Dreamer (The Dream World Chronicles Book 1) Read online

  The book I’d snatched burned guiltily in my bag. “Your grandmother asked me to get a book down for her.”

  Charlotte glanced at the old lady, still snoozing in her chair. “Did you steal anything?”

  The old lady jolted awake with a curse. She blinked drowsily before squinting towards the stairway and smiling. “You’re home, dear. Girlie here just dropped off some of her herbs for my back. You know how that crick of mine has been acting up lately.”

  Charlotte’s suspicious frown warned me that a confrontation loomed ahead; now was the time to escape. But halfway to the safety of the stairwell I spotted it: a marigold-yellow dream floating right behind Charlotte’s head. Now several hours old, it was faded and small and definitely not worth viewing, especially in front of witnesses. I tore my gaze away, but its presence tickled my constantly simmering curiosity: what was the dream about?

  “Did you drink what she gave you?” Charlotte seized the old lady’s empty tea cup and examined it, as if searching for leftover traces of poison. “I’ve told you over and over not to buy any of her herbs. They’re not safe.”

  “Hogwash,” the old lady tittered. “They’re the only thing that soothes my aching back.”

  “Hence they’re unnatural.” Charlotte didn’t take her eyes off me, as if afraid I’d cast a spell the moment her back was turned. Meanwhile the dream’s seductive light flickered tauntingly in my peripheral vision, its allure attracting my involuntary gaze.

  “But I’ve taken her herbs for years with no ill side effects.”

  Alice’s nervous gaze flickered towards me as she sauntered over. “Careful, don’t make her mad.” She stared determinedly at the floor, while Charlotte met my eyes head on.

  “I’m not scared of the witch.”

  Magic curled in my clenched palm, power for a spell I didn’t know but which I longed to cast into her snide face all the same. “I’m not a witch.” But my voice wavered, for even I didn’t believe my own words.

  Charlotte flinched at my glare. The dream followed her sudden movement and instantly my focus latched on to it, causing my consciousness to immediately tumble inside.

  A grey world surrounded me, all color washed away, mere shadows of what had once been when the dream was fresh. Musical whispers penetrated the silence like a broken music box, creating an eerie, nightmarish feel. The only distinct object in the fuzziness pressing against my senses was the outline of a small dog, unmistakably Charlotte’s loyal spaniel. He was all that remained of the story which had entertained Charlotte last night; everything else had been forgotten, erased by time.

  The choppy and incomplete dream concluded abruptly, and the dust-shrouded room reappeared. The old lady was once more snoring, but Charlotte and Alice cowered together, ashen-faced. I blinked, slightly disoriented. How long had I been within the dream? A minute? Longer?

  “What are you doing?” Charlotte’s voice, absent of its recent iciness, shook with fear. “Why were you in a trance? Did you just cast a spell?”

  Oh no, they’d seen everything. Panic clenched my already tightening chest as I hurried past them. They leapt out of the way like I had the plague.

  A thud penetrated the air as The Study of Magic Use Within Legends toppled to the floor, its twisty title glistening in the faint lantern light. I froze and waited for their accusations, but they seemed to have lost the ability to speak. Slowly, they raised wide eyes to mine. For a brief moment, a secret satisfaction rippled over me at the terror filling their expressions, but the feeling quickly slipped away, replaced by my own fear: I’d been caught stealing a book of magic. It was as good as a direct confession to all the rumors against me.

  Head swirling, I blurted the first defense I could think of: “Breathe a word of this to anyone and you’ll be sorry.” I resisted a smug smile as I flounced past their dumbfounded expressions and down the stairs.

  Chapter 2

  Outside, the rain had dissipated, leaving a thick mist hovering over the landscape. Brisk autumn wind tangled my hair and the damp grass coated my hem as I slogged through the rolling fields towards our misshapen cottage, hovering on the edge of the forest several miles from the village, nearly swallowed up by the trees enclosing it in a cocoon of foliage.

