River of Dreams

by Jan Nash

  To find Noah, to defeat the darkness, Finn had to be everything the Sorcerer was not. Her power was that spark inside her that connected her to everything and everyone. The Lochran was a representation of that spark.

  And she suddenly knew that the Sorcerer could not take it from her. She could destroy it or give it away. But it had to be her choice.

  If she stayed calm and connected, she could find Noah and get all of them out of there.

  “Jed, turn off your light.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes.”

  Jed flipped off the light, and it got darker than even Finn expected.

  She untucked her shirt. Her Lochran threw off enough light to see where she was walking. She crossed to one of the openings in the cave wall. She stood in front of it, trying to see with her whole body, to listen with her soul, to find a connection to her brother.

  Nothing.

  She stepped to the next opening and did the same thing. Nothing. She stepped to another one. Nothing.

  Another roar echoed through the space in front of her. He was getting closer. She quickly moved to the next tunnel.

  Nothing.

  Finn kept moving.

  Nothing.

  Nothing.

  Nothing.

  Jed stayed close. She was sure he had no idea what she was doing. She wasn’t really sure, either. She just prayed that when she got to the right tunnel, she’d—

  Her Lochran started pulsing.

  Ba-boom. Ba-boom. Ba-boom.

  It was a heartbeat. Noah’s heartbeat.

  “He’s here,” she said to Jed before running into the darkness of the tunnel.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  Finn’s Lochran got brighter the farther into the tunnel she went. She wondered if she should slow down. The Sorcerer was looking for her. If she slowed down, at least she might see him before he saw her, but if she slowed down, he might also—

  Her foot hit something, and she tumbled to the ground. Her sword skittered away, and the cave floor pulled at the strip of Jed’s T-shirt on her hand. Her wound scraped against the ground. She bit back a sob just in time to hear a cry behind her. Something was here.

  She whipped around.

  Noah, barely visible by the light of her Lochran.

  She’d run right into him.

  She felt the fears she’d been holding—that her brother couldn’t be saved, that even if he could, she couldn’t do it—flood through her. She let them go.

  Because here he was.

  “Noah,” she whispered as she scrambled to him.

  She was overcome with joy, sadness, fear, wonder, anger, confusion. She was feeling everything she’d ever felt all at once. Until after a moment, everything faded away, except relief.

  “Noah,” she whispered again, wrapping her arms around him, tears running down her cheeks.

  “Finn,” he whispered back.

  * * *

  Finn brushed the hair from his eyes and made a bloody smear on his forehead. Her hand was bleeding,

  “I heard two sets of feet,” Noah whispered to Finn nervously. Only now did Finn hear the rattle in his throat.

  “That was me.”

  Noah tilted his head, confused. “Jed? How did you—”

  Another howl blasted down the dark tunnel.

  “Long story,” Finn blurted out. “We’ll tell you when we’re safe.” She pulled Noah to his feet and picked up her sword.

  “We can’t leave yet; we need—” Noah started.

  “Noah, we’ve got to go.”

  “Finn, please. We need to find Dad. He’s alive.”

  Alive?

  Before she could respond, Jed gently said, “Noah, you’ve been here a long time, maybe—”

  “He’s alive, Jed,” Noah protested.

  Another howl echoed through the tunnel.

  Finn willed her heart to stop pounding. That’s why Noah had put himself in all this danger. He was just a boy who missed his dead father. She wanted to comfort him, as she had so many times, but they were still in danger.

  “We can’t stay here,” she said firmly. “We’ll talk about it later.”

  “It’s the truth, Finn. It is.” She could feel the longing in his voice.

  “Okay. But that monster’s coming, and you’re in no shape to do anything. So Jed’s going to get you out of here.”

  Jed’s head jerked in Finn’s direction. “What?”

  Finn’s plan. She’d gone over the details a thousand times.

