch except slime.

    Minerva ¨C Minerva - you ¨C you - !

    This was criminal. More than criminal. Minerva... Minerva was a murderer!

    ¡°Jules, we¡¯ve gotta get to Argent right away. We have to separate Manfred from Minerva, right now!¡±

    ¡°Amelie ¨C wait! The next train is not until 5 hours ¨C¡±

    ¡°Then we report her! Right away! I am going to ping the Serien council right away, send officers to the ¨C to the cottage ¨C remove her ¨C¡±

    All the world swims in visions of various colors. Memories of the future begin flooding my mind, of Manfred dying.

    ¡°She¡¯s the one! She¡¯s the one behind Manfred¡¯s sickness! SHE HAS BEEN POISONING HIM!¡±

    ¡°Amelie, AMELIE!¡± He grabs me by the shoulder, helping me still. ¡°Wait. We¡¯ve got to think things through right now. Just spare a few minutes for me, yeah?¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t! She¡¯s a murderer! She¡¯s the one that¡¯s been ¨C ¡°

    ¡°I know, I KNOW! Wait a moment,¡± says Jules. ¡°I know. Let¡¯s think things through. The tea. Manfred has been drinking it for close to 3 years. Yet, he hasn¡¯t died. Right?¡±

    ¡°Right!¡± I answer, my eyes swivelling like crazy, not focused on Jules.

    ¡°Amelie! Stay with me. One wrong move and we can get both of them killed! Minerva¡¯s likely not in a healthy state of mind. Never has been. Listen, the tea ¨C the poison ¨C it¡¯s likely to be slow-acting. It¡¯s likely to be slow-acting, okay? It took a long time for Manfred to become like this. So he¡¯s certainly not going to die right now or today. We still have time.¡±

    ¡°Time for what? What can we do other than get the council involved?¡±

    ¡°Listen, Amelie. Both of us want to save Manfred. If there¡¯s a poison, there can be an antidote. Do you get my point?¡±

    ¡°An antidote? But ¨C but you can¡¯t make one?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right, I can¡¯t. Not with my skills. But there¡¯s someone who can. Remember the doctor?¡±

    A flash of relief comes across me. He hasn¡¯t been able to visit for more than three weeks by this point for reasons unknown, but I know his address in the city of Serien. He lives only a twenty-five-minute run from our shop.

    ¡°We¡¯re going to get the doctor to make the antidote first. We show him the results of this poison. And then he ¨C or us ¨C or all of us ¨C are going to visit Manfred again, feed him the antidote. We remove the risk of Manfred¡¯s death first. And then we think of what to do with Minerva. Got it?¡±

    ¡°Got ¨C got it...¡± I stutter.

    ¡°Pack your things,¡± says Jules, carefully packing the results of his test ¨C and the sample of Minerva¡¯s poisoned tea remaining ¨C into his alchemical satchel.

 Chapter 9 - "We Both Sell Dreams"

    The half hour it takes for us to race through the streets of Serien, leaping over its many canals, bridges, boats, and slumbering cargo, is a mere blur to me. Before we know it, we stand on the second-floor landing of a small and narrow apartment complex by the address given to us as the doctor¡¯s residence.

    A knock on the door by Jules.

    A furious knock on the door by myself with such intensity that a neighbor¡¯s door opens.

    ¡°Would you shut it up? It¡¯s 6:40 in the freaking morning!¡± the old woman in pajamas hollers, slamming her door shut again.

    No answer. I sigh, clutching my head, nearly collapsing the floor.

    ¡°What¡¯d we do now?¡± I ask Jules. His lips are pursed, deep in thought, calculating.

    But just then, a slam shut on the apartment entrance below. I notice a shadow drape past the light of the faintly rising sun, and hear thuds on the staircases. I leap down, heedless of Jules, and run into the figure of a curly gray beard and fading gray hair, bespectacled in round glasses.

    ¡°Dr. Louis!¡±

    He is so surprised by my sudden appearance that he lets go of various fabric bags holding alchemical instruments and bottles of liquid. Some slide down while a bottle breaks in splatters on the staircase. He makes a loud swear.

    ¡°BY THE FOUNDERS,¡± he exclaims, clutching his heart, ¡°do you know what you¡¯ve done? I needed that bottle! What kind of freaking imbecile do you need to be to pounce on a stranger at an unholy hour like ¨C wait,¡± he pauses, doing a double-take, ¡°you are ¨C you are that Miss, aren¡¯t you?¡±

    ¡°I am. Amelie. Amelie Marceau. I ¨C we need to talk to you, right now.¡±

    ¡°Ms. Minerva?¡±

    ¡°Yes, yes, it¡¯s about Ren¨¦!¡±

    His eyes grow wide. The doctor unlocks his door, fumbling, and shoves it open. As we enter, he drapes a green curtain surreptitiously upon an alchemical setup bubbling and boiling still. He extinguishes the fire underneath.