  Cheerful light from the cottage gleamed through the shutters across the front garden, but it did nothing for my somber mood. My heart pounded as I relived that moment in the bookshop over and over—the terror that had filled Charlotte’s and Alice’s expressions when they’d seen the book of magic I’d stolen, my own apprehension tightening my chest over what would happen to me should they share my secret, and the strange satisfaction I’d taken in the fear I’d instilled.

  I trudged inside, trailing mud into the kitchen. Suffocating floral perfume emanated from the dozen potted plants crowding the otherwise pristine room. Mother sat beneath the window, opened a crack despite the morning chill. She didn’t even look up from her sewing.

  “Where have you been, Eden?”

  I rubbed my hands in front of the crackling hearth and glanced sideways to search the air around her. As usual, no dreams.

  “I delivered the package you wanted. She’ll send her payment via Charlotte by tomorrow.” If I hadn’t scared her off forever this afternoon. I ached to confide to Mother what had happened, but I’d learned years ago that she didn’t tolerate cozy heart-to-heart conversations.

  Mother didn’t answer, her focus on her work as she rapidly stitched together two quilted squares, concentration lining her brow. I watched, transfixed. Mother was a whiz with a needle and thread; she could sew an entire quilt in a matter of hours, an adeptness and speed I’d never been able to match. It was one of many disappointments to Mother.

  She finally broke the uneasy silence. “You were gone longer than usual. What on earth have you been doing?” Her voice was strained, but her anxious glance was cast not at me, but out the window.

  “The old bitty ensnared me in her ramblings before I could escape.”

  Mother finally looked up and searched my face. I shifted uneasily. Sometimes I had the unnerving impression she could read my thoughts and see into the deepest recesses of my heart. I held my secrets close, praying they’d remain hidden from her silent, disapproving inspection.

  She pursed her lips. “We planned on baking bread an hour ago. Go wash up and meet me in the kitchen.”

  I grimaced, but luckily she’d returned to her sewing and didn’t see. Dragging my feet, I clambered up the ladder to the loft.

  My attic bedroom overlooked our manicured gardens that entirely surrounded the house, as well as the rolling hills that separated us from the distant village. I slept beneath the sloping ceiling on a pile of pillows and blankets along the window that took up the entire wall. Piles of dirty laundry created miniature towers all around the room, and loose sheets of paper carpeted the floor. After my dream-watching tree, this was my favorite place, tucked high above the world like my own private treehouse, the perfect setting to practice my magic whenever I managed to slip away.

  Magic had been a part of my life for as long as I could remember, beginning as an unidentified tingling warmth coursing through my body. My powers had gradually developed as I peeled back layer after layer, exploring this hidden part of me, a tiny flame of power that had once been buried deep inside, but after years of practice was now stoked into an ever-growing fire.

  Remaining away from the village had been the one unspoken rule defining my early childhood; Mother possessed a strange aversion to the place and maintained a firm resolve to avoid it at all costs. As a child, I’d often lain awake during my usual restless nights nearly void of sleep and stared at the dark buildings in the distance, still beneath their blanket of moonlight, a forbidden playground full of unknown wonders and mysteries just waiting to be explored.

  One morning near daybreak ten years ago, shortly after my seventh birthday, as I stared at the village with my face pressed against the dirty glass, I’d spotted them: tiny pinpricks of multi-hued
lights different from the flickering lanterns lighting the streets, glimmers which popped into existence one by one within the village walls. Hypnotized, I watched them for several minutes before deciding to steal a closer look. I quietly slipped out of bed, crept through the house—careful not to alert Mother, who I knew was always awake inside her bedroom—and tiptoed outside.

  I found my way easily, led by my glowing guides. When I arrived, I clung to the iron bars and peered through the gate. Herds of people bustled amongst the cramped vendor stalls, a different colored light bobbing near each villager’s head. None took any notice of them, but I couldn’t look away, entranced by their unique shapes and bright hues, until one in particular caught my attention. There, hovering above the produce in a nearby stall, a soft tangerine swirl floated near a droopy-eyed toddler. I squinted curiously, and the moment I locked my focus on it, it happened.

