“What?” Gabriel said. The word, spoken in his regal voice, sounded awkward.
“Umm,” Archer muttered. He knew better than to speak off-the-cuff to Master Gabriel. In the three realms, Archer’s master was the Nightmare Lord’s opposite. He was the founder and leader of all Dreamtreaders. He was wise, powerful, and kind of sagely, but saying Gabriel was subtle and quick to anger was like referring to a bolt of lightning as a spark. Archer organized his thoughts and said, “I apologize for my . . . reaction to your appear . . . your presence. What happened to your incredible armor?”
“I am permitted two garbs,” Gabriel replied, a frown deepening the creases on his weathered face. “The Incandescent Armor you have seen so often, and the style of the day.”
“Style of the day?” Archer winced as he took in his visitor’s outfit. Gabriel wore khaki cargo shorts; a bright green, blue, orange, and yellow Hawaiian print shirt; a seashell necklace; dark sunglasses; and a floppy gray fisherman’s hat. He looked like a tourist who’d just spent a fortune in a beach souvenir shop. Well, except that most tourists didn’t have ghost-white skin that glowed with its own golden aura.
“Confound it, Archer!” Gabriel thundered. “You are always telling me to moderate my appearance. You said the armor made me frightening.”
“Not as frightening as that outfit,” Archer mumbled.
“Tell me, then,” Gabriel said, “what is the problem with this? Is it not the garb of your day?”
Archer held in the laughter that was begging to come out and said, “Master Gabriel, you have always demanded honesty, so I will tell you now that what you are wearing is not the garb of my day. You look like you just walked in from a cruise ship. Honestly, I was getting used to the armor.”
Master Gabriel crossed his muscular arms and scowled. Then, without a word, he raised one of his gray-and-black striped eyebrows. Instantly, the tacky beachcomber outfit dissolved, revealing his mighty armor. Except for the shades. Those remained.
“I like the sunglasses,” Gabriel said. “I think I shall keep them.”
“Okay, that’s kind of cool,” Archer said.
In truth, the Dreamtreader thought the Incandescent Armor was absolutely ten-plus levels above cool. From chestplate to greaves, the armor was a pale, etched gray that looked as if it had been painstakingly hewn from rich stone rather than forged from metal. And each piece was built out of layers, cunningly articulated so that Gabriel could move his body as freely as he might without the encumbrance of heavy armor. Archer especially liked the shoulder plates: massive cannonball-shaped guards terraced with blade-like ridges and thorny prongs. They made Master Gabriel look like he could play linebacker for a football team full of medieval juggernauts.
Designs and symbols, images and rune-like language had been carved into the armor. It was from these intricate markings that the radiant light came, as if each groove had its own private reservoir of liquid white fire. Light pulsed, faded, glistened, and ran over every inch of the armor, becoming more active and brighter whenever Master Gabriel moved.
The armor kindled brightly when Gabriel said, “I have come to bear you grave tidings.”
Archer sat up a little straighter. “What’s going on?”
Master Gabriel shifted his stance, seemingly tensed for battle. The hilt of his sword, the legendary Murkbane, the Nightcleaver, came into view. “More breaches, I am afraid,” Gabriel explained. “In greater numbers than ever before. The Nightmare Lord has been marking new territories and trespassing far beyond his borders.”
“So that’s my mission tonight?” Archer asked. “Patch up the holes again?”
Master Gabriel’s frown was so deep that his mustache and beard sagged. The same scraggly striped eyebrow arched and bristled above the rim of his sunglasses. Gabriel exhaled a mingling of impatience and anger, slowly ran a hand from his widow’s peak all the way back along the length of his long, steel-gray hair, and said, “You tread lightly enough on disaster. Your mastery of Dreamtreading has made you bold . . . and foolish.”
Foolish? I may be a lot of things, but not foolish. Archer blinked. What did I say? “Forgive me, Master Gabriel,” he said. “I meant no disre—”
“Need I explain what will occur if the breaches begin to fray and connect? Need I paint the picture of what will become of this world, should a mighty rift be opened at last?”
