Dreamstrider

by Lindsay Smith

  No, it’s his tone that troubles me. I was only a scrawny little wisp who loved to help him dissect dreams; I’d assumed I was his very first test subject for dreamstriding. But his description of me sounds too much like the Hesse who turned me over to the Ministry so long ago, like he was presenting them with a new toy. I’d forgotten how cold Hesse could sound—the detached scientist Hesse, who’d attack an experiment from every possible direction until it yielded a result.

  “Professor.” My throat clenches tight. “What are you saying?”

  “I’ve done terrible things, Livia. Why do you bother with me? I never should have created those formulas, never hunted for a dreamstrider … I could have spared so many deaths. I fear now even more deaths will come.”

  “Deaths?” I cry, panic rising in me like a tide. Surely he isn’t speaking about the Incident. “What do you mean? I’m here—I’m alive.”

  “No, Livia. You’re the only one to survive.”

  The room spins around me. “No.” My hands had been tidying, unconscious, a bone-deep reflex, but I drop the stack of papers I’d been about to move. “No. What do you mean?”

  He keeps staring out the window. “You know what the Wastes are capable of.”

  They say it was easy to get lost in your dreams in the days before Nightmare was destroyed—that you could slip too far into Oneiros in your sleep and get devoured by the Wastes. It’s why the priests forbade anyone but themselves and a few professors like Hesse from entering Oneiros. So many died. They succumbed to their deepest fears and darkest regrets, and Nightmare’s minions preyed on their pain until their souls were devoured. But it’s safer now—the only real danger comes from severing that tie to your body, like I do when I dreamstride.

  “They—they died trying to dreamstride?” Even now I can hear the chatter of the Nightmare Wastes, snaring like hooks into my skin. “But you—but you never told me—” I swallow down the bile that burns in the back of my throat. “You sent them to their deaths!”

  His fingers trace the lead lining his window panes. “Most did quit after the first hint of danger from the Nightmare Wastes. A few others accused me of trying to resurrect Nightmare himself—that another theorem I was working on…” He stops himself, finger trembling against the glass, then hangs his head. “But those who pushed on, who took that leap from their bodies … Every last one of them … dead.”

  I ball my hands into fists. Rage is useless to me; there’s nowhere for it to go. “Why wouldn’t you tell me? Why let me think no one had ever reached that stage?”

  “Because I didn’t want you to be afraid.”

  He squeezes his eyes shut and rocks back and forth on the sill for a few moments; I fear that I’ve lost him. I’d always feared that age would claim him before he could help me escape the tunneler life, but guilt looks to have a head start, crushing him slowly like the heavy slabs of stone the people of the northern islands once used to crush their criminals. Finally, he rears up his head.

  The great Albrecht Hesse, esteemed professor of theosophy, renowned scholar of dream interpretation and manipulation, and, for those initiated into the Ministry of Affairs, creator of dreamstriding. Dreamstriding had been nothing but a formula on a page before he met me, a jumble of variables boiled down from decades of study—not with the reverent hands-off fervor of the Dreamer’s priests, but the relentless prodding and scraping and measuring of a scientist. He knew, mathematically, it could be done, and didn’t give a damn what the priests said.

  But he could not do it himself. He told me it was because he was too old, and his mind too inflexible to allow him to succeed at dreamstriding. But now I wonder if it was his fear of death, a conviction that he was too important to lose. Only one damned foolish little girl managed to dreamstride—because she didn’t know enough to be terrified of what this man asked.

  “How could you?” But I already know. Research was more intoxicating than any drink to him, and each of my tiny successes fed his ego like nothing else could. We both knew I should be capable of more, though—digging further into a subject’s mind and using that access more fully. It was there, in his formulas, backed by reams of published articles and sealed Ministry reports. Hesse had envisioned a whole squadron of dreamstriders, actively spotting threats to the Empire by searching others’ dreams and using their bodies to gather information. Instead, there was me and my rudimentary grasp of dreamstriding.

  I’d spent my whole training wondering why I couldn’t do more with my gift. I’d never stopped to think what would have become of me had I been even an ounce weaker.

