Search for the Shadow Key

by Wayne Thomas Batson

  “Your mother and father are home?” Archer asked.

  Rigby glanced sideways. “No,” he said, “they’re still in England, doing what they always do.”

  “Their loss,” Kara said. “They’d be proud of you, you know.”

  Rigby sat up stiffly. “To use an American idiom: as if.”

  “Well,” Kara said, “they ought to be. You’ve done great—no, amazing—things with Dream Inc.” Kara put a hand lightly on Rigby’s forearm and made eye contact with Archer.

  That’s it, Archer thought. She’s totally gone now. “You know,” he said, anger simmering in every syllable, “it would be nice to think that all’s well that ends well. It’d be nice to think that we all did something heroic and deserve a little payback. But I can’t join you in this delusion.”

  “Delusion,” Rigby spat. “Is that what you think about—”

  “I know. Not think. Know. Dreamtreaders have been around since the dawn of time, and our job is to protect the Dream and the Waking World. My Dreamtreading commander tells me that now—right now, as we’re talking—the breaches are spreading, threatening to decompose into a full-on rift. Do you even know what that is?”

  Rigby sighed, and Kara shifted uncomfortably in her chair.

  “You really don’t get it, do you?” Archer asked. “The Dream fabric is in the worst condition it’s ever been in. Do you hear me? It’s damaged more than anytime in history. Damage the Nightmare Lord began and damage continued by Walkers.”

  “Walkers?” Kara blurted.

  “Lucid Dreamers,” Archer explained. “Dreamtreaders call you Lucid Walkers. And each and every time you go skipping through the Dream on your ‘safaris,’ you tear new breaches into the Dream fabric. I know. I’ve seen them. I’ve had to patch up most of them myself. But breaches are appearing and growing at a rate that even the Dreamtreaders can’t keep up with forever. If you don’t shut down Dream Inc., you’re going to destroy the world.”

  “Don’t be so blasted dramatic, Keaton,” Rigby chided. “You think you’re the only one who knows about the breach problem?”

  Kara turned and gaped at Rigby. “You knew?” she asked.

  “Of course I knew,” he said. “Uncle Scoville knew, and he passed it on to me. It’s not a big deal.”

  “Not a big deal?” Kara practically spat. “Archer says it might cause the end of the world.”

  “Look, love, Keaton here is right that there’s a danger,” he said. “But I’ve got it under control. It’s all about equilibrium.”

  Archer had just about had enough of Rigby’s nonsense. “Explain.”

  “It’s like this,” Rigby said. “The Dream fabric is real and all, but it’s much stronger than you let on. Sure, Lucid Walking causes a bit of damage, but so what? The fabric handles it, heals, and moves on. If it survived for centuries with a Nightmare Lord actively punching holes in it, surely it can survive a little Lucid Walking.”

  “It’s not that simple,” Archer countered. “With multiple Lucid Walkers going in and out, the number of breaches increases exponentially.”

  “Again with the drama, Keaton. The Dream fabric can sustain damage and still hold strong. We just have to maintain the equilibrium, the balance. Not too much Lucid Walking so that we avoid a rift and not so little that we have to shut down Dream Inc. Look, every time I go, I take readings and collect data. When I get back I feed the information into an application I created on my computer. It tells me where the balance is, and I make sure I schedule the Dream Inc. safaris when it’s safe to do so.”

  “Wait,” Archer said, “you have an app for that?”

  “Sure,” Rigby replied. “I’ll e-mail it to you, if you like.”

  Archer crossed his arms. “Yeah, please do,” he said quietly. “But does it show readings in real time? I mean, suppose the readings show that the Dream fabric is not in any danger. How do I know what I’m looking at isn’t old data?”

  “Would it work if I said you just ’ave to trust me?” Rigby asked.

  Archer glared at him and muttered, “No.”

  “Ha! I didn’t think so. Look, the data I enter makes it as real time as each and every visit I take into the Dream. It’ll be listed by date.”

  Archer chewed over this revelation. Was it really possible to monitor the condition of the Dream . . . by computer? Even with dozens of new Lucid Walkers doing the tourist thing in the Dream each week? Archer frowned. “Wait,” he said, “how do you keep track of all the Lucid Walking?”

