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>BAM
>BAM
>BAM
>BAM
>HO-LEE-FUCK
>That your heartbeat?
>Nope!
>Drums, boy. Those are drums; a steady metronome of hands bouncing off tightened animal skin
>And they’re not marching drums, either
>These are hunting drums
>Verdant mountain forest dotted with aspen and gigantic conifer, douglas fir, and narrow leaf cottonwood
Aand of course… mountains of dead animals
>Crows
>Ravens
>Magpies
>Oh there’s elk here, too, whole families of them flattened skulls caved in, bristling with dark arrows, rich blood spilling out of holes in their heads or flanks
>And dead rabbits, some with their little legs still kicking, as if on the run from something
>Dead foxes,
>Dead foxes, red and gray
>Echo catches up to Rhilla before you do, blitzing past the corpses of animals he would normally stop to chomp on
>When you do catch up to the bird he’s almost horizontal from exhaution
>He leans on a nearby boulder and gulps down air
>The bird turns when he hears you stumble to the brush
>“You see now how Rhilla has lived these endless days,” he huffs
“Did you hear that voice!?” you practically shout, red in the face, breathing hard as well
>Rhilla shakes his head a little, a loose feather falling into the brush
>“Yes,” he says, now standing upright. “You must never speak to the voice on the wind. It will ask for you, because slowly, it comes to know you. But human or Rhilla must never speak to it.”
“Goddamn, heretic. What… or who, the fuck is that voice on the wind? Can you tell?”
>The bird looks at you like you just asked him to teach you how breathe water
“You don’t know? A relative? A past lover? What’s your greatest fear-”
>“The voice on the wind is not of our world, Vulcada. It is Haasin! Haasin tha thas festered here for as long as I have bene hunted…” he says, straightening his short spine. “By the blood of my people, I swear, this Haasin can read minds.”
>“Haasin?” you grab Rhilla by the shoulders
>He doesn’t resist your touch – too shocked, tired, scared, or all three
>“You are DREAMING, bird. I don’t know what the fuck ‘Haasin’ is, but it should be clear to you by now that nothing going on right now is logically consistent!”
>“B-But it… but it-”
“DREAMING.”
>“-it spoke the names of my minn, and daka. Of my brothers and sisters. Of our cabin at home…”
>He shrugs your weak grip and steps away, scanning around him like the trees themselves are listening
>Okay, you really gotta wake this guy up
>This Traumatin-induced nightmare is way too real for him
>Too real for you, even
>Now, methods for waking a sleeping person from a nightmare — within the nightmare itself — vary
>Sometimes extreme violence does the trick. Ever woken up right before a nightmare sinks its teeth into you?
>Or you’re falling – a human meteorite – and you wake up in bed, centimeters before impact?
>Just you, popping up in your bed, subconscious still stuck in a sheer drop
>Sometimes you need to make the dreamer realize they’re in a stitch, and that can break the spell
>It also gives you a chance to introduce the dreamer to the fun of lucid dreaming
>Now, it depends on the person, but this can either be the best solution
>Or the worst
>Sometimes rationality works like a charm and they wake up shortly after the realization hits home; other times you’re better off hurling eggs at a brick wall trying to knock it down
>The dreaming mind and the rational mind are not the same. And it isn’t until you have control over the dreaming mind can you allow the rational mind to take over
“We really gotta wake you up,” you say, your speech quick and with exhaustion and terror. “You see now that you’re in a dream?”
>“This cannot be a dream! And if it is so, why can Rhilla not awaken?”
“ What were you doing before this thing, this ‘Haasin’ started to hunt you?”
>Rhilla’s eyes widen, just a little. “My memory… it fails me… I can only remember the hunt, and being hunted.”
“Exactly!” you shout as you grab his shoulders again, shaking him. “That’s one of the signs that you’re in a dream — you can never remember what you were doing before the dream began!”
>You lock eyes — your eyes brown, his a bright blue
“Rhilla,” you say, closer to him now. “How did you get here? In this mountain range?”
>He stares back at you, blankly, face slowly contorting into confusion
>“I don’t… I don’t recall. I’ve been on the run for so long that I cannot…”
>Finally, it feels like you’re gaining control of the dream, rather than letting it run circles around you
“Try to remember. The more you think about this whole scenario, the less it makes sense, right?”
>And that’s the truth
>You feel like you’re almost there — almost breaking through to Rhilla…
>…Until you hear your name on the wind
>You turn your head into the wind, heart hammering in your chest
>“…Anon…”
>The voice draws slow, stuttering breath
>”Another…” It says with an elongated wheeze
>There’s a pause
>And then
>”How… is another?”
>The trees in front of you bend and shake against the chaotic wind
>Heavy skies, black with rain, roll overhead, crowding the slate gray clouds
>Okay
>Just stay calm
>Remember: whatever this voice is, it’s just a nightmare — an uncompressed part of this bird’s subconscious, lost on its way to the hippocampus for storage
>BAM
>BAM
>You clench hands into brave fists as you step out from behind the boulder “Fuck you!” you cry. “You’re not real, and you don’t scare me!”