    ¡°Tell me. Tell me everything,¡± he says, holding up an index finger. ¡°The important first.¡±

    ¡°Minerva is poisoning Ren¨¦. We have to give him an antidote. As fast as possible.¡±

    ¡°What?¡± Dr. Louis sputters. ¡°You¡¯re accusing her of poisoning him? Do you have any evidence?¡±

    ¡°Yes,¡± answers Jules, taking out a vial of Minerva¡¯s tea still remaining and uncorking it. ¡°You can analyze it all you want to make the antidote, but you¡¯ve got to hurry. And fast.¡± At the mention of the word antidote, the Doctor makes a brief, tenth-of-a-second glance towards the alchemical apparatuses beyond the green curtain. I don¡¯t think Jules noticed, but in my hyperconscious-state where I can feel everything right and wrong about the world thanks to Eisen, it makes my heart lurch.

    ¡°Well, I¡¯ll see what I can do...¡± says the doctor, trailing off.

    ¡°It¡¯s not what you can do. You must do it!¡± I exclaim. ¡°Ren¨¦¡¯s life hangs on you! Where have you been the last three weeks?¡±

    ¡°My fault, my fault!¡± The Doctor shouts, hurriedly taking the test vial to the adjoining laboratory.

    ¡°I have experience. Just tell me what you need,¡± relays Jules, taking off his coat.

    We follow the doctor to his indoor laboratory, but just as we¡¯re about to cross the threshold, he motions us no closer. ¡°No shoes in the lab! Take those off. And your coat off, unless you want your face burned,¡± he says to me, despite still wearing his shoes, rushing into the lab and taking various beakers and cups into the cupboard instead of placing them out. And as we fumble to take the shoes off, I by the corner of my eye spy a set of stoichiometric papers, draped in black, crumbling and flaking off in the morning sun by the windowsill.

    ¡°What¡¯re those?¡±

    ¡°What?¡±

    ¡°What¡¯re those?¡± I ask again, pointing, finding their place wrong for a reason I cannot articulate.

    ¡°They¡¯re called stoichiometric papers. We use them to test poison,¡± he comments without special attention, unrolling his coat and throwing it to the floor on the far side of the laboratory.

    ¡°What poison?¡±

    The doctor ignores me as he hands Jules a couple of beakers. ¡°This one there, the smaller one ¨C here. Pour these with half a teaspoon of water. We¡¯re going to test the vial and know what poison it is. You how it goes, yes?¡± He enunciates rapidly.

    ¡°I already did. It¡¯s varuviere toxins.¡±

    ¡°Varuv ¨C Varuviere?¡± the Doctor stammers momentarily.

    ¡°We can check it again right now.¡± Jules strides over and notices the blackened stoichiometric papers himself. ¡°Do you have anything other than these?¡± he asks, holding them up, trying to see if there¡¯s a small piece of yellow on the edges that they could still use.

    ¡°Yes,¡± says the Doctor, snatching them away. Jules looks at him quizzically. ¡°Look by the second drawer,¡± he says, scrunching them up and throwing them into the refuse cans.

    ¡°Jules,¡± I whisper, ¡°can you show him the stoichiometric papers? The ones that we used ourselves?¡±

    ¡°Good idea, we can compare them that way,¡± he replies, fishing out the blackened papers from his satchel. He takes them out and is about to stride over to the doctor, but I stop him by his wrist.

    ¡°Amelie? What? What¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°Wait...¡± I trail off, examining the shade of black on our stochiometric papers. It is a distinct hue of black, mixed with a tint of plum and umber-brown. Catching the falling rays of the morning sun at an angle, it gives off a prismatic display of colors, making polygons on the surface of the paper that I see with my eyes. I would not have been able to discern any of this, but the heavy dose of Eisen I¡¯ve taken the past few days are persisting their effects in tandem with my throbbing head.

    ¡°The same hue...¡± I murmur, as I fish out the crumpled pieces of the Doctor¡¯s stoichiometric papers from the refuse cans. I compare them together. They are the exact same hue and tint.

    ¡°Dr. Louis,¡± I mutter, ¡°what did you test your papers for?¡±

    ¡°What?¡± he shoots back in an irritable tone of voice, calibrating the burner. He nicks his hand in the minute flame, and yelps. ¡°Jules, was it? Can you take Miss Amelie outside, please? She¡¯s slowing things down.¡±

    Jules stands, puzzled slightly.

    ¡°What do you mean, Amelie?¡±

    ¡°The hue. The papers. Exact same shade,¡± I repeat, putting them side by side for Jules to see.

    ¡°Huh, you¡¯re right,¡± Jules murmurs, stopping halfway from putting on his gloves. He also realizes something is odd. There¡¯s too many beakers and alchemical apparatus for someone whose title is a traveling doctor. This laboratory ¨C come to think of it ¨C is fit for an apothecary, not a doctor, a traveling one at that.

    ¡°Dr. Louis, how often do you test for poisons?¡± asks Jules.

    ¡°For occasions that require me to. What? We¡¯re out of time and you¡¯re asking for my schedule?¡±

    I notice steam arising out of the green curtain draped over other apparatuses outside. I unfold it to see vials of a green-deep liquid bubbling away by the side, with a corked vial of something that looked like tea ¨C

    ¡°Hey! MISS! No touching stuff that doesn¡¯t belong to you!¡±

    The tea is the same shade as the one in the vial we have. I uncork it and smell it. And that¡¯s when it hits.

    The same sweet fragrance of the tea that Minerva¡¯s been serving Manfred.

