Proto decided to change things up the next day. He tried on one of those yellow, blue and white tunic outfits that Somnus had arranged for him and looked in the mirror. He rather liked it.

  One of his life goals was never to have a job that required him to wear encumbering clothes each day—above all, the dreaded suit and tie. No danger of that here. He could turn somersaults in this getup.

  Let’s keep changing things up, he mused as he left his room, and turned left instead of his usual right. It seemed like everyone else here knew every turn in every hallway—despite the fact that they were all misty blue with intermittent white doors. The only route he knew was the route between his room and the lounge, which Astrid had taught him. It was high time he started exploring.

  That went well for about five minutes. He’d felt sure he was heading in the direction of the lounge the whole time. But somehow, he’d encountered no sign of it yet—just intersecting hallways of mirky blue. And when five more minutes passed without any luck, he began to get worried. Astrid wouldn’t be happy if he was late for today’s visit.

  He’d just rounded a corner, briefly closing his eyes and sighing, when he bumped into something at once soft and hard. Or someone, rather, judging by the way she gasped and stumbled backward. He blinked away his reverie and looked in front of him.

  It was Dahlia, garbed in her usual Victorian robe with her hair pinned up. She’d been holding a book in one hand and reading while walking. In her other hand was an unbitten apple.

  “Sparky,” she hailed him calmly, brushing a dislodged tress from her blue eyes. “You’re always finding ways to manhandle my books. Try to keep your hands off, won’t you?”

  “Good morning to you too, Morning Glory,” said Proto. “Sorry, I can’t resist a good book.”

  “Well, try asking nicely, rather than getting all handsy,” she replied. “Anyway, this is a book by Anne Bronte. I’m not sure it’s a good match for you.”

  “I liked Wuthering Heights. Is Anne so different from Emily?” he asked.

  Really, it was just by chance that he’d taken a course on The Nineteenth Century British Novel. Until today, it had contributed absolutely nothing to his life advancement. But apparently, his teachers had been right. You never know when knowledge will come in handy.

  Dahlia tilted her head at him, so that stray blonde strand fell over her face again. Her eyes narrowed skeptically, like a teacher whose worst student had just aced a test, while sitting next to the smartest student. “There are differences,” she finally replied. “Just like Louisa and Abigail Alcott. Or Athena and Artemis. Or, say, me and Astrid!”

  He blinked. “You’re sisters?”

  “I’m speaking figuratively, of course,” she answered with a dismissive wave. But, for some reason, her cheeks reddened slightly. “And personally, I don’t think the differences are all that subtle.”

  “Well, all those Bronte books end in true love and happily ever after, right?” countered Proto.

  She blinked. Then, her eyes narrowed. “So the differences don’t matter then? I think it makes them matter all the more.”

  Well, it seemed he’d botched this interaction somehow or other. It’d been a good try.

  He smiled and held out his hands mollifyingly. “This student defers to the scholar!” he replied. “Anyway, I should be off—”

  “You were asking about the Shadowcaster, weren’t you?” interrupted Dahlia. “I suppose I’ll have to show it to you, won’t I?”

  “I—suppose,” blinked Proto. “If you have time.”

  “Not really! But if I only did what I had time for, nothing would get done,” she spoke with a melodic lilt, waving lightly. “Or, worse yet, I’d have to give up reading!”

  It wasn’t clear to Proto how this course of action would help solve that problem. But he would go with it. “We can’t have that. Lead the way, Apple Blossom!” he urged, prompting an agreeable nod from Dahlia.

  “Come!” She turned and was off in a flourish of robes. “Show some spunk, Spunky.”

  “You know,” he mused, almost jogging to keep up, “you may be different from Astrid. But your taste for name-calling is awfully similar.”

  She shrugged and waved her apple. “Even apples and oranges have something in common.”

  “They’re both fruit?” he said.

  “They’re both far above you and out of reach,” she replied instantly. “But they’ll come down on you if you wait there stupidly for long enough.” She bopped him on the head with her apple.

  He sighed, as Dahlia’s thin lips bloomed into a smile.

  She continued down the hall with Proto in her wake for a couple minutes before tapping one of the white doors, which started sliding open. There was nothing to distinguish it from the thousand other white doors here, except perhaps the larger space separating it from the adjacent doors. But inside was a room utterly unlike anything else Proto had seen here.