>Just for safety, you feel for the brass key in your pocket your anchor to reality
>Echo chirps in as well, perhaps cursing the voice on the wind in his own way
>This is all just a dream, you remind yourself
>What happens here is inconsequential
>Rhill’s talons practically rip into your jacket as he tugs you back behind the safety of the boulder
>“What are you doing!?” he roars, terrified. “HAVE YOU NO SENSE?! HAVE YOU NO MIND? I say you must not speak to the wind!”
>BAM
>The drums are louder and more resonate now than before
>BAM
>The voice, however, does not respond to your challenge verbally
>It responds another way
>Rhilla drops his hold on your jacket, stepping back behind the boulder
>The unmistakable bay of hunting dogs carries on the wind
>Two long, heart-dropping howls
>Rhilla squawks in terror
>“We have lingered here too long!” he says as he grabs your arm
>He tries to pull you away with him, but you’re frozen in place. “Come with me, Vulcada, there is a shelter nearby. We must be swift, yes, yes! If they have our scent we katha without it.”
>You scan the hill, squinting
>Echo yips
>And starts to backtrack
>He pauses to look up at you, a quiet plea for you to leave
>But it feels like your muscles are sloughed with concrete
>Ahead of you, several hundred feet up the hill, the brush starts to flicker with life
>Your blood runs cold
>Two black hounds emerge from behind a juniper bush, scenting the wind
>They wear a coat of matted black fur that flakes off in places; their starved bodies are sunken in, revealing hungry rib cages beneath shadow-black flesh
>One of them looks in your direction
>Its eyes flash
>White pinholes of fire surrounded dark
>Like a small twinkling star, alone in the vastness of space
>Fear roots you in place
>You’re afraid to make a sound
>Echo whines and takes off after Rhilla, who has the gift of quiet step, as he slips away with a tap on your shoulder
>Not like you, in your big, clumsy boots
>The other dog turns and stands, body pointed at you
>If you move very, very slowly… maybe you can give them the slip-
>And just as you’re about to turn around, the dogs break into a frenzied snarls and barks
>Their white eyes fixate on you with animistic fervor
>Shit
>One of the dogs cuts loose with a howl — one that carries across the mountain range
>The other dog howls in response
>BAM
>BAM
>BAM
>The voice on the wind returns in a gust that nearly bowls you over
>“Another…”
>“Anon… is another…”
>You don’t wait any longer, or pray for stealth like Rhilla
>Echo and Rhilla made their choice to go further down hill
>A rather sensible choice
>You get it
>You take off after where you think they went, too scared to look behind you
>With harsh snarls the hunting dogs tear after you, like inky black comets
>The baying starts up again as they give chase
“ECHO!?” you call in a dead sprint. “Echo!? Now would be a good time to do your thing and show me where to go-”
>Echo yips and appears alongside you, running as well, a gray blur aside from his pink tongue hanging from his mouth
>Well, that’s hardly helpful if he’s not with the target; albeit quite noble he decided to stick around with you
>Despite your initial impression of your fox, he shifts into a higher gear as he overtakes you, four legs churning through the underbrush with ease
>“Echo wait!” you call
>He’s trying to lead you somewhere – you hope – and it better be after the bird
>You follow after your fox, driven like a wild animal to scramble over rocky boulders and fallen logs, to crash through the underbrush with wild abandon
>Thorns and brambles stick to your jacket
>Branches cut away at your bare-skin
>You feel like an animal
>Hunted
>Behind you the black dogs gain impressive ground
>The terrain slopes even further, the trees begin to thin out, little by little
>The sound of water and wind fills your ears
>And thankfully Echo doesn’t have to lead you far, because the ‘shelter’ that Rhilla spoke of earlier appears as you break from the treeline
>A small, one-room cabin set on the very edge of a cliff
>Beneath the cabin, where the ground seems to terminate into nothing a fierce river rages
>The river churns white with lethal velocity, whipped up into a frenzy by the gathering storm and the jagged rocks below
>You spot Rhilla, a small black figure, who pulls at the front door to the cabin in vain
>When he sees you sprinting towards him he waves you over with one arm
>“You! Vulcada! If you are from my dream you will help me open this door, yes?” he says panicked. ”Always locked, always locked! But you can help, yes?”
>You’re still catching your breath alongside Echo, the limits of your conditioning from Academy revealed
>Your heartbeat matches the steady hunting drums beating in your skull
>BAM
>BAM
>Echo nibbles at your heel and you come back to reality
>Rhilla’s eyes are huge, his beak working with exhaustion and disbelief
>“Are you deaf!?” he shrieks. “Do you not hear me?! The hounds have our scent — help me open this door!”
>Help you open a do-
>OH
>YOU CAN DO THAT!
>In a snap, you produce the old brass key from your pocket
“Move aside, heretic,” you say confidentially as you push past Rhilla, pressing the key against the lock. “I’ll get us in.”
>“Praise the Ancestors!” Rhilla exclaims as he throws a terrified glance behind him. “Be swift, demon! Be swift!”
“Watch an expert dreamer work his magic.”
