The Dream Catcher's Daughter

by Steven Fox

  The Guardian then stood, offering his shadowy hand to Jason. He took it and stood beside the powerful mage. The Guardian turned to him, and Jason thought the Guardian looked more like a hunched, old man beneath the shadows than the powerful mage he’d come to know.

  “I fear, however, the Dream Caller has returned. For you.” Before Jason could say anything, the Guardian continued, “Strange things have been occurring—a giantess, a hound, twins…am I correct?”

  “Um…”

  “I take your hesitance as a yes.”

  “But why me? Why did the Caller summon my dreams?”

  To this, the Guardian said, “The Dream Catcher can teach you. Will you learn?”

  “I won’t learn. Not until you tell me what’s going on.”

  The Guardian crossed his arms. “Answers are not always handed out. You must work for them. I leave it to you, then. Will you learn?” Finally, Jason nodded. “Then tomorrow go to the Dream Catcher. She will take you from there.”

  The Guardian turned to leave, but Jason said, “Hey, wait. I don’t even know where the Dream Catcher lives.”

  “I believe you do. After all, the Dream Catcher’s apprentice gave you her mistress’s house key.”

  Jason blinked, and the Guardian vanished. He stood there a moment, dumbfounded, then walked home. His dad was still working, but Jason had a spare key. He went upstairs and found his cell phone on his bed. A note sat next to it, from his dad:

  Left this in my office earlier! Don’t want to lose it. Never know what might happen to you.

  Jason crumpled the note and chucked it into his wastebasket. He sat on his bed, clutching his cell phone. For a few moments, he only stared at the phone. Then his eyes trailed to his desk. The second stool wasn’t there. But it would be, sometime. Unless he did something, the second stool would always threaten to appear. Just as the liquid stone would threaten his body. Just as the law threatened to wipe his memory. Just as, now, this mysterious Dream Caller hunted for Jason with his own dreams.

  He opened his phone and fished out from his pocket Len’s house key and phone number.

  EIGHT

  Darlene sent him a text around seven the next morning, asking him if he’d be at the U TOP, usual time. No, he’d replied. When he called her the previous night, Len had told him to come over around 3:30, that way no truancy officers would pick Jason off the street. He didn’t have a record as a truant; his record was so clean teachers would ask where he was, not because they suspected him of playing hooky, but because his absence was like a void. Jason was sure his year away had remedied that.

  He sat on his back porch, staring out into the backyard. The family apple tree stood in the far corner facing north. A few rotting apples lay about the tree’s roots. Tara had liked apples, fresh apples, and applesauce. They’d made her giddy, made her giggle with the charm of a fairy.

  The tree’s trunk seemed to curve slightly inward toward the middle. Jason rubbed his eyes, and the curve disappeared. Suddenly, he wanted to carve curves into the tree. Carve them deep and smooth. Then he’d hollow out the sides so that two wooden arms looped out like teapot handles. He’d chop down the rest of the tree, harvesting the apples first, of course, then round out the top of the handles, making shoulders and a head atop the wooden statue.

  But why stop there?

  He’d strip the remaining five foot-seven wood statue of its bark. With sandpaper, he’d smooth it out. He’d use a chisel to create breasts and a face. The hands would come next, firmly planted against the hips, which would be fitted inside jeans of sanded wood. The hair, lips, and nose would be tricky. But he had a good memory.

  The hardest part would be the eyes, those shimmering hazels. How would he catch so much emotion with only wood? He couldn’t. The real thing had to be here. How else could it be done? Without Tara Engel, this sculpture, this monument to beauty would stand as ugly proof of failure. By the time Jason came to this conclusion, he could hardly breathe. His body was trembling, filling with the liquid stone. His lips were dry and caked with dead skin. His bottom lip split when he opened his mouth. The iron tang of blood stuck to his tongue as he licked his lips. The stone had already filled his arms and belly and the lungs would come soon after. Then his heart. By that time he’d already be dead.

  “Forth,” he croaked.

