“Yeah,” Cal replied tersely, not knowing what else to say.
“And your parents?”
Why was she asking so many questions? No one ever spoke to him. “My dad died when I was young.”
“Sorry,” Ash said.
Cal nodded but made no reply. His mum never spoke of his dad. Cal didn’t even know his name.
“What are you doing besides English Lit, then? There’s no course in Greek mythology,” Ash asked. “I mean what with using the word koboloi.”
“History. It was the next best thing.”
Ash stepped playfully over a large stone, as if impatient at standing still too long. “You must spend a lot of time reading?”
He did. Perhaps too much, some might say, but they were usually the kind of people who never read enough. Reading was a lot more interesting than the incessant small talk that so many people engaged in.
He looked at Ash and then up at the trees. Why couldn’t she leave him alone? “Sometimes a person’s his own best company.”
Those green eyes were staring at him again, but their light had dimmed and Cal thought he saw disappointment in them.
Ash smiled. “Well, I best go get some lunch.”
Cal closed his bag as Ash walked off. She was an outgoing girl. No doubt she’d be friends with most of the class within a week or two. Perhaps she liked to start with the ones hardest to befriend. Cal suppressed a grin. Perhaps she’d try to make friends with Luke Hastings next?
He stood and sucked in the spring-scented air. He would go back to the Dreamframe tonight, and tomorrow school would return to normal and Ash, like everyone else, would never speak to him again.
Chapter Two
Cal became aware of his dream state within moments of falling asleep. Consciousness within his own dreams was second nature to him after twelve years of studied practice. With that realisation, the hazy, disjointed dream world spun away, leaving Cal floating before a vast wall of cloud. Lights shimmered like silver stars across its billowing milk-white surface. Cal allowed himself to fall into the brume and within seconds the mist dissipated and in its place appeared the city with its sun-drenched piazzas, majestic domes, marble sculptures, and lush topiaries.
He stood on a rooftop. Cal had yet to encounter a patrol on top of a house, so the location made a good entry point. The nearly flat roofs also made it difficult for anyone to see him from the streets below. Looking back, he spied the building that held the chamber with the painted peacocks. The brilliant yellow orb of the sun cast its rays relentlessly down upon the city, bathing the small domed roof in a golden glow. It was daytime here, of course. It always was. The sun dipped during the day but never reached the horizon—at least, not before Cal woke up. Yet another difference between this construct and those he’d previously known, where sometimes it was day and at other times night.
Cal’s attention switched toward the centre of the city. He heard voices. Many voices. Weaving his way skilfully across the terracotta tiles, he edged ever closer to the source of the chatter and murmur. He stopped. The hustle and bustle was coming from directly behind the row of houses across the street. The main piazza lay there. He usually avoided the centre of the city, preferring the less-populated outskirts, but something had piqued his curiosity. Something had changed. He could sense it.
He scuttled over the remaining housetops, scrambling easily over the parapets and other obstacles in his way, then leaped across an alleyway to reach a double-levelled roof. It was a large building, some kind of tavern by the look of it, that jutted out some distance into the street. Across from it, and adjoining the opposite row of houses, stood a low barn-like building. Cal reckoned it a good twenty feet between the two.
He breathed out heavily. No sense in wasting an opportunity to improve, he thought. In this construct, for some reason, he found it harder to exercise his dream powers, but, as if to offset that disadvantage, the improvements he made here seemed more lasting and less random. In truth, the added difficulty made his accomplishments even more satisfying.
Cal backed up as far as he could and then ran for the edge of the tavern, launching himself boldly into the air. He imagined the gap closing between him and the barn as he visualised an unseen force pushing him forward through the air. It was, as always, an exhilarating experience. He landed a little clumsily on the barn roof, corrected himself, and looked around. No one had seen him. Pleased with his triumph, he ran for the end of the barn and leapt upwards five feet to land on the rooftop above. He smiled. Only a few years ago he’d struggled to even match his vertical leaps in the waking world.
