Hidden Island Chapter 45, part 3 of 3

Hidden Island
Chapter 45, part 3 of 3

Belita awkwardly arced her body and craned her neck to follow his gaze. She saw nothing but circling colored wings and rolling blue and white.

"What is it?" she asked, suddenly aware again of the strangeness of the situation. The realization she was dreaming rocked her mind, but she accepted it quickly. She no longer balked at lucidity.

"There is another dream walker," Sandman said. "The Dreamtime is being warped by someone unskilled. Their dream is... leaking."

He didn't move. She felt like she was being stretched for a moment, and when it passed, Sandman was standing a short way away, wearing his customary sarong again. He hadn't pulled out of her. He'd ceased to exist in the space he'd previously been in.

She willed herself to accept the abrupt change, just as he'd taught her. Her mind was still reeling from an overload of pleasure, so it wasn't difficult to choose not to care that something unreal had just happened. That was the secret to maintaining the dream. She'd wake up if she let herself dwell on things clashed with her sense of reality. She sat up and curled her legs beneath her to watch her lover. She could see the concern in the set of his shoulders.

Something felt ominous. It was like the feeling in the air before a storm began to gather.

"You feel it?" he asked.

"Aye," she said with a slow nod. "I feel scared and sad now, and I don't know why."

"It is not you," Sandman said. "The Dreamtime connects the subconscious of every dreamer.

That is how dream walkers move from dream to dream. We can feel other dreams and use them like beacons to move towards. The stronger the emotions in a dream, the more influential the beacon.

This one is powerful and full of fear."

"Are we in danger?" Belita asked.

"No," Sandman said. "They are."

"Can we help?" Belita asked. She stood up and moved to his side. By the time she reached him, she was dressed. The abrupt change barely registered to her, and she was thinking about other things.

"Perhaps," Sandman said. "I am too far away to travel the Dreamtime to someone unknown.

You will need to be a bridge for me."

"Alright," Belita said with a curt nod. "What do I do?"

"Move towards the feeling," Sandman explained.

"How?' Belita asked.

"Sometimes when you dream, you feel like you are looking for someone," Sandman began.

"Aye," Belita said. "Usually, I'm looking for you."

"You are lucid. Please don't look. Find," Sandman said.

"How?" Belita asked, completely confused.

"However you want," Sandman said. "However, you imagine you would find someone nearby who needs your help."

"We're in the middle of the ocean," Belita said in exasperation.

"You always forget," Sandman's skull-like face grinned at her. "Here, you can fly."

Her eyes lit up. Together, they leaped into the sky.

Teach Manor was once a royal lodge, back when Bastard's Bay had been Prince's Cove, a tropical retreat for a Malaharan royal family. Over many years, it passed from sultanate to sultanate as a gift or as spoils of war. It was eventually gifted to the Imperial royal family as a diplomatic offering. During a short battle with Nival, it was turned into a defensive battery.

When the Nivalese captured the island, the Manor was used as a supply depot until the war ended, when the Empire returned the island as part of the peace treaty. During the Barcolan rebellion, the island was the Imperial base of operations, and the manor was used as a garrison. That was when the port had become more of a fully-fledged town.

The most daring story of the Barcolan war involved a group of formerly enslaved people who captured an Imperial gunship and launched a surprise attack on Prince's Cove. The Manor was so severely damaged that when the Empire agreed to the armistice ending the Imperial occupation of Bar Cola, it also abandoned Prince's Cove.

Pirates quickly filled the void. That was when the Teach family moved into the Manor and rebuilt it while establishing themselves as the new power in the area. They'd been lords of the island and its surrounding waters for fifty years. After being renovated by so many wealthy hands, rebuilt after two wars, and used as a home by a family of pirates, Teach Manor was a sprawling labyrinth of rooms and hallways full of different styles of architecture and strange connecting corridors. It was easy to get lost. It was also easy to hide.

Currently, every hall seemed full of people with weapons.

Caine hadn't seen any more of the mercenary guards he'd run into near the Old Man's study.

The people chasing him now were unmistakably Teach family pirates. There were hordes of burly young men with dark curls and hawkish noses. The Old Man's lineage was hard to mistake. Most had just woken up and were running through the halls in their trousers or nightgowns, brandishing swords and pistols with one hand and carrying the rest of their clothes in the other. It would have been comical if there hadn't been so many of them and they hadn't been trying to kill him.

Caine was quick and knew Teach Manor well enough to avoid getting cornered, but they had numbers. At least three Teach ships had come to port in the last few days. Teach ships always ran at least half their crews with family members to ensure there was no chance of mutiny.