    ¡°Hey ¨C hey Jules! This is the same tea that¡¯s ¨C¡±

    With a sudden bang and blast, Jules knocks over on the ground, out cold.

    The Doctor shuts the blinders.

    ¡°Damn it! DAMN YOU! You just have to poke your nose in places you don¡¯t belong, don¡¯t you?¡± He screams, advancing towards me. I instinctively make for the door, but it is locked from the outside.

    ¡°Don¡¯t tell me you¡¯re in league with her ¨C you ¨C the poison ¨C this is your doing? Minerva doesn¡¯t know?¡±

    ¡°Oh, shut up, you Maestro,¡± the Doctor swears, unsheathing a scalpel from his coat pocket. ¡°You think I¡¯m in league with that rich crone?¡±

    ¡°Then why¡¯re you being defensive? You have something to lose,¡± I retort.

    ¡°Yes, because I¡¯ve been making the antidote for Ren¨¦ all along. It¡¯s what pays my bills. And now you¡¯ve shoved me into a situation where I have to explain all this or otherwise I¡¯m mistaken as the one that poisoned that blasted boy!¡± He hollers, throwing a beaker towards me. It shatters by the plastered wall.

    ¡°You¡¯ve had the antidote all along? Then what in the Naraks have you been doing with it instead of saving him?¡±

    ¡°I have been saving him, you idiot Dream Merchant. You noticed that I haven¡¯t been able to visit since 3 weeks ago. Ren¨¦¡¯s condition worsened in those 3 weeks. Perhaps you can make the connection?¡±

    ¡°What...?¡± I ask. ¡°You ¨C you were keeping him alive? But how hasn¡¯t he healed?¡±

    ¡°The same reason as you do.¡±

    ¡°What reason?¡±

    ¡°Are you this imbecilic or are you deliberately trying to get on my nerves?¡± Dr. Louis screams.

    Then it hits me like a carriage. There is no profit in healing Ren¨¦ ¨C Manfred ¨C completely. Because as soon as he heals and gets better again, it means the doctor¡¯s services won¡¯t be needed anymore.

    Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

    ¡°And just as I¡¯ve scrounged enough bottles to deliver another batch, you two show up,¡± he swears, hoicking a good spit into the refuse can next to him.

    ¡°You ¨C you knew about the poison all along! You knew Minerva was poisoning him! And you didn¡¯t bring Manfred to safety!¡±

    ¡°Of course I didn¡¯t, I¡¯m not an idiot! What do you think happens if I do?¡±

    ¡°MANFRED CANNOT WALK!¡± I roar, indignant.

    ¡°Who in the Raks is Manfred?!¡±

    ¡°Ren¨¦!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s what he¡¯s ¨C forget it. You didn¡¯t hear any of this, understand?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve heard everything! You ¨C you knew about the poison all along as a doctor, someone who¡¯s supposed to heal and save lives, and you let this go on for ¨C for ¨C for 3 years! Just so you can live off them like a parasite! YOU SHOULD HAVE SAVED MANFRED AND REPORTED MINERVA RIGHT AWAY!¡±

    ¡°Maybe this goes over your head, but have you seen her? Have you seen her talk about her son? I¡¯ve seen her mix the calcophout flowers into the tea, have asked her about why she does it! And you know what she told me?¡±

    ¡°What?¡±

    ¡°That it¡¯s something she¡¯s always done when making tea. I¡¯ve asked her why she doesn¡¯t do it to her own teapot then. And do you know what she replied with?¡±

    ¡°That ¨C¡±

    ¡°That it¡¯s to make Ren¨¦ feel better, and she herself doesn¡¯t deserve such a rare ingredient. You should have seen her eyes. She said it with such nonchalance that I could not believe what I was hearing.¡±

    ¡°Oh, then you used it as an opportunity to take advantage of her illness? Her and Ren¨¦¡¯s?¡± I holler back, indignant.

    ¡°I told her it was poison! I told her it would make Ren¨¦ feel sick! But she didn¡¯t believe it. She told me that if I was that bad, mistaking the sweet flower for something so poisonous, then perhaps she should get a better doctor.¡±

    ¡°You coward,¡± I spit. ¡°All I hear is excuses to live off their backs. IF YOU ARE A DOCTOR AS YOU SAY, YOU SHOULD HAVE REPORTED HER RIGHT AWAY!¡±

    ¡°AND WHAT DOES THAT MAKE ME?¡± The doctor hollers, pounding his heart. ¡°What does that make me? She will insist I¡¯m in the wrong, that I¡¯m a false doctor, and fire me, implicate me as the one who¡¯s doing the poisoning! She will deny poisoning her son herself! Do you know how precarious of a situation I was in? One flick of the finger just like that, and it will be ¡®he said,¡¯ ¡®she said¡¯ at the courts, and the jury will see me as the one having thought of such a scheme and accuse me of trying to hijack the Cartier family fortune! For all their idiot brains, they hear the word ¡®doctor¡¯ and equate it to alchemist and poisoner!¡±

    ¡°But why is she poisoning Ren¨¦ then?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s all too obvious! It¡¯s so that she doesn¡¯t bleed inheritance! If Ren¨¦ dies, she gets to keep all of her husband¡¯s wealth to herself! She¡¯s a widow, that much you know!¡±

    ¡°You''re wrong,¡± I say, shaking my head. The real Ren¨¦ was already dead. I witnessed it in Minerva''s deepest memories as my soul was being torn to shreds. ¡°Minerva¡¯s not such a person. She loved Ren¨¦.¡±

    ¡°Love can be pretended. You¡¯re an idiot for believing in everything you see, when you are a creator of illusions yourself, Dream Merchant!¡±

    ¡°You are an archon-damned DOCTOR!¡± I roar, rushing at him at such speed that he he¡¯s taken aback. I groan and push him onto the wall. ¡°Doctors are supposed to heal. They swear oaths to save lives. You have the gall to tell me you are anything but a CROOK?¡± I rattle him by his lapel.

