Chapter Two, draft 1.5

Andrea meets a watcher and his charges

“Edgar is a watcher,” Candy explained. “His duty is to protect wanderers and their ways.”

“My name is An--” she began, only to be cut off by a hiss from Candy.

“You can trust Edgar,” she said, “but you never say your real name out loud here.”

“Oh,” said Andrea. “Sorry. I’m Angela.”

“Angela,” Edgar murmured, his brow furrowing. “Female of angelus, angel. Fitting for a wanderer, I suppose. And not so different from your real name that you’re like to forget it. Do not forget, mind. There are dangers enough here without giving your name away.” He nodded, and stepped back, his arm moving in an expansive gesture to the clearing behind him.

A half dozen people lay about or stood talking around a tall, wooden pole, its top capped with a brass sphere trailing ribbons of every color. The ribbons floated in the air like the tentacles of a jellyfish underwater, wrapping and unwrapping around the pole or simply eddying about in the air around them. “Is that what protects us?” Andrea said.

Candy giggled and Edgar said, “No, it is merely a device the wanderers occasionally focus on. It is pretty, no?”

Andrea nodded her agreement. She looked instead to the people ranged around it, some as outlandishly dressed as Candy and others she wouldn’t glance at twice in the waking world. Candy had already gone over to a sleeping pair, rousing them and talking animatedly, about her latest adventure, Andrea supposed. Our adventure.

“Are they all wanderers?” Andrea said.

Edgar shook his head slowly. “Each of them has lost her or his way. A couple of them have none left. They come here because it is safe, and those who can seek other ways. I take it you will do the same?”

“It’s the only way I can wake up, right?”

The old man chuckled. “Indeed.”

“Does that mean my body back home will continue sleeping as long as I am here?”

Edgar nodded, then said, “You will find, however, that time is fickle. You may spend days or weeks wandering only to find that very little time has passed in your world.”

Andrea sighed. “Will it really take me days to find another way?”

“Some of the people in this clearing have spent years looking. Candy really has not told you much, has she?”

Andrea chuckled. “To be fair, she didn’t have much time.” She looked over to her, seeing how happy she looked conversing with her two friends; a hulking woman swaddled in dark tatters and rags, and a wisp of a boy with long, pale hair and clothes of forest green. “She told me not to leave the house and I didn’t listen.”

“Was that your way?”

“I think so.”

Edgar put a hand on her shoulder, and turned her to face him. “Close your eyes, child,” he said, and she complied. “Think of your home, of the bed you fell asleep in. Think of how it feels to wake up on a morning with no obligations, no hurries. Think of this, and tell me what you feel.”

She imagined opening her eyes to see the powder blue ceiling above lit by the morning light streaming in through her curtains. She heard the burble of the coffeemaker in the kitchen, and thought of how the smell always wafted into her nostrils even before she woke. Andrea imagined the feel of her sheets under her naked flesh, of the heavy warmth of the comforter above, the softness of her pillows.

“Relaxed,” she said at last as she opened her eyes. “And a little scared I won’t feel that again.”

“Very good,” Edgar said. “You bear an intrinsic connection to your world, Angela. If you can think of home and feel anything but stark terror, there remains a way to return there. Should the final way be destroyed, you will feel it in your very bones.”

“Is that what made you a watcher?” she asked, then immediately clapped a hand to her mouth. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean"”

The watcher laughed. “No, child, I take no offense. As a watcher, I am of this place as you are of your world. My duty is to protect wanderers and their ways, and for those as gathered here, help them find other ways or offer what protection I can.”

Candy looked at Andrea and called out, waving for her to join her companions. She excused herself, Edgar nodded and moved on to his charges, and Andrea walked over to Candy and her friends.

“So, Angela,” said Candy with a smirk, “I want you to meet my friends. This is Buxom and Sylvan.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Andrea said with a nod to the woman and boy. “Did I pick the wrong name? Does everyone choose a word?”

“It’s just a name, it’s not important as long as it’s not your true name,” said Candy. “Anyway, ‘Edgar’ isn’t a word. Though I think it means ‘spear’ or something like that.”

Buxom chuckled as Sylvan rolled his eyes. “Is this your first visit to the Waning, Angela?” she asked.

“Is that what this place is called?”

“Not a place,” Candy said, sticking out her tongue.

Sylvan brushed a lock of hair out of his face. “The Waning is the space between the worlds. It is populated with the dreams of sleepers, and very occasionally the dreamers themselves. We are such dreamers. You should feel lucky.”

Andrea frowned and said, “I just feel scared and confused so far. I just want to find a way--”

Candy shushed her and Sylvan stared as he put an arm around Buxom and held her close. “We don’t speak of that in front of Buxom,” he hissed.

“It’s all right, dear,” said Buxom, her voice muffled by Sylvan’s thin chest. She turned to Andrea and wiped a tear from her face. “I really shouldn’t be so sensitive about it anyway, it’s been decades. I’m what we call a widow, dear. I’m here until the end.”

