Siba was chatting about a picnic she had taken Danel and Anita on when they were young. She was going into a lot of detail, but Felitïa was only catching every other word or so. The details kept changing though. It wasn’t a picnic; it was a family dinner. Then it was a banquet, and then a family dinner again. Siba wasn’t correcting herself. The details were just...constantly different.
This was a dream, of course. It had to be. It was the only explanation why Siba’s gown was a different colour every time Felitïa looked at her, and the rest of the room was hazy and undefined—except when Felitïa looked at a specific spot, when it would take on a bit more solidity.
It was nice to know she was sleeping undisturbed. She wondered how long it had been. It felt like Siba had been droning on for ages, but that didn’t mean anything. It could have been hours or minutes, maybe even seconds since she’d fallen asleep. Not that it mattered how long it had been. It was sleep. That was all that mattered.
It was weird once again being aware she was dreaming. Perhaps she should learn to do this more often and take advantage of it.
Perhaps there was something she could do now.
She pulled up the Room in her head. Like in the waking world before she had become too tired to manage it, it was possible to continue paying attention to dream-Siba and the Room at the same time. There were several presences in the Room, though she had no idea if these were real presences her mind was detecting in the waking world, or just ones made up by the dream.
One of them was Siba. Another one vanished almost immediately, and a short time later, two more appeared. Servants moving in and out of her range perhaps? Possible. Distances in the Room still had no relation to real-world distances.
Or it was just the inconsistencies of dreams.
Siba’s presence was stable though. As were two others that seemed strangely familiar. They were…
No, it wasn’t possible. One was Zandrue. The other was Ezmelda.
That settled things, then. These were dream presences. Zandrue should be on the other side of the continent, and while Ezmelda was closer, she had no reason to be in the palace. Indeed, she had every reason not to be.
It also explained why Felitïa hadn’t recognised them right away. The dream had simply morphed them into Zandrue and Ezmelda when Felitïa had looked more closely.
It was a shame. If she could monitor the real world while she slept, she… Well, she wasn’t certain what she could do with that, but it would have been something interesting.
This was a strangely boring dream. Perhaps because she was lucid.
“You aren’t listening to me,” dream-Siba said.
“No, I’m not,” Felitïa replied. “You’re not real. Go away.”
And Siba vanished.
Felitïa smiled. If she had control over the dream, perhaps she could dismiss the dream presences from the Room and maybe perceive real ones?
But the presences in the Room wouldn’t go away when she tried. And Siba’s was still there.
That was annoying.
Felitïa peered closely at Zandrue’s presence. Could it be real?
She looked away and then looked back. Nothing about Zandrue’s presence changed. It was hers, every familiar aspect of it.
There was another possibility. The presence could be neither dream-created nor real.
Nice try, but you should have picked someone from my memory who could be believably nearby.
The presence didn’t reply, but of course it wouldn’t. No one else replied either.
I will find you! As long as you’re in my head, I will find you!
There was a slight…shimmering? That was as good a word as any. There was a slight shimmering between Ezmelda’s and Zandrue’s presences. Felitïa peered closer. It was like a couple pinpricks of...whatever substance the presences were composed of. Like minuscule points of light. She was actually impressed she’d noticed them. They were very well hidden.
Got you!
She focused on those pinpricks, directed all her mental strength towards them. The pinpricks shrunk and pulled away, as more defences went up to keep them hidden.
Oh no, you don’t. You’re not getting away.
With a sharp tug, she yanked on the pinpricks, pulled them forward, and ripped away the defences. Another presence materialised.
Right, this time, I’m not letting you go. You are…
She trailed off.
It wasn’t the same person who had invaded her head previously. She didn’t recognise this presence.
But whoever it was was close enough to her in the waking world that she could detect their panic at being discovered. The one who had been invading her head had never panicked or shown any emotion previously. It was possible they had previously been too far physically from Felitïa to detect the emotion, but she doubted that. This was a different person.
Were they working with the one who had been invading her head? Maybe.
Something hit her, sent her reeling, and she crashed into the grey walls. The Room shredded apart in front of her, only the grey walls remaining.
With a cry, she sat up in bed, breathing heavily.
Siba sat in a chair nearby. She looked to have just woken up too, perhaps from Felitïa’s cry. “Are you all right?”
Felitïa took a moment to control her breathing. “Yes, I think so. Just...just a bad dream.” Not exactly true, but she didn’t want to explain the details to Siba at this time.
Siba smiled sadly. “And you were sleeping so peacefully.”
