Dreamwalkers
(Part One)
Copyright 2013 D.M. Andrews
“I know how men in exile feed on dreams of hope.”
—Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Acknowledgments
Thank you to R.J. Locksley for her helpful editing, and to Alex Hausch for his great cover art.
Chapter One
Cal poked his head around the sandstone pillar and let out a silent breath of relief. The girl hadn’t seen him. She was still looking around the chamber in wide-eyed wonder, lost in the beauty of the marble floor and the domed ceiling decorated with peacocks. The girl’s dress, like her hair, flowed long, and both were of the deepest black. A shard of midnight in a sunlit hall of gold and white. The stark contrast unsettled Cal, as did the fact that he’d already encountered her three times this week, and yet never once had he sought her out. Coincidence, Cal thought.
He pushed away from the pillar and made his way silently back to the arched window through which he’d just come. Climbing out onto the ledge, he eyed the paved ground thirty feet below. After balling his hands three times to psych himself up, he dropped to the street and landed on his feet, a hand thrusting out at the last moment to keep his balance.
He stood and straightened the denim jacket his mum had given him for his fifteenth birthday. It was too small for him by now, two years later, but here in the city it fitted perfectly. Everything here was perfect.
He surveyed the city’s edge and saw no one. As he had done a dozen times before, he sprinted toward the city wall. A flight of stone steps stood between him and the walkway high above, but he leapt up them, taking eight steps in his first bound. A few seconds later, he reached the walkway.
Cal looked down and smiled. Eight. His best yet. Moving toward the wall, he gazed out over the verdant landscape below. Serried vineyards and pink-blossomed orchards punctuated the green hills and lowland forest, but in the distance it all blurred and, a little farther out, faded into nothingness.
A month had passed since he’d first come to the city. Every time he tried to go somewhere else, he failed. That was unusual, but the scenery more than made up for the limitation. This was the most detailed and consistent construction he’d ever experienced. The changes between his visits were barely discernible. But there were changes. Like the perfecting of an artist’s painting, each time he came another few brushstrokes had been added to the canvas.
Cal looked back at the city and wondered if the girl in black stood gazing out of the tall glassless window he could no longer see. Why had she come? It nagged at him. He kept his own company, carefully and deliberately avoiding the city folk. They were distant figures to him, subjects in whom he had little interest—but this girl…this girl seemed different in some way Cal couldn’t quite put his finger on. It was as if she didn’t really belong here.
Footsteps echoed down the street. Berating himself for his lack of vigilance, Cal hunkered down. Half a dozen men clothed in leather armour turned the corner of the street. They flanked several prisoners in mancatchers. Cal pressed himself low against the walkway.
The city watch spent their time patrolling the streets. They had come and gone over the weeks, but always at a distance. They weren’t hard to avoid, so long as he stayed away from the streets and piazzas.
The patrol marched down the middle of the stone-paved street beneath him. All the captives were young, some barely out of childhood, and appeared dazed and little interested in escape. The mancatchers, poles that ended in neck-traps, enabled the men of the watch to force their captives onward. The devices made Cal’s skin crawl. Perhaps it was the thought of being captured and controlled. He wasn’t here to be caught. Here he was free.
The watchmen, together with their prisoners clothed in dressing gowns, knee-length shorts, t-shirts and, in the case of one girl, a pair of peach-coloured pyjamas, finally disappeared down another street.
Out of curiosity, Cal had once followed a patrol and discovered they took their captives to a fortress at the city’s centre. What became of them after that, he didn’t know. He didn’t understand why the patrols rounded people up in the first place, but those who wore the traditional apparel of the city were generally left alone. Maybe the watchmen were some kind of fashion police. Ridiculous, of course, but then anything could exist here.
Cal waited a few moments before making his way back down the steps. With a final glance across the street, he slunk into a narrow alleyway and pressed his back against the wall. He ran a hand through his short dark-brown hair, silently reminding himself to be more careful in the future. Turning to disappear up the alley, he came face to face with the girl in the black dress.
