Dreaming Awake Read online

  Dreaming Awake

  Dreaming Awake

  E.F. Joyce

  CoNTeNts

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Anaka held the hand of her dearest friend as they were led down one dark corridor after another, each hall looking the same: a winding maze. Despite their entire childhoods spent exploring the palace, Anaka had never known of this terrifying labyrinth. She was only nine, but had been selected from birth to be the closest servant of the future queen. At age ten, Elixa was about to become the next Queen of Dreams, the youngest in Yeraz's long history.

  Her fear mounted as they descended yet another staircase, the crumbling stone walls looming higher around them, reaching for an indiscernible ceiling – a black shadow hovering ominously over them. The gray stone floor matched the walls, as if they were wrapped in an ashen cocoon from which there was no escape. The little princess still carried her resentment toward her papa like a weighted stone – he'd ruined her birthday and made her mother cry. But in this place where evil wove through the very walls like moss, she looked to him for courage.

  Anaka knew this, and though she wanted to be all the strength Elixa would ever need, she was not yet big enough. He walked on Elixa's other side, his face like marble – cold, beautiful and unyielding. He had watched over Yeraz for nearly a thousand years; an immortal among the dying, the keeper of their empire, the guardian against all enemies. They called him the Ilahi, an ancient word for god. Even old, tough men like Grand General Grayna were afraid of him, and of course he could be scary, like when he'd ruined Elixa's birthday. But mostly he was the princess's papa, the man who brought them gifts and read them stories. Elixa reached out with her free hand and grabbed his.

  The ground began to slope gently downward, and with each step her courage faltered. An unnatural darkness fused with the hallway, dimming torches and turning the gray stones to black. Her heart stopped, she swore it did, just for a second. The group halted in front of a thick and towering metal door that loomed forebodingly at the end of the crumbling, dismal path. Anaka wished her friend did not have to become queen, would not be forced to bond with the Sphere of Dreams. She only wanted to return to their rooms, where Elixa would practice her magic and they would play games and run wild through the gardens.

  Outright terror ripped through her like a winter wind as the Ilahi pulled open the massive door, revealing nothing but blackness. Grayna held a torch toward the entrance, but the darkness rejected all attempts at illumination. The place was like a wound in the very fabric of reality, spreading its insidious infection into all that stood before it. She could feel the waves of evil pouring from the dark opening, promising painful death and endless suffering should she take one step further.

  "I can't! I won't go in there! You can't make me!" Elixa screamed, releasing Anaka's hand, running back down the hall, toward the palace, away from the Sphere. Her father snatcher her up, held her tight and gazed into her gray eyes.

  "Breathe," he said to her, his calm voice a counter to her hysterical cries. "Everything will be alright," he promised. "The Sphere wants to grant you power, not harm you."

  The Sphere wants...like it was a living thing. At the time she hadn't realized he'd said that, or what it meant. Not until much later. Right then, she had been too afraid to notice. Elixa nodded and let him carry her into the chamber. Anaka followed, despite her dread. Everything would be fine, the Ilahi had said so. He would never let anything bad happen, not to Elixa, not ever.

  The shadows engulfed them as they stepped over the threshold, the Sphere peeking out through the gloom like a single glowing eye of a great and terrible monster. Elixa cried and kicked and screamed, her small child's voice gaining momentum against the towering emptiness of the stone hallways, echoing back in exaggerated, ghoulish wails. Grayna fidgeted, clearly uncomfortable at Elixa's suffering, though not enough to change his mind, to stop the ceremony and deny the little queen her throne. The empathy in his apprehensive face was quickly replaced with the look of pinched determination, worn by those who had no choice but to accept the inevitable.

  Anaka took a deep breath, disquieted by Elixa's screams of terror and even more so by the monstrous aura that lurked inside. If she were stronger, maybe she could save her friend from her fate, stop all of this and shatter the Sphere into a thousand pieces. But she was only nine; she had no magic and she couldn't do anything at all. Of its own accord, the metal door thundered to a close behind them.

  Chapter 1

  I

  The sea salt filled her lungs, gathered in her nostrils and clung to her long, black hair that lashed around her face in the chill ocean wind. Her knees sunk into the spongy, coffee colored soil, her fingers brushing delicately over the worn headstone. Three years prior, the white marble had shone like the polished floors of the palace ballrooms, before the ceaseless rain had beaten away the sharp corners, washing off every flake of the black paint that had stated her mother's name. Now the carved letters were barely legible:

  Azan Stone.

  Stone was a name for an outsider, for an exile, for a nobody. But Anaka wasn't a nobody. She was Handmaiden to the queen and the Black Hand of Yeraz. She'd been given a new Yerazi surname, as unborn Anaka had been considered blameless, and her mother had ever resented that. "Anaka" meant curse in Wakati, and Azan had so named her child purposefully, constantly reminding Anaka of its meaning.

