The Dreamwalker's Path

1/The Hall of the Hours

His name was not Gabriel, and never before stepping into Sanctuary had the thought occurred to him to take the name as his own.

But the name corresponded well with his long-standing intention to appear as the gentler of Time’s advocates, and to be Time’s messenger among the common people, so when the denizens of Sanctuary had begun to address him as such, he did not correct them. It had been so long since he had thought of himself as anything but Gabriel, in fact, that he wasn’t entirely certain what his original name had been. The name he bore now had suited its purpose spectacularly, easing the minds of the people that came across him in Sanctuary, and that of his fellow Hours; his comrades, too, had forgotten the name he had been born with.

And all of that would serve its purpose now.

The murder of the four links to the Alchemist, which he had performed in Time’s name, had awakened a part of him that he had long ago set to rest—not because he had wanted to, but because he knew that particular part of his nature was an impatient creature, and it was hard to be objective with it nagging the back of his mind.

Now though?

Sanctuary was changing. For the first time in all of the centuries that Eight had been one of Time’s loyal Hours, Sanctuary was changing—drifting apart from its maker, leaving it, and Time itself vulnerable.

Vulnerable to the one thing that Eight was certain Time would never suspect to be a threat.

Him.

It had cut him deeply when Time had confided in him her intent to bring the Dreamwalking witch into Sanctuary to take the place of Sebastian the Black. Though he was not certain that becoming the Twelfth Hour himself would have made that much of a difference in the grand spectrum of the city or in the eyes of the other Hours, he had hoped that Time would recognize his recent service to her by giving him some reward rather than just pushing him aside.

And he had been so very wrong.

He was not, he realized, the only person that the concept of Time took for granted. All of her Hours were overlooked and underappreciated in their own right. They and the denizens of Sanctuary stood in awe and fear of her and of her command of the city itself, and she accepted their devotion and praise without acknowledgement.

They were, Eight thought bitterly, little more than her play things, her very own version of angels of the Christian god. Their only purpose, as far as Time was concerned, was to kiss the dust her feet had tread upon.

And now the bitch couldn’t even hold the city together.

He walked quietly through the archway that marked the entrance of the Fifth Hour’s suite. It did not surprise him to find that the room was decorated in deep shades of purple— the same color of the fox-demon’s Hour’s garb.

“Are you here, Five?”

From behind a vanity screen of rice paper, a delicate voice answered, “Yes. A little soppy, I’m afraid, but yes, I’m here.”

“It rained on you as well, then?” Eight shifted his weight, uncertain of his purpose now, though he had told Five that he would seek them out to continue their conversation before splitting up to take care of the boys.

Five emerged from behind the screen, drying his hair with a purple towel. “It rained on me as well,” he confirmed. “I believe that your words from earlier today are correct, now. I sensed with the rain a certain weakness in Sanctuary, and in Time’s hold on the city.”

Eight exhaled his relief with a smile. “Yes,” he said, earnestly. “Yes, you see it is exactly as I said. And I believe that with the right cultivation…” he gesticulated his explanation as the his words faded.

Five nodded. “I agree. But…why?”

It was the question that Eight dreaded, not because he didn’t have an answer, but because he simply didn’t know whether the other Hour would accept his answer as the truth that he so desperately felt it to be. And once the words were spoken, there was no taking them back. They would be out, in the open, where Five could see. That meant that he would be at the other Hour’s mercy. It meant that, if for some reason, Five disagreed, Five would have the ability, the opportunity, to inform Time of his treacherous thoughts.

At length, and very quietly, Eight answered, “Because we can do this better without her.”

2/ Sanctuary

The alp had no recollection of how it had been collected in the decanter and placed on the shelf of the once-man who had called himself the Alchemist, but she knew that it had been a long time since she’d been free.

It was just her good luck that the lumbering green beast happened upon her in the crumbling clock tower and knocked over the decanter that served as her prison.

She shivered in excitement, her white wings shuddering mid-air, causing her to drop a few inches.

What to do now? she asked herself as she caught a slight breeze and fluttered onward. Well first, we should have food—yes, that′s good. Lovely milk and cream, yes. And then perhaps some mischief.

