Chapter 10

10.

         The giant man with the tiny insect head rolled a piece of broken masonry over and over in his huge hands, his fingers tracking over each crack with gentle reverence, reading the years in the dust and the shape, his eyes opaque but strangely compassionate.
         “This city was built by my people at the beginning of time itself,” the giant man said as he kneeled on the empty street. His voice was jagged and odd, the rhythms of his speech off kilter, as if the words were as foreign as he seemed. “Men and women died in the thousands to raise it from these waters. Their names are etched in the dirt of these streets, their bones part of the mortar that holds the city together, their blood is what keeps the oceans at bay.” From somewhere was a strong breeze and the pungent scent of salted air. “We sought to embody the triumph and glory of our people in these structures, to capture our souls in these stones as a monument that would stand as long as time itself. I believe we managed to accomplish that, so very long ago.” The unblinking blue eyes, not unlike opals, somehow looked very sad. “But we have not surpassed it. I do not think we ever shall.” The relentless wash of faraway water accompanied his words.
         The insect man raised himself to his full height and turned in a slow circle, regarding the crumbling opulence of the odd buildings that surrounded the square, relics fighting for the forefront of his attention. “My people are gone from here now, voluntarily or evicted, and time has reduced our greatest achievement to merely a symbol, to be clutched at in the desperate hope of regaining a dream that was never more than a myth to begin with, an ideal that to most is perhaps more solid now than the reality itself.” With ponderous grace he held the chunk of stone to his eye level. “It is a terrible thing, indeed, to forget.”
         Slowly the giant man turned his palm so that the stone tumbled from his hand. The clunk it made when striking the street belonged to a different time, and resonated in a place that no longer existed. “So many centuries . . .” the insect man intoned, his deep voice ripping like syrup in the dry air. “All this city has known is blood, from the first one who fell from its heights to the destruction wrought by its self proclaimed guardians.” Stalking over to the warped and crumbling facade of a nearby building, the strange man ran his hand over the wall, his fingers leaving streaks of dust tracks in his wake. The barren majesty was reflected in his eyes. “I came here without malice, without prejudice, to see for myself what we have lost, to write of the grandeur that lurks beneath these ruins, if one could only turn back the clock. I came here to find the remains of the tatters of a dream long since forgotten, to seek the history that still bleeds from the silence.”
         The giant man paused, and there was a rattle in his throat that might have been a sigh. “And now . . .” his finger traced an odd sigil in the dust, a word not spoken here since the stars were dust, “and now you ask me to fight . . . with you, for you, to keep the city out of hands that have no more right to it than you do. Do you understand what you ask?” The pained gaze of the man swept over the square. “I am no warrior, merely a scholar. The warrior creates history, with his blood and his valor, while I can only try to read what is left in the dried stillness that remains.” The giant man turned to stare off into the distance. “You are asking me to go from observer to interloper . . . to tempt me with the chance to guide events . . . to disturb my quiet study for a cause that may not even be mine . . . and yet . . .” he trailed off. An explosion resounded in the distance, a flowerburst of noise. Pale flame was refracted in his eyes. The wind died down, fell silent.
         The man bowed his head. “And yet I will not see this city’s sacred foundations shattered again,” the man’s voice was deathly quiet, bones rustling over dried leaves. “I will help you.”
         The man was looking right at him. His eyes were mirrors that saw nothing, that reflected everything. If he looked too closely, he might fall in and never tumble out.
         “These are not your dreams that drive me . . .”
         The world was fading, becoming dull and dark at the edges. Somewhere, someone was yelling, pathetically, helplessly.
         “. . . nor are they an explanation for what happened . . .”
         The background, the city, darkened and became opaque.
         “. . . all history is interpretation, all life is constant revision . . .”
         There was only the giant man, with his insect head, with his brilliant, unblinking blue eyes endlessly staring. All else was dark.
         “. . . and the final sentences have yet to be written, long after our dust has gone away . . .”
         Only the eyes now. As big as the world.
         “. . . and if there is one thing that reality can teach us . . .”
         Falling now. Headlong into an azure star.
         “. . . it is this . . .”
         All colors fade. All words fail. All we know is temporary.
         “. . . do not believe anything you see-“
         But . . . all I see is . . .
         “What do you see?”
         The voice was a splash of cold water, thrown with whiplash fury across his face, almost physical in its subtle violence.