Distracted by her sudden appearance, Cal fought to master himself as his heart and mind felt yanked away from his body. The city blurred, becoming hazy and then transparent. White mist billowed into the now glass-like alleyway, obscuring his vision. His last image was that of the girl’s face. Her eyebrows rose as if in shock, and yet beneath them, her green eyes glinted with something other than surprise. As Cal’s world turned black, he suddenly knew it was a look of amusement.
Cal’s own eyes flew open and he sat bolt upright. Heart still pounding in his ears, he looked around his bedroom in disbelief. What happened? Why had he lost control?
* * *
“It is now estimated that five hundred people are suffering from HF1. This mysterious sleeping sickness, first identified in the Mediterranean just six weeks ago, has claimed victims across the globe,” the news presenter reported as scenes of patients in foreign hospitals cut to patients in British ones.
Cal took another bite of burnt toast and screwed up his nose. The breakfast was so much better when his mum’s shifts allowed her to be home in the morning. He’d calmed down since last night’s experience, dismissing it as some aberration.
Cal switched the TV off just as images of teenagers staring vacantly at the camera from hospital beds appeared on the screen. As he made his way out of the door moments later, the news images still in his mind, a twinge of envy ran through him. At least they didn’t have to go to school, he thought. They could stay in their dream world. He couldn’t.
“Hey, Sissy!” the driver shouted from the wheel-trimmed Mini Cooper as it sped past Cal soon after he’d left the house.
Cal stopped and glared after the car, fists clenching with the desire to throw a stone through the rear window.
“Koboloi!” Cal uttered darkly, as if it were a deadly curse. Luke Hastings and his sidekicks could disappear off the face of the earth for all Cal cared. They acted like thugs and never seemed to think about anything beyond the end of the day. Not that the other boys at his school were much better. Girls, football, dances, loud music—that was all they thought about. None of them had any imagination. A run-down Morris Minor rolled past, not far behind Luke’s car. Cal, caught up in his ill humour, hardly took any notice until he glimpsed a girl’s face at the passenger window. She was staring at him. He froze. It was the girl from his dreams. He was sure of it.
By the time he got to school, he’d convinced himself that he’d been seeing things. It was, after all, the briefest of glimpses, and the reflections on the glass had probably distorted his view.
Luke pushed past Cal, knocking Cal’s shoulder roughly. “Oops, sorry!” Luke said before smirking and sauntering off to his desk at the back of the classroom with the rest of his partners in crime.
Cal tightened his fist around the strap of his schoolbag as he watched his six-foot-two tormentor take his seat. Cal exhaled. One day Luke would push him too far, and Cal wasn’t going to care about the extra six inches.
Cal dropped into his seat, resigned to the fact that he must suffer the misfortune of being surrounded by
the dull and insignificant for the rest of the term. Images of the victims on the morning’s news report flashed through his mind again. Maybe he would be lucky and be the first in his school to contract the illness.
After registration, the door opened and the deputy head ushered in a new student. Cal’s mind raced as Mrs Eyres, their teacher, introduced the new girl.
“Class, this is Ashlin Ravenhill. She’s new to Hythewood and will be starting with us today. I hope you’ll all introduce yourselves. She’s moved in from London and will no doubt be in need of some new friends, which I am certain this class will provide in abundance.”
It was her. The hair was shorter, and the black dress had been replaced by a pair of jeans, a green top, and a dark grey jacket, but it was the girl he had seen in the Dreamframe.
Recovering from the shock, Cal put his head down as the teacher directed Ashlin to the only spare desk in the room—the one next to him. He’d worked hard to keep that seat empty. At the start of the year he’d arrived in class extra early to pick his place and put his schoolbag firmly on the chair next to him; he’d even placed a couple of books on the desk to dissuade any would-be neighbour. Now, however, he wished he was sitting somewhere else.