“I’m sorry,” Andrea said. “I ought to be more sensible with what I say. I didn’t mean to upset you, Buxom.”

The other woman waved a hand at her. “You didn’t know. If you’ll excuse me, I’d really like to go lie down now.” Sylvan led her away, turning back to glare at Andrea as they retreated.

“I'm off to a great start with your friends," Andrea sighed.

Candy patted her back. “Chin up, she knows you didn't mean nothin' by it. She should get used to green ones going on about their ways and how much they can't wait to get back, it's only natural."

“Has she really been here for decades?"

“So she says, and I've never known her to exaggerate things. I think she was a wanderer for most of her life. There's a big part of her that loves the Waning, but it's not the same when you can't ever go back."

“Is she . . . I mean, back in her world--"

“No one knows for sure, not even the watchers. Lots of folk think that what comes here is the soul, and if the soul can't get back to the body, the body dies."

Andrea thought on this in silence. She imagined herself in a coma for months before her last way fell to whatever preyed on wanderers. She envisioned her friends and family clustered around her body as her heart finally stopped, the last bridge back shattered, and her loved ones never knowing she lived on in a strange realm of wonder and nightmare. A tear slipped down her face and she hastily brushed it away, turning her head away from Candy.

“How does the protection of this place work?” Andrea said after clearing her throat.

“It’s something like your house,” replied the girl. “So long as someone remains in this clearing, it is safe. Usually that’s Edgar, though he sometimes goes with a wanderer when they go out looking for a way. Just to be sure, you never leave the clearing without telling someone that you’re going.”

The wind picked up again, the trees creaking and groaning. “Of course, the odd wailer tries to test their strength against the ward. It’s useless, they’ll never make it fall so long as we’re here.” After a moment, the wind subsided and Candy gave Andrea a satisfied grin.

“What’s a wailer?” Andrea asked, looking around for any signs of danger or the wind returning.

“A wailer is someone who’s picked up a thing or two about the Waning. They can twist and manipulate it. It’s a safe bet that a wailer broke up your house like that, maybe more than one. You don’t ever want to get caught out alone with a wailer. You see one, you run.”

“What do they look like?”

“Like anyone else, I suppose.”

Andrea sighed. “There’s no knowing who is a wailer, then?”

“Like I said, they do stuff. If you see anything weird going on around someone, take off, okay?”

“Candy,” Andrea began, pointing to the pole and its ribbons, “that is weird. Should I assume everyone in this clearing is a wailer?” A couple of people turned to look at her with concerned expressions. She flushed, not having intended to speak that loud. She lowered her voice to a whisper, “I guess it’s bad manners to call someone that, right?” Candy nodded.

Andrea thought about dreams and her attempts to manipulate them. She opened her mouth, closed it again, then said, “It doesn’t sound necessarily bad to be a wailer, though.”

Candy began to protest, then frowned and put a finger to her lips. “I mean,” she said, “you’re not wrong. But no one here has ever met a wailer who wasn’t trying to hurt them, or break ways.”

“Edgar!” Andrea called to the watcher, who rose from his crouch, smiled at the woman he had been speaking with, and walked over her with a deliberate pace.

“May I help you, Angela?” he said somewhat shortly.

“Can anyone become a wailer?”

His eyes as he set his jaw. “In theory. However, I don’t see how you would learn without another wailer to teach you, and seeing as they all subscribe to ideals of violence and chaos"”

Andrea cut him off. “I want to learn. I believe it will help me find another way.”

“Very well,” Edgar said. The corner of his mouth quirked in a lopsided grin. “Learn, if you will. It makes no difference to me so long as you do not harm any of these people, or break the ward on this clearing.”

Candy goggled at her. “You’re off your head.”

“Maybe, but I would rather try something than wait and do nothing.”

Edgar regarded her for several long moments, Andrea meeting his gaze unflinchingly. “Perhaps,” he muttered. “Look to the pole and its ribbons. Sometimes the wanderers here can bend them to their will. If you wish to become a wailer, begin with that.”

Andrea nodded and turned to take in the pole again. She focused on a red ribbon, one of many, that floated lazily near the wood. Stilling her thoughts, her longing to return home, her confusion at her situation, she cleared space until only the ribbon existed in her mind. Everything around it fell away; the clearing, the wanderers, Edgar; she saw only the ribbon and its slow waving. Straight as an arrow, she thought, and bent her mind to it. Andrea pictured the ribbon pulling taut with tension, sticking straight out from the ball atop the pole and vibrating to an unseen force.

The ribbon continued its subdued flutter.

“Well,” Edgar said, “you have time yet.”

Andrea frowned and closed her eyes. The image of the tight-drawn ribbon burned in her mind, a glowing line of crimson.

Candy gasped, and Edgar growled in discomfort.

Andrea opened her eyes. The red ribbon had torn near the top, and the bulk of it floated slowly to the ground. Edgar stared at her, and Candy gaped.

Author's Note

I'm not too sure about this one. Feel free to point out errors, provide suggestions, etc.