  Painful relief followed, searing every joint, tendon, and cell as if he’d just finished an excruciating workout. Jason fell back, banging his head on the screen door; it didn’t hurt much, not compared to the rest of his body. He wiped the sweat from his brow, and a breeze swept across his face, turning it icy.

  His phone’s alarm buzzed. It was already three o’clock. He sat up, careful not to look directly toward the tree. He turned to head out through the back gate. When he hit the street, he looked back at his house. It felt like he’d forgotten something.

  He glanced down at his phone, then pocketed it.

  ***

  His father never forced Jason to work on Fridays, which freed up plenty of time for Len’s. When he arrived on South Hollow Ave, music floated past cracked and faded concrete; past houses with shattered windows and rusted cars; past overgrown lawns and sagging foundations, peeling paint, and the hodge-podge of trash scattered throughout. At the foot of Len’s drive, the music grew louder. She was on the roof, legs folded beneath her Indian-style. Jason felt stupid for using such a tasteless analogy, considering Len had the complexion of a Lakota princess. Her hair fell in tangles down her back, looping down and around her hips. It almost looked like a pet lying beside her, that spool of gray hair, snoozing as Len sewed smooth melodies into the air. The song seemed familiar, and Jason couldn’t help it when his eyes watered. He wiped away the tears.

  “Len,” he called out, throwing up his hand in a wave.

  She jumped, the music stopping on a sour note. Light exploded from one end of her flute and Leech lunged out of the light, his claws aimed directly for Jason’s throat. Jason only stood there, mouth agape.

  Len slurred a few notes together and as though she’d hit the ‘rewind’ button, Leech flew backward, talons still extended, mouth still slobbering and snapping as it disappeared into the flute, a puff of smoke burping from the end. Len glared at Jason. He blinked, and Len reappeared on the porch. She drilled her fist into his shoulder. He stumbled back and rubbed his arm.

  “What was that for?” he said.

  “You forgot to call me. Never surprise a Dream Catcher or her apprentice.”

  “Sorry, didn’t mean to. Didn’t you know when I was coming?”

  “My job is never done. I don’t have downtime, okay? Just don’t fuck up again.”

  Jason barely winced at the f-bomb. He’d heard worse. What burned into his mind was the hateful glare Len gave him, as if he was a burden passed onto her. This caused him to smile a bit on the inside. Someone who understands how I feel about myself.

  ***

  Len played her flute for a few minutes and explained that it helped calm her down. “Actually, it helps everyone calm down,” she said. “You’d be surprised how far and wide the magic of this flute reaches.”

  After that, Len led him into the small hallway, then through the door on the right into the kitchen. “So,” said Jason. “You comfort people? Everyone? While they sleep?”

  “Kind of. We make sure to catch malignant dreams. Nightmares are bad, too, but they just scare you. They’re a byproduct, really. Dreams…they can look good, but be bad. It’s our job as Dream Catchers to make sure these dreams never influence a person’s conscious decision-making. So we soothe whatever pain they may be suffering by taking away the indulgent dreams and replacing them with better ones.”

  “So you control what people dream?”

  “Oh, not even close.”

  Jason paused, his nose assaulted by a pungent stench. The kitchen was small and filled to the brim with plastic grocery sacks, the very sacks Jason used for delivery, though he couldn’t tell what each bag was filled with now—som
e looked to be swollen with cans, others with paper wrappers—but they were full and round, like plastic, garbage-stuffed mushrooms huddled on the yellow linoleum floor. They crowded the counter, the table, the top of the fridge. They even sat in the chairs, a plastic family feasting upon their own plastic brethren. Len snapped her fingers in front of Jason’s eyes.

  “I know it’s a pigsty, but you can go dumpster diving later.”

  She led him down another hallway, walking over and around the sacks clogging the floor, the pathway etched into her muscle memory. Jason kept brushing against them; one felt like it was filled with a waterbed, cold and jelly-like against his leg.

  “If you don’t control people’s dreams,” said Jason, “what do you do?”