    ¡°I am a HUMAN TOO!¡± He screams, prying my hands off his lapel with fury. ¡°I HAVE DUES I NEED TO PAY TO THE BLOODS!¡± He froths at the mouth. ¡°You think I don¡¯t have children? I have two daughters. They¡¯re only toddlers. I need to pay my dues or the Syndicate will kill me or them both. They¡¯ll be chucked into those workhouses or better yet, I will have NOTHING to call FAMILY! Every time I visit Ren¨¦ I see my daughter¡¯s eyes in his! But I can avoid it precariously month after month as long as I keep supplying the archon-damned rich whatever fantasy they want, poison or not!¡±

    ¡°That could¡¯ve been yours to stop,¡± I exclaim, incensed. ¡°To nip it in the bud before it bloomed like a rose from a corpse! You knew all the way from the beginning, and you planned it all out, living like a parasite and mosquito, sucking all the blood dry just because her pockets are deep!¡±

    ¡°Parasite? PARASITE! Ha ¨C Haha! Hahaha! What does that make you, Dream Merchant? What does that make you? You are the exact same as me. You enjoy the Denaros you receive from her! Just like me, you sell a service of assurance, and just like me, you take advantage of the rich who can¡¯t tell the difference between what¡¯s sound and what¡¯s absurd! We both sell DREAMS! And we sell them because we must, because we have our own lives to live!¡±

    He throws me off him and stumbles to a table, grabbing a disinfecting bottle and smashing it by the side of the table. He points it at me, advancing.

    ¡°WE ARE NOTHING ALIKE!¡± I issue a hoarse scream, taking my coat and wrapping it around my arm. ¡°YOU KNEW THE TRUTH FROM THE BEGINNING, AND DIDN¡¯T TELL. I DIDN¡¯T KNOW ANYTHING!¡±

    ¡°And now that you know,¡± he rambles, ¡°what¡¯re you doing to do about it? Tell the madam? Save her? Save her blithering adopted son? You¡¯re still going to visit. You¡¯ve been there all since the start of spring. You think you can change what currently is? You report this to the councils, and I¡¯m going to tell them you were in on it too. I¡¯m taking you down with me. After all, you are an undergrounder. Better yet, the madam will be convicted and tried. And her son will be chucked into an orphanage. With his ailing health, he¡¯s going to die quicker than most! So what seems fair to you? Do you see reason? Just keep this up so the madam will be happy, that her son will get to live, both of us can afford more spoons at meals, and nothing has to go wrong! Don¡¯t you get it? This is the BEST CHOICE!¡±

    ¡°THIS ISN¡¯T THE BEST CHOICE!¡± I shout, throwing a chair in his direction. It catches his elbow as he makes a loud groan. ¡°No one should live to suffer without their knowledge!¡±

    ¡°SO THINK WE ALL!¡± The doctor hoarsely screams, pounding his chest. ¡°SO THINK WE ALL! BUT THIS WORLD IS DAMNED! THIS WORLD IS UNJUST! IT CARES NEVER TO US WHO CRY AND IMPLORE! SO WE HAVE TO MAKE CHOICES ON WHAT TO KEEP OR WHAT TO LET GO! IS THAT SUCH A HARD CONCEPT! THAT¡¯S HOW WE KEEP MOVING FORWARD, LEST WE CHOOSE DEATH FOR OURSELVES! AND HEAR ME! I WANT TO BE GONE TOO! I ONCE HAD DREAMS TOO! I ONCE HAD A LOVE OF MY LIFE! BUT SHE¡¯S GONE BECAUSE OF THE BLOODS, AND I CAN¡¯T DIE BECAUSE MY CHILDREN NEED ME! THAT¡¯S HOW I AM CURSED TO LIVE ON THIS WRETCHED, WRETCHED EARTH!¡± He pounds his fists and wine bottle onto table until the wood dents and glass shatters.

    ¡°And if you dare report me ¨C no, you are going to report me, because you simply don¡¯t get it ¨C I¡¯m ¨C I¡¯m going to kill you,¡± he stammers, taking a vial from his pocket and pulling the liquid into a syringe with a needle with shaky hands. ¡°This world has no fairness... I have to make it fair for those I love,¡± he says, mortally afraid of having to kill another ¨C to kill me. He shuffles towards me, arms raised with the syringe, intending to bring it down.

    I shuffle away, but find nowhere to run. It is then and there that a mortal fear also grips me ¨C I¡¯d never considered myself weak or unable, and drowned in the fury for my search for the truth, I¡¯d ignored into what dangers I¡¯d put myself. In this very room at this very moment, I am utterly powerless.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry... I¡¯M SORRY!¡± He shouts, bringing it down upon my chest.