Girls unnerved Cal. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe if he’d had a sister he would’ve been more comfortable with them, maybe learned a little more about how they thought or how to talk to them. Now he had another issue to add to his discomfort—the girl taking her seat next to him had been in all his dreams for the past week.
She glanced at him as she sat down. There didn’t seem to be any recognition in her deep green eyes. Cal gave the briefest and most perfunctory of smiles. He was being silly. It was just a coincidence. The characters in the Dreamframe were his creation, not real people.
“OK, class,” Mrs Eyres began in her usual manner. Cal grimaced. She always spoke to them as if they were children instead of seventeen-year-olds. “I hope you remembered your assignment from before the holiday. Can anyone remind me what it was?”
“Why, did you forget, Miss?” Luke leaned back in his seat, a wry smile spreading across his long face as the back row guffawed. Cal rolled his eyes.
“Thank you, Mr Hastings,” Mrs Eyres said, peering over her glasses at the errant student. “No, I have not forgotten. Indeed, I’ve even made a copy of the reading assignment for everyone.”
Mrs Eyres distributed a small handout to the class while maintaining a particularly close eye on the back row. She got to Cal and Ashlin last, one copy left in her hand. “Sorry, I made these before I knew you were joining us. You’ll have to share.”
Mrs Eyres reached the front of the classroom again and felt her pockets. “Oh dear, silly me. I seem to have left my reading glasses in the staffroom. I know, why don’t we have Mr Hastings come up and read the assignment for us?”
Luke’s countenance fell immediately. Cal stared back at the bully. He could tell Luke was half thinking of ignoring the request, but that would have him before the Head again.
“Come now, it’s not the full chapter,” Mrs Eyres urged.
Luke pushed himself up and traipsed toward the front of the room. He carried the handout as if it contained some written confession of guilt that was about to be publicly declared.
“Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland,” Ashlin said almost reverently as she shifted the handout to the centre of the desks.
Cal, not sure if it was a statement or a question, remained silent. No need to encourage a conversation, he thought.
“I love this story. Have you read it before?” Her pale complexion and jet-black hair made the green of her eyes stand out all the more. He dropped his gaze to the paper as Luke began to read from the front of the class. Cal knew he couldn’t avoid a response as easily as he’d evaded her gaze.
“When I was a kid,” Cal whispered, trying to sound dismissive. He wondered what she’d think if she knew he had a worn copy in his bookcase he’d read at least ten times. He had first read it when very young, so technically he hadn’t lied.
She nodded and lowered her voice. “So what’s your name?”
“Erm, sorry. I’m Cal.” Why did she insist on talking so much?
“Call me Ash by the way, no one calls me Ashlin except my dad when he’s being very serious—and school teachers of course.”
“Right.” Cal traced his finger along the line of a scratch in his desk, wincing at Luke’s lack of understanding of how Lewis Carroll’s story was meant to be read.
Ash smiled and turned back to the handout to try to follow along, though Cal suspected she was reading it to herself rather than listening to Luke, who sounded like the text wasn’t worthy of his consideration. He read it with neither passion nor understanding.
Cal’s thoughts turned back to the girl sitting next to him. Had he seen her in town? Or perhaps on one of his trips to the library? The subconscious could take in a face and then throw it into a dream. They’d just come back from the school holidays. She could have been in Hythewood for over a week for all he knew. That was plenty of time to see her in such a small town. Yes, he reassured himself, plenty of time and opportunity.
Luke eventually finished reading the assigned excerpt of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and returned to his desk with a look of triumph on his face.
“Thank you, Mr Hastings,” Mrs Eyres said as Luke took his seat. “Now, who can tell me what’s happening here? This is from the final chapter. We had a brief look through the other chapters before the end of term. Alice, if you remember, was trying to make sense of what was going on. Now, in this chapter she seems a little different. Can anyone tell me why?”
“She’s growing bigger!” Esme said. Esme was all pigtails, braces and enthusiasm as usual.