Yes, she decided. She was feeling a little frail, and some mischief would do wonders for her strength after having spent so long in the decanter...

But where? That was the question, surely. Not here! Not in this ugly little place where she had been stowed after her abduction! Not where someone could find her and put her back!

The alp rode a current of air down an alleyway and, suddenly, became aware of the fact that the air was warmer here. Curious, the alp fluttered toward the ground and stretched herself out. Wings and antennae shrank down, her body became bigger, fatter, sprouted fur. She flicked her tail and added a few inches to it for good measure.

Now a white cat, the alp slipped behind a pile of fresh brick and rubbed herself against the crumbling wall at the alley’s end. The wall, she realized, was much warmer than a wall ought to be when it was out of reach of a hot summer- sun. The contrast between its warmth and the unwarm of the alley (Unwarm. That was the only way to describe it, for it was not cool, either.) made the alp’s fur raise in delight. She slinked along the wall until she came to the warmest portion, and then she nosed at what she was sure was the source of the heat: a slender crack that started at the foundation of the wall’s age-paled, brick and ran upward.

How curious! Thought the alp, pressing her nose farther into the crack, a little hesitantly, and sniffing. Perhaps there was an oven on the other side! Perhaps a warm house with humans living inside. A new mother perhaps, and her wee babe to go along with her. Or better! Someone hopeful, someone with an active mind. Someone, perhaps, of eight or nine who, each night, laid her tender head down and flipped through her hopes one by one by one as the Alchemist flipped through each of his books when we were both locked in the clock tower and longing for our own freedom.

Yes, the alp thought sweetly. Yes, a dreamer is just the sort of person we should hope to find.

No longer hesitant, the alp pushed her nose through the widest part of the gap and squeezed. Slowly, her body stretched itself thin and she eased through the crack in the wall.

As she pushed through to the other side, she felt something unexpected happen. Her body should have reformed. Here on the other side of the wall she should be a white cat again. But somehow, instead, she was nothing at all.

A charm, she thought churlishly. Some nasty wicked witchy put a charm on the house!

But it was not a house, she found. No, it wasn’t even a kitchen, though it certainly felt like the alp was hovering by a hot oven. Instead, she hovered over a road of large grey stones, each so smooth and so identical to their neighbors that she thought it must have taken many skilled men to cut the stones from their mountain and to place them just so upon the ground. But even the grey road was not as impressive as the black river that stretched several lengths of a horse and plough between the grey path she hovered over and another of similar ilk.

Perhaps it was not the river itself which was so compelling, but the giant, many-colored monsters that glided across its surface, some stopping, some turning, some seeming to speed up, zipping around other river-gliders and disappearing out of sight when the river swept around a bend.

And so many people! They walked backward and forward, busy-busy like honey bees after the first signs of winter—like they were trying to beat a deadline—chattering, laughing, always moving, or standing on the grey path and looking up and down the black river before skipping across stark white lines that must, the alp thought, be magic, for how else could a human walk on water?

It was a cornucopia of opportunity. Each man and woman tasted of hope, each child brimmed with untapped potential, and the alp was sure that she should be salivating at the thought of tasting each dream that passed her by. She would eat, she thought, until she was so fat she couldn’t move. Then, when the stupor of her gluttony finally wore off, what an excellent adventure it would be if she could climb upon the back of one of those river-gliders and convince it to take her fast-fast up and down the river—to take her to another town, perhaps, with more people and more dreams so that she could start the whole process over again! Surely she had wandered into the glorious heart of the human world! Surely she had escaped the Summerlands of the fair folk for good! Surely—

A dark skinned woman with beautiful black and caramel curls walked through the alp as though she did not exist, and all of the alp’s plans came crashing down upon her at once.

What good would this world do her if she had no body to enjoy it? Obviously whatever magic made this world so spectacular also protected it from the likes of her. If she wanted to enjoy the full effect of this buzzing, churning, dreaming world, she would need to find the wicked witchy who cast the spell protecting it, and force her to remove the no-fun, spoiled-sporting curse she had laid upon her.

And then...

Then she could have some proper fun.