Dream Brave

by Anna Silver

  Hantu took her hands in his own and grinned. “There is no obligation here, Eclipse. Even now, you can turn back.”

  But she shook her head. “They have already seen to my body. I must go with you into your world, or have no world at all.” She looked around at the others. “Doubt delayed me. I had to wade the waters of the Lowplane for some time before the Midplane would show itself.”

  Anya nodded. She'd been there before. Early on, when she was just learning the ways of dreamwalking and her mentor still presided over her, she'd spent many a night wading through the Lowplane marshes until her confidence allowed her to move higher.

  Eclipse's pale eyes met hers. “Roanyk?”

  Anya shook her head.

  There was an intake of breath, and then Eclipse was beside her. “I'm sorry.” It seemed everyone had known something of the love growing between them.

  “So am I,” she replied.

  Chapter 3

  An Unexpected Storm

  “To the far shore,” Hantu called, moving past the circle of stone toward the edge of the trees. They could wait no more. With Eclipse among them, the time had come, though Roanyk hadn't. He stopped at Anya's side. “We are all disappointed.”

  She sniffed and hung her head. None so much as herself.

  Hantu patted her hand lightly. “What I said to Eclipse stands true. You may yet turn back.”

  Back to her body. Back to her life as the Si'dah of her people, to the training of Dyna. Back to the arms of Raku. But those arms would hold nothing for her now that she'd tasted another's. And that life would only remind her of all that she'd lost. If she couldn't have Roanyk, she didn't want to be Anya anymore. She was ready to forget, to become someone Other.

  She slid her hand from under Hantu's and balled her fists. “No. I go forward. With you.”

  He nodded briefly and moved ahead of her without a word. They each passed through the trees in his wake, Anya waiting until she was last of all. Turning back to the empty grove once more, she took it in one last time, this place where she'd met Roanyk, where their love had blossomed. And where she was now leaving it behind. Would she see him again? When she returned here as another? Would he look on her the same? Would he be here at all?

  The stones sat empty and silent. The trees stood sentinel to the hollow shell of her heart. “I love you, Roanyk,” she said aloud to the empty grove, her voice echoing back to her again and again. “I always will.”

  Then she turned and passed through the wall of trees into the unknown.

  At first, the wind, the sand, the sting, it all seemed part of the ordeal. They didn't call it the “far shore” for no reason. And as far as Anya knew, no one had ever attempted what they were doing before. Certainly not her own mentor, who only ever counseled her to seek the Astral's wisdom in the sustaining of their people, then to retire to the rest of the Highplane like every Si'dah before her.

  Anya knotted her arms against her chest, dropping her head, and felt her knees buckle twice before she found their strength again. Ahead of her, she'd all but lost sight of the others. Hantu was leading the way, but he was less than a shadow in the storm that plagued them. Behind him, Geode and Atel were nearly side by side. Geode's blue cloak continually flashed in the howling wind like a raised flag. That cloak was about the only thing keeping Anya in their path. More than once she'd lost sight of them altogether until the motion of that cloak caught her eye and drew her forward. Atel's massive staff dug deep into the shifting earth at their feet with every step, steadying him though his pace was slow. Eclipse was next, her wings wrapped tightly about her like a cocoon. Her small frame seemed to be a help in this wall of wind that pummeled them. She kept low to the ground, beneath the worst of it. But her wings were a constant concern. Open, they would leave her at the mercy of the lashing gusts. Anya was last, bundled against the torrent like a swaddled babe. Her long black hair darted around her wildly, whipping her face and neck.

  It was as though the Astral were saying, Don't. Stop right there. No further.

  But why would it oppose them so? This was not something Hantu had warned them about. First Roanyk's mysterious absence and now this impossible storm? Anya wondered how much more they could expect to encounter that she would be utterly unprepared for. With every step, this seemed like a worse idea, but she couldn't go back to the empty silence of that grove that held nothing for her but Roanyk's betrayal.