Archer swallowed. “No, Master Gabriel,” he said. “I didn’t guard my thoughts before I spoke them. I think I’ve fallen behind in my training. I’ve been trying to squeeze in extra study time, but it’s never enough.”
Master Gabriel crossed his arms. One corner of his mustache twitched upward. “Humility,” he harrumphed. “There may be a grain of hope in that vast sea of shifting sand after all. There is so much more for you to learn beyond the Nine Laws. For now, know this: if enough breaches fray and a rift tears through, your world will devolve.”
“Devolve?” Archer squinted. “I don’t know what that—”
“It means the breakdown of reality, Archer,” Gabriel explained. “Imagine a world where no one can tell the difference between dream and awake. Do you see?”
So many terrible images flooded Archer’s mind that he thought he might pop. “People would lose their minds; they’d kill each other.”
“It would be the end of humanity,” Gabriel said. “And my Superior will not have that.”
Archer took a deep breath. “Okay, got it. I won’t underestimate the breaches. I’ll get to work right away.”
Gabriel’s arms fell. One hand went to the hilt of his sword; the other rested at his hip, thumb tucked into his belt. “Your mission is threefold,” he said. “Dreamweave the breaches. Bind them up tight, mind! Then, if time permits, ask around about your fellows, Duncan and Mesmeera. They have not checked in . . . in some time. Go to the usual sources, but be discreet. Take Razz with you. She will help.”
“That’s if she shows up,” Archer muttered.
“What do you mean by that?”
“She’s cool and all,” Archer said, tiptoeing through the realm of criticism. After all, Razz had been a gift from Gabriel. “But she doesn’t always show up when I need her. The last time . . . well, never mind.”
“Never mind, eh?” Gabriel’s armor flared once. His eyebrow seemed to corkscrew above the frame of the sunglasses this time.
“Sir?” Archer asked, changing the subject quickly. “You want me to ask about the other two Dreamtreaders? Sometimes, missions run long. We don’t always have time to check in. What’s the big deal?”
Gabriel’s eyes darted to the side as if he’d heard something worrisome outside Archer’s window. “Just mention their names casually as if seeking an entertainment or rumor. Oh, and be extraordinarily shrewd and cautious if you should speak with Bezeal. That rhyming weasel can be an excellent source of information, but he often manages to pry more news from the questioner than he reveals himself. I am not entirely sure where his loyalties lie.”
“I’ve dealt with Bezeal before,” Archer said. “He has a weakness. I’ll use it against him.”
“Good, good,” Gabriel said. “But be mindful of your own weaknesses. You can be certain that Bezeal will.”
“Right,” Archer said. “Got it.” He waited a few thick seconds and then asked, “Has something changed?”
“What do you mean?” Gabriel asked, pushing the sunglasses up the bridge of his nose so that his eyes were completely hidden.
“Well,” Archer began, his thoughts racing. Yes, what do I mean? “I guess it’s several things, really. For one thing, it’s May third. You don’t usually show up unless it’s the seventh day of the month or . . . unless it’s something urgent. You’ve got Murkbane with you is another thing. And last, well . . . you seem, uh, nervous.”
“Nervous?” Gabriel said the word as if he had tasted something spoiled. “Nerves, lad, are for mortals. But I am concerned about a great many things. The Lord of Nightmares has ever been ambitious and cunning. His pl
ans . . . blunt and destructive. But he and his kind have failed through the centuries due to the valor of the Dreamtreaders and one . . . other . . . thing.
“The world, you see, has always had a critical measure of discernment, knowing wrong from right, dream from reality. When the Nightmare Lord came calling, trying desperately to tear the dream fabric asunder, people knew better. They rejected his sorcery for what it was: an illusion of fear echoing from a dream. He was never able to gain the traction needed to open a rift.”
“But now?” Archer asked.
“But now, who in your world can be certain? Of anything?” Gabriel’s lips curled in a snarl. “The people of your world are forgetting their foundations. Discernment erodes and muddies all waters, no matter how pure. Your world is losing its anchors, Archer.”
“Anchors?” he echoed. “But anchors are for Dreamtreaders.”