  It looked like a cave, but with blue stone matching the hallways outside. A gravelly path wound downward along its periphery toward what vaguely resembled a symphony hall with an orchestra pit. But the seating was all stone, and the stage was dominated by a smooth wall of stone, somewhat like a movie theater screen. As for the orchestra pit, it was more of an abyss, and continual flames were leaping from it toward the high roof.

  Between the fiery abyss and the screen-like wall was an altar, made of the same blue stone as the cave and polished to a shine on top. At its center was an empty slot.

  Proto regarded all this with wide eyes. He felt like he should see the Devil, the Oracle at Delphi, or Plato any second now. But instead all he saw was Dahlia, strolling ahead and passing through a smoke cloud on her way down.

  She inhaled and breathed out with satisfaction. “Much as I like the dusty scent of old books,” she mused, “this has a warmer charm, I think.”

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  At the lack of any reply, she glanced back and saw him still standing near the entrance. “What are you ogling back there? We’re not even at the part where I take off my clothes!” She smiled as he coughed and blinked. “Just kidding. Maybe? My, it’s hot!” She fanned her face with her book.

  Feeling a little red in the face, and not just from the heat, he lurched onward and descended the path.

  At the bottom, she approached neither the stands nor the stage, but a small passage leading away from them. He followed her inside. They soon emerged into a simple room with an indented nook in the wall and a hole above it, rather like a vending machine. Above it was . . .

  “Is that a touch screen? For a computer?” asked Proto.

  “Ah, technology. Many things get worse with time, but not everything!” mused Dahlia. “This is where we pick the dreamer. It’s so easy now. Just type the name and some details from his dream—or the city he’s from, or his job, or his girlfriend’s name, or his car model, or his favorite color, or his deepest fear—and he’ll pop up! As long as we have the data recorded.”

  “You don’t even need a name! Which is nice, because my job introduces me to more new names each day than a 19th-century Russian novel.” She set down her book and apple. “Here, let me show you. ‘Prime Minister of . . . ’” she began typing. “Hm, let’s go with that one.” She typed a country’s name and tapped a button. A few pictures of vials appeared on the screen, each with a brief description. She touched one of them. “And . . . voila!”

  A corked vial clinked down into the nook in the wall from the hole above it. Dahlia snatched it and held it up triumphantly. “The memories of a national leader!” Mists swirled within the vial.

  Proto stared at it for a moment. “Ohh. That’s what Mayger was doing with that vial.”

  “Mayger?” she repeated. “Ah, right. Astrid was here, so you were with Mayger, weren’t you? Visiting that artist dreaming of going berserkergang! But yes, you’re right,” she continued. “Our visitors collect the mists that arise in dreams. And from those mists, we shadowseers can see the dreamers’ memories here in the Shadowcaster.”

  “Shadowseers,” he repeated, wrapping his mind around all this. “So, dream visitors like Astrid and Mayger collect dream mists in vials. Those vials—what, get sucked up into the system here?” He pointed at the hole, as she nodded. “And the visitors type in what they know about the dreamer. Then, when you want to view the memories of that dreamer, you type in a search with some info about him here, and the vial pops back out?”

  “Exactly. It’s like a social media search for dreamers!” she enthused. “Which, let me tell you, is much better than the old system. That was more of a library of dreamers, with our own sort of Dewey Decimal System, only more ridiculously complicated and obtuse. If that’s possible. Do they still teach that thing to kids?”

  “I think I learned about it in library class at age seven,” said Proto. “But that was twenty years ago.”

  Dahlia tilted her head at him and opened her mouth, as that stray tress fell over her face again. She briefly looked . . . sympathetic? But instead of replying to him, she brushed the hair off her face and smiled. “Well. Why don’t we give you that demonstration?”

  He nodded, wondering about that look but deciding not to dwell on it for now. “So, we’re going to see a Prime Minister’s memories, huh?”

  “Hm? No. I was just showing off.” She pushed another button. A whooshing sound of suction came from the nook. She inserted the vial, and it was sucked back into the hole it had come from. “Today, we’re going to view the dreams of . . . ” began Dahlia, starting to type.

  Then, she paused, pressing her lips. She glanced at Proto again, giving him that same look as a moment ago. “You know what?” She held a button, erasing what she’d been typing. “We’re going to let Lady Luck decide today! It’s a custom. Can’t get lucky without trying, as they say. Here, let’s do it together.”

