Dreamwalker's Bride - Chapter 401

Chapter 401: Snoring
Ford hurried along behind Mia, pulling Anaisa with him. She kept up easily, but trying to avoid the many wights in this area was proving difficult.

Not being able to see one another was a disadvantage, as he couldn’t tell when Mia changed direction except by the pull of her hand, and then he had to communicate that to Anaisa in turn.

He was glad they’d left the others behind. This game of remaining undetected would be ten times more difficult with additional people in a chain of held hands.

There was no time to pause and figure out exactly what the wights were doing or why. All Ford could tell was that they were in a hurry.

One or two paused as if they saw the invisible humans for a second, but perhaps that was his paranoia over anything else.

An eternity later and yet in the flash of a moment, the trio of humans had left the hall and moved up a long flight of twisting stairs.

They were uneven, and one or another of them tripped several times on the uneven steps. Ford frowned, having taken for granted how difficult it was to navigate a stairway without the ability to see your own feet.

The steps were as black as the walls, and yet, a subtle and pervasive illumination kept the area from pitch darkness. Perhaps the occasional narrow windows let in more of the magical light than he expected, or perhaps the black stone was actually some form of luminescent gemstone that he hadn’t seen before.

Three times, a wight or group of wights hurried up or down the stairs, and the humans pressed against the wall to avoid being bumped into or detected. It seemed pure luck that the creatures didn’t notice them on the narrow stairwell, but how long would their luck last?

Ford grew nervous. Though he wouldn’t call this easy by any stretch of the imagination, it still seemed unusual that they had not been detected.

After all, the wights had the ability to cancel out magic… did they need a specific target to do so? If not, why wouldn’t they make some sort of broad magic-cancellation barrier within the castle to catch invaders?

He puzzled this and more as Mia turned from the top of the stairs down a very wide passageway. This area seemed richer than the entry, somehow, with lamps on tall holders and chandeliers hanging from a very high ceiling.

Ford frowned. The stairway had been small, the steps nearly human-sized. But the front gates of the castle had been for something enormous, and this hallway seemed to match.

He didn’t know what to make of the mismatch, other than the fact that the stairway must not have been for use by whatever large… emperor… lived here. Isn’t that what Mia called it? She’d said he had a crown…

Ford shuddered, and Mia pulled him around a corner. Anaisa seemed tired, from the way her grip had loosened slightly. She’d begun to lag bit by bit.

It had been a long climb up the stairs. As a miner, Ford was used to ladders and ascending, and he supposed Mia must be used to hard labor on the farm, but perhaps a former countess, not so much?

There was no way to ask, and she didn’t squeeze to signal she needed to stop, so he decided simply to keep paying attention. To everything. To Mia, to Anaisa, to their surroundings, to the sounds of movement in the halls–though there wasn’t much. The wights seemed more to glide than to step, not quite touching the ground.

So what was that sound?

A steady, great sound that grew like a loud growl. Ford’s blood ran cold as he imagined what sort of monster could make such an insidious threat.

Mia paused, and so did he. Did she want to say something? Was something wrong?

Or was she simply listening, like he was?

No, knowing Mia, she was looking for the source of the sound, overtaxing her magic so that she could keep everyone safe.

Though, perhaps in the castle, so high above the trees and with walls between her and the gemstones, perhaps she wouldn’t be able to overextend herself into the dire situation she’d been in before.

He hoped that was the case.

After a short hesitation, Mia pulled them onward, in the same direction, around two more corners as the growling grew louder.

No, was it growling? It was too steady. Surely the monster would have either pounced or given up its anger rather than keep up the pace of its ire.

Ford realized slowly that it wasn’t growling at all. At least, not intentional growling. The rhythm of the sound was much more akin to… snoring.

Which seemed so much worse. If this was the sound something made while, presumably, peacefully asleep, how angry would it be when woken? How much worse for the unfortunate soul who made such a grievous error?

Dreams… Trace had said he was controlling the emperor’s dreams, hadn’t he? The dream Ford had of the man lingered at the edges of his memory, still unable to recall all of it. He didn’t know whether he would be capable of using the information from the dream, even if he did have it!

All he could do was continue following Mia and brace himself for the very worst. The culmination of their quest: to find Trace, and to save him and bring him home.

Mia paused again, this time in front of an enormous door that stood slightly ajar. One large enough to match the grand entrance to the castle. She didn’t squeeze his hand, but instead leaned back towards him for a moment, as if needing his support before plunging ahead.

He nudged his shoulder against her in response, hoping that was what she needed.

A second passed, and he ran his thumb over the back of her hand. She squeezed twice in response, and then pulled him towards the opening between the door and the doorpost, leading him into a room with a bed many times larger than the bunkhouse he’d once lived in with twenty other miners.

Atop it, the sound of snoring came to an abrupt halt.