  Ahead, it appeared the others had stopped, taking refuge as they clustered together against the winds. Anya joined them, leaning her head low into the huddle they formed, barely able to hear their voices over the howling protests of the Astral. “Why is it resisting us like this?” she asked them.

  Hantu shook his head, yelling to be heard at all. “I don't know. Perhaps there is some other way?”

  What other way? There was only ever one way anywhere in the Astral. Forward. It really didn't matter which direction you chose to move in, eventually they all brought you to your destination. Because like time, space was a matter of illusion here. Nothing more.

  “Impossible,” Atel said aloud. He'd obviously been thinking along the same lines she had.

  “Is it a test?” Geode asked.

  Eclipse huddled tight against the tall wind-block he provided.

  That was more likely. The Astral did not give up its secrets easily. If you wanted something from it, you often had to give something in return. This was partly why Anya's mentor had insisted that as Si'dahs they must live loveless lives. A trade she had been willing to make until Roanyk. And one she was being forced to make again.

  Something flickered to life in her at the thought. Roanyk's betrayal followed by this maddening betrayal of the Astral itself, could they be connected? Perhaps the first was no betrayal at all. Perhaps that was why Roanyk hadn't joined them. Could the deal her people's first dreamwalkers struck with the Astral have held him back?

  Anya's blood suddenly ran cold. Eclipse had said the Astral played on her doubt and forced her to wade the Lowplane until she rose above it. What if it was doing something similar to Roanyk? Something not unlike what it was doing to them now?

  She turned to look behind them until the tug of Hantu's hand on her shoulder brought her back down into their tiny circle of protection.

  “What is it, Si'dah?” he asked.

  She swallowed hard, feeling the grit of sand against her throat. Even as a group, they might not make it out of this. But alone, what chance did Roanyk stand? She had to go back for him, had to find out what he was struggling against. This could be her fault—she knew it deep within herself. She had gone back on the trade her people made with the Astral, and now the Astral would punish her by taking the only love she'd allowed herself to feel. She couldn't let it win.

  Anya looked at the faces around her. “It's Roanyk. I think he's lost. I have to go back.”

  Hantu's face contorted. “Si'dah, what you ask is madness. You'll never make it through this alone. Even if you did, you won't know if you found the right current without me. You could drown here, or be lost to some unknown world. I can't allow that.”

  How could she make them understand? This was her doing. She had to fix it. If it meant going back so Roanyk could make the journey without her, fine. But she couldn't let him be lost to the Astral's whims because she had been too foolish to weigh the gravity of their bargain as dreamwalkers. “I'm not asking permission,” she hissed.

  Geode struck out and pawed at her arm. “Hantu's right. Please, listen. You'll never make it. I know you're hurting, but Roanyk didn't come. It is his decision to make.”

  But they were wrong. This wasn't his decision. The Astral was making it for him. He would never go back on his word. That was against his very nature. He was nothing if not honorable. It was one of the things she loved most about him. How did she not see all this before? “Think!” she commanded Geode, all of them. “Roanyk would never let us down like this. He would at least have come to give his regrets. He is no coward. This is not the
man we know.”

  Hantu glanced over a shoulder and turned back, his words carrying on the wind almost as soon as he could speak them. “Perhaps not. But there is nothing we can do for him now. If we move forward, if we make the leap into the next world, my world, then maybe the Astral will let him go.”

  Hantu had always been wise beyond his years. Si'dah could read the truth in what he was saying, but she still couldn't accept it. Roanyk would never leave her out there alone like that.

  “The best we can do for him, for ourselves, is move forward,” Hantu stated.

  “Then you'll have to move on without me,” Anya told him, no malice in her heart. “For I cannot leave the man I love behind.”

  With that, she rose to her full height in the unmerciful winds of the storm and began walking away from them, back the direction they'd come. Now that the Astral knew what she intended, maybe it would ease up a bit and let her be.

