Dreamworms Book 1: The Advent of Dreamtech by Isaac Petrov (drm ebook reader TXT) 📕

the woodlands that edge the eastern rim of Lunteren—a maze of low, narrow birches naked of leaves. Only the occasional conifer offers a relief of green. The humid, dense fragrance of the winter wilderness spreads across the auditorium, acting like a balm on Ximena’s grateful dream lungs.

As Edda walks, she touches the white bark of passing trees, leisurely. She is grounding herself into the dream, Ximena realizes. With such naturality, she does it… yes, almost unconsciously.

Edda stops in front of a particularly large birch and studies it, tilting her head, her gaze intent and focused. The trees closest to the birch appear to react on their own by moving away, making space around the birch. Then, gradually, the birch grows larger, its branches thicker, its trunk wider, until it is not a birch anymore, but a magnificent oak.

“Aws Blessings to you, Redeemed van Dolah,” Rew says. She was not there an instant ago. She stares at the oak, impervious to the fact that her legs are embedded in a thorny bramble bush nearby. “Do you know what all this is?”

“Elder Rew.” She smiles at the mare. “Blessings. What is what?”

“This place.” Rew gestures with a clumsy sweep of the arm. “What is the nature of our surroundings?”

“Uh, the dream, you mean?”

“Indeed. A dream. You are aware.”

“Course I am.”

“Can you estimate how long you did require from the moment your dream began until you achieved awareness?”

“Uh, it was pretty much right away. There’s always something that makes me… wonder, yeah? Ask questions, like you said. Like,” she spreads her arms, palms up, “what am I doing here, inside this forest? Then I usually look at the palm of my hands, or pinch my nose, to confirm that it’s really a dream, although tonight I didn’t need to, because… It’s hard to explain. I was already sure of it, yeah? I could feel it.”

“I do understand. And that is remarkable, Redeemed van Dolah. You have developed the intuition of a master of the inner walking.”

“Thanks. I’ve been practicing non-stop, changing things all around me.” She points a finger at the oak and smiles with pride. “And I never slip from the dream. Not once! It wasn’t easy—sometimes stuff happens, like before, when a rabbit popped up from the ground, and I was tempted to follow it. There’re always temptations to lose myself in the… dream story, if that makes sense?”

“It does, very much indeed. You have developed a deep intuition for dream mechanics. It is the nature of dreams to engage your consciousness, your dream senses, your attention; to pull you into the logic of their narrative; to gnaw on your awareness until it dissipates completely.”

“Uh, thanks…?”

“You are welcome. Your ability to retain awareness makes you equal to a grounding master. But as pleased as I am to confirm that you comfortably tread the Second Step, it is the Third Step that concerns us during this session. You already appear capable of transforming your environment by just wishing to do so. I shall assess now to what degree.” Rew extends an arm at the large oak that Edda transformed from a birch. “Can you turn it back into the smaller tree with white bark?”

“Into a birch?” Edda stares at the oak, smiles, and waves theatrically at it. “Abracadabra!”

The oak changes at once—branches shrink, trunk thins, bark lightens. It is over in less than a second.

“Ta-dah!” Edda mocks a bow at Rew. “Now, let me guess. This… dream magic is the Third Step, yeah?”

“The Third Step indeed.” Rew nods. “Will-control—dream-substance manipulation by desire.”

“I’ve been practicing. I got really good at it!”

“Manipulation of individual elements is not evidence of mastery.”

Rew directs her expressionless white eyes at the birch. The tree changes again, shrinking rapidly into the shape of a person—into Edda herself.

“What the…! You can change my own dream! Do I really look like that? Wait…” She concentrates. The Edda between the trees looks down to her own bosom as it grows noticeably, tightening the tunic around her chest. “There!”

“Thanks,” the second Edda says with a wide smile.

“Sure, sexy thing.”

Rew waves an arm in silence, almost impatiently. The second Edda disappears.

“Hey! You started it!”

Rew ignores her. “Are your abilities developed enough to change the entire dream environment into something else completely?”

“You mean, like turning the forest into something else?”

“Indeed.”

“Wow.” Edda scans her surroundings. “I’ve never tried that. Into what?”

“That is up to you, Redeemed van Dolah. A full environment exchange. Anything that is not a forest.”

“Aha, let’s see…” She looks thoughtful, then closes her eyes and slows her breathing.

“Are you trying already?” Rew asks.

“Yeah, goahdamnit! It’s difficult!”

“Do picture the new environment. Do wish for it. Do want it.”

“Duh! What do you think I’m doing?”

“There is a technique that might be of assistance. If you do allow.”

“Hold on. Let me…” Edda’s face contracts. “Try…” The surrounding birches remain defiantly solid. “Oof! Okay, I give up. Tell me, oh dream master.”

“A gradual environment transition is hard to accomplish, even for a Walker in the Shadow. But a reset is simpler.”

“Say what?” Edda tilts her head.

“A reset. A clean beginning. Make this environment go away first, and only then wish a second environment into existence.”

Edda frowns in confusion.

“For instance,” Rew says, her feminine, psychic voice reverberating with calm patience, “you may close your eyes for a few moments, and then open them into your desired environment; or you may spin rapidly until the world around you disappears in a blur, while you visualize a fresh one to await you upon completion.”

“Okay. Uh, let’s try with the eyes first.”

The scene goes black in the auditorium, simulating the fact that they are watching the events from Edda’s perspective. Ximena leans forward in the darkness with expectation.

“Visualize…” She hears Edda’s voice in the darkness. She sounds like she is exerting herself. “What I want… A few moments… Okay!”

An almost blinding light returns to a transformed scene.

The forest is gone.

Edda and Rew are now standing on a wooden boat in the midst of a river. A very wide river, wider than