    But up bursts Jules from the floor. He tackles the doctor and roll away, engaging in a furious struggle of grunts and pained screams.

    The doctor stabs Jules momentarily in the thigh ¨C but before he can push with full force the liquid content from the syringe, I kick the syringe away and step on his hands. Jules holds him down, but with a free hand not bound the doctor unsheathes another scalpel from his coat pocket and stabs him in the shoulder, making Jules issue a hoarse scream; he reels backwards, the doctor stands, and nicks my cheek with an erratic cut, kicking me into the wall where I reel. The doctor strides like a crazed man towards me, but Jules grabs his legs and makes him fall ¨C I step upon his wrists and kick the scalpel away, wasting no moment to drive down the air which pins him to the floor. Jules rips off a portion of his shirt and ties the doctor¡¯s still struggling hands behind his back ¨C but the doctor scratches his hands and wrists with bloodied fury, drawing droplets of crimson, headbutting him from behind and rising up again. He reaches for the scalpel at the corner of the room, but I reach it first ¨C I duck out from his grip, a portion of my hair torn out in his grip to which I shriek, and shakily hold the scalpel in front of me, my eyes bulging, with his own the same underneath his broken spectacles.

    ¡°WAIT!¡± Jules shouts hoarsely, holding out his hand, kicking an armchair between us two still standing. ¡°WAIT. NO MORE. No more. No more. None of us has to die. None of us has to die. It¡¯s monumentally stupid for us to die like this. None of us will get what we want.¡±

    ¡°SPEAK FOR YOURSELF! I¡¯LL GET MINE!¡± The doctor retorts, shuffling his gaze back to -

    ¡°WAIT! I SAID!¡± Jules roars in agony and anger so loud the windows rattle. ¡°Then ¨C then you¡¯ll become a murderer.¡±

    ¡°I MAY AS ALREADY BE!¡±

    ¡°Your two daughters,¡± I plead. ¡°You can¡¯t kill me, or him, and get away with it. You¡¯re outnumbered, and even if you do, your conscience won¡¯t let you stay the same. You¡¯re in no position to negotiate, so hear him out. Taken by the council, the ministers, you¡¯re still out of luck. Your greatest fear is going to come true. So hear him out,¡± I deliver in raspy breaths, enunciating with a speed so fast that it must¡¯ve barely taken a second.

    Jules continues, still panting. ¡°None ¨C none of this ¨C happened. It¡¯s the only way.¡±

    Absolutely not, I want to retort. But if we keep going like this, then Manfred will never be able to...

    ¡°None of this happened? Are you out of your mind?¡± spits the doctor. ¡°You expect me to believe you that you won¡¯t report me to the council?¡±

    ¡°Yes,¡± Jules answers curtly. ¡°Because we are not stupid. Right, Amelie?¡±

    I ponder over. What the doctor said was right. If I report the doctor, then the truth behind Minerva and her son will come to light. It was a certainty that Minerva would be convicted and thrown in prison. Manfred will mostly certainly be taken back to the orphanage. But could the doctor himself bring us down? He said he would, but where¡¯s the evidence for it? Manfred himself would be able to vouch for me, and so would Minerva, that I did not do anything to harm the two of them in my line of work. Additionally, I joined Minerva much later than the doctor did, so there¡¯s only thin line of reasoning that can effectively connect the two of us being accomplices. I am an undergrounder, yes, skirting the protection of the law in many ways, but a liar and crook unlike this doctor is none of them.

    I enunciate my reasoning to the doctor. His expression droops as I speak. He knows that he is the only person in this room without a hand to deal.

    ¡°So,¡± I give my verdict, ¡°here¡¯s what¡¯s going to happen. We are not going to report you. In return, you create more antidote for the poison that Minerva¡¯s been mixing in the tea. And you give this antidote to us. You will then leave Ren¨¦ and Minerva alone. You shall visit them no further. Break any of these rules we set, and we will report you immediately no matter what. It¡¯s a small penance to pay for the moral filth you committed in bringing a child nearly to death through willful neglect, trading one innocent life for another.¡±

    ¡°Then you rob my family¡¯s daily bread. I cannot accept.¡±

    ¡°Then find new people with honest work,¡± I say, emptying my entire pockets of my Denaros and hurling them at him. The doctor tries in vain to catch them mid-air. Jules looks at me as if I¡¯m crazy, but soon understands. ¡°I¡¯m no stranger to your suffering, and don¡¯t want to see your children die, whether you are lying out of your teeth or not. I give you the benefit of the doubt. After you create the antidote, you shall put it in a bottle. I will have you shake this bottle in front of me, and drink it in front of us, so don¡¯t try to pull anything funny. Only after you pass the bottle to us will your duty for the antidote be considered complete.¡±

    With the contents of the bottle, I would deliver it first to Manfred immediately; what¡¯s left over, Jules could analyze, and continue producing more of the antidote on his own. With it, we could slowly nurse Manfred back to health.