When they were in port, this was where the family slept. There was an entire wing of rooms Mary affectionately called "the nursery," and now all the kids were hunting him.

"How are we doing?" Caine muttered as he caught his breath at the end of a narrow corridor.

"The wine is helping," the angel said. "Drink more."

"I'm still feeling tipsy," Caine said. "This situation is already stupid enough without being drunk."

"I'll burn it off as fast as I can. I can't repair our body without fueling it first," the angel said tersely.

"Wine ain't exactly known for its recuperative properties," Caine muttered.

"Do you want an explanation of the energy density in various foods? Or would you like to learn about the sheer inefficiencies of how the human body turns food into fuel?

"Ah, no," Caine muttered. "Maybe later."

"Good," the angel said in exasperation. "How about I concentrate on using my energy extraction methods to repair our fractured bones?"

"Yeah, that sounds better," Caine admitted, pausing at a closed door. He pressed his finger against the cork of the fresh bottle and shoved it down the neck. Anton would have been shocked at corking a bottle of fine wine. Caine enjoyed the thought and took a long swig. The shouts and footsteps were relatively distant at the moment. He tried to listen to which ways they were conglomerating.

It had been a long time since he'd been here. The manor had mostly stayed the same, but they'd shored up defenses based on his experience getting in. He'd already encountered a few surprises where new doors had been put in, and others were missing. He couldn't count on the old clandestine ways in and out. The ones he knew, Mary knew. That meant they were probably sealed or trapped now. The only sure ways out were the complex ways.

Unless he wanted to fight back toward the towers and climb out of Mary's window, there were only two ways to go. One was the front door, where he knew they were waiting for him. It was a large antechamber. It's a great spot to bring numbers to bear. Staircases. Balcony. It is designed to be an ostentatious display of wealth and a practical kill box. He wasn't sure he could fight out, even at his best.

That left the back way. Steal a boat or swim from the kitchens and servants' quarters to the private docks. The kitchens would be a great place for a running fight. There are cramped spaces, lots of improvised weaponry, good corners, and cover to obstruct gunfire. It's risky but manageable.

The docks would be a problem. The manor wasn't exactly shorefront. It was a long stretch of stairs down to the water. No cover. He'd be backlit, without cover. Easy pickings for a halfway competent shooter. If he protected his head and got lucky, he could sprint to the water and dive. Or maybe he could find something to use as a mobile cover along the way. It was still a bad idea, but better than walking into the trap they were trying to herd him into.

Then there was the other dilemma. Rush, or buy time. The longer he waited, the less wounded he'd be when things got messy, but that meant more time for the people trying to kill him to get organized. He looked down at where his free hand was resting on the pommel of his new saber. The corner of his mouth twitched. Right. The old rules no longer apply. They'd died with Anton. He needed to adapt.

"We're leaving," he muttered.

"Yes, I was paying attention to your whole meandering analysis," the angel said tersely. "The plan seems to be to rush towards the back door before I've finished healing us and charge the docks, hoping we don't get shot. Do I have that right?"

"Hoping we don't get shot in the head," Caine corrected.

"My mistake," the angel said.

"If you have better ideas, now is the time," Caine groused.

"Unfortunately, no," the angel admitted.

Caine took a long pull on his second bottle. "On the bright side, you'll have plenty of opportunity to try out your new sword."

The angel perked up in his mind. "Perhaps this situation isn't as grim as I thought."

"We're still not killing them," Caine reminded the angel.

The voice in his head scoffed. "We just killed the man who you made that promise to."

"It was never for him. It's for me," Caine said firmly.

"Yes, well, I never made that promise," the angel argued.

"No killing them," Caine repeated.

The angel grumbled. "Fine, but we are going to argue about this later."

"This suicidal charge suddenly seems like a less terrible idea," Caine said dryly.

"Oh, don't think death will save you," the angel insisted. "Your soul will be right here in the

So that you know, ways with me. We will have plenty of time to talk about how your idiotic rule got you killed."

"Damned if I do, damned if I don't," Caine chuckled.

He could feel the angel's amusement and exasperation. "Now you're just being rude."

Footsteps began to echo more closely behind him, and he could hear muttering in the next room. He was out of time. Just as the voices in the next room reached the other side of the door Caine had been leaning on, he drew his sword and yanked it open.

The four shocked men on the other side never stood a chance.

"What in all the hell is that?" Belita whispered in an urgent hiss.

"A Mare," Sandman said quietly. He was a bastion of calm behind Belita's tense frame.