  Rigby frowned back. “I don’t follow you.”

  “I mean, how do you know how many Lucid Walkers are in and out over time?”

  “Carefully controlled, Keaton,” Rigby replied with a dismissive wave of his hand. “At Dream Inc. we have a meticulous schedule. We know just how many Walkers the Dream can tolerate at any given moment. We never let in any more than acceptable.”

  Archer blew out an exasperated breath. “That’s not what I mean. What if your clients go to the Dream on their own time?”

  “Archer,” Kara said, squinting, “you’re not making sense.”

  “Your clients,” Archer repeated. “Once they learn how to Lucid Dream, what’s to keep them from going in any old time they want to? What’s to keep them from teaching their friends how to Lucid Walk? They could overwhelm the equilibrium before your data readings can catch up. They could trigger a rift without any warning.”

  Rigby opened his mouth and shut it with a snap. When he spoke, his words had a thick, wet quality to them. “As I said, Keaton: carefully controlled. Successful corporations do not give away their secrets.”

  “I’m going to talk to my Dreamtreading Master about this,” Archer said, getting up to leave.

  “You can do what you want, Keaton,” Rigby said. “I’m not shutting down Dream Inc.”

  “You should have come down to see Licorice, Archer,” Kaylie said, stomping slush with each step she and Archer took as they walked home from Rigby’s. “She’s such a sweetie-fluffer-muffin!”

  “She’s a coyote,” Archer muttered. “She could eat you.”

  “Licorice would do no such thing!” Kaylie said indignantly. “She’s just a pup.”

  “Uh-huh,” Archer replied distantly. He was unhappy about the icy water seeping into his shoes. He was unhappy about a lot of things.

  “Archer, are you listening to me?” Kaylie asked.

  “Yeah,” he replied. “I’ve heard everything you said.”

  “Hearing and listening are two distinct entities,” Kaylie said, switching on genius mode.

  Archer said nothing.

  “Boy, Rigby must have really made you mad,” Kaylie said.

  Archer walked the rest of the way home with his mind churning. Yes, Rigby had made Archer angry. So had Kara. Part of him had secretly hoped he could salvage their friendship, but that seemed out of the question now. He felt like he didn’t know Kara anymore. She was too hard to read, too hard to understand.

  And there was something she’d said, something that Archer found intensely curious. Kara had said, “We didn’t even know that physical things could already pass through the Dream fabric, much less that the Nightmare Lord himself could come through.”

  Archer had confronted Rigby and Kara about the Nightmare Lord’s intrusion into the Waking World, but he’d never said anything about physical objects coming through. And what had Kara meant when she used the word already, as if she’d been expecting things to come out of the Dream for a long time?

  Everyone has secrets, Archer reminded himself. Rigby had his Uncle Scoville, among others. But Archer knew almost nothing about Kara’s secrets. Archer wondered if that would come back to haunt him.

  “Take her?” one of the raspy voices asked.

  Rigby stood in front of his basement door and stared down into the darkness. “I hadn’t wanted to begin with something so extreme.”

  “You said to distract,” whispered another voice.

  “Taking her would distract,” came
still another.

  Rigby was silent for several moments. Archer was getting way too curious, and he wasn’t stupid . . . not in the classical sense. He needed other things to keep him busy.

  “Go ahead,” Rigby said, shutting his basement door. “Take her but don’t hurt her.”

  “We hears!”

  “And we obeys!”

  SIX

  VISIS NOCTURNE

  “THIS CAN’T BE RIGHT,” ARCHER MUTTERED, STARING AT the computer screen in his room. “Maybe I’m looking at the wrong graphic.”

  Rigby’s Dream Fabric Monitoring App—Equilibris, he called it—was very professional. It opened in a typical metallic gray browser window and showed a graphic representation of the Dream territory. The three districts glowed in different colors from cool blue to violet to red.

  The closer an area was to the color red, the more numerous the breaches. Archer tinkered with the app’s preferences and its settings, but the results still showed the same. There were a few hotspots, flares of violet or red, but overall, the Dream seemed to be in good shape.

  If Rigby’s app were to be believed, that is.