Cal squatted on the roof above the piazza. A market now stood upon the square, and several hundred people milled about the score of stalls. Cal had had no idea that so many people inhabited the city. The city had been a ghost town when Cal had first discovered it back at the tail end of the winter. He had seen a citizen or two every now and again, and a few more of late, but never such a crowd as this.
At the piazza’s centre a fountain sluggishly threw up water from the mouth of a jadestone mermaid. A multitude of colours swirled about it, from the apparel of the patrons to the dyes of the market’s textile goods. Most of the men wore woollen tunics and cotton trews, but some sported doublets and wore high boots over their hosen. The women, likewise divided, wore either plain yet fetching bodices and skirts, or long rich gowns of various hues.
Cal’s attention fell upon a figure near a fruit stall. A figure wearing a black dress. It was Ash—or his dream-version of the girl at least. She sauntered past the mermaid fountain to a stall displaying silk bolts of endless colours. Cal frowned. He’d not been in this part of the city for weeks, strange that she should be here.
Ash studied the fruit stall’s wares for some time before spying something else that took her fancy. She wound her way out of the crowd to the side of the square below Cal where a long stall boasted a wide range of hats and headdresses.
He knew the girl below to be some conjuration of his subconscious, but the likeness to Ash was uncanny. Despite his better judgment, Cal found himself positioning himself immediately above the hat stall. She wasn’t going to surprise him this time.
He peered over the edge. Below, a wagon brimming with bouquets of flowers stood next to the hat stall, but no one appeared to be tending either. Cal jumped. The twenty-foot drop ended with a graceful, though not noiseless, landing. Ash turned around at the thud of his trainers on the flagstones.
“Your dress becomes you, my lady,” Cal said, plucking a red tulip from the wagon and putting it to his nose. There was no smell of course. There never was in the Dreamframe. He offered it to Ash with a slight bow.
“Cal?” Ash said, taking the flower. “What are you doing here?”
Cal struggled to think how to respond. Usually his creations weren’t so familiar with him. She was supposed to curtsy and play out her part as the setting of the Dreamframe demanded. Obviously, his subconscious had constructed something a bit more complex this time, but he would play along.
“This is my dream world,” Cal said.
“If that’s what you wish to believe.” Ash picked up and examined a tall headdress that looked like the sort of thing a princess in a fairy tale might have worn.
Cal folded his arms. “There’s a new girl at school. Her name’s Ash. You look like her, though your hair’s longer. You talk like her too, but you’re just a dream, a trick of the mind.”
Ash laughed and put the headdress back on the stall. Cal was surprised to find her laughter made him feel the same way here as it had at school.
She put a hand on her hip. “Yes, very clever. And there’s a boy like you at my new school who doesn’t care much for the company of others, though he’s somewhat more clean-shaven.”
For some reason Cal couldn’t help having stubble in the Dreamframe. He thought it made him look older. “You’re telling me what I already know, which isn’t surprising because you’re a facet of me.”
“I’m n
ot a facet of anyone!” Ash looked quite indignant.
Cal knew this was a bad idea. He was arguing with himself, talking to an imaginary figure that his own mind had constructed to entertain him.
“We could meet, in the school library tomorrow at midday.”
“Sorry?” Cal said.
“To satisfy you that I’m really here, or not.”
“OK. Agreed. And to make sure it’s not a coincidence, why don’t you make sure you have a copy of that book we were reading in English Lit?”
Ash smiled and, as she did so, her visage flickered momentarily into that of Lewis Carroll’s Alice, though still with her own face, before reverting back to the long black dress. “Thanks for the flower! Oh, and it’s a gown, not a dress,” she said before walking playfully away into the crowd.
Cal was annoyed. He was the author. Maybe the book hadn’t been finished yet, but the characters needed to keep to their roles.
