The Dreamer Pt. Seven

‘I come here every night when I dream. I have come ever since I was a toddler- a one- or two-year-old,’ the Boy 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?’
‘No. One is about the physical world, one is about memory.’
‘Ah. I see your reasoning. So what happens at this time?’
‘There is a lost little boy wandering alone up this next street. I'll go to comfort him and take him home. What about you?’
Adialon knew instinctively that he needed to learn all he could about this world, and he also knew that this boy, if anyone, could teach him.
‘I will come with you.’
‘This is a dangerous world,’ the Boy warned him. ‘If you stay, you will be under constant attack, whether you know it or not.’
‘You have survived thus far,’ Adialon pointed out. ‘Will you teach me to do the same?’
The Boy nodded slowly. ‘Yes.’
The Boy strode down the pathway of stone, Adialon following. In a moment they turned a corner onto the next- ‘Street,’ Adialon thought aloud, remembering what the Boy had said. A little two or three year old boy sat on a raised part of the street, weeping piteously.
Adialon watched closely to see what the Boy would do. Power blazing forth is hardly what the child needs, thought Adialon.
The Boy squatted on his heels next to the child, who looked up with red, swollen eyes, tears streaming down his face.
‘Hey there,’ he murmured. ‘It’s going to be okay.’
The child looked solemnly up at the Boy for a moment. Then, to Adialon’s wonder, he reached up his arms toward the Boy, who gently picked him up.
‘Come on, buddy. Let’s get you home.’
Adialon followed as the Boy carried the child, curled up with his face buried in the Boy’s shoulder.
Time passed as they crossed one street and turned onto another, until Adialon had lost all sense of direction. The Boy must know where he is going. Soon the little boy had stopped crying. In only a few moments more the child had fallen into a deep slumber, his fears and sorrows forgotten.
Such a simple thing to do, Adialon thought, to reach out and care for someone else. We are much the same, really. Both giving of ourselves. Both concerned for those in our sphere of influence.
‘We’re almost there,’ said the Boy.
The Boy had taken only a few more steps when he stiffened, looking around him in sudden alarm. He quickly turned to Adialon. ‘Take him!’ he said, handing the child over to Adialon, who accepted the child into his own arms unquestioningly. The Boy pointed to a dwelling farther up the street. ‘He lives there. Hurry!’
The Boy then turned away, his hands tightening into fists as though readying himself for a fight.
Adialon did not stay to find out what would happen. He hurried to the dwelling the Boy had pointed out, and rapped smartly on the dwelling’s closed portal. Almost immediately the portal opened, to show a diminutive, raven-haired woman, whose face was streaked with dried tears. At first the woman seemed wary, almost afraid of him, but then her eyes fell to the child in his arms.
‘Sammy!’ she cried. ‘Oh, Sammy, my poor boy!’ She reached out to take the slumbering child into her own arms. She held him close, rocking him slowly back and forth. Her eyes then returned to him.
‘Thank you! Thank you so much! I have been so worried. I took him with me to visit my friend and we were talking in her yard; I put him down for moment, talking to my friend, and when I looked down he was gone.’
‘Twas my pleasure, lady,’ he said awkwardly. ‘In truth, it was not I but my friend who found him.’
‘Will you please tell him thank you for me?’ she smiled through her tears.
‘I shall.’
When the portal had closed, Adialon turned, looking up the street from whence he had come.
The Boy was gone.
Adialon hurried toward the place where he and the Boy had last spoken. When he was within a few paces, he became aware of a dark cloud before him, and suddenly was afraid.
© 2010 by Adam Scott Campbell. All rights reserved.