  Maybe this is just a snapshot, he thought. Not real time. For all I know, Rigby gathered his data right after I’d finished a dreamweaving tour. Maybe it would appear more stable then.

  Archer left the app running and the window open and went for his Dreamtreader’s Creed and the summoning feather within. He tossed the feather up into the air and waited.

  A border of sparkling blue sealed Archer’s bedroom door signaling Master Gabriel’s arrival. Archer wondered what outfit he would dream up this time. He didn’t have long to wonder.

  The master Dreamtreader appeared in a storm of bluish white fireflies. He wore a smooth black fedora, the brim pulled low, his trademark sunglasses, and a long, black trench coat.

  Gabriel crossed his arms and scowled. “What?” he demanded. “What’s wrong with this one?”

  “Uh . . . actually, nothing’s wrong with it,” Archer said. “I’m surprised.”

  “Surprised?”

  “Yeah, I mean, that’s pretty cool. You look like Morpheus from The Matrix.”

  “Never heard of him,” Gabriel said, shoving his hands deep into his coat pockets. “Now then, why have you summoned me?”

  “Trouble,” Archer said. He explained Rigby and Kara’s refusal to close down Dream Inc. He even showed Master Gabriel the app on the computer.

  “That isn’t even close to accurate,” Master Gabriel said. “Not at that time and certainly not now. The Forms and Verse Districts are teeming with new breaches.”

  “But not Pattern?”

  “No, nothing in Pattern,” Gabriel replied. “You may recall that both Pattern and Verse went dormant before the fall of the Nightmare Lord. For a time, Forms, your district, was the only place in the Dream with a continuous need for Dreamweaving. But now, Verse has flared up violently, even more than Forms. Yet Patterns remains undisturbed. I find this fact both curious and troubling.”

  “Could the Lurker have something to do with it?” Archer asked. “That’s his territory.”

  “I cannot imagine how,” Master Gabriel replied. “Whatever the Lurker has been doing since last year, it has been for his own interests, not the benefit of the Dream and certainly not for our benefit.”

  “Maybe he scared all the scurions away,” Archer said with a throaty laugh. “He’s ugly enough.”

  Master Gabriel didn’t return the laugh. He lowered his shades and fixed Archer with a smoldering glare. “There is no humor here, Archer. In spite of what your friend Rigby tells you, the Dream is sliding slowly toward a rift. It is as unstable now as I have ever seen it. You’ve got to get back to work tonight.”

  “What about the new Dreamtreaders?” Archer asked, staring at the floor. “I’m trying. Razz and I are pushing ourselves, but it’s too much. We can’t do this alone.”

  Gabriel turned, took a few steps, and placed his palm flat on Archer’s bedroom door. Threads of sparkling blue trailed out of the door’s border to his fingertips. “Nick is almost ready to awaken,” he said quietly. “You still have the scroll?”

  “Of course,” Archer said. “And it still won’t open.”

  “Soon, Archer, soon. For now, you will have to make do with Razz. As I said, there has been a wild flare-up of breaches in Verse. The most volatile area is Garnet Province. Make that your first priority.”

  “The Libraries?” Archer asked.

  “It is likely,” Master Gabriel replied. “There is great power there. The Inner Sanctum holds many secrets. And, Archer, there is some talk that Bezeal has recently made visits to Garnet Province. You must be careful.”

  “Careful?” Archer echoed. “It’s just Bezeal we’re talking about here. I’ll be sure to keep chocolate handy.” He laughed. “He’s a fool for chocolate.”

  “Bezeal is what he chooses to reveal to you for his purposes. You must not underestimate him, Archer.”

  “Seriously?” Archer swallowed back a laugh. “I mean, I know I’ve screwed up in the past, but I’m sure I can take on Bezeal.”

  “It is precisely that attitude that has hurt you in the past,” Master Gabriel replied. “Or have you forgotten the blood pact?”

  “I haven’t forgotten.” Archer stared down at his right palm. There was no scar, of course, because the wound happened in the Dream. But he remembered how it felt. Bezeal had offered a deal and held out his hand. When Archer shook, a small hidden blade pricked and stung his palm. His blood had flowed, had mingled with Bezeal’s blood. “No, I’ll never forget,” he said. “But I satisfied my end of the deal. I got him that stupid, useless puzzle box.”