         Jaymes blinked, opened eyes he didn’t know were closed. The small room twisted bizarrely, unbent and resolved into the familiar. What the hell-
         “Well?” asked the voice, laced with impatience.
         “Ah . . . what . . .” Jaymes muttered, rubbing his eyes. He was sitting in a chair and by the tingling he felt in his legs, apparently he had been there for a while. His head for some reason felt scraped raw, a million tiny fragments scouring the surface of his mind. Images and words tumbled in an endless void, pieces of an nonsense puzzle. His mouth was full of cotton.
         Blinking again, he looked at the man across from him. His expression was stern and strangely piercing. He appeared to be waiting for something.
         “Ah . . . excuse me, did you . . . were you talking to me . . .” Jaymes asked, not even hearing himself, the words impacting the hearing of someone other than him. “I’m sorry, Valreck. Sir. Did you say something?”
         Valreck sighed lightly, putting his hands on his knees and standing up from his chair. “I did, Jaymes, as a matter of fact.” Clasping his hands behind his back and moved around behind the chair, his gaze never leaving the other boy. “I asked you about the dream that brought you here. The one you were about to tell me about.” His words were curt, more cutting than usual. “You said it was very important.”
         Jaymes didn’t remember saying any such thing. He had thought Valreck had asked him here to help with something. He recalled telling his father that. At least they knew where he was. But having a dream . . . how could he, it was still daylight out? He would have had to have been sleepwalking. How was that possible?
         And yet, he had been dreaming.
         “Don’t you remember . . .” Valreck’s voice was a needle, prying at the cracks, working its way into his sodden brain.
         For a moment, a ridiculous alarm in the back of his head told him to keep silent, to make something else up, to say nothing at all and excuse himself with an embarrassed grin. Jaymes saw no reason to do any of these things. Valreck was the expert with dreams, that’s why Jaymes came here. To make sense of his head. To make sense of his life.
         Pressing his hands together between his knees, Jaymes said, “It . . . it was of a . . . I was in this weird city, I could hear water so maybe it was by the ocean, and this . . . giant was talking, to me I guess and he was telling me . . . he was saying why he didn’t want to fight . . . there was supposed to be a battle I guess, and . . . but he said he didn’t want to fight but that he had to and then . . . and then . . .” he squinted, forehead tightening as he tried to recall more of it. But every time he closed his eyes all he saw was blue. Like an endless sea. Like a boundless sky. Trying to pierce it caused his head to ache. Eventually he just gave up and, shrugging, said, “And that’s it, I guess. Weird one, isn’t it?” He laughed in a way that he hoped didn’t sound nervous. But then, what was there to be nervous about? Everything was just fine, right?
         Valreck was silent for a moment. He was still standing, a few steps away from his chair. It was much brighter in the room than Jaymes had assumed before. Must have just been a trick of the light.
         “And what did this . . . giant look like?” Valreck asked finally.
         Jaymes tried to picture the man who had spoken but found that the image slipped through his mind every time, as if the details were made of water and his every attempt merely disturbed the lake it rested on. “He was . . . big . . . and his head, it was . . . funny, like . . . a bug’s? I think and he was wearing this sort of red armor . . . so maybe his face was, it was a mask, maybe?” He glanced up at Valreck for confirmation but found the man’s gaze impenetrable. Looking down quickly, he muttered, “But maybe I got it wrong . . .”
         “No, that’s fine, lad,” Valreck said, coming over to Jaymes and laying a hand on a shoulder. “Sometimes dreams can be a very elusive animal, easily turning to ribbons even as they try to convince you of their inviolate solidity.” Jaymes wasn’t exactly sure what he meant, but it sounded close to his experience. “You just have to do your best and try and focus on as many details as you can.” Stepping away from Jaymes, the other man strode over to a small table in the corner. “In fact you’ve done a better job than most at recalling your dreams, Jaymes.” Picking up a small book, he continued, “If I asked you to keep this by your bedside and write down any dreams you have upon waking, do you think you would be able to do that . . .”
         Jaymes opened his mouth to answer, but inertia seemed to drag his tongue in another direction. “You want pages full of a teenaged boy’s dreams? That’s certainly a unique way to get your kicks. Unless you want to know how many different ways there are to describe breasts.” His body suddenly felt numb, all his nerve signals being rerouted down a different pathway, one that ended with a shattered bridge, all his thoughts spinning down into a river of darkness.