  “Well, dreams can’t be controlled. Not unless you’re a focused individual. Get what I mean?”

  “Not really.”

  She whirled around, her hair whipping Jason across the face. Her lips puckered. “Okay. So, lemme use an example. Hm…Okay, you know that girl? Your girlfriend?”

  “Girlfriend?” That word nearly broke the dam holding back the liquid stone. “I…don’t have a…girlfriend.”

  “That black girl. The sexy one.”

  If he could’ve, Jason would’ve burst out laughing. He felt a great relief inside. Had Len just said Darlene was sexy? “She’s not my girlfriend. She’s lesbian.”

  Len’s face smoothened out, her eyes narrowing slightly. She cleared her throat, turning around. Jason had already seen the blush.

  “Well,” she continued, “let’s just say…for example…Darlene is dreaming of…of doing something stupid. She’s sad, so dreams of losing herself in whatever. These dreams might be harmless on the surface, but they’ll eventually corrupt her if no one puts them in check.”

  “Why can’t she do it herself?”

  “Depends. Maybe she can. But most people, even magi, aren’t talented enough to have a lucid dream, where they can influence every little thing.” She looked back to Jason, her red cheeks seeming still a little too crimson. “They let their dreams and nightmares torture them to the point they start hurting others. So I play my music, and those who are troubled by their dreams are less susceptible to their desires. Maybe they’ll even get better. Happier.” Len turned from Jason’s stare. “You look like you’re plotting my death. Quit staring at me.”

  “When you play your song, do you learn the names of those who are suffering?”

  “No, and I couldn’t remember that many names. Why would you…”

  “I never told you Darlene’s name.”

  Silence so thick, Jason swore the liquid stone inside of him had seeped into the air. Then, without another word, Len bid him to follow her down the hall.

  ***

  The basement staircase was marked by dusty purple curtains as thin as mist. Jason thanked God he didn’t have allergies, because the stairway looked like the Mecca of all allergens, with motes of dust the size of pencil erasers floating down, illuminated by light cutting in through a window at the end of the hall.

  Len pointed down the stars. “My mistress is expecting us.”

  The stairs creaked beneath them as the stairway curved down and down. The dust thickened and Jason coughed. After another five minutes, Jason wondered if they’d reach the end of the stairs before he suffocated on dust bunnies. He’d survived his fifth coughing fit by the time they reached the basement. ‘Cave’ was probably a more appropriate word.

  The walls ballooned out wide and deep. Instead of wooden beams, pillars of rock rose from the ground and supported the ceiling. Jason had to crane his neck in order to see the top and even then the shadows hid the true peak. He wondered how far underground they were.

  They stopped between two of the pillars, and Len fell to one knee. “Mistress, are you well?” Something shifted in the darkness. “May we approach?”

  There was no audible response, but Len stood, nodding. There were white markings beneath their feet as they moved farther into darkness, but it was too dim to see what they made. Out of the shadows appeared a bed. Upon white sheets lay an old woman: her skin wrinkled leather; her hair snow-white. With hands clasped over her stomach, the only thing to betray her corpse-like appearance was the rise and fall of her chest.

  She looked at them, her eyes half-open. Jason was struck by this woman’s strange air, much like the air of youth Len carried. But she can’t be, thought Jason. She has white hair and wrinkled skin. But Len’s hair was gray and her face was smooth, youthful. The Dream Catcher’s eyes caught his gaze. She lifted a trembling hand and pointed at him. Her mouth opened to say something, but let out a racking cough instead. Len moved to her mistress’s bedside. Jason stared at this feeble old woman. How was she supposed to teach him if she couldn’t even talk? Did the Guardian have any idea the condition this woman was in? If he did, this was a cruel prank. Or a death sentence, if the Dream Caller was alive.

  When the coughing subsided, the Dream Catcher cast one last glance upon Jason, then flickered her gaze to Len. She nodded, but Jason thought it could’ve been exhaustion tugging at her head. The old woman leaned back and closed her eyes. Len stepped into place beside Jason.