  “Are you so certain it was useless?”

  Archer’s open, ready-to-argue mouth shut with a snap. He knew many things about Bezeal, but did he really know him? And if there was anything true of the shifty, little merchant, he never—ever—got the worse end of the deal. Why had he wanted that puzzle box, the Karakurian Chamber, so desperately? And why was there a sudden burst of breaches in the Verse District’s Garnet Province . . . at just the same time as Bezeal’s recent visits?

  “You are thinking before you speak,” Master Gabriel said. “That is very reassuring.”

  Archer gave a thin smile and sighed. “Okay, I think I’ve got the mission: hit Verse hard, especially Garnet Province. Keep an eye out for Bezeal and investigate the Libraries. Got it. But what about Rigby and Kara? His company is sending more and more people Lucid Walking. The breaches will keep forming more and more. What do I do about it?”

  “I am not certain,” Master Gabriel replied. “But you are right: you need help. It will come soon. But, in the meantime, forget Rigby’s computer program. You will need a more accurate vision for the conditions in the Dream.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Tell me, Archer,” he said, “how much of your time in the Dream do you spend searching for breaches versus weaving them up?”

  Archer thought a moment. “Well, I get around pretty fast on my surfboard, but yeah, I waste a ton of time hunting the breaches.”

  “This will no longer do,” Master Gabriel said. “I think it is time.”

  “Time?” Archer echoed. “Time for what?”

  “You must have Visis Nocturne.”

  “Never heard of it.”

  “No,” Master Gabriel replied, pacing the room, “you wouldn’t have. Remember, you are still very young for a Dreamtreader. Visis Nocturne gives you the vision to track breaches more precisely. Duncan and Mesmeera called it ‘Seeing Sideways,’ and that is not altogether inaccurate. You must be able to see the Dream as I see it. And for that, you need Visis Nocturne.”

  “Seeing sideways, for real?” Archer asked. “Snot rockets, I can do that?”

  “Not before,” Master Gabriel said. “It would have been too draining on your mental energies. But now, you’ve matured. You’ve come to a new level of strength. You will be able to handle it. Yes, I’m sure yo
u will.”

  “You don’t sound sure.”

  “Yes, yes, you will. You must. I will teach you, but I warn you with all caution, Archer: use this power sparingly. It takes ten times the energy as flight. More than a few seconds of Visis Nocturne will make you very weak. Using it too often could knock you right out of the Dream . . . or worse.”

  “Okay, Master Gabriel,” Archer said, mentally stuffing the indignation and impatience that threatened. He took a breath and tried to act with a little more dignity. “I will be careful.”

  “Come.”

  Archer complied. Master Gabriel reached out his hands and placed them on the sides of Archer’s head.

  “Close your eyes.”

  Archer blinked a moment but did as he was asked. He felt Gabriel’s thumbs resting lightly on his closed eyes. He felt his fingers near his ears. Then there was light, bluish-white sparks and flashes, swirling and racing. Like a series of dot-to-dot pictures, the sparks came together in strange, recognizable shapes: mountains, trees, cliffs, forests, and lakes. Only for moments, and then they dissolved into random whirling sparks once more.

  Master Gabriel removed his hands and said, “Now, slowly, open your eyes.”

  “Whoa,” Archer gasped. His entire room coursed with the racing sparkles, but more than that, he became aware of tunnels that had appeared in the corners of his eyes. He was looking straight forward—at his bed, the window just above—but those peripheral tunnels added a new dimension. He suddenly had startling clarity, and he saw . . . more.

  His pillow became a hillside of braided cords, winding and looping and intertwining. And among the corded strands, squat, baked potato–sized, eight-legged lumps marched. They had no visible eyes, but gaping beaklike jaws that continuously opened and closed.

  “Yikes! What are those things?”

  “Probably dust mites,” Master Gabriel replied drolly. “Nothing to be concerned about. They’ve been there all along.”

  “Eww,” Archer said. “I’m sleeping on those things? Every night?”

  “If it makes you feel any better, an army of them are probably roaming around on your head right now.”