lizard last night, too. Actually, the creature I dreamed was a dragon.’
A moment of silence held as we considered this. Then Chade hesitantly attempted, ‘Well, it should not surprise us if you and Thick share the same dream. You are so often Skill-linked throughout the day, why shouldn’t it bleed over into the night?’
‘Because I don’t think I was asleep when it happened. I was trying to do the Skill-walking. Fi— Tom says it was easiest for him to bridge over to it from a light sleep. So I was in my bed, trying to be asleep but not too asleep, while reaching out with the Skill. And then I felt it.’
‘What?’ Chade asked.
‘I felt it looking for me. With its great big whirly silver eyes.’ Thick was the one who answered.
‘Yes,’ the Prince confirmed slowly.
My heart sank.
‘I don’t understand,’ Chade said irritably. ‘Start at the beginning and report it properly.’ This was addressed to Dutiful. I understood the double prong of Chade’s anger. Once again, the three of them had attempted an exercise, and both Thick and Dutiful had experienced some success while Chade had failed. Underscoring that was the mention of a dragon. There had been too many mentions of dragons lately: a frozen dragon for Dutiful to unearth and behead, the dragons the Bingtown contingent had bragged about (supposedly at the beck and call of the Bingtown Traders) and now a dragon intruding into our Skill-exercise. We knew far too little about any of them. We dared not dismiss them as legends and lies; too well we recalled the stone dragons that had rallied to the Six Duchies’ defence sixteen years ago, yet we knew little about any of them.
‘There’s scarcely enough to report it,’ Dutiful replied. He took a breath, and despite his own words, began in the orderly way in which Chade had schooled both of us. ‘I had retired to my chambers, exactly as if I were going to sleep for the night. I was in my bed. There was a low fire in the hearth, and I was watching it, unfocusing my mind in a way that I hoped would both invite sleep and yet leave me aware enough to reach out with the Skill. Twice I dozed off. Each time, I roused myself and tried to approach the exercise again. The third time, I tried reversing the process. I reached out with the Skill, held myself in readiness and then tried to sink down into sleep.’ He cleared his throat and looked around at us. ‘Then I felt something big. Really big.’ He looked at me. ‘Like that time on the beach.’
Thick was following the tale with his jaw ajar and his small round eyes bunched with thought. ‘A big fat blue lizard,’ he hazarded.
‘No, Thick,’ Dutiful patiently kept his voice soft. ‘Not at first. At first, there was just this immense … presence. And I longed to go towards it, and yet I feared to go towards it. Not because of any deliberate threat from it. On the contrary, it seemed … infinitely benign. Restful and safe. I was afraid to touch it for fear that … I’d lose any desire to come back. It seemed like the end of something. An edge, or a place where something different begins. No. Like something that lives in a place where something different begins.’ The Prince’s voice trickled away.
‘I don’t understand. Talk sense,’ Chade demanded.
‘It’s as much sense as you can apply to it,’ I interceded quietly. ‘I know the sort of being, or feeling, or place that the Prince is speaking about. I’ve encountered such, a time or two. Once, one helped us. But I had the feeling that one was an exception. Perhaps another one of them might have absorbed us and not even noticed. It’s an incredibly attractive force, Chade. Warm and accepting, gentle as a mother’s love.’
The Prince frowned slightly and shook his head. ‘This one was strong. Protective and wise. Like a father,’ said Dutiful.
I held my tongue. I had long ago decided that those forces presented to us whatever it was that we most hungered for. My mother had given me up when I was very small. Dutiful had never known his father. Such things leave large gaps in a man.
‘Why haven’t you spoken of this before?’ Chade asked testily.
Why, indeed? Because that encounter had seemed too personal to share. But now I excused myself, saying, ‘Because you would only have said to me what you just said. Talk sense. It’s a phenomenon I can’t explain. Perhaps even what I’ve said is just my rationalization of what I experienced. Recounting a dream; that’s what it is like. Trying to make a story out of a series of events that defy logic.’
Chade subsided, but he did not look content. I resigned myself to being wrung for more facts, thoughts and impressions later.
‘I want to tell about the big lizard,’ Thick observed sullenly to no one at all. He had reached a point at which he sometimes enjoyed being the centre of attention. Obviously he felt that the Prince’s tale had stolen his stage.
‘Go ahead, Thick. You tell what you dreamed, and then I’ll tell what I did.’ The Prince ceded him all attention.
Chade sat back in his chair with a noisy sigh. I turned my attention to Thick and watched his face brighten. He gave a wiggle like a stroked puppy, squinted thoughtfully, and then in a painstaking imitation of how he had frequently heard Dutiful and me report to Chade, began his account. ‘I went to bed last night. And I had my red blanket. Then, Thick was being almost asleep, going into the music. Then, I knew Dutiful was there. Sometimes Thick follows him to dreams. He has lots of good dreams, girl dreams …’
Thick’s voice trailed off for a moment as he breathed through his open mouth, pondering.
The Prince looked acutely uncomfortable, but both Chade and I managed to retain blandly interested expressions.
Thick abruptly resumed his tale. ‘Then, I thought, where is he? Maybe it’s a game. He’s hiding from Thick. So I go, “Prince” and he goes, “be quiet”. So I am and Thick is small, and the music goes around and around me. Like hiding in the curtains. Then I peep, just a tiny peep. And it’s a big fat lizard, blue, blue like my shirt, but shiny when she moves, like the knives in the kitchen. Then she says, “come out, come out. We can play a game.” But Prince says, “sh, no, don’t” so I don’t, and then she gets mad and gets bigger. Her eyes go shiny and whirl round and round like that saucer I dropped. And then Thick thinks, “but she’s on the dream side. I’ll go on the other side.” So I made the music get bigger and I woke up. And there wasn’t a lizard but my red blanket was on the floor.’
He finished his telling with a great gasp, having run out of breath and looked from one of us to the other. I found myself giving Chade the tiniest of Skill-pokes. He glanced at me, but contrived to make it seem a chance thing. I felt tremendous pride in the old man when he said, ‘An excellent report, Thick. You’ve given me much to consider. Let us hear the Prince now and then I’ll see if I have any questions for you.’
Thick sat taller in his chair and his chest swelled with such pride that the fabric of his shirt strained across his round belly. His tongue still stuck out of his wide froggy grin, but his little eyes danced as he looked from Dutiful to me to be sure we had noticed his triumph. I wondered when impressing Chade had become so important to him, and then realized that this, too, was an imitation of his prince.
Dutiful wisely allowed Thick a moment or two to bask in our attention. ‘Thick has told you most of the story, but let me add a bit. I told you of a great presence. I was – well, not watching – I was experiencing her, or it I suppose, and being slowly drawn closer and closer. It wasn’t frightening. I knew it was dangerous, but it was hard to care that I might be absorbed and lost forever. It just didn’t seem to matter. Then the presence began to recede. I wanted to pursue it, but