They stood in the doorway of the odd tavern, watching a bizarre confrontation play out. Bella had descended from a balcony on a massive spider and torn down a series of webs. Now, she, Quinn, and Will seemed to be trying to convince Jack of something. The words were muffled and distant like they were underwater. That was the price of lurking at the threshold. It made the dream they were watching harder to interpret. Everything looked slightly off, like watercolors starting to run, and every sound was distorted. Sandman had explained it after Belita had managed to find the source of her strange anxiety. The trip had been odd. She didn't remember it clearly. She remembered flying and the ocean, then fog and darkness, but not much else before arriving at this red doorway. It was as though her mind had skipped from the island to here and blurred everything in between together.

"A mare? Like a horse? Are we seein' different things?" Belita asked incredulously. "Looks like a damned huge inky spider takes me."

"A Mare is a spirit—a demon of sorts. A dream creature," Sandman explained. "They are where the word 'nightmare' originates."

"Great, now yer tellin' my nightmares are real," Belita said with an uncomfortable shake of her head.

"Not all are. This one is," Sandman clarified.

Will said something that made Jack furious. The spider lunged, sweeping Jack onto its back and scattering the others. Belita started to lunge forward, but Sandman's firm hand on her shoulder held her back. Belita frantically performed quick magic, and the three of them vanished, leaving Jack alone in the center of a decaying ballroom, sitting on a throne carried by a nightmare. She looked surprised; then her anger drained away to hollow sadness.

"What the hell?" Belita asked. "What just happened?"

"The dream walkers left," Sandman said simply. "Smart of them."

Belita was feeling agitated. "Dammit, Sandy, can ye give me a little more? What is going on?"

"I do not know," Sandman admitted. "The Mare seems odd. Now, I would guess. I have never seen one in this stage before."

Belita let out a long, exasperated breath. "All the people in the world, and I had a fall for the one who makes every-fuckin-thing intake a riddle."

Sandman chuckled. "Everything is a riddle. Most of them aren't even my fault."

Belita elbowed him. He chuckled and continued. "Mares are not understood well. It is said they are manifestations of fear. As such, they begin as twisted sort of protective spirits, but to perpetuate their existence, they soon become agents of the fear from which they were created. I would need to know the dreamer better to know more about this one."

"Her name's Jack. She's the leader of the expedition I was hired to carry," Belita explained.

"She's got a bad history with my new navigator, Will, and my new ship's witch, Bella. They were two of the folks who had just vanished. Will's the guy who innate green, and Bella's the lass with the big hair and bigger tits. The green lad is Jack's bodyguard, Quinn. I think she's got somethin' going with him too, but I dinna pry."

"Quite a tangled web," Sandman mused.

Belita looked over her shoulder incredulously. "Did ye just make a pun?"

The big man said nothing, but she could feel his amusement.

"So is she a'right?" Belita asked.

"No," Sandman said. "Mares cause insanity."

"Should we talk to her?" Belita asked.

"Not now. She is agitated, and the Mare is a dangerous threat," Sandman warned.

"I thought we couldn't be hurt in a dream?" Belita asked.

"Normally, we cannot," Sandman said. "A Mare is a rare exception. It can feed on us as it feeds on its creator."

"Ugh," Belita grimaced. "I Dinna even like spiders when they're tiny."

Sandman looked around the antechamber more closely. "This dream is... odd. Other magics are at play here, but I know not what."

"Maybe Bella will know," Belita suggested.

The Sandman nodded. "We need to act quickly. The Mare will become stronger with time. The stronger it gets, the more harm it will do to Jack. Her sanity will unravel."

"What can we do?" Belita asked.

"Talk to her when she is awake. Explain what is happening. Convince her to address the fears the Mare sprang from," Sandman said. "I am too far away to deal with the Mare myself. By the time you are closer, the Mare will have gained too much strength. My help will have to be less direct.

Your ship's witch seems to be a clumsy but passable Dreamwalker. I want to visit her. I may be able to teach her ways to help Jack."

"I'll talk to both of them when we wake up," Belita said. "I'll try to convince Bella to take a little Dream Walk with me tomorrow night. Ye can meet her then."

Sandman wrapped his arms around her shoulders from behind. "Good."

She held his forearms with her hands and ducked her head to kiss them. Then she woke up.

The tangled blanket felt like his embrace. After the horrors of the Grindylow, the deaths of so many of her crew, and the shipwreck, she felt like she'd never feel rested or whole again.

She'd been wrong. Sometimes, a good night's sleep and a hug from the right person can feel like air to the drowning. She took a deep breath, happy to feel like herself again.



To be continued