  But within moments, she realized that was not the case. For the storm only raged on and gained in strength. It seemed the Astral was determined to keep them apart. It wanted Roanyk for its price, or nothing at all.

  Anya cursed under her breath and pushed forward. The winds should have been at her back now, but they tore at her from all directions, shredding her skirts and twisting her hair into impossible tangles. Her face was raw with the tiny lacerations of sand. And her eyes burned, blurring everything in front of her face. They were right, she would not make it on her own. But she had to try.

  Suddenly, a tremendous gust cut past her, blowing something hard against her shoulder and throwing a large flash of white into her path. Anya stumbled to her knees in the deep sand and had to struggle to rise again. When she looked up, Eclipse was inexplicably before her, head down and legs locked in a battle of strength as she strained against the winds to move back toward the spot where Anya had left the others huddled together. It made no sense until Anya saw the filmy presence of her wings unfurled behind her. In this dauntless attack from every direction, the wind had managed to tear her wings out from her body, causing her to catch air and fly helplessly back. Even now, tears and rents appeared in the delicate fabric of her wings as if made by a dozen invisible knives.

  Anya strained to reach out to her, to help. She threw out her hand, calling against the incessant whistling of air for Eclipse to grab hold. The tiny girl looked up, her face a twist of agony and fierce determination, and did as she was asked, but the effort proved too much. Pitching her off balance, it gave the wind more leverage, and just as their fingers brushed against each other, her mouth parted and her delicate expression contorted into one of shock. She was thrown back like a petal on a breeze, disappearing before Anya's eyes into the swirl of sand around them.

  Anya froze, horrified by what she'd just witnessed. She couldn't erase the sting of shock she'd seen on the girl's face just before the wind ripped her from sight. All her life, the Astral had only and ever been a friend. Not this treacherous landscape that threatened everything she held dear, swallowing people whole before her very eyes.

  Would the Astral take each of them now as punishment for her defection?

  Tucking her shock away, Anya surged forward, more determined than ever. She would reach Eclipse and help her. She would find Roanyk. Together, the three of them could figure something out. Some way to appease the Astral and make right the promise she'd broken. Some way to find a new life now that their old ones were forfeit. Anya remembered Eclipse saying that her body had already been dealt with. If the girl never made it forward into Hantu's world, what would become of her?

  Chapter 4

  The Price

  After what might have been hours struggling alone in the sand and wind, she was convinced of only one thing: the futility of her choice. How much time had passed since she'd seen Eclipse disappear into a whirlwind of grit and fury? Since she'd left the others behind? And still the storm raged, and still she saw no one. By now Hantu, Geode, and Atel would have reached the far shore. They would have found the current. They would have ridden the tide into Hantu's world. She was lost out here. Along with Eclipse and Roanyk. Unless she'd been wrong and Roanyk had never come.

  Anything seemed possible now. Nothing seemed certain.

  There was naught to do but move forward until the Astral tired of this tantrum and at last allowed her refuge somewhere. She curled her long fingers into tight fists against her chest, cursing the wind. “I would have found a suitable substitute for my heart!” she shrieked at the roaring Midplane. “If you would only have given me the chance.”

  But there was no response to her pleas. Just wrath. Just chaos.

  Anya put a hand to her forehead to shield her eyes so she'd have some vision. A shadow was etched against the curtain of swirling sand ahead. At first she thought it a trick of the light cast by her hand over her face. But shifting her hand or her gaze made no difference, and something in her heart lifted at the sight. It gave her feet purchase and her legs speed. She took desperate, plunging steps forward, rocking against the wind and sand for balance, watching the shadow draw nearer to her as she drew nearer to it.

  A flash of white made her heart sink. She'd been scouting for Roanyk's black hair or dusky skin. But it lasted for only for a moment. She registered it must be Eclipse. Perhaps together they could make more headway than apart. As she drew closer, she could make out the tattered remains of Eclipse's wings splayed in the wind. But something in the girl's movements was off. Her body seemed limp against the storm, though she was upright and moving forward with considerable speed for her size. Her wings, so battered and torn, must have given the storm little to catch and lift at this point. Perhaps she could move more quickly on her legs now that her beautiful wings were destroyed.