  “It’s the only way we can all get home,” she said as she gently stretched her Lochran. “I can take you back to the River and wake you up. You’ll be in your own bed. I can wake myself up and be in my own bed. But Noah … without a Lochran, he’s trapped. It’s why he’s in the coma. It’s why he’s getting weaker all the time.”

  She wriggled the Lochran off her hips and stepped out of it. She put it over Noah’s head and then shoulders, sliding it to his waist so she could cover it with his T-shirt.

  “It’s not mine,” Noah protested.

  “We’re all connected. It’ll work.” Noah looked better already.

  Jed grabbed Finn’s arm. “I’m not going to leave you here.”

  “I need to borrow this.” She leaned the sword against her leg and peeled the headlamp off his head. She put it on and then ran her fingers through his matted hair. Mostly to fix it, but also so she could touch him. In case …

  “It’s the only way, Jed. You’ve got to get Noah through the maze, a lake, and that void. You’ll need time.” She kissed him lightly on the lips. He tasted salty. Sweat, tears, probably both. They’d lived a lifetime today. “Get to the River. Please. Take Noah home. I will see you later.” She started to head off.

  “How? You don’t have a Lochran.”

  She could hear how scared Jed was, but there wasn’t time to explain it. But Noah knew.

  “She’s going to get my Lochran back,” she heard Noah say. “She’s going to take it from the monster.”

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  Finn ran hard until the tunnel curved and she was out of sight. She stopped to look back, just to make sure Jed and Noah were leaving. It took a moment, but the faint light of her Lochran finally started moving away. She took a deep breath, tried to still her heart. What Noah had said …

  Their father. Poor Noah had wanted him to be alive so badly; it had been easy for the Sorcerer to trap him.

  When the light of her Lochran disappeared, Finn turned and headed deeper into the tunnel. She felt the Saint Patrick medal flicking back and forth on her wrist. “I’ll be praying for you,” Sharon had said. Finn wondered if prayers had a shelf life.

  * * *

  The Sorcerer roared again. It was loud enough to make Finn stop. He was close. She tucked herself into a spot against the wall. She just had to delay him long enough for Jed and Noah to get through the void. After that, well …

  Finn shook the worry out of her head. She had a plan. Stick to the plan.

  She touched the headlamp to make sure it was facing forward. She gripped her sword firmly in both hands.

  She could hear water dripping in the cave.

  She wondered about this place. He’d obviously created it, a kind of lucid dreaming that allowed him to fabricate a space of his own. A place that must resemble the French cave he had called home all those years ago.

  And now, who knew how many other Dreamwalkers he’d captured, only to leave them rotting in these tunnels. How many had died in the real world, as their spirits slowly wilted away in the darkness, the way Noah was on the verge of doing? How she would if she couldn’t find a Lochran and get out of there.

  They’d all come here, as she had, on their own missions, hoping they could use their skills to conquer … what the hell was he?

  A walking nightmare?

  A fifteen-thousand-year-old nightmare. And she was a sixteen-year-old high school sophomore. That did not seem like a fair fight.

  Maybe instead of fight, the Sorcerer would
agree to a dance contest. She was sure she was a better dancer than he was. The idea cheered her up, but only for a moment, because then a hint of sulfur wafted through the tunnel. The plop, plop, plop of the water was replaced by a louder thud of feet on the tunnel floor.

  He was here.

  She held her breath.

  Thud, thud …

  Almost.

  THUD.

  Now!

  She hit the On button of the headlamp and leaped from her hiding place.

  The Sorcerer turned away, knocking into the wall in surprise.

  Finn swung her sword at the Lochran stick, breaking his grip and sending the stick skittering down the tunnel. As quickly as she could, she swung her sword again, but he was a step faster and jumped back. Her blade sliced through air.

  Finn’s follow-through carried her arms across her body, and he jumped at her now exposed side.