Although the city was a little strange in that regard, too. He didn’t remember constructing it like his other worlds in the Dreamframe, but perhaps he’d become so familiar with the process that his subconscious mind had done it for him. Maybe his subconscious was now taking over the character development for him, too.
It was an interesting thought, and if he hadn’t been so engrossed in it as he made his way out of the street he might have seen the two watchmen before they saw him.
“Halt!” one of them said, but Cal had no intention of doing anything of the kind. He turned and dashed toward a low colonnade across the street. He could run fast, but the two watchmen were still too close for comfort as he stole a glance over his shoulder. Making a quick note to improve his running, Cal raced down the alley at the end of the colonnade. He hadn’t been down here before, and had no idea where it led.
The alley ended at a narrow flight of steps, which Cal took, closely followed by the men pursuing him. At the top, a large balcony surrounded a small domed roof. Cal circled left but only one of the watchmen followed. The reason for this became apparent when Cal came full circle around the balcony. There was no other exit. He was trapped.
Both watchmen extended their mancatchers out toward him and closed in. Cal sighed. “OK, you can go. You’re dismissed!”
The watchmen glanced briefly at each other and then continued to move in. Why don’t they obey? This is my dream!
Behind the eyeguards of their leather helmets, the eyes of the watchmen glinted as if they’d just won a prize. They’re not getting me that easy.
Cal looked down over the low railing of the balcony. The drop was over forty feet, perhaps nearer to fifty. He’d never attempted such a height before, but he had little choice. These wayward characters were beginning to irritate him.
He swiftly stepped over the railing to the ledge and, before the watchmen could reach him with their neck-traps, he leapt down. His heart leapt too as the building rushed past him as he descended. He tried to control the fall, to keep his feet and legs able to absorb the impact, but it wasn’t going to work. His hold on his descent faltered as the ground loomed up all too fast beneath him.
Cal awoke, his left leg in pain. He reached down and massaged it. It’s just cramp, he told himself. Even so, it kept him awake for most of the rest of the night.
* * *
Ash paid Cal no special attention, or he her, at registration the following day. He spent the rest of the morning in Miss Reed’s classics class, though his mind wasn’t on the lesson. His mind swung between self-ridicule and fear. The former because of his thoughts that Ash could have actually been in his dream, the latter because she might be in the library.
Almost reluctantly, Cal made his way from Miss Reed’s classroom toward the library after the lunch bell had sounded. For some reason he felt his chin for stubble. There was none of course. He shaved every morning before school and had done so for a couple of years.
He paused as he reached the library door. This was all crazy. Ash wasn’t going to be here. He pushed back his thick hair, and walked into the library, past the bookshelves, and to the sitting area in the middle of the room. At the end of one of the long tables, Ash sat engrossed in a book. She didn’t look up. It was a coincidence, Cal told himself, even though there was only one other person in the library—a blonde girl who had the anxious look of one who needed to finish an assignment in a hurry.
Then Cal remembered the second part of the agreement. He grabbed a book from a nearby shelf and sat down a polite distance from Ash. She still hadn’t looked up.
It was a few moments before Cal managed to work out the story from the upside-down text. It was Peter Pan. A flood of relief hit his body and he took himself to task for being stupid enough to believe Ash had been in his dream. If he met her again tonight in the Dreamframe, he’d have her explain her failure to keep their agreement. He smiled. It would be interesting to see how his subconscious would deal with that one.
“Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland was out.” Ash looked directly at him and he froze in his chair.
“I can’t believe it,” Cal said eventually, more to himself than Ash.
“Well, you can ask the librarian if you want. It’s a popular book.”
Cal frowned and then had a thought. Pinching himself hard, he looked around the room, but the library remained unchanged.
“I tried that already, when you walked in. Nice book, by the way.” Ash glanced at the book Cal had grabbed blindly from the shelf.