  “She’s the Dream Catcher?” he said.

  “Yes. She falls in and out of sickness.”

  “I see.”

  “She’s exhausted because dreams are wreaking havoc everywhere.”

  “Dreams?”

  She nodded. “Apparently, full-fledged Dream Catchers can feel these things. That’s what I’ve gathered, anyway, from the magic my mistress has taught me.”

  Jason eyed the flute in Len’s hand—a sleek instrument carved from a red wood. Intricate designs were carved along the underbelly and along the holes on top.

  “So that’s your wand?”

  “Yeah. What’s wrong with that?”

  “How do you get your power?”

  Instead of speaking, Len raised the flute to her mouth. She blew a quick flurry of notes, like the chirping of birds in the morning. It reminded Jason of a dream he’d had when he was young: He’d flown high above the earth, his arms spread wide. Golden powder fell from his arms, dusting the heads of people everywhere. He loved it; everyone loved him.

  This very dream, one he had forgotten for years, was now being projected upon one of the rock pillars by Len’s flute. She played another succession of notes, and the holographic image of his dream faded away.

  “Whoa,” said Jason. “I…I thought I had no dreams anymore. I thought they were all…gone.”

  “No. Just sealed. All of them. Well, except for a few troublemakers.”

  “Yeah, cuz a giantess, a nightmare hound, and sex-crazed, knife-wielding twins are clearly just troublemakers.” Suddenly, Jason remembered something. “Do you think it was the Dream Caller? Who released Talshe and them?”

  Len scrunched her brow. “How do you know about the Dream Caller?”

  “The Guardian told me. He said the Dream Caller…” Jason stopped, because he noticed the darkness falling over Len’s face.

  “Why the fuck would you listen to him?” she said. “He doesn’t know anything.”

  This caught Jason off-guard, but he couldn’t show it. “What are you talking about? He’s one of the oldest, most powerful magi…”

  “I know what he is. But, I’m telling you, don’t trust him.”

  “Why not?”

  “Can’t you see? It’s clear as day!” When he didn’t have an epiphany, Len grunted. “The Dream Caller’s been dead for years. The Guardian released your dreams.”

  Jason shook his head. “No. That can’t be. He doesn’t have that kind of power…”

  “Oh yeah? Who do you think taught the original Dream Catcher and Dream Caller? Why do you think the Guardian was able to seal your dreams? If he can seal them, he can most certainly drag them out.”

  “But I heard the Dream Caller’s ability is to materialize dreams.”

  “Dream Callers can turn dreams into flesh and blood,
because they have a contract with the King of Dreams.” Len waved a hand. “But that’s not important. Whether or not he can turn dreams into reality doesn’t matter. What matters is what the Guardian wants.”

  “What he wants?”

  She nodded, glancing back over her shoulder at the Dream Catcher, who coughed. “He wants to kill my mistress.” She turned back to Jason, crossing her arms. “And when that happens, the world will plunge into chaos.”

  “How do you know any of this?”

  “Because he killed my parents.”

  NINE

  Dream Catchers adopt because their bodies age rapidly. There are signs of a suitable apprentice: The child must be a girl, and the Dream Catcher must hear the child’s first words. Then, if the Dream Catcher has a powerful vision after hearing the first words, she will adopt the child as her apprentice, no matter what the true parents say.

  “My parents didn’t want me to leave,” said Len. “They probably complained, maybe even put up resistance. But the Guardian didn’t like it. He struck them down. All because they didn’t want to give up their only child.”

  Jason rubbed his eyes. The Guardian was well-respected. Well-feared. Why would anyone be willing to jump on his bad side? Len had an answer to this:

  “Years ago, when I first met the Guardian, he said something. At first, I didn’t think much of it. Then, when my mistress told me my parents were dead, I put two and two together.”

  “What did the Guardian say?” said Jason.

  “He said, ‘You were lucky to have been chosen before your parents died. Now you will never have to worry about having your memory erased’.” She looked up at Jason, and narrowed her eyes. “You’re familiar with the law.”