>What do you know?
>It slips in with ease
>Your key is a perfect fit for this oldlock
>You give a quarter turn with your wrist, expecting the door to click open like it always does inside your dreams
>The key halts in place, catching on something
>What
>This… has never happened before
>A gust of wind assails the three of you, leaden and dark, burdened by a voice
>A voice Rhilla and Echo hear, too
>”Anon… the other… is…”
>And then, right as you’re jiggling the key around in the lock…
>…Right when the lock gives after years of disuse, hardened by rust…
>…The voice on the wind says something that chills your blood
>”other is…dream walker.”
>The lock turns with a heavy, mechanical THUNK
>The door to the cabin is thrown open by the force of the wind
>BAM
>Rhilla just about runs you over to get inside, tailed by Echo, just as frightened
>You withdraw the key from the lock and dive into the cabin, landing onto what you think is a welcome mat
>BAM
>BAM
>Wind rips into the cabin with such force that you hear things deeper int the cabin falling over, clattering to the stone floor
>Your training (or survival instincts) kick in, and you’re on your feet in a snap
>The door
>Shutting the door feels like trying to push a boulder up a hill
>That is to say, it’s pointless to do it alone, as you throw your whole weight against the door, contending with the wind
>You’re about yell for help when-
>Rhilla – though his might is small – joins your effort
>With both yours and Rhilla’s hands on the door, you finally manage to push it shut
>And then you throw the lock
>And collapse against the door, panting, exhausted, shivering
>Your arms tremble, and it hurts to lift them any higher than midway past your chest
“This is some fucked up nightmare you’re having Rhilla,” you say, letting your arms drop to your sides
>The approach of the dogs is muffled by a wall of logs, mortar, and the two glass windows on each side of the front door
>Wind rattles the glass panes, like they’re about to burst open
>The heretic isn’t listening
>Rhilla sits on the stone floor in a puddle of gray storm light, saying nothing
>His chest heaves
>Sweat beads off his beak, and takes a high dive onto the wooden floor
>His blue eyes flick anxiously around the cabin
>The look of stress
>And disbelief
>Is written across his features
>Echo paces slow circles around the bird, as if he’s keeping him prisoner
>The crow’s focus snaps around the cabin — which is a lot larger on the inside that is on the outside, at least from the thin light you can see
>“This… this is not possible…” he stammers
“That’s what I keep telling you,” you sigh
>“I once lived here!” Rhilla aches slowly back onto his feet. “Th-This is where I grew up!” he exclaims, breathless
>“How?” he turns to you, lost in the haze of the dream. “How can this be? We left our home near the mountain valley to be closer to the Seminary in Varagas. I was thirteen.”
>You’re about to answer when extends a talon, pointing at your feet
>“Look — the mat you sit upon is the one that my sisters and I made for our parent’s tenth kindling anniversary.”
>You look down at the woven straw mat beneath your muddy boots, laced with red thread on the fringes
>There’s even laced thread resembling letters to a language you can’t read
>But it’s certainly not flickering, or illegible, like most text in dreams
>This really is his childhood home
>Though much of it is shrouded in darkness, the very huma- err, corvid flourishes remind you a lot of your home in Kiba
>And the mat – it’s something you and Natalie would have made for your parents
>All at once you feel something strange about the heretic
>Kinship
>You shake away the heretical feeling of empathy
>It’s unnatural to humanize them
>But when you see the deep claw marks etched into a supporting beam – maybe a tantrum of a child, maybe a huma- FUCK, a corvid accident?
>You try to ignore the feeling, swallow it down
>Like the anxiety building in your chest
>You hobble to your feet, which practically resonate in pain
“Okay, bird. I don’t suppose you’ve had enough reminiscing? I’m still under an oath to the Church. To GOD.”
>Rhilla is silent
>He stands to your left, on the other end of the home, next to a stone fireplace
>Rhilla leans forward as he examines something on the wall
>And you think you’d have a better time talking to a wall
“Bird! are you even listening to me?” you say, walking over to see what’s so God damn interesting over here
>In reply, the heretic hums in thought, says nothing, and strokes the feathers beneath his chin
>When you lean over his shoulder to look, he acts like you’ve always been there, transfixed into stillness by the same…
>…family portrait?
“I take it it this is the flock?”
>Rhilla nods as he studies the painting
>a medium-sized canvas, framed in glass and polished oak, shows a pastel painting of a rather large family of crows
>Two older and much larger crows stand in the center of painting, the woman’s hand on the father’s shoulders
>Must be the parents
>There are four little crows on the mother’s side, – girls in dresses and bonnets
>And three boys on the father’s side, wearing some more contemporary dress clothes
>Collared shirts, thin blazers
>The parents, though, wear traditional corvish garbs – earth-tone tunics, stitched with complimenting green and yellow thread. Long, flat are jewels sewn onto their collars
>Everyone in this painting smiles back at you
“You said this is you used to live here when you were young. So…” you draw a finger to a young crow in the middle of the other two boys
“…Is that one you?”