He looked down at the title, A History of Fashion for the Fashionable Woman, before placing it carefully on the table and pushing it aside as if it were a plate of unpleasant food. “So, you were actually there? I mean, in the market? Last night? You remember?”
A smile played upon her thin lips. “Yes, and the time before, in the alley, when you so rudely disappeared. I’ve got a good memory.”
Cal moved his chair closer. The blonde girl across the other side of the library was still engrossed in her work. “You don’t seem too surprised.”
“Actually, I’m very surprised, but I think it’s exciting too, don’t you?”
“But…” Cal began, trying to find the right words. “You can’t just step into my dreams.”
Ash raised her eyebrows. “Your dreams?”
“Yes, the city. I’ve been there every night for more than a month. It’s my best Dreamframe to date.”
“Dreamframe?”
“It’s the word I use to describe the series of constructions that make up the dream world.”
Ash nodded. “And you’re intimately acquainted with the architecture of southern Europe during the Renaissance period? Is that an area you’ve studied in your history class?”
“Well, not exactly—”
“Or not at all?” Ash interrupted.
Cal sat back in his chair. It was true, he didn’t know the first thing about that era of history except that it was influenced by the classical period. “The subconscious can create things, do things, that surprise us. Maybe I watched a movie or read a novel, or maybe—”
“Or maybe someone else constructed it?”
“You?” Cal asked.
Ash shook her head. “I like some of the Renaissance art, but can’t claim to be familiar with the architecture or even the fashion, though some of it is rather fetching. No, I was thinking that perhaps neither of us dreamed it up.”
“What do you mean?”
Ash leant toward him. “I mean that it might be someone else’s dream.”
“That’s impossible.”
“You’ve got a better explanation?”
“Not yet, but there must be one.”
Ash closed her book. “Think about it. It would explain some things. Let me guess: you’ve not been able to control the city physically—how you interact with it perhaps, but not the city itself? The construction, as you call it, is more consistent than any dream you’ve been in before, as well as larger and more defined?”
Cal stood up. “There’s a reasonable explanati
on for all that.”
“We need to find out whose dream it is, Cal. We could—”
“No.” Cal dismissed whatever she was going to say with a shake of his head. “This is one of those dreams where you think you’re awake and you’re not. People do not share dreams!” The girl across the room had, by the look on her face, just registered she wasn’t alone in the library. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go wake up.”
Cal walked from the library and out to the patch of grass behind the school pond. Confusion, like loose strands, cascaded through his mind, and cords of discomfort knotted in his stomach. Maybe he was still dreaming? It was the only explanation, unless he was ill and unable now to tell the difference between the waking world and the world of dreams.
He knew the truth of the matter though, the spring fragrances now surrounding him told him as much. It was about to rain too. He could smell it. He closed his eyes, but he was wide awake.
Chapter Three
The rain swept down upon Hythewood within the hour, accompanied by a mist that stubbornly clung to the surrounding treed hedgerows. Cal looked into the gloom from his position on the field, his sodden football kit chilling his bones. Mr Jenkins, the P.E. teacher, said physical exercise was good for the mind and would help them with their A-levels. Cal was glad at least that the cramp had gone from his leg. The inclement weather chafed him. In the Dreamframe’s city it would be warm and dry. It always was. The dreary haze that filled the trees hung in stark contrast to the coruscating white clouds marking the borders of the Dreamframe.
The flames of his ill-temper in the library only a couple of hours ago had already been doused in the waters of cold reality, but Ash’s words still taunted him. He needed to get away, to think. Why did it feel like everything that had once been solid now seemed uncertain?
Running footsteps entered into Cal’s thoughts. He turned to see Luke’s tall frame rushing toward him as the ball flew by Cal. Cal leapt aside, but not fast enough. Cal hit the ground hard.
He sat up. A ringing sound permeated his skull. Cal put a cautious hand to the eye that had connected with Luke’s elbow. It was tender and beginning to swell, but there was no blood.