  She didn't even know what she was doing there, at her mother's grave in that ramshackle corner of the capitol city. In life, she'd been allowed to reside in the palace with Anaka, and in death she'd been shoved into a forgotten, overgrown hole to decompose unnoticed, denied even the traditional Yerazi funeral rites; nothing more than she deserved. Anaka had been sixteen when her mother died, and already the queen's favorite tool. She'd gone to visit her after returning from a particularly successful takeover in the queen's name. Her mother had lain there, so pathetic in that yellowed room, her skin paper and her eyes red.

  "Annie," she'd whispered, her voice cracking against her stone lips. Dutifully, she'd sat next to her mother, held her wrinkled hand, locking her disgust away deep inside her. Be a good daughter, hold your mother's hand, and cry, why aren't you crying? She'd never been good at tears.

  "Please, Annie," she'd wheezed. "I've heard such," coughing, "Terrible things about you. Please tell me," coughing, "About King Herrold. It isn't true. Just tell me that. You are not so evil." In Wakati culture, murder was purest evil, the darkest of sins, an inerasable stain on the soul. A pretty little lie was all that her mother had wanted. A lie that would have done no harm. Just a few words, enough to let her di
e believing that she was a good girl, her Annie, the child she'd never asked for.

  King Herrold. His hot blood had flowed over Anaka's tiny hands when she'd twisted the dagger into his heart, the sickening crunch of his insides ringing in her ears. The nobles in the room had gasped their unbelieving shock, the space between exhalation and action granting her more than enough time to escape.

  Killing him had been so easy. All she'd had to do was to filch a servant's uniform from his palace stores and saunter into his chambers as if she'd belonged there. With her flat nose and dark slanted eyes, medium height and build, Anaka was plain, neither pretty nor ugly, and this was her greatest attribute. She was also Wakati, the island race. Most Wakati in Yeraz were servants or slaves, and so her role was assumed. Unnoticed, invisible, Anaka was the shadow that lurked in the alcove, the cobweb that clung to the ceiling, unseen by the maids day after day.

  Carrying a tray of drinks and Hakkon's stolen dagger up her sleeve, the greedy eyes of each noble had passed over her, unseeing, as if she were a particularly plain bit of wallpaper. And then she'd done it; her seventh assassination. Queen Elixa had claimed his kingdom and the troops had lauded her. They'd taken to calling her the Iron Handmaiden, and she liked it, every bit. Unlike the Wakati Islands, in Yeraz killing was strength – proof that one could conquer over their enemies, and despite her looks, Anaka was Yerazi all the way through.

  "It is true, mother. I murdered the king. And do you know what? The shining light of the heavens did not descend to carry his soul to eternal bliss. Despite what you believe, death isn't pretty. He spat blood in my face, he shit on the carpet and then died in it." She had released her mother's hand, retreating. She couldn't stand another second in that room, the stench of decay lingering on every fiber. Those had been the last words she'd ever said to her mother. She could have lied, but if she had another chance she would have done the same all over again.

  Anaka was not her mother. She would be better; she already was. Her small hands grasped the headstone and she pulled herself to her feet, the soft dirt leaving brown circles on her knees, soaking into the gray fabric of her pants. Anaka pressed her hands against her rounded stomach, her fingers tracing the alien movements inside of her.

  "I will do anything for you," she whispered to her unborn daughter, her words drowning in the wind. "I will tear the world down to keep you safe."

  Wind pulled at her clothes like a hundred tiny fingers as she walked back to the palace, passing busty housewives hurriedly yanking laundry from the lines, the threat of rain pressing upon the city like a living thing. Leaning, water-logged houses were slowly replaced with taller stone structures and eventually mansions the closer Anaka got to the city center. The queen's palace was atop a hill; a dank, gray fortress of fat stone towers and window-lined walls separated from the city by an intimidating stone barricade, rounded down by centuries of ocean storms. The palace road was lined with ten foreboding pillars carved with The Ilahi's likeness, his oppressive glare smothering the city for eternity. The living god of Yeraz; or so the fools believed.

  The Ilahi had strode into Yeraz alone and on foot eight-hundred years prior, charmed its queen with his good looks and became king in less than a fortnight. He was the embodiment of every Yerazi attribute – cold, emotionless, a remorseless killer and a skilled fighter. It was said that he braved the fighting rings every single day for twenty years, earning the love of the people. Rumors flooded the city of his prowess, some even claiming they'd seen him fight through mortal wounds, always miraculously healing.

  When his advisors, guards and wife noticed he had not aged a day in all that time he claimed to be a god sent down from the skies to test the people of Yeraz of their worthiness, that they had been passed and that he would make them rulers of the world – their culture and customs placed above all others. Eight centuries later, with the exception of a small southern kingdom, he had kept this promise. But that had been long ago, if ever at all. These days he was rarely observed with anything more deadly than a wine glass in his hands.

  Guards in heavy wool uniforms nodded at her as she passed through the gates, entering the main hall just as the ash-colored sky burst open, fat droplets sliding aimlessly against the sodden ground. A shiver crawled up her spine, muddy footprints trailing behind her as she climbed the three flights of stairs to her rooms. The vast halls were empty apart from the servants who slid past her, their arms laden with soiled laundry and crusty dishes, not daring to glance in her direction.

