2.3: A Fighting Chance

“Congratulation, Sherlock! And here I thought you were aware of that this entire time!” she yelled, jumping out of her seat.

She began to pace the room frantically, like a wolf deliberating what to do with a subordinate that had failed her.

“Do you understand why I am upset? Why I'm scared? And you know for a fact I'm not scared of anyone or anything, but this...this stupid, awful link that you can't get rid of in any single way is something else! Who even came up with a Lifelink in the first place, huh? Sure, it can save your life in a cinch, but you're screwed for the rest of it! It's like taking shark loans out in a bad economy with no means or intentions to ever pay them back! Cause when they come to collect, you are deader than a doornail. We’re that doornail, Titus!”

“I didn’t have much of a choice!" I defended.

“With the link or the loans?”

“Yes!”

She glared at me, her nostrils flaring like a dragon about to breathe hellfire onto an unsuspecting village. Then her anger slowly subsided as if she realized she had bigger problems on her plate.

“But,” she said, mincing her words, “the Lifelink did catch Marlette’s attention, according to her. So, as much as I don’t want to admit it, you making the Lifelink may have saved our lives.”

Relief and indignation flooded my soul as I realized that the costly Lifelink I created actually made a difference in saving her life. Relief, because for once I had made the right decision. Indignation, because she had belittled a difficult decision I had made for her sake.

"Is that a thank you?" I said.

"Yes! I'm upset, not ungrateful!"

She sat back down on the stool, her arms crossed in front of her, her eyes gazing unwaveringly at me, begging me to do better.

“You need to step up your game,” she said.

“I know. I’m trying my best.”

Priscilla lowered her head onto the bar and did not move for a long time. I finished the last of my green tea ice cream and set my cup back down on my table. I turned around on my stool away from the bar and rested my back against the edge of the table. As much as I loved the banter we had, there were times when her quips genuinely hurt, and I wasn't sure why.

Change the subject, I told myself. Before you say something stupid.

“The dream cycle should be over by now,” I said.

“It is.”

Thank goodness.

“Then we’re safe at the city and we can finally catch a break,” I said, smiling.

“Nope,” she said, stirring from her nap with a yawn. “We’re traveling deeper into Tartarus as we speak. On a boat.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“I thought we were going to get erased if we were outside the city when the cycle ended,” I said.

“Yes, but apparently, that doesn't apply to Tartarus," she said, rolling her eyes. "Erasing Tartarus would free any prisoners trapped down here from their eternal suffering, according to our Seraph friend, something Morpheus apparently doesn't want."

Iris seems to be on good terms with Morpheus, I thought. Why would she do something he would hate?

I had not forgotten the task I had sworn on oath to help Iris accomplish, to help her free a prisoner from the nightmare. I wasn't sure what I was expecting, maybe a quick prison break that I would be able to do with the help of a few time dilations. But now that I knew that we would have to deal with Morpheus to free the prisoner, I felt less confidant about our success and even less confident about Iris's intentions toward us. Was she trying to get us killed? Certainly, she knew that picking a fight with the Warden of the Nightmare in our current state was a terrible idea.

"Marlette promised to take us to the city if we helped her free a prisoner trapped here," she said. "We do that for her and she’ll give us the key fragment Fraysser stole from us.”

Good, she already knows.

"So Fraysser's dead," I said.

“Most likely.”

“And Esther?”

She shook her head.

“I really don’t know," she said, clearly not wanting to talk about her friend. "We still have the cat, though.”

“Gordon!" I exclaimed. "He’s alive! How?”

“Marlette had the backpack with her when she found us and the cat was inside. Speaking of which, why did you leave the cat behind?”

My mind began to race.

“He asked me to leave him behind,” I said. “He said he would have died if he entered Tartarus.”

“Well clearly, he was lying to you! He was just fine when I saw him.”

I frowned.

“Having him during the fight would have made a huge difference,” I said. “He better have a good reason for lying to me. Where is he?”

“I left him inside a trashcan at the edge of this dream since he was being a bit much,” she said, smiling wryly. “We’ll pick him up on our way out.”

“Okay, he deserves that for lying to us, but leaving a cat inside a trash can is just messed up.”

“He’s inside a pocket dimension. He’ll be fine!”

“The backpack won’t be. And guess who has to carry that backpack around?"