Master Gabriel’s armor flared like a flash of lightning. “You really are far behind in your studies,” he muttered. “Anchors are of critical use for Dreamtreaders, yes. But we all need anchors, Archer, in every area of our lives. If not, we drift far from the truths that matter . . . and the meaning of it all.”
Archer could think of a hundred questions. But he dared not ask one for fear of looking even dumber than he felt. Still, it was as if Master Gabriel had just laid a map at his feet, a map to an ultimate treasure. Archer had a feeling Master Gabriel’s words would echo in his mind for some time to come, but for now, it would have to wait. Archer went back to the business at hand. “Are you saying the Nightmare Lord is winning?”
“The Nightmare Lord’s advances now are very methodical . . . precise, even,” he said. “But no, he is not winning. I am beginning to suspect that he knows how close he is to a rift. My chief concern for now is that he will soon open enough breaches to allow things to pass through the dream fabric into the Temporal.”
Archer felt as if frost had flash frozen on his spine. He shrugged his shoulders against the discomfort and felt the sting of his wound. “Master Gabriel, what do you mean by allowing things to pass through?”
Gabriel took off his sunglasses, which promptly disintegrated in his hand. His large, deep-set eyes looked weary, each dark pupil nearly vanishing in its iris, a kaleidoscopic ocean of blue and silver. He exhaled. “It would be the beginning of the end, Archer. When inhabitants of the Dream enter your world and those of your world become lost in Dream; when dreamers bring back tokens from the dream, and nightmares take from your world; when your people will awaken only to find that they can no longer tell whether they are awake or dreaming . . . that is what I mean.”
Archer threw off his blanket and slid from the bed. “Something like that happened to me,” he said. “Last night.”
Master Gabriel gripped his sword pommel so tightly that his knuckles crackled. “Do not tell me you forgot to check for tendrils?”
“No, not that. I’m pretty careful about that. Well, just look.” He lifted the back of his nightshirt and turned.
Gabriel looked at the long, angry red welt. “You mean to say that you tossed and turned in your dream . . . so much so that you wounded yourself?”
“No,” Archer whispered.
“It will heal soon enough,” Gabriel said. “I fail to see what—” His words failed. The master Dreamtreader’s pupils grew so huge that his eyes appeared black and haunted. “You suffered this wound in your dream?”
Archer let his shirt fall back and nodded.
“This is dire news,” Master Gabriel said. He turned hurriedly to Archer’s closet as if he might burst through it to depart.
“There’s more.”
Master Gabriel spun on his heel. “What do you mean, more?”
Archer led the way to his bedside table and gestured. “After the Dream,” he said, “the same dream where I was wounded, I found these. I—”
The expression on Gabriel’s face was so sudden and so severe that Archer’s mouth shut with a snap.
“Dead leaves twain,” the old master muttered, “raven’s fletching, and wrought-iron chain.”
Archer swallowed. “You know these?”
“They are the Tokens of Doom,” Gabriel said, his expression far away.
“Tokens of Doom?” Archer echoed. “I’ve never heard of those before.”
“Of course you have not,” Gabriel shot back. “You are, as you say, behind in your studies. They are legendary omens of disaster for a Dreamtreader. How did you come by these?”
Archer hesitated. “I . . . well, I’d finished repairing the breaches . . . so I—”
“Archer Percival Keaton.” Master Gabriel ground out each word through his teeth. “Do you mean to say that you . . . approached Shadowkeep—alone—after all of my warnings? That you dared face the Nightmare Lord this early in your studies? For it is only he who can bestow the Tokens of Doom.”
Archer stared at the floor. “I . . . I still had time.” Archer said. “Old Jack was—”
“Your available time is not the issue. We are talking about the Nightmare Lord! There will come a day when his reign will end at the collective hands of the Dreamtreaders, but now? Now, Archer, you are overmatched.”
Overmatched. That word stung. Archer knew Master Gabriel was right. Of course he was. He knew everything there was to know. But still . . .
“If I’m so overmatched,” he found himself saying, “how’d I sheer off one of the horns of his war helm?”
Master Gabriel’s head cocked backward. He started to speak three times before words actually came. “Are . . . are you completely mad, Archer? The Nightmare Lord could pick his teeth with your—You cut a horn from his helm?”