  She felt a searing pain on her forearm as a flaming sore singed her skin. The sword fell from her hand, the grip too slippery with her blood to hang on to it. The clatter as it hit the floor reverberated through the tunnel.

  She heard him more than she saw him racing toward her. She quickly got to her feet and, like they’d done during the parkour unit in gym class, jumped up against the wall and pushed off with her foot. He barely missed her, but his momentum carried him right to her sword. He picked it up and turned around to face her.

  He was a weird sight. The antlered head. Skin clothes. No shoes. Flaming sores. And the smell, like a plate full of rotten eggs.

  Horrible.

  The Sorcerer waved the sword back and forth, savoring the moment. The sulfur stench filled her nostrils as her lamplight bounced off his eyes. They were cold and dark. Just like …

  Finn flashed to—

  Her father looking through the hole the night Finn was trapped in the box. His dark eyes glaring at her.

  The sulfur smell had been there.

  She couldn’t think about this now, but she couldn’t help but flash to—

  Her dream.

  The one Noah was in, when he fought the Sorcerer. There was a shadow in the background. Finn looks, sees her father. Moving away from the fight, not toward it to help Noah. Why would her father be with the Sorcerer? And why was Conor in the dream world at all? He’d ripped his …

  And then she saw it, around her father’s wrist, a Lochran worn like a bracelet.

  He lied.

  He didn’t rip off his Lochran. And, if he lied about that—

  It took all of Finn’s willpower to stay upright, be focused on the monster in front of her.

  Inside the mask, she saw wrinkles form on the edge of the Sorcerer’s eyes. He was smiling. He could sense her struggle and thought the battle was already won. She needed to get a grip, or it would be true.

  She needed to get back to Noah.

  Another sore burst through the skin on the back of his hand. It hissed and then started burning with a steady flame. The smell. It was overpowering.

  “Where’s my father? What did you do with my father?” The questions exploded out of Finn.

  He responded with a series of guttural sounds she couldn’t interpret. She’d understood the language of the Asian Dreamwalker, but this, this was … old, she thought. Just like him. Even if he wanted to answer her question, she wouldn’t understand what he said.

  He took a step closer.

  Finn backed up, glancing at his Lochran-covered staff. No way she could get to it without being sliced in half.

  He took another step forward.

  The entrance to the tunnel was at her back. Could she outrun him if she turned and … no. She knew she couldn’t.

  She had to stand and fight. But with what? All she had was …

  The talking stick.

  Finn reached into her back pocket and pulled it out. He froze. She saw the monster’s eyes widen.

  She put a hand on either end, pretending that she was going to break it.

  He screamed an unintelligible string of words. She guessed it was a version of “You break that and I will crush you like a bug.” She didn’t say anything. She simply pointed at the sword and gestured to the ground.

  He yelled again, enraged.

  She grabbed the mangy feather on the talking stick and pulled at it.

  He stopped screaming. Finn pointed at the sword again and then the ground.

  He put the sword down.

  Finn made a waving gesture, indicating he should back up. And, amazingly, he did. She wondered what kind of power this stick had. Whatever it was, today was not the day she would find out.

  Today was just the day she was going to get the hell out of there.

  When he’d backed up far enough that she could get his Lochran staff without him rushing her, she picked it up. He hissed at her, like a snake. She shrugged, hoping that was the universal sign for “I don’t give a shit.”

  She gestured toward the entrance of the tunnel and tapped the two pieces of wood together forcefully when he didn’t move. He shook, having some sort of seizure, and moved immediately when she threatened to do it again.

  Interesting.

  * * *

  Finn kept him fifteen feet in front of her so she’d have time to react if he decided to attack. She was starting to feel fuzzy. She’d tried to do some breathing exercises. They didn’t help. She assumed it had something to do with giving her Lochran away. She found herself getting distracted, thinking about Noah and Jed and … her father, so she started studying his weapon, which had the added benefit of keeping her eyes forward and the Sorcerer in view.