  Anaka wished she could exist only in those early morning hours, the halls empty save herself and the diligent servants, free from the gossiping courtesans – visiting representatives and their families from the provinces who struggled to fit in to Yeraz's harsh culture. On several occasions, she had been stopped in the halls and asked to fetch refreshments or take care of their chores, her Wakati ancestry working against her. Thirty of Yeraz's fifty-two provinces had yet to abolish slavery and more than two-thirds the empire's slaves were Wakati. This fact made it easier for her to slip in and out of places unseen, but virtually impossible to demand the respect of anyone.

  The brass knob to her rooms stung her fingers with cold as she pushed open the door. That cursed palace was endlessly cold; the damp chill seeping into everything, burying its roots in the stone, coiling beneath doors and creeping under windowpanes. Anaka changed quickly out of her wet, mud spattered clothes, replacing them with brown fabric pants and a long, cream-colored tunic, rejecting the current fashion of tight corsets and billowing gowns, even before her pregnancy. She hurried to the fourth and highest floor, already late for the council meeting. As if they would miss her.

  II

  The twelve men of the Queen's Council stared at her with their round, blank moon faces, their eyes narrowed in weasel-like animosity as she opened the door and took her seat in between Maurice Sundry, the Master Sorcerer and The Ilahi himself.

  "So glad you could make it, Handmaiden," Yeraz's Grand General and commander of its armies, Earl Grayna greeted icily, the rain beating a rhythm on the window behind his head. "As you are aware, your attendance at these gatherings is not required," he added, flipping through some parchment laid out in front of him, not bothering to make eye contact with her.

  Grand General Grayna was a huge man, bulking muscles barely contained by his thin tunic. His close cropped hair was graying, wrinkles advancing in the corners of his eyes, but these signs of age did nothing to slow him. He continued to lead every charge himself, killing more men than any thought possible and further heightening his reputation among the soldiers. In his first assignment as general, he'd single handedly ended the Seven Years War against the Abori Empire - now the six Abori provinces. Currently the head of the Queen's Council and the commander of all of Yeraz's army, he had more than a hundred Kan Sivids, or legal deaths, to his name.

  "If it were a simple matter of choice Grand General, I would not trouble myself to be here. However, the queen insists," Anaka reminded him coolly, unwilling to falter in front of Grayna, not only a skilled warrior but also cunning; a strategist and able liar. He was no man to be trifled with. But the Handmaiden herself was not one to take light either. Anaka was not only the Handmaiden but also The Black Hand of Yeraz – the head of the city's elite guild of assassins, a title she'd gained two years prior. She was certainly not the youngest to ever achieve the rank – most Black Hands came into office during their teenage years when they were most reckless and fearless, and few kept their lives past the age of thirty.

  The Black Hand commanded the assassin's guild based in the capitol, and the capitol guild controlled all the province guilds. Anaka ruled over them all, answering only to the Ilhai himself. Despite her skill at killing, Anaka doubted she would have chosen assassin as her career path, but the queen had commanded it and above all things she was Elixa's servant.

  The men stirred uncomfortably in their high backed wooden chairs, and she knew they were thinking that the queen's word mattered little in the ma
tters of the council. The queen controls the world, but the council controls the queen, was their secret motto whispered among only themselves, behind closed doors and under cover of darkness.

  "Right," Grayna muttered. "Now, regarding the next item on the agenda, our corn and wheat supplies have decreased by four-fifths since the loss of Tibre," Grayna said, his dirt-colored eyes pinning Anaka to her seat with their silent accusations, reminding everyone who the blame belonged to. She did not look away.

  "If we do not recapture Tibre within a month, we will have to place not only the capitol, but all surrounding provinces on rations. There will be riots and starvation. Our only option at this point is to consider a peace treaty with Dalga. Their king is willing to negotiate."

  "No!" The Ilahi shouted, Anaka flinching in her seat. "It is not the Yerazi way to cow down and sign for peace in threat of hardship. They took from us, and we will not show them mercy. We will take Tibre back by force."

  "And just how do you propose we do that?" Hecton Mills, the renowned war strategist, once a legionnaire before the tragic loss of his left leg chimed in. "The surrounding mountains are impenetrable, as are the Bronze Gates. The tunnel has been collapsed. There is no way in."

  "If we sent a contingent of sorcerers to break down the gates–" he suggested.

  "Sorcerers!" Grayna interjected. "And just where do you suggest we find those? We've lost hundreds of them already in this absurd war. The rest await orders outside Kinjia. We have none left to spare. Right, Sundry?"

  The scarecrow thin man seated to Anaka's right, his hair as gray as his robes, cleared his throat. "Yes, this is true," he admitted, though seeming reluctant.

  "How many have died?" Grayna pressed.

  "About three-hundred-fifty give or take, though it could have easily been more," he admitted, rubbing the skin of the back of his neck with the palm of his hand, a nervous habit he'd developed over the years. Anaka noted the red, flaking skin there and wondered why Sundry would lie about their losses.