  “So many lies I’ve told. To protect Barstadt—that was always my goal—but it’s too much. Lies about dreamstriding. About Nightmare’s death. About the Dreamer himself—”

  “About the Dreamer?” I take a step closer to him. “What are you talking about?”

  “You all put so much faith in him, but he’s powerless. It’s just a great lie, keeping Barstadt in its sway.”

  “The Dreamer isn’t powerless.” My skin tingles; anger flares up inside of me. “He gave me the gift of dreamstriding. He slew Nightmare to protect us.”

  But Hesse just snorts. “Sure he did. It’s all too much,” he continues, as if the dam has broken, and now the truth is gushing forth. “I never should have gone down this road, and now I’ll pay for it. I wish I could destroy it all. The theorems, the equations, the ritual. Livia.” He twitches. “You have to destroy it. Find the key and destroy my research. You know where it is, Livia.” His stare bores straight through me. “My work has to stop. No one can know the truth of what I’ve found.”

  “What work has to stop? What research do you want me to destroy? Dreamstriding?” But as I move one stack of papers and clear a space on his writing desk, the question dissolves on my tongue. A hardened chunk of something wrapped up in wax paper is stuck to the desktop. Its cloying scent had been masked until now under the stench of his squalor and despair. I peel back the wrappings, but I already know what I’ll find.

  Lullaby. The Dreamless resin. It’s already partially worn down.

  “You have to forgive yourself,” I tell Hesse, rewrapping the sticky wad of resin. “And tell Minister Durst the truth. We need you, now especially.” I hesitate, lowering my head. “I need you.” To protect me against Minister Durst, I think, if nothing else.

  I scurry over to the window—even with wax paper between the stuff and my skin, I don’t want to touch it for long—but as I lean over Hesse to lob it outside, he snatches my wrist. Our eyes meet. He pries my fingers apart with a strength I’ve never seen from him and takes the ball of filth from me.

  I grit my teeth. Within a minute of using Lullaby, he’ll collapse into dreamless sleep, and I’ll lose him again. He’s shut me out, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it.

  “You’re better than this,” I say. “You’ve created incredible things—the Dreamer has given you an incredible mind. Why are you throwing it away?”

  “Please. Destroy my work.” He rubs the sticky mass against his gums and sinks back against the windowsill, eyes lidding as sleep reaches for him. “If you value this life I’ve given you, then make sure it ends with you.”

  Chapter Ten

  Marez tosses back the rest of his ale and slams it onto the tabletop with the other emptied steins. “Ahh. Just what I was thirsting for.” His elbow knocks into my ribs. “Fun. You could stand having some.”

  “We’re working,” I reply, folding my arms across my chest. We’re supposed to be finding out what business the ale hall owner had with Lady Twyne, but Marez and Kriza insisted we grab a round to lend credence to our presence. My throat is rubbed raw from having to shout over the din of the ale hall, and we’re no closer to uncovering Lady Twyne’s plans. “Do you always conduct investigations while inebriated?”

  For all the ales he and Kriza have downed, Marez’s gaze is as sharp as broken glass. I can feel his mind whirring like clock gears, his eyes darting about, his ears homing on every sound. H
is nose grazes my ear as he leans in to make himself heard. “I’m not inebriated. And as for fun and work—I always prefer to combine the two.”

  I’m grateful for the poorly lit ale hall, for whenever I blush, my face seems to radiate heat like a well-fed furnace. “I’m afraid we don’t have that luxury right now.”

  “No? More’s the pity, my dear.” He smirks at me. “In Farthing, we can always make time to enjoy ourselves.”

  My skin tingles at his words. I work my jaw, searching for an appropriate response, but before I can cobble one together, Marez leaps up onto the bench, and joins Kriza and the other patrons in a fresh round of drinking songs. I slump forward with a mighty exhale.