    ¡°You have until tomorrow. Get to it.¡±

    * * *

    A multitude of thoughts race around my mind. There is the issue with Manfred too, but more telling is just why Minerva would do this to her son, adopted or not. It was just too cruel, too demonic, too disgusting. Even if we cured Manfred, would Minerva be better? Would solving the disease bring her happiness?

    I call back to the memory of E. J. Greenwood. Manfred was fully healthy when he arrived. And yet, there was no evidence that Minerva was actually genuinely happy in the past 3 years. She purposefully fed him the tea to make him sick. Almost as if Manfred being sick reassured her mental state in a sick, twisted kind of way. But that¡¯s what grief does, I think. She¡¯d never seen her son happy after her husband¡¯s death, and the only memory she has of her true son is that of him being bedridden. Manfred being healthy was an anomaly, one which reminded her that her adopted son wasn¡¯t real. And so she had to...

    A nausea catches in my mouth. I have to clasp it with my hands. It couldn¡¯t be. It can¡¯t be.

    But at the same time, something else lodges in my throat. It¡¯s that Minerva insisted Manfred was her biological son, almost as if she purged her memories of adopting Manfred, almost as if she had no idea. Something told me it wasn¡¯t premeditated malice that drove Minerva; rather, a sickness in the soul so deep that it even influenced her memories, and made Manfred out to be her true son, and she was poisoning him without realizing it, her mind dismissing it as something which must be done, something which was normal, something she had always done for her son so that she finds no fault in it. It was like an instinct. In such a case, us nursing Manfred back to health with the antidote was likely to be ineffective in the long-run. Manfred would, for fear of abandonment, never leave Minerva¡¯s side. And as soon as we leave, the poisoning would continue, because the world in which Minerva lives right now is not the world she knows, or can even confront. Her soul and dreams are elsewhere, still living in the past. She is shaping reality with her grief without even realizing it.

    For everyone to be truly happy, it was Minerva herself who had to be cured. She had to be rescued from her grief which still grips her to this day, unable to let go because abandoning it would mean losing everything she loved.

    And in that moment I realized that the dream of immortality that she requested me at the cusp of winter was not for her own son; it was a cry for help for her own self, a dream for herself that her son would be immortal and never had to die.

 Chapter 10 - Eternity

    ¡°...Why didn¡¯t you tell me, Manfred?¡± I ask, my face contorted in a mixture of pity and sadness. I already know the answer.

    ¡°Because I didn¡¯t want to be abandoned...¡±

    ¡°Even when your adoptive mother ¨C Minerva ¨C has been killing you? Making you sick?¡±

    ¡°Mmm-hmm,¡± he nods, his round eyes of gray flickering with tears. ¡°Because I¡¯ve nowhere to go... please Miss Amelie. Please don¡¯t tell on her to anyone else. Please. I beg you, please,¡± he grabs onto the fabrics of my sleeve.

    ¡°This is... what your mother ¨C what Minerva¡¯s been doing is... nothing but wrong...¡± I trail off, clutching my head in our shared dream.

    ¡°As long as I follow along, I¡¯ll still be loved. And nothing bad has to come.¡±

    ¡°Even when it means you will die?¡± I ask, lowering my knee, brushing his face with my fingers.

    ¡°Yes...¡± he nods.

    ¡°Then I¡¯ll save you. I¡¯ll save everyone.¡±

    ¡°You have a way to do that?¡±

    ¡°Of course I do,¡± I say, trying to hold back my tears, ¡°I¡¯m the best Dream Merchant there is.¡±

    Manfred¡¯s little form turns back into the form of a little Celendir, vanishing in the wind.

    I awake in Manfred¡¯s bedroom, my hand on his. He¡¯s been fed the antidote, mixed with a glass of warm, pristine tea. Minerva doesn¡¯t know this, of course. She does not have any idea that I now know everything. One could call it quits here, and just like the Doctor before me, carry on as if nothing has happened, feeding Manfred the antidote at the right intervals, carrying on this charade.

    Minerva looks to Manfred ¨C who she believes to be Ren¨¦ ¨C with a sorrow so deep I can feel her emotions entangling with mine. She cries into the pillow next to him, squeezing it tight. Memories of her squeezing her son¡¯s casket all alone, singing her lullaby, surface to my mind.

    If I do not save Minerva, no one will. And Manfred will once again be alone.

    It was time to complete my final project.

    I silently get up towards the bathroom. And cracking all of my remaining Eisen bar, I set it alight to inhale it entire.

    * * *

    ¡°Mum,¡± Ren¨¦ whispers, coaxing her awake. Minerva sluggishly lifts her head from the stained pillows, bleary-eyed. She finds herself arising from the bed of her childhood home, a cottage tucked deep in the mountains, where she also raised Ren¨¦ after returning with Hugo.

    ¡°Ren¨¦...?¡± Minerva slowly raises herself up, adjusting her hair, feeling the folds of the pillows and pillowcases, slowly folding the edges of her bedsheets, gawking at me. I am conjuring the form of Ren¨¦, down to every minute detail ¨C the little scar on his shin, his hair of gray and navy, his little nose and his big round eyes, a thin frame, in loose blue pajamas. I mimic the quality of his voice down to the last tremule.

    ¡°Where... where...¡± she mumbles, feeling around to feel the solidity of the bedframe.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡±

    ¡°Huh?¡± Minerva recoils as if surprised. I make the little Ren¨¦ recoil in tandem.