  Anya sped up, anxious to reach her and give aid. It was only when she was mere feet from the girl that she noticed the black hair blowing out behind the shattered wings and the broad feet moving beneath Eclipse's dangling legs. She seized, catching at her hair and holding it back to see better.

  Eclipse approached, her face slack and eyes barely open. She was weak, too weak to walk. Someone was carrying her, holding her protectively before him. As one wing flopped down in a sudden downturn of wind, his face was revealed from behind it. Anya would know those ice-blue eyes and red markings anywhere.

  “Roanyk!” she called, throwing herself forward to close the space between them. He shifted Eclipse into Anya's waiting arms, allowing her to help him hold the girl up. Tears, hot and wet, fell down her raw cheeks, disappearing in the wind as quickly as they dropped. “I thought you hadn't come,” she told him.

  His expression said otherwise. He, too, was weakened by the storm. But Roanyk cut far more powerful a figure than Eclipse ever could. He was too strong to be beat down yet. “How could I not?” he asked her.

  Anya nodded and looked away, afraid to let him see the play of emotions that was surely coursing across her face: doubt, fear, regret, shame, love, relief, joy. Had her words to the Astral done this? Or had their love simply been too strong?

  “We must stop,” Roanyk shouted to her. “It's the only way.”

  Anya dipped her head in agreement and followed him over to a towering dune. They laid Eclipse at its base and sat beside her, their arms naturally curving around one another. The winds continued to bay at them, but after a bit they settled, sensing that there was nothing to fight at the moment.

  The lull brought more relief than Anya thought possible. Her hair settled around her square shoulders. Her eyes began to dry out. Her skin tingled with its wounds. When she at last spoke, she didn't have to shout to be heard. “Why is it abating?”

  Roanyk cast his eyes over her, ignoring the question. “You're injured. There're cuts all over you.”

  Anya shrugged. “It's nothing.” She looked over the remains of Eclipse's wings. “She has endured much worse. And you—you look worn.”

  “I've been fighting the Astral every step of the way. Long before the grove. When I finally arrived, i
t was empty.”

  Anya cleared her throat and it burned like liquid fire. “We thought you'd chosen not to come. Foolish, I know.”

  He took one of her hands in his. “But you came back?”

  She nodded. “I figured it out after we'd left. It's my fault, Roanyk. All this.”

  “How?” he questioned. His eyes drunk her in, and even now, with all they were facing, she felt herself quiver at the love she saw in them.

  “It is the price my people pay to have a dreamwalker among them. I cannot know love.”

  “But you do,” he said flatly. Her passion for him was evident. He needn't question it.

  “Yes. Against all odds, I do. And I dared to shun the agreement we have kept for generations with the Astral. It tried to take you from me as its price for my defection.” She felt ashamed she hadn't seen it sooner, before they were all caught in this mess, but there it was. She wondered silently at what the others had been forced to trade for their power, what bargains had each of their kind struck, but she knew it was not for her to know.

  Roanyk considered this in silence. But as long as his long arms were around her, she didn't care about anything else. At last, he told her, “The Astral is nothing if not true. It would not stand such a slight. But perhaps there is something else you can give it. Something that will allow us safe passage to the far shore. For I fear now, we can none of us go back.”

  “I've hoped as much,” she admitted. “But what?”

  Roanyk tightened his hold on her, placing a tender kiss on her temple. “I am afraid that is something only you can answer.”

  Afraid to move, for fear the storm would rage again, the three of them took shelter in the shadow of the dune for what felt like an entire night. Overhead, the mists showed specks of starlight, but there were no real stars here, only reflections of reality. And yet this place was more real than any world any of them had known. That was the mystery of the Astral, it was everything and nothing at once.