  My consciousness transported to a world of inverse colors and flying horses, each detail as vivid as if I were experiencing it for myself—the warmth of the horse’s body pulsing beneath mine, the wind tousling my hair as it carried me through a cloud-filled sky, the glimmer of sunbeams caressing my face, and the scent of rosebuds tickling my nose from the wreath crowning the horse’s neck.

  I suddenly jerked from the dream and found myself back outside the village gate as if nothing had happened, my memory the only evidence of the experience that had danced across my senses, as if I’d just stumbled inside a storybook. I eagerly concentrated on one floating light after another, each a fantastic vision as unique as a painting done by a different artist. Up until then I’d never experienced these adventures on my own, but after much reading I’d discovered these imaginative journeys—which seemed to be viewed by people of all ages while they slept—were called dreams.

  And I’d been watching and recording them ever since.

  I lifted a loose floorboard beneath my bed of pillows, where I kept all of my dream journals safely tucked away. I pulled one out, already filled with dozens of dreams jotted in my untidy scrawl, and curled in bed to record Alice’s dream in every detail I could remember—the mysterious tree with its labyrinth of rooms, the gentle caress of each leaf dipped in surreal colors, the kiss of the sun and sea breeze, the smell of the surrounding ocean…

  “Eden?” Mother’s shrill voice echoed off the beams of the ceiling. “Get down here this instant. I’m waiting.”

  “Coming.” Yet I didn’t move, torn between pleasing Mother and incurring more of her disapproval. After a moment of internal struggle, I settled more comfortably against my pillows to reread the dream, a more pleasant alternative to whatever awaited me downstairs.

  It almost felt as if I were re-experiencing it myself. I thumbed through previous entries, revisiting each like an old friend. So many different varieties, each with a unique flavor. What I wouldn’t give to have a dream of my very own, just one, but my nights were long and empty.

  My heart jolted as Mother’s footsteps pounded up the ladder. I scrambled to lift the floorboard and shoved the journal inside just as Mother appeared, hands pressed against her hips.

  “What are you doing? I told you we need to bake bread.” She frowned at my opened bottle of ink and my smudged fingertips. Her forehead puckered. “Writing again? What is it you’re always writing?”

  My heartbeat escalated. I recognized the suspicious glint in Mother’s eyes, the look she got when her motherly instinct suspected I was up to something.

  Please don’t find my journals, I silently prayed. She couldn’t discover the secrets I’d so carefully kept hidden over the years out of fear that if she knew them, she’d despise me like the rest of the villagers. Her eyes narrowed at my silence, and I braced myself for the inevitable confrontation.

  But to my surprise, Mother dropped the issue without argument. That was unusual. She glanced out the window, brow furrowed. “Come downstairs.” Her tone warned me against disobeying again.

  Five minutes later we stood together in the kitchen, our fingers burrowed in the soft loaves. Normally, Mother pounded the dough into submission with an aggressive fervor, but today that intensity was missing, her mouth tight as her gaze repeatedly drifted to the misty garden outside. Distraction replaced her usual mechanical movements, normally as precise as clockwork—she’d almost added an extra cup of flour and nearly forgot the yeast altogether.

  “Are you waiting for someone?” I asked the fifth time she paused in her kneading to once more search outside.

  “Hmm?” She brushed some of her aquamarine hair out of her eyes, leaving a trail of flour along her brow. “Of course not. You know I never entertain visitors.” Even as she said it, she startled beside me, knocking over a container and sending a cloud of flour over us.

  I coughed and rubbed the stinging powder from my eyes. “What’s wrong?”

  She didn’t answer, her gaze riveted to the window. I glanced out, too. No one was there.

  The tight lines creasing her forehead finally settled. She offered a thin-lipped smile. “How about rosemary bread? I know it’s your favorite. I’ll go fetch the herbs from the garden. You stay here.”

  I glanced at the bread, already formed into loaves and ready to be put into the pans. “But—”

  But she’d already wiped her hands on her apron and bustled to the front garden. Muffled murmurs drifted from outside. Strange; we never got visitors. Where had they come from?