    ¡°Sorry, Ren¨¦... it must have been a bad dream. A really long bad dream...¡±

    ¡°A nightmare?¡±

    ¡°Mmm-hmm...¡± she trails off.

    ¡°Want some chamomile?¡± Ren¨¦ says, expectant gleam in his eyes.

    ¡°...Mmm ¨C thank you,¡± she says. Her tense shoulders seem to relax. She rubs her eyes and parts the frizzled bangs of her hair out of her eyes. She reaches for the mirror by the bedside table and swivels it at herself.

    The wrinkles on her face her gone. Her hair comes down to her shoulder in beautiful braids. She is the image of herself exactly as she was before her family was picked from her.

    This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

    Massaging her neck, she gingerly draws herself out from the fluffy bedsheets, motioning her legs aside and stepping onto the wooden floorboards. They make a soft creak, cool to her soles. A long, silk nightgown graces her frame. She dons a soft gold cardigan folded over a chair, buttoning the tops. She steps outside.

    Ren¨¦ is almost done with the tea. He pours a cup out, his little hands trembling under the weight of the teapot and a handle that is too thin ¨C and spills some over the cup into the saucer.

    ¡°Oops...¡±

    Minerva softly brushes her son¡¯s hair. ¡°Let mum get the rest. Thanks.¡±

    The door opens to the scent of cool spring outside. The winds from the mountains descend and brush the pine-green grass in waves. A mourning dove coos in the wind among an olive tree. Mother and son seat themselves on a small, round wooden table, with a fixture. Minerva adjusts her sunhat at an angle to her head.

    Ren¨¦ takes a sip.

    ¡°Mum?¡±

    ¡°Hmm?¡±

    ¡°What was the nightmare you had?¡±

    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s nothing, it¡¯s...¡± her voice pauses as it tenses in her throat. She looks up, exhausted. ¡°It was about... not being able to be by your side.¡±

    ¡°What do you mean?¡± I make Ren¨¦ ask, quizzically. ¡°Did you go somewhere?¡±

    ¡°No, no!¡± Minerva blurts out, suddenly pulling Ren¨¦ into a tight embrace.

    ¡°Mum?¡±

    ¡°No, no... I ¨C I didn¡¯t go anywhere. You have nothing to worry about. You¡¯ve nothing to worry about...¡±

    ¡°Oh...¡± I make Ren¨¦ say, lowering his voice to a wistful whisper, ¡°then... it¡¯s me who went?¡±

    She gasps.

    Ren¨¦ continues. ¡°It¡¯s okay, mum. Hope I wasn¡¯t away for too long...¡±

    ¡°Wait, Ren¨¦, something isn¡¯t right...¡± she says. ¡°I¡¯m... you¡¯re ¨C¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong? Are you in danger?¡± Ren¨¦ asks rather timidly, standing up.

    ¡°This ¨C grass ¨C it shouldn¡¯t be here, it¡¯s from the meadows down south, but we are up in the mountains...¡±

    Good. I nod, watching them from the side, invisible to both.

    ¡°And our tree, it should have blossomed with flowers by now. It should be peach...¡± Minerva sighs. ¡°Oh, Ren¨¦...¡±

    Ren¨¦ makes a feeble smile. ¡°Did I do a good job?¡±

    Minerva collapses to her knees. Hot tears spring up from her closed eyes. ¡°It shouldn¡¯t have been this way... it shouldn¡¯t have been this way... you are still alive... you are still here... you should¡¯ve been alive... you should¡¯ve been here...¡±

    She wails, echoes of her cries carried by the wind to disappear before the mountains.

    ¡°I¡¯m so sorry that I couldn¡¯t be by your side... mummy¡¯s so sorry... it¡¯s all my fault, it¡¯s all my fault! I¡¯m so sorry Ren¨¦.....!¡± Her chest heaves in roiling sobs. Anguish throws themselves out into the air.

    ¡°I¡¯ve always been by your side...¡± assures Ren¨¦, hugging her. In her diminution, Minerva¡¯s been reduced to her form in the midst of her elementary-school memory, with a cast on her arm.

    ¡°I¡¯m so sorry to make you see me like this...¡± Minerva bawls.

    ¡°It¡¯s not your fault, mum. It was never your fault.¡±

    ¡°But this means you passed through the Labyrinth of Echoes! That means you¡¯ll be ¨C you¡¯ll soon be... it¡¯d been 3 years... 3 years and no news... and now it¡¯s all so sudden...!¡±

    Tears erupt again as Minerva shakes her head. Her son pulls her close.

    ¡°We can¡¯t change what¡¯s already been passed, mum,¡± he assures, wiping her tears away. ¡°But you can still do something. You can still do something to save me.¡±

    ¡°What is it?¡± Minerva exclaims, holding his hands.

    ¡°Manfred in the cottage by the sea. Do you remember?¡±

    Minerva cups her mouth. She stumbles back, shaking her head.

    ¡°No,.... no..... no........!¡±

    I see memories, memories so far chained under the weight of her being, released all at once to her own conscience. How she mixed the calcophout flowers into the tea. How she¡¯s been mixing it all the time. All the time in the hope that Ren¨¦ would return, and that it made Manfred Ren¨¦. Another boy... another boy forced to be her son.