>You can’t really tell them apart, so you chance a guess
>“No no, that one is Harri; I am the youngest; the one on the end.” He drags a finger to the crow on the far left – a young, blue-eyed bird shines back at you with a friendly smile
>He wears a cheap, navy blazer and white collared shirt – one that hangs loose on his small form;
>Perhaps the product of a young bird wanting so badly to fit in with his older brothers that he’s got on any second-hand outfit that a his small savings could afford
>A sentiment that rings true for you, too
>Maybe not in the same way, perhaps
>But if you’re not trying to fit into the Church…
>…well, aside from family, then this whole thing is a waste of time for you
“You look so happy in this painting, all smiles and grins,” you chuckle a little. “It’s kinda funny – whenever we were given drawings or illustrations of of hereti- um… one of you… in Academy, none of the birds are smiling. And look! All smiles from your whole flock.”
>Rhilla leans close and mumbles something almost beneath the range of your hearing
>“Smiling? What?”
>The sound of a kitchen pot clattering off the stone floor shaves a few hours off of your lifespan
>Rhilla is all granite and iron – he just glares at the painting, as if vaguely horrified by it
>Behind you Echo roots around the kitchen,
>You watch as he deftly leaps onto what must be a wash basin, then onto some shelves, sending little wooden mugs and bowls careening onto the floor
>If it bothers your target that his childhood home is being desecrated by a filthy _vulca_, he doesn’t let on
>“What did you mean when you said it was odd my family is smiling?” Rhilla asks, voice trailing
“I just… didn’t think you could, you know? Beaks and all…” your voice fades into a whisper as you trail off
>The target’s not listening
“Rhilla? Bird? Are you still with me?”
>Nothing
>He just gawks at the artwork, a puzzled expression across his face
>Time to apply manual pressure
“C’mon, Rhilla.” You jostle the bird by the shoulders. “Don’t make me show you the OTHER way of waking up a dreamer.”
>Rhilla brushes your hands away, and turns to you
>“We never smiled in paintings, or, rather, it was not a common thing. Only recently – in the past year or two – young birds would smile for their portraits,” he says. “This portrait is too old for any of us to be smiling.”
>That… that may be a good thing
>If he can pick up on the incongruities, he might be able to end this…
>…without option two
>Rhilla sighs a deep, exhausted sigh and then pads into the kitchen, his little talons but a small clicking noise echoing off the stone, contending with the howling wind
>The kitchen is little more than a nook adjacent to the living room, ensconced by wooden counter space, framed cabinets, and a simple larder – already knocked opened by Echo in search of food
>In the center of the kitchen – lined with crude brick – there’s a shallow stone pit for firewood, some char burnt into the stone basin
>An old cooking spit sits positioned over the stone depression, perhaps once used to cook meals and heat water for the teas his kind are famous for enjoying
>Echo vaults down from the counter when he sees the bird studying him
>The fox’s ears fold against his skull, as if he knows he was doing something he shouldn’t
>Treading on someone’s memories; a private garden of the mind where sacred things live
>But, the bird doesn’t seem to care as Echo threads between Rhilla’s legs, joining you at your side
>You reach an idle hand down and stroke the down fur atop his head
>Silence settles like a wet blanket
>Save for the wind
>The howling wind – muffled by your shelter – punctuates the silence like the droning wail of a banshee
>You can still hear the glass panels in the entrance chatter in their frames
>Almost like someone is trying to break in
>And you swear…
>…if you listen closely…
>…There’s a sliver of something in the air besides wind, and the dogs howling…
>…a high-pitched shriek
>You watch as the heretic paces through the literal halls of his memory, tracing a moment frozen in time back to a scratch on the wall, a dent in the cauldron reduced to a story; a chipped wooden mug reminds him…
>…of growing up
>“This is our kitchen,” he says as he bends down and plucks a wooden mug off the floor, the kitchen washed in gray light. “Many hours Rhilla spent in this kitchen, cooking with minn and my sisters. You see where the cooking fire might go, yes?”
>He motions with a weak gesture towards the stone pit in the center of the kitchen
>“When it came time to celebrate the Harvest Festival… Ancestors, my memory tells me there were hundreds – but it was more likely thirty or forty of my flock and family – would gather here from all over to boil apples until they were soft,” he says, his eyes flashing a dreary weakness, mind casting back to sometime ago, when he was happier
>Safer
>With his kin
>“We’d add too much cinnamon and too little cloves to a round tin lined with dough, which we’d bake over hot coals.”
>You almost feel the heretical pang of empathy once more
“Almost sounds like a pie to me,” you chuckle, standing besides him, surveying his childhood home’s kitchen
>He flashes a look, one eyebrow raised, like you spoke lost words of ancient magick to him
>“Pie?”
You blush a little. at the misunderstanding. “This might not be the right time for a recipe swap, but we do something similar during the Feast of Saint Glasswell — you can bake apples and cinnamon and sugar together to make an apple pie… I think. Honestly, have to ask my sister for the recipe.”