         Valreck started at the sound of Jaymes’ voice, although it didn’t sound different to him. But then the whole world was receding, every voice shouted at him from the top of a distant well.
         “Ah . . . I see,” Valreck said, a faint smile coloring his face. “You are becoming stealthier every day, my friend. I didn’t even hear you come in.” Who was he talking to? Jaymes thought, trying to press through frosted glass. Everything was happening to someone else. He was someone else. He had become a guest in his own body. A machine with a new ghost. “You bear good news, I hope?”
         “Sort of . . . I got Tolin to spy on our visitors . . . unfortunately he reverted to type and killed them when he suspected he had been spotted . . .” Jaymes felt his lips twist into a perverse smile. “Not that we shouldn’t have seen that coming.”
         Valreck shook his head slowly. “Indeed,” was all he said. “That ends that, I suppose. It would have been nice to confirm who they were but-“
         ”I wasn’t finished yet,” Jaymes said, pivoting in the chair, hooking one leg over an arm of the chair and slouching back, his arms resting on the other side. “By the time I got there it was over but as it turns out we were smart to be paranoid. It was them all right.”
         “Truly?” Valreck asked, his voice sounding as close to awed as Jaymes could remember. “So Mandras did not lie to us. Fascinating.”
         “Sure, you can say that now. Believe me, out of all the legends to come true, this isn’t exactly the one I would’ve picked,” Jaymes’ throat felt dry, as if he’d been talking for hours and hours. Yet all he was doing was sitting here. This voice he heard wasn’t his, the person speaking was someone else. But he was here. And so was the voice. And the words. And the voice. Overlapping, a reverb with a one second delay, ricocheting off the hollowed center of his mind.
         “And you’re certain of this-“
         ”Let me put it this way,” Jaymes barked out a laugh that had never before graced his throat. “If Tolin didn’t do his job right, we’re going to have the unpleasant surprise to end all unpleasant surprises.”
         “Hm, indeed,” Valreck mused, crossing his arms and tapping his chin with one finger. “So that is true as well,” he murmured. Louder, he added, “How long do you think you delayed them?”
         Jaymes shrugged shoulder that weren’t his. “Beats me. I’m as clueless about this stuff as you. Tolin is fairly thorough so he should have bought us a good margin but I don’t think we should rely on that.”
         “No, no we shouldn’t,” Valreck agreed, pacing in a lazy path around the room. Jaymes’ eyes followed the other man, and he could taste a small, sly grin on his face. Stopping, Valreck looked over and said, “A meeting might be in order.”
         “I was thinking that, actually, if only to bring everyone up to speed. We did more than slay myths today . . .” Jaymes grinned wider. “We also have a prisoner.”
         Valreck’s eyes widened. “Impressive,” he said with absolute calm, though the expression that lit briefly across his face spoke otherwise. “And he’s in our possession for certain?”
         “I just handed him off to our resident transporter, she has him somewhere reasonably secure. He’s not going anywhere for a while.”
         “Excellent,” Valreck said, with sudden passion. “Perhaps he can help us dispel some of the many rumors we’ve heard about his organization.” He paced halfway around the room, digesting this information. “Any other developments I should know about?”
         “There’s one other running around out there. Tolin managed to wound her but she ran off before he could finish.” A silent laugh shook his abdomen. “I’ll let him fill you in, he tells it so much better. But he’s on her trail now, that’s where I left him.”
         “It sounds like everything is under control for the moment,” Valreck noted with approval. Then his face became serious. “What do you think the chances are of a search party being sent out?”
         “Pretty damn good, the old bat is keeping an eye out for anything suspicious. But we’re going to have to discuss what to do if they have friends show up . . . as efficient as we might be, I don’t think we should just rely on blind luck and surprise the second time around.” Jaymes shrugged again, the motion feeling oddly natural now. “Just a thought.”
         “No, it’s a valid thought,” Valreck admitted, bowing his head as he spoke. Raising his eyes to Jaymes he said, “Call a meeting then and we’ll try to coordinate what needs to be done.” A grim smile froze on his face. “If they have not realized yet, they will see that we are far from helpless.”
         “Will do,” Jaymes said offhandedly. Then, as if seeing himself for the first time, he looked at his stomach and then back at Valreck again. “So . . . what exactly were you doing with this guy?” Why was he talking about himself like that? Was this normal? He wasn’t sure anymore. He couldn’t even say this wasn’t the first time it had happened. “Something about dreams?”