“Yes, Miss Partridge. And why’s that?” Mrs Eyres asked.
Esme made no reply, but Richard Gulliver, a very serious-looking boy, offered an answer. “She’s angry. She’s had enough of their nonsense.”
“That certainly seems to be the case.” Mrs Eyres cast a knowing glance at the back row. “But is there something more here?”
There was no response. Ash looked back and then, turning to the teacher, raised her hand.
“Yes, Miss Ravenhill?” the teacher asked.
“Alice has come to the conclusion that she’s dreaming. I think her change of attitude and size comes from realising that? She knows it’s just an illusion, that she’s the master of her own dream. She can control it. She can end it.”
“Very good, that’s spot on, Miss Ravenhill,” Mrs Eyres said, but Cal wasn’t listening.
Did this girl understand? Did she see? Cal’s mind raced as he entertained the thought that he might not be entirely alone. No, he thought, as he shook his head and brought himself back to reality. He was being stupid. She had read some commentaries on the book, that was all.
“Sorry, Sissy!” Luke and his lackeys intoned as one as they pushed past Cal at the main doors after the class had finished, knocking his ham-and-tomato sandwich from his hand. Cal’s chest rose as he fought to control his composure. He let out a deep breath and then bent down to pick up his lunch. Fortunately, only one of the sandwiches had fallen out of the cellophane.
He glanced back to see Ash standing at the door staring at him, but then Esme appeared at Ash’s side and introduced herself excitedly. “So, what was your last school like?”
Cal left the two girls to their idle prattle.
* * *
Cal was halfway through an apple when Ash came walking up the dirt path through the small wooded area between the car park and the aviary. Cal often came here to be alone and watch the birds. The caretaker didn’t like anyone playing near the cages, so the area was usually quiet, except for the chatter of the parakeets.
Ash walked by Cal’s little hiding place at the bottom of a large tree, coming to a stop in front of the chicken-wire cages. Cal watched her as she looked around at the exotic birds. For a moment it seemed like he was back in the Dreamframe. Th
eir paths had crossed yet again. It wasn’t the same person, he reminded himself. He took a final bite of his apple just as the birds decided to stop squawking, and Ash turned on hearing the crunch.
Cal didn’t know what to do with himself. He hadn’t meant to stare at her. It was Ash who’d wandered into his little safe area, not the other way around.
“Why did they call you Sissy?”
Cal grabbed his schoolbag, glad to give her something else to rest her eyes on. The initials C.C. had been boldly written upon it with a black marker pen: a practise started by his mum after his penchant for losing things had become costly, though the truth of the matter was that they’d been stolen by the likes of Luke Hastings, but he’d never her. “Callum Chase.”
“Ah, how imaginative of them,” Ash said.
Cal frowned. “Yes, Luke and his koboloi were pushing the limits of their creativity on that one. I suspect they had outside help.”
Ash broke into a wide grin that lit up her face. He hadn’t intended his words to be humorous. “What does koboloi mean anyway?”
Why had he said that word aloud? He never let anyone know his own private names. He would have to explain. “They were mischievous sprites in Greek myth. The word can also mean impudent knaves. I thought it fit.”
Ash laughed. It was innocent and free-spirited and Cal immediately forgot about Luke and his sidekicks. “Esme has told me everything about everyone, even the teachers.” She took a step closer. “Aren’t they a little bitter?”
“Sorry?” Cal asked.
“The seeds,” she said as she stuck her hands into her jean pockets.
He always ate the apple seeds. “I’m used to it.”
Ash looked at him as if she was trying to read him. Maybe she did recognise him. He had to ask. He had to know. He wiped a hand across his lips. “So when did you arrive in town?”
“A little over a week ago.” If she saw the look of relief on Cal’s face, she didn’t show it. “Dad took a place here. He’s a painter, an artist, that is. He got fed up with London and decided Hampshire was the place to be. I think he’s going through his coastal landscapes phase. Have you always lived in Hythewood?”