  Stouts, porters, and saisons shower down on me from all directions as the grating, oomphing melody rings through the ale hall. “Well, I see there’s one bit of Barstadt culture you Farthingers don’t hate,” I say. Not that he can hear me over the lyrics detailing a northern farmer’s daughter and her bountiful virtues (among other bountiful things). After several more verses, some of the singers reach their limit, and tumble off the benches; the song collapses similarly. Finally, the Farthingers plop down on either side of me.

  “I don’t hate everything about Barstadt,” Marez says.

  “Just most?”

  Marez slings an arm around my shoulder, crashing into me like a drunkard, but his words are frightfully sober. “The problem with Barstadt,” he says, “is its obsession with order.” The hand around my shoulder trails down my back, sending a fresh flush to my face. “Everything must be so prim and proper. So rigid.”

  I sit up straighter and shy away from his touch. “It’s—it’s good for there to be an order to things,” I stammer. “It keeps us honest. Allows us to focus on fulfilling the Dreamer’s messages.”

  “You call it honest, the structure of Barstadt society?” He laughs—harsh, rimed in frost. “Only fully fledged citizens can live and work on the proper streets, while those deemed unfit for society are forced down into the tunnels. The rats of the city, herded this way and that by crooked gang leaders who know how to trade their tunneler subjects for a coin, any way they please. It’s slavery.”

  “Slavery has been abolished in the Barstadt Empire for over three hundred years—”

  “Really? You could have fooled me.” He cups my chin in one hand and turns my head toward the doors. “Look around you. This hall was built by tunnelers, it’s cleaned by tunnelers, and the whole thing is orchestrated by a vast network of criminals, the go-betweens for the right proper citizens and the sad, forgotten wretches.”

  Anger churns fierce inside me; his touch burns on my chin. He knows nothing of what it’s like to be a tunneler. The cycle of violence in the gangs, the tunnelers’ lack of citizenship—they are all broken, yes. But the Dreamer will show us the best path to resolve these issues. He must. We must trust in him and his plan—I can’t imagine any other way.

  “And what of Farthing?” I ask. “Are you telling me that a confederation of pirates, smugglers, foresters, and more is free of all criminal elements? You’re nothing but a bunch of crooks. Your whole nation is founded on crookedness.”

  “It’s not a crime if it isn’t illegal,” he replies with a twist on his lips. “We watch out for our own. No aristocratic inbreds telling us what to do. Everyone does their part for the confederacy because they want to be a part of it.”

  What of the Dreamer’s plans? I want to ask, but I doubt Marez cares much about those. I can’t imagine the Dreamer leading us away from Barstadt, his chosen land.

  But neither do I hear the Dreamer asking me to stay.

  Marez shakes his head. “You really must learn to loosen up, enjoy the small pleasures in life. If you ever have a chance to visit Farthing, take it, little secretary. You’re sure to learn a lot more about enjoying yourself.”

  I try to imagine what it would be like for me in Farthing, or anywhere but here—not being indebted to Professor Hesse or the Ministry of Affairs. Not relying on my paltry skills as the dreamstrider to spare me from returning to tunneler life. Freedom to pursue whatever best suits me. Feeling like I belonged.

  But it’s a fleeting fancy—these Farthingers are no more my people than Brandt and his aristocrat friends. He’s picking through my weaknesses with the same skill I’m certain those nimble fingers of his can pick locks. I lean away from Marez and hope the dark hall is hiding my blush. Tonight, I’m doubly glad it’s Jorn shadowing me, and not Brandt.

  “Kriza? I think it’s time.” Marez glances over my head at her. She’s singing and flailing around with the best of them, but as soon as their eyes lock, she goes cold with determination. A shiver runs through me. Even Brandt isn’t that talented an actor.

  Kriza hops off the bench and wraps an arm around my shoulder. “Hey, girlie, let’s you and I visit the pissin’ room and have a chat, hm?” She’s slurring her words, staggering around. If I hadn’t seen her eyes seconds before, I’d swear she was three tankards past sane. I try not to let the prickle of fear under my skin rise to the surface. Let the professionals do their work.

  We burst into Kriza’s “pissin’ room”—the chamber, as we call it in polite circles—and she hooks a chair under the door handle. The stench of ammonia and the weak bouquets of flowers that attempt to conceal it bring tears to my eyes.

