The Dreamer Pt. Six

He was in the same place he had left, outside the dwelling- place. There the boy stood with his back to Adialon. The light that surrounded him before was gone.
Or hidden, Adialon thought.
‘I know who you are,’ said the boy.
‘Who am I?’ Adialon asked, curious as to the boy’s answer.
The boy turned to face him. ‘You’re a man of courage. You’ve fought a lot of battles with your enemies, and have lost a lot of them, but haven’t ever quit. You have saved your family from being wiped out. Everyone in your village owes their life to you, whether they know it or not.’
‘I suppose that is true; however, I was simply doing what I could for my kith and kin.’
‘Family and friends,’ the boy said, nodding. ‘But that’s not all you’ve done.’
‘What is it you imply?’
‘You have laid your soul down as an open sacrifice for everyone you know. Not just your body, but your whole soul. You have given up everything you want for the benefit of everyone else. You have been completely selfless in what you have done. You have fought for so long and spread yourself so thin that you cannot feel any more strength inside you to fight with.’
‘You are not wrong,’ Adialon said. He sat down upon a large rock. The boy sat on another rock across from him.
‘Since you already know so much about me, you must know my name.’
‘But it would be rude to not ask you anyway,’ the boy replied. ‘So, what’s your name?’
‘I am called Adialon where I have come from. What are you called?’
‘They call me Boy.’
‘That is all? Just Boy?’
‘Yes. I have another name, but it’s hidden.’
‘Has it always been hidden?’
‘Ever since I was very little.’
Adialon nodded. He decided not to press the matter. He then looked around him, at the trees and the sky.
‘What world is this?’ Adialon wondered aloud.
‘It is two worlds at once,’ the Boy replied. ‘The dream world, and the spirit world. Anything can happen here. Anything at all.’
‘Then it is a place where worlds meet?’
‘Worlds, and times too.’
‘Do we come from the same world, or perhaps the same time?’
‘Not the same time. Maybe different times of the same world, but I don’t know.’
‘How were you able to do that, before? How were you able to show yourself to the man, and the little girl, back yonder? Were we not, are we not still dreaming?’
‘Yes,’ the Boy said. ‘But we’re dreaming what is really happening. Our dreams are real.’
‘Real dreams. Then they are not truly dreams. They are in fact-’
‘Reality. Yes, they are.’
Adialon pondered this for a moment. Then his questioning began anew.
‘How did you blaze forth, like a torch in a dark place? How did you do such a thing without burning yourself to ash?’
‘My light comes from inside me; so does yours.’
Adialon looked himself over. ‘I see no light.’
‘You have to see it with your spiritual eyes. Maybe you haven’t developed them well enough to see yet. And that’s how others will see you here. When you share your light, it grows. The more it grows, the more people can see it.’
‘How do you know so much of this world? I sense that you are very wise, and yet so very young.’
‘I come here every night when I dream. I have come ever since I was a toddler- a one- or two-year-old,’ he added at Adialon’s confused look. ‘I have never lost my ability to see, because I treasure it as a precious gift, though a heavy gift.’
‘Indeed,’ Adialon nodded. ‘I feel as though I am rediscovering an old gift. I used to dream when I was younger, but have since lost it, the ability or the aptitude.’
‘You haven’t lost it. You’ve just forgotten it.’
‘Are they not the same?’
© 2010 by Adam Scott Campbell. All rights reserved.