Felitïa pushed the blankets aside and slid to the edge of the bed. “How long was I asleep?”
“I don’t know. Half an hour? An hour? I’m afraid I might have dozed off and lost track of time.”
“Nothing strange happen?”
Siba shook her head. “Nothing. Should there have? They haven’t come looking for you if that’s what you’re worried about.”
Felitïa looked about the room. It was Siba’s personal bedchamber in the apartments she had shared with her husband. It wasn’t large and didn’t contain much. Just the single-person bed, a couple chairs, some paintings, mostly portraits on the walls, a table with a tea service, and a couple potted plants with narrow leaves near the door. “Yeah, I am a little worried about that.” She leaned over and looked under the bed. Just the bedpan there.
“I’m sorry you woke so soon. That draught should have kept you asleep for hours.”
Felitïa sat back up and smiled at Siba. “It’s not your fault. You’ve done all you can. Thank you.”
Siba smiled back. “I’m glad to do what I can.”
Felitïa reformed the Room in her head, which came together without any difficulty. The presences from her sleep—Zandrue’s, Ezmelda’s, and the other one’s—were still there. However, the other one had put defensive spells back in place, though they weren’t hiding the person as effectively as before. No, that wasn’t right. They were just as effective. She could just see through them more easily because she knew they were there.
“Do you want to try sleeping again? I’m afraid I have no more draughts left, but maybe you can still fall asleep from the last one. As I said, it shouldn’t have worn off yet.”
Felitïa shook her head. “That’s all right.” She stepped out of bed and headed to the door. She was wearing only her night shift, but that was fine. She was going to hide herself anyway. “I need to do something.” She reached for the door handle.
“What?”
Felitïa turned to face Siba, brushing against a leaf of one of the potted plants. The leaves were wider than she’d thought. “I just need to check something.”
Siba stood up, concern in her eyes. “Is that safe?”
“Don’t worry. I can hide myself. I’ll just be a moment. Then I’ll try to sleep again.”
Siba nodded. “All right.”
Felitïa turned around and reached for the door handle again, but hesitated. She hadn’t brushed up against the leaf again. The plant leaves were narrow, like she’d initially thought. She fingered a leaf and turned slowly back around. “Siba, just curious, what kind of plant is this?”
Siba shrugged. “I don’t actually know.”
“No, neither do I. Tell me, what was your favourite birthday?”
“I’m sorry?”
“Favourite birthday? Do you not celebrate them? Or what about your mother? What was she like? I hope you had a better relationship than I have with mine?”
“I...uh…”
“Or your father? Who was your first crush? Mine was a woman much older than me.”
“I… Why are you asking me these things? What happened to checking something?”
Felitïa closed her eyes, took a deep breath, gathered her mental strength, then re-opened her eyes.
With a clench of her fists, she tore the illusion apart. It was surprising how easy it was. Just a thought—a push—and what had seemed reality fell away, darkness replacing it.
It had been an incredibly realistic illusion. The skill and power behind it were astounding. She could never have done something like that herself.
But there was a reason illusions worked best when they were small: hiding something from view, or adding a single object or person to otherwise real surroundings. Too complicated and it became too easy to make mistakes, like with the plants. Illusions could also only have knowledge that either the caster or the target had. Knowledge possessed by neither had to be avoided or made up.
Get out of my head!
She formed the Room around her again. Zandrue’s, Ezmelda’s, and the other one’s presences were still there, as was Siba’s. They had to be real. As little sense as it made for Zandrue to be near, those presences were real.
Was there a way to contact them?
Not likely. That would require actual telepathy beyond what Felitïa had ever been able to do.
But it was clear she was still asleep and she needed someone to wake her.
The Room darkened and flipped. Felitïa tumbled. Tumbled through countless dimensions as the Room spun around her.
She reached out and grabbed hold of everything. She yanked. With all her strength, she yanked everything back into place and stopped the spinning.
She was now standing beside the figure in line after Nin-Akna, a thin, lanky man with black hair.
Felitïa blinked metaphorically.
The figure clouded over again, as did the other figures behind it. For a moment, they had been visible too, and she had missed them. Damn it!
No, it didn’t matter right now. She had an invader to deal with.
Something moved far off, near the grey walls.
Felitïa pulled, and the presence she had previously found hiding in her mind hurtled towards her. However, as it got close, it broke away and dived down under Zandrue’s presence.