  “Ye gods, it’s worse than I imagined.” Kriza pulls the paisley-patterned scarf from her hair and ties it around her mouth. “Ain’t you stuffy imperials ever heard of plumbing?”

  “It gets clogged down here by the docks, but you get used to it,” I say in a pinched, nauseated voice that indicates otherwise.

  Kriza hops onto the long wooden bench. I gasp as her foot edges dangerously close to one of the holes that open onto the sewer far below. But she’s as nimble as a squirrel, finding purchase on a sconce to hoist herself higher along the wall, then swinging her elbow into the giant wooden slats of the ventilation opening overhead. Brandt once told me that the ventilators in ale halls are the sole thing standing between a chamber full of ammonia, lit candles, and a massive explosion, and I’ve no interest in finding that out for myself.

  “Do you need an engraved invitation?” Kriza asks me. “Come on.” She wriggles her way up the ventilation slot, and I hear her stomp onto the roof of the chamber.

  Dreamer, protect me. The acrid stench of human waste floods my senses, reminding me what awaits me if I fall. I’ve no desire to take a dive into that particular pond. Once, I evaded a gang enforcer by clinging to the stone wall that dropped down to sewers far below, praying he wouldn’t believe I’d been so foolish to drop down into that waste. Maybe I still have some of that strength. I reach for the wall sconce and prepare to swing myself up. Come on, Livia. Focus.

  The door handle rattles, jostling the chair to no avail. “Hey! Who’s in there? Let us in!” someone shouts from the other side of the door. My mother once warned me never to come between a bladder full of ale and a chamber, no matter how much more cleaning I had to do. I take a deep breath. I can’t lose my concentration. Pretend you’re dreamstriding, Livia, and make your body work with you.

  “Come on, now, I can’t hold it much longer!” another man yells. The chair groans as the mob on the other side throws its collective weight against the door. Now or never. I lunge for the sconce and swing a slippered foot into its crook. Pure determination carries me upward through the ventilation hole, and I brace my arms on the topside of the roof, my lower half dangling through the opening. Kriza stares down at me, hands on her hips.

  I kick my legs, trying but failing to haul them onto the roof with the rest of me. “A little help?”

  She presses her lips into a thin line, eyeing me like a worn bit of clothing she’ll soon have to throw out, then braces both her thick hands on my forearm, and yanks me up. Not a moment too soon, either. As my feet clear the lip of the hole, I hear the chair in the chamber splinter, and the mob clambers inside.

  Kriza takes off running along the angled roof b
efore I have so much as a chance to catch my breath.

  “Wait! Won’t they know we’re up here?” I call after her.

  She rolls her eyes. “I’d love to see any of those drunkards try to follow us. Come.”

  I pad across the sloping slate roof and join her at a corner of the building. Like most buildings in Barstadt City, the ale hall is a tall and narrow pale structure with high, dark roofs that come to awkward points. Rooms jut out in a labyrinth of stacked floors.

  “We should find the records we need in the manager’s office—up there.” Kriza points to the third floor. “Tall enough to sit on top of the main hall, with mirrors cut through the floor so they can watch for trouble.”

  “And we’re heading for the office?” I ask.

  She nods, her bloodred hair loose and wild around her face, free from her scarf. “We’ll see what tales their shipping logs tell.” Kriza hoists herself onto the roof of the second-story room beneath the office window.

  “And we’re taking the outside route why?” I flail and flop around a few times before finally joining her on the next roof.

  “Coz it’s far more fun!” She flattens against the outer wall beside the window. “Marez should be starting that riot for us right … about … now.”

  “Riot?” I screech.

  “To draw the owner out of his office.” She rolls her eyes. “I would expect anyone in the Minister of Affairs’ service to know such basic tradecraft.”

  “I mostly deal with paperwork, and—”

  Kriza whips around to face me, her eyes deadly cold, like a viper. “Marez clearly sees something in your skills that I’m missing, and our nations’ agreement requires us to bring you along. But if you’re going to get in the way of our investigation—”