  I squinted through the window just in time to see two strangers slink into Mother’s garden. I barely caught a glimpse of black hair streaked with orange before the gate closed behind them. My stomach lurched. They had colored hair, just like Mother and me. Whoever these strangers were, they weren’t from the village.

  I slipped outside and crept to the gate to lean against the keyhole. “You’re two hours late,” Mother hissed. “You were supposed to come at dawn, when my daughter was out. Where were you?”

  “We had a few…distractions,” a smooth female voice said. “But everything has been taken care of.”

  “Never mind that, we need to hurry; my daughter is in the kitchen.”

  “Do you have it ready?”

  “Naturally.”

  There was a pause, the only sounds being the shuffle of Mother opening her bag and a gasp of awe.

  “It’s more spectacular than I’d imagined,” the stranger breathed. “Ebony, you’re a genius.”

  “I’m pleased you’re satisfied,” Mother said. “When are you going to use it?”

  “Immediately, of course,” a new voice replied, this one deep and husky. “There isn’t any time to waste. We’ve already begun setting everything into motion. If all goes well, you’ll be able to join us shortly.”

  “Good,” Mother said. “I’m tired of this endless waiting.”

  “What about your daughter?”

  I pressed my ear further against the keyhole, squashing it roughly against the cold metal.

  “I’ve been watching her carefully and she hasn’t exhibited the usual signs. I’m concerned she lacks the ability, but I’m sure she’ll still be quite useful.”

  “Have you told her?”

  “No. It’s too delicate a matter. You must understand our situation…”

  “Of course,” the female stranger said. “I’m sure when the time comes, she’ll prove invaluable.”

  “With what I have planned, I can only hope your assessment proves accurate.”

  “When should we come back?” the man asked.

  “I should have something for you in two weeks.”

  They paused, and I barely had time to wonder if the strange conversation was over before suddenly the gate handle turned. I scrambled back, but before I could find a place to hide, Mother emerged alone, fiddling with the locket she always wore around her neck. She froze when she saw me, but her pale face quickly hardened.

  “Eden? What are you doing out here? I told you to stay inside.”

  I shrank back at her icy glare. “I heard voices, and I wondered who they
were. No one ever comes here.”

  Mother stiffened, but otherwise her face remained indifferent. “Someone from the village requested an herb remedy to help with their migraines.”

  I craned my neck to catch a glimpse of the strangers presumably still in the garden, but it was empty. Where had they gone?

  “We don’t usually get visitors from the village,” I said. “They seem to be under the impression you don’t exist.”

  Mother fiddled with her necklace. For as long as I could remember, she’d always worn a see-through locket about the size of my hand, shaped like a twisted hurricane and containing a small reserve of glitter, which she usually kept tucked beneath her collar away from my prying eyes.

  “So long as you didn't hear…” Her anxious expression softened and her mouth curved up slightly from its usual thin line. “I’m a bit distracted today. I have a lot on my mind. Come, let’s go back inside.” She stroked my hair once before severing her touch, leaving me yearning for more.

  Half an hour later we returned outside to tend the tomatoes, the scent of baking bread drifting from the house. I tried to concentrate, but my mind kept drifting back to the confrontation in the bookshop and the mysterious visitors Mother had met in her herb garden…especially them.

  My mind swirled with what I’d overheard. Despite her casual dismissal of the incident, I couldn’t quench the questions swarming my mind. Who were those mysterious strangers? What was Mother anxiously waiting for? What role did she want me to play in whatever she was planning? And what abilities had she been hoping I’d develop? Whatever they were, naturally I’d left her disappointed, just as I always did.

  Perhaps she’d been referring to her extraordinary gardening ability, which she’d been trying to grow in me since infancy. I knew she wanted me to learn to love plants and tend them in the natural way she did, where each plant radiated at her touch, as if her fingers themselves were a drop of sun. While I’d developed adequate skills, my gift wasn’t gardening—it was magic and seeing dreams, skills which, according to everyone, were forbidden. If only I could share this part of myself with her…or any part, such as the villagers’ whispers this morning, my fears that I didn’t fit in, and the fierce longing I felt for her approval.