>A friendly smile warms your features as you speak
>Shit
>This dream might be pulling you in too
>You’re trading recipes with the enemy now
>“On the thirteenth day of October there would be a festival with fireworks… and prayer… and of course roasting meat on the wind… armloads of seed and grain passed out to those in observance of the Harvest Festival.”
“The thirteenth huh? Same day we have the Feast of Sain Glasswell. There’s all these lights, and fireworks, and stalls selling things… it’s a lot of fun. And it’s coming up, I think.”
>At that Rhilla sighs unhappily, letting out a deeply held exhaustion.
>“It is all so tiresome…” he says, staring holes into his wrapped talons, lifting them a bit, testing to see if he’ll dream his way through the floor. “I miss fireworks… I miss the cooking of my people. You know the Harvest Festival will be soon? Rhilla misses celebrating the harvest festival. I have been the property of demons for so long… I cannot recall the smell of…” he looks at you
>“It is silly but Rhilla has forgotten the smell of rain.”
>In ordinary circumstances this is just pitiful moaning by a heretic
>But these are no ordinary circumstances
>This is a crow drawing connections to the waking world
>The more can get him to think about his past, the further away from the nightmare you can bring him
>And the better chance you have of waking him up
>And sooner or later, the REAL nightmare you’ve been living will end
>You shake your head, lost in thoughts of freedom
>Of home
>You need to wake up Rhilla and soon, before the nightmare gets active again
>Nat and Greg depend on it
>The door behind the two of you rattles with some force as the wind batters it
>“That reminds Rhilla,” the target says as he motions towards the door with a talon. “How did you get us in here? I cannot number the times I tried to enter into this cabin — to break a window or bash down the door — but always the door remains locked and the windows hard as steel. How is this possible?” He turns to you, expecting an answer
>You hold up your brass key to the thin light
>Rhilla leans forward, squinting. “It is a simple key?”
“It’s called a dream token,” you say. “My mother had something like this too. Hers was my dad’s handkerchief; mine’s a key from our old house in Kiba. It’s something familiar to you – anything small that you keep on you normally – which reminds you you’re dreaming. ”
>“Kiba,” the crow turns the word over with his tongue. “Yes… I know of a Kiba… that word is familiar to me, somehow…”
>You feel like you just got hit by lightning, its echoing report trapped in your bones
>Holy FUCK
>He’s getting it!
“Concentrate on that feeling,” you say, stepping forward, towards the bird. “That feeling of distrust in what you see or experience is normal when you’re in a dream.”
>Rhilla doesn’t seem to retreat from you this time. His blue eyes slowly dilate as you approach, grab him by his shoulders, speak to him not as human to heretic, but as being to being, one with a common goal
“You’re in Kiba right now, Rhilla. Outside of this God-awful nightmare, you’re in a bed, within the walls of the Church. They injected you with something called Traumaitn to make your dreams more powerful. And there’s a woman outside of here,,” you’re nearly shaking at this point, so close to resolution you can feel it like electric currents through your veins. “her name’s Anna, and she’s in charge of this whole thing. So listen, I am BEGGING YOU to accept that you are dreaming and END this nightmare! My uncle Greg and my sister Natalie are counting on me to wake you up. So PLEASE, wake UP!”
>It’s then – before the heretic can respond – that you hear that shriek on the wind come howling back
>That terrified, strained scream, where every syllable is wrung out of the body by terror
>Accompanying that scream is a hellish choir of howls and snarls, of hunting dogs tearing at something
>Your body locks up; head turns towards the door, shaking against the wind
>Like someone – or something is trying to get in
>The next scream you hear banishes the thought – because it’s a familiar one
>Echo races towards the door, barking and scratching at the old wood panels
>“Hooooo-leeeee FUCK!KKKKKK!”
>“Stay away you mangy cunts!”
>That sounds like…
>Your sister, Natalie
>The frosted glass windows provide only the outlines of the landscape – a rocky meadow, punctuated by some mossy boulders from higher up on the mountain’s slopes
>You can’t see the treeline or the hill from inside the cabin
>A powerful instinct takes over from there
>The urge to protect what you have left of your family
>You don’t care if you’re still in a dream with the bird
>You just need to see her, once – even if she’s a dream entity
>You unlatch the shuddering door…
>“What is this one doing!? Stop, stop!” Rhilla shouts
>…and wind POURS into the cabin, the still air within washed out by a rush of cold air
>You stand in the entryway
>BAM
>And watch
>BAM
>As your sister
>BAM
>Sets into a full
>BAM
>Arm-swinging,
>BAM
>Terrified-for-her-life
>BAM
>Sprint
>BAM
>Two starved, black dogs follow in mad pursuit
“NAT!” You wave your sister over. “Over here!”
>Echo cuts loose a few excited barks, hardly heard over the wind
>BAM
>Natalie covers IMPRESSIVE ground as she makes a beeline for the cabin, sprinting nimbly around and over shrubs and rocks
>BAM
>Her long black hair trails behind her as she moves
>BAM
>She sheds an old jacket of hers – one torn to bits by the dogs – until she’s left in her undershirt and trousers
>You can only gawk at the familiar sight, hardly listening as Rhilla barks orders at you, a galactic mile away right now
>BAM
>BAM
>Her form is immaculate
>Her stride covers ground faster than your own
>BAM
>It’s…
>…otherworldly?