Archer nodded. “I somersaulted over him, went to take off his head, but he deflected the blow with his axe.”
That brought Master Gabriel up short. “Well, that is something of a feat,” he said. “Few have been brazen—or stupid—enough to attempt such a thing. Congratulations.”
“Thank you,” Archer said, feeling the red surge into his cheeks. “It was—”
“Congratulations for making yourself and everyone you love targets of the Nightmare Lord’s most focused vengeance! You realize that he can trace your entrance vortex. He probably already has.”
Archer thought about Kara, the night of the derecho . . . the terrifying dream. She’d said there was a hideous pale-eyed man. My fault. He didn’t want those words in his mind, but there they were.
“You have no idea how relieved I am that you survived relatively unharmed,” Master Gabriel said, his voice mercifully gentle. “But it was not worth the risk. Not yet.”
“But the villagers . . . they were storming Shadowkeep. They couldn’t get through the guards. They were being slaughtered.”
“Dispatched, you mean,” Master Gabriel muttered. “They should not be in any mortal danger, not really. When will you understand that?”
Archer continued to stare down.
“At worst, one of your kind might awaken with a bloody nose,” Master Gabriel went on. “He might be haunted by irrational fears or even develop a severe sleep disorder. No, those people who became villagers in the Dream would not likely die. The fabric keeps them safe enough physically. But this layer of protection does not exist for you. Oh, no. Not for the Dreamtreader. You might have been killed . . . or worse. Noble intent, Archer, but foolish actions.”
“I’m sorry,” Archer muttered.
“Sorry does not remove the scar on your back,” Gabriel replied. “How on earth did you survive?”
Archer thought about the mysterious maiden’s voice, but something warned him not to mention it to Gabriel. “I . . . well, I got to my anchor before he could do any real damage.”
“That scar is real damage,” Gabriel said, his words hissing like steam. “The Tokens of Doom are worse still.”
“What are they?” Archer asked. “What do they mean?”
“Too much to tell,” he said. “Go to the Creeds, for what I know is contained within them.”
“Well, are they dangerous?” Archer asked, pacing in front of the small table. “I touched them!”
Master Gabriel reached out for Archer’s shoulder and held him still for a moment. “You are in no danger from them,” he said. “In and of themselves, they can do no harm. But, they bear an ancient and ominous significance, warning of deadly peril, especially for the Dreamtreaders. Now, Archer, I must go and go quickly. There are many decisions to be weighed and preparations to be made.”
“Master Gabriel,” Archer said. “You told me there were three parts to my mission. You only explained two of them.”
“The last part of the mission, Archer,” he said, “the most important part now, is to stay alive. Anchor first.”
“Anchor deep,” Archer said.
He watched Master Gabriel dissipate into a twinkling of stars, and then . . . nothing. Archer’s bedroom was dark. It seemed darker than it ever had before.
FIVE
THE STALKING
What brings you to Main Street in Gatlinburg? KARA WONDERED. She’d followed him, expecting him to swing a right onto Hemlock Avenue, his street. But Rigby hadn’t. He’d kept walking straight on Sweetbriar Lane, and now they were just a stone’s throw from the quaint shops on Main Street.
“Going shopping, are you?” Kara muttered. She watched him slow at the intersection and then, as expected, he disappeared around the corner to the right. She felt certain Rigby hadn’t seen her and didn’t want to blunder into him, so she bided her time before turning the corner herself. A breathless twenty count later, she slipped onto Main Street.
Kara hung back and pretended to look at the colorful jewelry on a sidewalk display in front of Diamond in the Rough. Truth be told, she couldn’t care less about the cheap trinkets sold in that little boutique. She had her sights set on bigger treasures. Much bigger.
She glanced sideways. He still seemed consumed by his cell phone. Even while walking, he waved his arm around, apparently making an animated point to someone about something. She let him get a little more ahead of her. Then, she stealthily followed. Rigby passed by Replay Sporting Goods, paused at Garner’s Electronics, and seemed interested in something in the storefront window. No, Kara realized. Rigby was just checking his hair in the reflection.