  There were eight Lochrans embedded in his stick: two blues, two greens, a red, an orange, a purple, and one that was the color of a wheat field. They were attached to the stick as if they had grown there. Where they connected to the stick was how a new branch connects to a tree limb. Finn was pretty sure they would snap off cleanly if she bent them near the root, and equally certain doing so would piss him off.

  When they walked through the hole in the maze, Finn guided him to the entrance, following the arrows she’d cut into the floor. She wasn’t exactly sure what she would do when they got to the wall of water. He’d created a giant lake in his dream world, so she assumed he was comfortable with water in a way she wasn’t. She’d also noticed he’d started looking at her over his shoulder. No doubt, he had formulated some sort of surprise attack. You don’t survive fifteen thousand years by doing what you’re told.

  “Hey,” Finn said. He looked over his shoulder but didn’t turn all the way around. Finn couldn’t see his hands, and she suddenly realized she hadn’t seen them in a while. His skin pants didn’t have pockets, but it was possible there was a pouch underneath to hide something sharp. She saw his shoulders tense. She banged the Lochran-covered staff and the talking stick together in a rat-a-tat rhythm. He winced, so she did it again, hoping it would dissuade him from whatever he was planning.

  It didn’t.

  The Sorcerer spun around and attacked.

  Finn used the staff to deflect his arm and the sharpened piece of obsidian he thrust at her. His momentum carried him past her, but he quickly turned to attack again.

  Before he could, Finn did the only thing she could think of: She hurled the talking stick as far as she could. He howled in anger and watched it arc over the wall. Before he could turn back to her, Finn lunged at him, Lochran-covered staff held high.

  She aimed for his head.

  He ducked, as she knew he would. She planted her front foot and swung her back foot at his now-lowered head.

  It connected solidly. And even though she was kicking an animal’s skull, she heard a satisfying thump as the force of her blow caused his head to bounce off the inside of it.

  She advanced again, bringing the Lochran-covered staff down on his back.

  As it made contact, she heard something … like roars of approval from the Dreamwalkers whose Lochrans had finally gotten payback.

  She raised the staff to hit him again
, but the Sorcerer scurried away on his hands and knees, getting out of range before finally climbing to his feet. Finn took a step forward, forcing him into full retreat.

  He limped down the passageway. The wound she’d just made on his back hissed and then erupted in flame just as he turned the corner.

  She assumed he was going to retrieve the talking stick. She hoped it landed far enough away to buy her some time. With one final look to make sure he was really gone, Finn plunged into the wall of water.

  She kicked her legs and headed for the surface. When she was a good distance from the golden door, she opened her hand. The feather from the talking stick floated out of it. She’d thrown the talking stick because she had to, but if she was forced to give it back to him, she wanted to at least try to make it less useful. Who knew if losing the feather could do that, but it had been all she could think of.

  She watched the feather drift toward the bottom of the lake. It disappeared into darkness as she turned and swam for the surface with the glowing Lochrans to lead her way.

  THIRTY-NINE

  Finn climbed out of the lake, exhausted. She stumbled to the wall of the cave and looked for the marks she’d made to help find the entrance to the void. They were still there, along with other marks Jed and Noah had carved into the wall:

  U.

  R.

  Then a downward-facing arrow, followed by an O.

  It was signed Noah + Jed.

  You Are Arrow O, she thought. That’s obviously not right. But she didn’t have time to figure it out. She needed to get the hell out of there. She needed to get home.

  Finn had decided the lime-green Lochran was Noah’s. She took a deep breath and snapped it. It came off clean. She gently pried the circle of the Lochran open and put it around her neck. She immediately felt better.

  She didn’t know what to do with the Lochran-covered staff. If she threw it in the lake, the Sorcerer would probably find it. She could hide it in the River, but it seemed that would doom the Dreamwalkers he’d taken them from to whatever state they were in now. She had to protect the Lochrans, hide them. Somewhere safe.