         “Yes, his dreams have been very . . . enlightening so far. It’s a fascinating phenomenon that has started to prove quite useful. It was what warned me of our visitors. However, I have been trying to refine his dreams somewhat, in an attempt to garner better results.” Pointing at Jaymes, he said, “Alas, inducing such dreams has delivered me nothing but gibberish. I may have to try a different tack.”
         “Hm,” Jaymes replied, nodding sagely. “Interesting theory. And is it unique to him . . .”
         “No, I believe it’s genetic. His father exhibits some of the same activities but it was more latent. I’ve had much better luck with the boy.”
         “Well it might have saved our rears, so I’m all for it,” Jaymes replied. Giving a mock salute with a hand he didn’t have, he said, “Keep up the good work. I’ll be going, then. I assume you want the gathering to be as soon as possible?”
         “Preferably,” Valreck answered. “Events have the potential to change very rapidly and I don’t want anyone to be caught off guard. So yes, as soon as we can, if you would.”
         “You got it,” Jaymes said, swinging his legs off the arm and onto the floor. His feet were so far away. No they weren’t. “I think everyone will be eager to hear about
                   what’s
                             going
                                       on-
         The glare of the sunlight in his eyes caused Jaymes to blink hard. What? Shaking his head, he tried to clear his vision, feeling like his head had become full of fuzz. Shaking only blurred the picture up more. Like the glass ball his mother had shown him once. The more you shook it, the cloudier it became.
         He was standing in front of his house. Jaymes blinked again, feeling for a second that something wasn’t right. He didn’t remember coming back. He barely remembered leaving. The last thing he recalled was being at Valreck’s and telling him about another dream he’d had . . . he looked at his hands to see a small book nestled there. Of course. Valreck had asked him to start writing his dreams down. Now he remembered. And what had he said as well? Sometimes there are habits we possess that are so automatic, our brains do not bother to retain them. That was probably why he didn’t remember walking home.
         Jaymes laughed to himself, beginning to walk toward his house, tossing the book into the air and catching it as he did so. And to think he had almost panicked. Maybe he did need more sleep at night, if these little things were making him so edgy.
         As he entered his house the first thing he noticed was that it seemed quiet. Not oddly quiet, since it wasn’t uncommon for his father to be out in the fields and his mother to be at the market, but more like a hushed sort of quiet, like the house was holding its breath. For a second he was tempted to leave, to avoid breaking this pristine silence. But no, that was silly, this was his home, he had every right to be here.
         “I’m home,” Jaymes called out, tapping the book against the doorframe. The tapping barely extended past the entryway. From the back of the house, near the kitchen came a vague rustling noise, but Jaymes couldn’t distinguish it from a normal house sound. As a child he used to lay in bed at night and hear the various thumping and hissing noises a house would make when nobody was speaking, but he had learned not to dwell on them or else risk going crazy. That wasn’t going to happen here. Everything was perfectly normal.
         “Anyone here?” he asked, crossing through the living room. Footsteps evaporated behind him, forcing him to spin around. Nobody. There was nobody there. What’s going on? he asked himself. Nothing. Nothing was wrong at all. Valreck always reassured him of that. Even when things seemed wrong, they generally were not as they seemed.
         “I said, I’m home,” he called out again, as he stepped into the kitchen.
         And stopped.
         His eyes took it all in at once. Two people were sitting at the table. His father’s back was to Jaymes but he was slumped over the table, his head resting on his arms. Jaymes couldn’t tell if he was breathing or not.
         The blue eyes that regarded him from the other man were instantly, frighteningly familiar.
         “You . . .” Jaymes stuttered, feeling his chest clench, and he staggered back as if punched hard. This is what panic is like. “You . . . I . . . I saw you . . .”
         “Hello,” said the giant man with the insect head, “I have come here to dine on your children.” His voice was a scratchy baritone, a frequency that went through his spine.
         What did he say? “I saw you . . . you were in my dreams . . . I saw you . . .” and everything else in the world threatened to slide away, water streaming down a window pane, leaving tracks, always leaving something of itself behind.
         Footsteps clattered behind him again. “Then you’ll be seeing him in a second, pal!” a voice yelled. “Naptime!”
         Jaymes started to turn toward the voice, but then something hard struck him in the head, sending stars exploding across his vision, bright bursts of light that plummeted like dying fireflies and in their wake leaving nothing but a cloying, stifling darkness.