>She’s close enough now that you can see the blue-eyed panic struck across her dirty features
>“Hold the door!” she shrieks, nearly at the front entrance
>BAM
>Behind her, the dogs streak like black comets, frothing with hunger
>BAM
>One moment you’re in the doorway, standing like some kind of leaden idol
>Then a sharp fork of jagged pain erupts in your side, and you go to scream, but the wind carries your voice from your throat
>BAM
>For a second, your eyes squeeze shut, and you stagger backwards, clutching your side
>BAM
>An unseen force pushes you onto the hard stone floor, bruising your spine against the uneven surface
>And when your eyes ease open?
>Rhilla drives his shoulder into the door, his spindly legs digging in hard
>Natalie’s shriek is just barely above the drums in your head, and the how of the wind.
“ANON!” Natalie’s voice is raw, lungs scoured by the horror of the chase
>The heretic drops the lock into place and takes a few steps back
>Silence
>And then
>BAM
>BAM
>BAM
>Natalie’s fist collides off the door with a heavy THUNK THUNK THUNK
>A mad chorus of howls erupts from outside as Natalie smacks against the door
>“Anon! C’MON, let me in!” she howls, terror ringing clear in her voice
>You start upwards
>“This isn’t funny! There’s things out here! REALLY SCARY THINGS!”
>The handle shakes just a little, and you hear the lock catch
>BAM
>Something in your heart softens like butter
>BAM
“How did you- how did you get in here?” you stammer
>“That blonde lady – the doctor – shot me up with some kind of experimental medicine. I woke up and there were these dogs prowling around, so I ran down hill and ended up finding you!”
>She beats upon the door with her fist, the thick, oak-construction shaking
>“HURRY UP! THOSE DOGS ARE COMING BACK!”
>Your trembling hand reaches for the latch
>Rhilla catches your hand with a firm gentleness
>He looks at you, blue shot wide with fear
>And he shakes his head twice, losing a feather as he does so
>You turn your attention to the door, a thick cut of polished fir standing between you and your sister
>Sent into a nightmare so carelessly by doctor Mueler
>The baying sounds of hunting dogs arc above the howl of the wind
>Natalie tries the door unsuccessfully. “If I end up as dog food, it’s on your head, you hear that!?”
>Oh God, you really think you should open the door
>What if she’s not just a dream entity…?
>Those dogs sound close
>…what if she’s really here, in the dream, with you?
>Only God knows what Traumatin does – it’s not out of the realm of possibilities that it temporarily let her dream walk
>But when you see Echo skitter away from the entrance, his eyes fixed on what might be on the other side…
>…when Rhilla’s feverish grip on your arm tightens…
>…do you finally understand what the heretic is trying to tell you…
>“ANON! Come ON! Open this fucking door already!” Your sister’s voice is hoarse, vocal chords shredded into ribbons
>Not by raw fear
>But by anger
>She punctuates her request with a frame-rattling assault against the door
>…whatever is outside?
>That’s not your sister
>The dogs outside fall silent
>Rhilla releases his hold on you
>And then
>Natalie starts to laugh
>Thick gales of rib-sucking laughter pour out of her with all the grace of a mechanical horse learning to walk
>Her joy towards the incomprehensible booms throughout the cabin
>You watch her through the glass frames next to the door as she keels over, body shaking and seizing in unnatural fits
>The laughter never stops
>Her back arches, and she retches a dark phlegm onto the front door with a pained sound
>She’s still for a moment – statuesque, almost
>And then she turns her head
>Just so her blue eyes shine in your direction
>Eyes that seek to gain power over you
>Eyes that see you as little more than a food source, an obstacle…
>…a target
>A gleeful smile that turns up on her face when your eyes meet, and you can see the black bile in between her white teeth
>You don’t get the sense that you’re looking at the familiar visage of your sister
>This is something else – something wearing your sister’s skin
>This Natalie straightens her spine, her eyes never leaving yours,
>A gleeful smile crawls across her alabaster skin, thin lips quivering with primal rage
>Your eyes flick down to the object she’s got in her hands
>A chunk of granite
>As if she ripped it out from the side of the mountains like she was pulling a weed
>Maybe she did pull it from the mountain
>Laughing, Natalie starts to walk away from the door, about twenty or so feet
>Those feral black hounds fall in at her side
>She turns to face you, just a smudge in your frosted glass portal
>Echo whines at your side, anxious paws nudged into your calf
>You make the mistake of blinking
>And for a moment – less than a flutter of a hummingbird’s wings
>Natalie is gone
>Standing in your sister’s place, a dog at each side, is…
>…something else
>A tall silhouette of a man
>Rail-thin and starved, like the two dogs at his side
>Gangling arms that hoist the stone behind his head, crowned with the hollowed-out skull of a deer, antlers and all
>A face with no features – just eyes as white as pale starlight
>Fixated on you
>When your eyes open again you have only a split second to react
>That stone Natalie had hums clean through the air, undeterred by the wind
>Right at your skull
>Echo yips, forcing you to heave to the right at the last moment
>The glass pane above you explodes into a thousand pieces
>Rhilla squawks, ducking his head, talons covering the top of his head
>Something heavy and gray sails into the kitchen, bouncing off the wash bin, landing on the stone floor with the report of an artillery shell
>Wind rips into the cabin through shattered pane of glass
>The noise is near-deafening, like a flood of locusts pouring into the small space
“HOW CAN YOU NOT SEE THAT THIS IS A DREAM YET!?” you shriek at the bird
>Rhilla scrambles to his feet
>“DREAM!?” he echoes your scream, as if mocking you. “Rhilla say this is Haaasin’s work!”