“The trashcan was empty! You'll be fine.”

She stood up from the bar and made her way toward the ice cream parlor’s exit.

“Sorry to cut our vacation short, but Marlette should almost be done with patching up our bodies and I'm anxious to see if we're going to be alright. Let’s wait for her at the edge of the dream.”

“No, thanks for playing along,” I said. “I've forgotten how much fun we had climbing the Cathedral."

I stood up, but not before Priscilla motioned for me to clean up our table.

“We’re in a dream,” I said. “The workers here don’t have feelings.”

“That’s rich coming from someone who complained every day about how much he hated working food service,” she said. “Clean it up!”

“Hey, you remembered something about me!”

“All the useless information, yes,” she said curtly. “Ugh. I still can’t believe I thought we were a thing all those years! "

I laughed heartily as I removed the spoons from the empty cups before stacking the paper cups together. I grabbed the stack with one hand and the spoons with the other as I hopped off my stool.

“You really missed having a vassal, didn’t you?”

“Just a bit.”

We made our way to the exit together. I waved goodbye to the cashier who had returned from the kitchen. She waved back with a smile on her face.

When we reached the exit, Priscilla propped open the exit door with her back. I pushed the trash compartment flap open with a napkin before dumping the cups and spoon into the darkness within. Then I tossed the napkin in after them.

I stepped out the door first.

“Thanks,” I said.

“Uh-huh.”

We were greeted by the late afternoon sun as we stepped out into the deserted town square. Directly in front of the ice cream parlor was the marvelous stone fountain gifted to the Dawn by the Dragon Knights after they agreed to take on as a student the troubled youth that was Yeigar. The three-layer fountain ran not on electricity but a closed magical circuit that only needed to be recharged annually.

Magic lamps mounted on tall, olive-colored poles lined the streets surrounding the fountain. The lamps emitted a mesmerizing blue light that shone like stars precisely at 6 pm, about fifteen minutes before the sunset. At night, walking through town square under these lamps was like taking a stroll through the outer reaches of space where galaxies were at arm's reach.

The fragrance of fresh ice cream wafted out from within the ice cream parlor to mingle with the aroma of warm, buttery pretzels from the bakery on the other side of the fountain. It was like stepping into a fragrant steam bath at a luxury buffet, where fine food was served to you while you relaxed in a quality hot tub.

The level of immersion the illusion achieved was astounding. I felt quite at home even though I knew that what I saw was a lie. Yet one glaring error made it impossible for me to fully buy into the facade: the town square was nearly a ghost town. Sure, there were a handful of people entering the restaurants and shopping outlines but not nearly as many as there would usually be at any given time during the day. It was an unyielding reminder that I was in a prison of another's making, far from home and safety.

“Does any of this look familiar to you?” I asked. “I know it’s been seven years.”

“It feels familiar,” she replied. “This is what I imagine the city to look like. Was the Dawn really this beautiful? The Cathedral, especially.”

“Yes. Some details are off, like those lampposts over there are supposed to be bright red, not olive green. But enough is correct that I don’t think twice about the difference.”

“Mother was a perfectionist, but I don’t think she’s ever seen the Dawn. She must have created the world from someone else’s memory.”

“Is that how illusion magic works?”

“Something like that.”

Four cobblestone paths converged at the stone fountain, which was also the dead center of town square. One path led south to the dormitories where we lived, one led east to the guild headquarters where all major guild decisions were made, one led north to the Rosen Bridge, where one could cross in-between worlds, and one led west to the vast wastelands where dangerous monsters roamed unhindered.

Priscilla led me west, though it would be some time before we actually hit the wastelands. I thought about asking if we were going the right direction, but she seemed so certain I assumed that was where Iris had instructed her to go.

“How far until the edge of the dream?”

“A few minutes,” she replied. “You'll see a beat-up trash can when we get there. Why, you tired of walking already?”

“No, I just wanted to ask you something about your stepmom before Marlette wakes us up. Something important.”

“Go ahead.”

“Why is your stepmom giving us a fighting chance?”

Priscilla hated talking about her stepmom, but I needed to know more about what motivated Marchioness Hilda to know what we were up against. Her stepmom had nearly killed both of us already, and I had a feeling we weren't even close to escaping her nightmare.

"Fine," she said. "Then you tell me this first. Why did you keep Marlette a secret from me?"