Felitïa followed as fast as she could. The dimensions of her mind sped past her, like streaks of multicoloured light. But not just light. Smells and sounds. Lavender. Roast chicken. The smell after a thunderstorm. Laughter. Crying. Bird calls. What was all this? Were they memories?
The other presence remained ahead of her, just out of reach.
Then again, what did reach mean here?
Felitïa grabbed for the presence, but it ducked to the side. She tried again, but it rammed into her, and she went flying again.
Blood red. Sea blue. The shape of trees. Dogs barking. The shape of Zandrue. The smell of sweat she had once deliberately sniffed on Zandrue trying to understand why Zandrue sniffed people, back before she knew Zandrue was a Volg.
Felitïa pulled herself to a stop. Around her was just a swirl of blue, grey, Elderaan, and fireplace smell. There was no sign of the invading presence.
These had to be her memories—or perhaps, not exactly memories. They weren’t events. They weren’t moments in her life. But maybe they were the things that triggered memories. She had never explored her mind in this way before. She hadn’t even known she could.
But this was her mind. She had to have some sort of control over it. She couldn’t just let that presence run about wherever it wanted to. So, time to find it again.
She propelled herself forward and to the side. Back and forth. Zigzagging through her mind. Past bright oranges. The green of grass. The brown and white of dirty snow. The pitter-patter of rain on the window. The sound of Maneshka’s breathing while she slept. One shape, colour, sound, or smell after another. Hundreds of them. Thousands.
There was the presence.
She raised the black walls of the Room around it, trapping it in an n-dimensional sphere. Then she pulled the sphere across the infinite landscape of her mind and back into the Room, where she left it trapped. The walls contorted, and bent back and forth as the presence inside tried to break free. It would almost certainly do so eventually, but the prison was holding for now. That gave her some time.
Felitïa turned to Zandrue’s presence. She could almost imagine Zandrue actually standing there, and not just the shapeless blob of her presence.
What was she thinking?
She could imagine it. With a thought, Zandrue’s presence reshaped to look like Zandrue actually looked. For a moment, she looked exactly like she did in the line-up not far away, which meant no clothes. With another thought, Felitïa dressed her. She could handle the nakedness in the line-up, but for now, she just wanted to see Zandrue how she normally saw her in real life.
How do I contact you? You’re not far. I know you’re not.
Zandrue didn’t answer.
Damn it! I still don’t understand my own head, Zandrue. How am I supposed to fight an invader who can tear apart my own mental constructs when I don’t even understand how it all works?
She leaned against Zandrue who, not surprisingly, remained absolutely still. The presence might now looked like Zandrue, but it was still an abstraction of what her mind was detecting. It couldn’t actually react.
Felitïa sighed and ran a finger through Zandrue’s hair. It didn’t actually feel like hair. It was more...well, nothingness. It had no feeling at all. So she imagined the feeling of soft, silky hair.
And that’s what it felt like.
She ran her finger along a particularly long, thin strand of hair stretching down Zandrue’s side, then curling away just before the hips, and out away from the body.
That was weird.
It wasn’t a strand of hair. It was something long and thin, and it came from Zandrue—or rather the presence. Felitïa got rid of the image of Zandrue and just viewed the presence as she normally did. The strand was still there, stretching away from the presence into the distance, towards the grey walls.
Felitïa followed it.
It went up to one of the grey walls and right into it.
Felitïa peered closer.
There were tiny imperfections along the wall, so small they were practically invisible unless someone looked really close like Felitïa was doing now. These were where her invader had hidden the mental traps Felitïa had still not figured out how to remove. Some were tiny dents, other minuscule gouges. Others might even be holes. The strand from Zandrue went through one of those.
Felitïa grinned.
This had to be how they got through. This was how the emotions and presences Felitïa detected got into her mind. Maybe it was even why distance and direction made no sense. Perhaps assing through the walls messed that up somehow.
But if something could go one way, then it could go the other too.
She grabbed hold of the strand and broke it in two. Zandrue’s presence and the portion of strand leading to it vanished immediately.
Except they didn’t.
Zandrue’s presence was now in Felitïa’s hand. She squeezed it down to the same size as the strand so now it was just more of the strand. Or rather, the strand was Zandrue’s presence and always had been.
She held the end up to her eye. It was impossibly thin, but it did look hollow. With a thought, she widened it, stretched it out to the side so that it was just large enough that she could stick a metaphorical finger in it.
Behind her, the black walls of the prison blew apart.
Time was running out.
Felitïa held the strand up to her mouth.
Zandrue, can you hear me?