>If you had less restraint you’ve strangle this stupid fucking heretic
>But if he takes off again you might not get another chance to wake his feathery ass up!
>Pots and pans in the kitchen clatter onto the stone floor, papers on the kitchen table flutter into the air like a spray of autumn leaves
>Loose feathers whisper off of Rhilla, almost as if he’s disintegrating right before you
>Fuck, given how this Trauamtin-nightmare is going, he might as well be
>You turn to look out the the shattered window behind you-
“GET DOWN!” You throw yourself on to the bird, knocking him and you onto the stone floor
>Just inches above you – in the space your skull once occupied – another hefty stone bursts through the window
>The projectile rings off the cauldron, crumpling in the side of the plated cast iron
>That type of force…
>…this coherence – if you could call it that…
>None of these things are normal for dreams, let alone nightmares
>It’s time to wake up
>The door – the whole frame, even – shudders as it’s bent forward, constrained only by ailing hinges
>Probably not a great sign that one of them splinters apart, leaving the door on just two of its three hinges
“Bird! Time to go!” You roar
>You stumble upwards as Echo barks in shrill staccato
>Rhilla jumps to his feet in a snap, already on his way out of the living room, past the kitchen
>“WE TAKE THE WAY OUT BACK! Follow this way, this way!” he squawks behind him, already on the run
>BAM
>“The storage room! Follow, follow!”
>BAM
>God’s not gonna save your ass once that thing busts open the door like a piece of cheap particle board
>BAM
>You scoop up a frightened Echo and bundle him into your arms like a struggling toddler
>You turn heel
>BAM
>And, holding your thrashing service fox…
>…you chase Rhilla down a long hallway, to a door set into the right-hand wall
>Blood pulses hot in your veins; your muscles burn with a cocktail of lactic acid and extreme strain
>This is bad
>Like, very bad
>You have no idea how pain works with Trauamtin – it could be real and unending until the heretic wakes up
>Time for option two? Because this heretic is beyond reason
>Unfortunately, you really only get one shot at enacting option two before you burn your trust with the heretic
>Sometimes you’re better off yelling at a brick wall than trying to reason with a dreamer
>An idea — a risky one — condenses in your mind
>It might not work, but you don’t think you have any other options at this point
>You can feel your heartbeat jump in your throat, as the barrier between you and whatever is outside splinters in a hail of wooden shards
>Echo scrambles to get out of your grasp but you clutch him tighter
>Rhilla disappears behind you down the hall, taking a turn into an unlit room on the right-hand side
>Behind you, the door does not swing open off its hinges with grace
>A small hole does not open up in the carpentry for one to fit their hand through and manage the lock
>The front door splits in two with a tremendous crunch
>And you don’t turn to look at who’s in the house now
>Because you know you’re not alone
>Even without looking behind you, you can hear the scratching sound of untrimmed claws echoing off the stonework floors
>Heavy footsteps race behind you
>And everywhere wind
>You catch yourself on the frame of the door to the storage room and slide in
>The room is illuminated by the cold gray light of the outside storm
>Rhilla left the door wide open for you
>How kind of the heretic to do that for you
>Legs churning, you explode into the stormy gray light of the outside world; baptized by a rip curl of wind that drags the air out of your lungs
>You spot Rhilla near the edge of the cliff overlooking the river below
>He turns as he sees you barreling towards him, both relieved and terrified that there’s no place to go but down
>Just like you intended
>You dig into what little adrenaline you have left, tearing into a full-sprint at the terrified, trusting little crow
>It’s best that you don’t tell him your plan for waking him up
>He might not approve
>And It’s also best that he doesn’t know that if reason can’t wake a dreamer up
>Violence can
>You’re going to tackle that bird
>Lunge at him so hard you knock him off his footing, sending you, him, and Echo onto the rocks below
>Your body tenses up to make a powerful lunge…
>…when a pain so vivid – so visceral – blossoms in your chest
>That you can’t breathe anymore
>Something’s in the way
>You drop to the ground
>Just feet away from Rhilla, who looks on in shock and terror
>There’s a stiffness in your chest, a catch in your breathing
>You wheeze through curdles of blood
>The taste of rich iron fills the back of your throat
>Echo yips and leaps out of your hands as you pitch forward, landing on your stomach
>Agony sears your nerves centered right in your back, just above your heart
>With an incredible effort, you crane your neck, and look behind you
>The shaft of a black arrow — the length of your forearm — protrudes from your upper back
>Hot blood seethes from your wound, blossoming underneath you in a crimson outline of your fallen body
>Standing in the doorway of the storage room, no more than a few feet away, is a black shape of a man, holding a crooked wooden bow
>In your weary vision he’s a silhouette — a gangling shadow, tall and jagged, yet human in his shape
>Two eyes stare back at you, cold and sterile like super-heated flames in the kiln of the stars
>No color
>Just two small dots of white, shining like cold frost
>The dark figure steps forward, out of the cabin
>The two black dogs follow at his side as he approaches
>And even as the outline of a man moves closer, all detail is washed away in darkness
>You watch as the shadow figure threads another arrow onto the bowstring and draws it back
“JUMP!” you shout, head turning towards Rhilla. “For fuck sake, jump in the water!”