  Proto blinked at her phrasing.

  But she already was tapping a search bar labeled “ID,” then hitting a seemingly random bunch of letters and numbers. They filled the bar halfway. “Alright, your turn.” She stepped aside and held a hand toward the screen. “Say a prayer to Lady Luck, Spunky!”

  He glanced at her, unsure if she was expecting him to say something aloud, but she was staring at the monitor. So he just drummed his fingertips over some letters and numbers, filling the remainder of the bar.

  “Good enough.” She swept him aside and stepped back in front of the screen, checking a box labeled “Select Closest Match” and hitting “Proceed.” She waited a moment. “And . . . your lucky vial!” The glass clinked down into the nook.

  She seized it and spun around, already striding out of the room. “Come! Time waits on no man, and neither do I. Except Somnus.”

  Proto couldn’t help smiling at her belletristic energy. Dahlia was rather different from Astrid, wasn’t she? She almost could be called . . . nice. As long as you played along with her chatty bookish hauteur.

  He followed her back toward the stone chamber with the stands and the stage, lost in such musings, as she approached the altar beside the flames.

  Then, she unbound her hair and started taking off her robe. And suddenly he was very much in the here and now.

  “Is it just me, or is it hot in here?” she mused, fanning her face beside the raging abyssal flames. “What, did you think I was joking earlier?”

  Beneath her robe was a sleeveless toga-like outfit. “Don’t get too excited! This is where I stop.” She cast the robe aside and approached the altar. “You go find a seat and enjoy the show. Not too much though.” She waved him back toward the stone stands without looking.

  This was the most flustered Proto had felt since that bleary moment he’d woken up in the blue hallway. “I’m all ears. And eyes,” he managed. That robe of hers had hidden quite a lot on top.

  She laughed delightedly. “This, Sir, is a ritual. Conduct yourself accordingly!” she chastised, as he seated himself midway up the stands.

  He searched for a reply, but she already was uncorking the vial in front of her. And as the mists within began to swirl up, what words he had were lost.

  The blonde woman leaned over the ascending mists and inhaled. Her limbs stiffened briefly, then went languid. Her head lolled back so her hair fell low and she was staring upward at the screen.

  The mists rising from the vial seemed impossibly voluminous. As they rose and spread, they blocked some of the firelight flaring above the abyss. This cast shadows upon the screen-like stone wall.

  Those shadows’ forms were strange and almost recognizable. He squinted at the shifting shapes, feeling continually on the verge of identifying them, only to have them turn into something else.

  Amid his rapture, Dahlia broke into speech: “I see him!” Her voice was charged with deep pathos and backed by a toneless power.

  “I see him emerge into the breathing world with two wails and cries. He is the first. He is the smaller and the greater. His place is below and above.”

  “Seasons pass. He grows and thrives on the cherry blossom lane. Seasons pass. He runs suntanned and shouting through the streets in Summer. He slides and trudges and shouts through Winter’s whiteness.”

  “Mars rules the Sixth House, and a fever almost takes him. But Venus and Mercury are watchful from the Fourth, and he is given a second chance.”

  “From youth to teen he passes. He practices the arts and studies the sciences. He reads of times long lost and dreams of their return. They will return.”

  She went on speaking about the unidentified man in this allusive and oracular way. She described his young adulthood, his schooling, his eventual job, and the life he led.

  Setting aside her prophetic mannerisms, the life she described was fairly unremarkable. The events she recounted did seem somehow familiar—indeed, even the shadows on the stone wall seemed familiar—but not in any way suggesting they were important.

  At least, not until she got to the later portions of her shadowcasting. And at that point, things became altogether unfamiliar:

  “He stares on the victim. His eyes go wide, and his heart falls. He shakes the body. He calls his name. There is no movement. There is no response,” spoke Dahlia.

  “He walks with his love through the hidden garden. His brother stares, jealous, but says nothing. They see him, but say nothing. They speak of a dreamt-of future. It will never come.”

  “The World Rood grows on the horizon. It beckons them. When the flames fall, it will beckon them, and they will come.”

  “The flames will fall, and he will not fall. Not until he walks through the flames to recover their source. And in his dying will he turn undying.”

  “His name is Yemos!”

  Proto’s jaw dropped at the name, and the familiarity he’d sensed earlier suddenly became crystal clear.