    Her remorse arrives like such a violent tide that I ¨C for a moment ¨C feel the dream about to crack under the weight of her throes.

    Minerva clutches her head and retches to the side, crying out with such disgust at her own self that Ren¨¦ has to stop her, clutching her arm.

    ¡°Please... please forgive me, Ren¨¦, please forgive me for what I did, please forgive me... don¡¯t hate me.... don¡¯t abandon me!¡± she prays, rubbing her hands together, her eyes wide, afraid, afraid of the judgment and label that would come from her son.

    But judgment is not the way I intend things to unfold.

    ¡°Mum, mum.... ¡° he assures, his hands on her shoulder, ¡°I know you did it out of love for me. I do. But it¡¯s a wrong thing to do. Now that I¡¯m here, you have to put a stop to it, okay? You have to put a stop to it. Manfred¡¯s of the same flesh and blood as I am. If you love me, if you love him, let him go. Give him that tea no longer. Can you promise me that?¡±

    ¡°Of course... of course... of course,¡± she says, blotching the tears by her sleeves.

    Ren¨¦ pulls her close. Wordless moments pass in that embrace, their warmth and rhythm of heartbeat a conveyor of thousand words.

    ¡°And mum... you know what I came here to do, right?¡±

    Minerva nods, but then shakes her head.

    Ren¨¦ answers gently. ¡°In this dream, I can spend only a day. No more and no less. The heavens allowed me to bid you a last goodbye. After that, I will be released to the cosmos. My atoms will fly into the night sky, and once again become part of the earth and sea.¡±

    ¡°But it means you¡¯ll be gone! I can¡¯t ¨C I don¡¯t want to leave your side!¡±

    ¡°No, mum,¡± he says, ¡°I¡¯ll once again be a part of you. And I¡¯ll always be here,¡± he smiles, touching her heart.

    I unfold the last day for Minerva with her son within my dream. With Eisen, I can sustain it for a full day, though at a significant cost to my health.

    Every movement and moment I conjure with my own heart brings me closer to the dream shattering away. But I hold on. I persist.

    Minerva and Ren¨¦ take to the stream with splashes. Minerva forms her son¡¯s hair into a mohawk with soapy suds. They race about in a game of tag, in a match of hide-and-seek. They play cards. They pretend warriors. They giggle and laugh, knowing that a few hours later, all of it has to end.

    The 24 hours pass, and I am at my limit.

    Immortality is a myth, as much as it is a dream ¨C we have to end, and draw the curtains close.

    But for now, both mother and son hold eternity in the palm of their hand.

    I''ll carry on just a few seconds longer.

    For from away, the scent of baked cookies wafts into the room.

    Fin

 Thank you for Reading & A Warm Hello from the Author

    Hello! Thank you for reading Dream Merchant Amelie ¨C I appreciate you for sharing the journey with me.

    I''d once heard of a story from my mother of someone she knew who was suffering from such grief that she would see hallucinations of her son. She had a son who was 23, and had been killed by an accident while performing his national service (military duty) in the army. His passing was so sudden and unexpected that she for years had trouble coming to terms with the physical reality of her son¡¯s death. I began to write and unfold Dream Merchant Amelie as a way to explore how we tackle grief of such magnitudes, especially when there seems no answer for a way out of it, and how this grief intertwines with the lives of others - seen from the perspective of someone who cannot initially surmise that the character is driven by this grief and only sees its apparent effects. As I continued writing, I found the scope naturally expand to a larger topic which I was surprised ¨C and devastated ¨C to come across.

    This larger topic has to do with the fact that, sadly, Minerva and Ren¨¦¡¯s condition is not fictitious. It¡¯s called ¡®Munchausen syndrome by proxy¡¯, or factitious disorder imposed on another; it is where one person, usually a caregiver, creates an impression of a disease in the person they care for, and presents them as being sick or injured. According to medical studies, this syndrome results in a mortality rate of anywhere between 6 ¨C 10% for children who are subject to the caregiver, making it perhaps the most lethal form of abuse.

    Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

    There are several hypotheses as to why a person may have this mental health disorder which drives them to fabricate the disease in their children. Some suggest that the behavior may be motivated by the caretaker seeking sympathy; other literature suggests a desire for attention is a contributing factor. Dream Merchant Amelie and of Minerva¡¯s story is an exploration of these different reasons, but I didn¡¯t want to simplify those reasons to narrow interpretations of malicious desire or selfish attention; grief and survivor¡¯s guilt come heavily into play in the story, and I wanted to explore the ways in which the characters could eventually overcome this together and survive. In this case, Dream Merchanting is a form of therapy, so to speak, one which Amelie seeks to accomplish.

    This story was written during a particularly difficult period for me, and features lots of emotions which I believe bled through to the story. Thank you for staying by its many ups-and-downs, and if Dream Merchant Amelie surprised you or resonated with you ¨C or you found it tugging on your heartstrings ¨C thank you. I am glad I could write and share this story, and would appreciate your support in the voting block for the January 2024 Community Magazine Contest.

    To a new future, Amelie, Manfred, and Minerva departs,

    See you again,

    Toshinori Heiichi