>Rhilla freezes, eyes shot wide in terror
>His beak works to stammer out an explanation, or some kind of answer
>No time
“RHILLA!” you shriek, “Into the river! GO! NOW!”
>It’s almost as if the crow can’t hear you
>Deafened by the wind
>The terror
>Fuck it
>You really have no other options
“ECHO!” you shout and point at the bird, “Over the edge! Over the EDGE!”
>Echo yips in response
>In a snap, your service leaps towards the heretic, claws bared
>Echo manages to catch the distracted bird off guard as he’s watching the shadow figure draw his bow
>The fox catches him in the chest, his snarling little fangs cloying for the crow’s neck
>Rhilla stumbles backwards, one foot off the edge of the cliff
>Echo thrashes as he clamps down the bird’s tender collarbone, loosing a handful of feathers in the process
>“Get this rat off of me!” Rhilla shrieks
>He puts his left foot behind him and finds no purchase
>Gravity and momentum do the rest
>With a cry of terror Rhilla and Echo slip over the edge, dipping backwards, a trail of feathers in the wind the last sign of their existence, the echo of the crow’s scream rising over the cliff’s face
>You sigh an exhausted, bloody sigh
>The black figure looses another arrow
>It slips through the air, unimpeded by wind or weather
>It does not go where you think — the spot where Rhilla and Echo once occupied
>Another jolt of pain in your upper back forces your head down into the coarse foliage of the underbrush
>The arrow pierces you with such force that you’re pinned to the dirt, like a frog waiting to be dissected in an Academy science class
>Your mind clears of all its terror, like black storm clouds rolling back to reveal blue skies
>The wind is gone
>Or you can no longer hear it
>Just…
>BAM
>BAM
>Drums…
>BAM
>Heavy footsteps swell in your ears
>Bare feet on raw dirt and underbrush
>BAM
>Your vision dims; darkness swells around you like an unseen hand dimming an everflame lamp
>BAM
>Funny, you don’t feel any pain
>You… you feel as though you’re just barely tethered to the ground right now
>Floating
>BAM
>Like you could fly if you weren’t holding onto something
>BAM
>You reach in your pocket with a pained gasp, bloody fingers slipping around your brass key
>This is…
>This is still a dream, right?
>So why does it hurt so bad?
>A dark figure appears in front of you, crouching down low, his white eyes spinning and wheeling like starlight from behind the mask of a deer’s head
>From this distance, you can see the details – or lack thereof
>There’s no definition to him
>You can make out wiry legs, a thin torso, and arms
>But he has no skin to give him color or complexion
>No hair to toss in the wind
>No bone to give him rounded shoulders or a chiseled jaw
>Just a flicker of shadow given form; an unsteady being of darkness
>A body with no jaw, no cheekbones, nose
>No definition, save for the deer head on his skull
>And his eyes
>Those small, pale eyes that flicker like tongues of white everflame meet yours
>And you open your mouth to speak
>But nothing but a suffocating chortle comes out of you
>The strange silhouette speaks
>“Dream walker,” he says, voice low and raspy, as if learning to combine words for the first time
>There’s a tremendous, percussive ring in your ears, like a sudden wave on the lake shore that swallows you whole
>You feel like you’re drifting upwards into the sky again
>The ground rumbles with an intensity known only to cataclysmic earthquakes
>The dream is ending — you hope
>And thank GOD
>Thank God this is only a dream
>And this… thing…
>Ceases to exist once you and Rhilla wake up
>With one hand holding onto the dirt and vines of the underbrush, swallowing blood, you at last let go
>And you can barely hear this… thing… when he reaches forward for you with one flickering hand
>“You…. help… me…” he says
“No…” you choke out. “No. No. No. No…”
>He wraps that massive hand around your throat
>His hand squeezes shut
>And suddenly all you can do is gasp
>And shout
“NO!”
>It’s right about there the dream ends
Oliver Hart
Author of Foxing, Leaves of Fall, Liquid Courage, Beating the Heat, A Red Winter, Weber’s Gambit, and many other stories. He primarily writes hmofa, but dabbles in most genres. Interests include, writing, reading, technology, and music.
Stories: Foxing, The Leaves of Fall