The War for the Waking World (11 page)

She was answered by frantic rustling, hisses, and whispers.

“Scath, I am the master of the Shadow Key!” she cried out, the words flash-simmering like water thrown on hot coals. “I am
your
master! I call you to account for this. I call you to come to me and answer for yourselves. And, so help me, if your answer is displeasing, I will use the Shadow Key to end you all!”

“Nooooo!” came a myriad of cries.

“Mercy upon us!”

“It wasn't our fault!”

“He asked us!”

“He invited us!”

“Told us it was a game!”

Kara stepped back over Rigby and confronted a cauldron of suddenly obsequious Scath. “Speak!” she demanded. “Quickly! Or you'll regret the moment you were formed!”

In a storm of mewling, apologetic rasps, shouts, and interruptions, Kara pieced together the story. Rigby had tricked the Scath into killing him. He'd become despondent over his failures and his capture at Kara's hands. He'd come so close to ruling as the next Nightmare Lord only to have it snatched away at the last moment. But because he
was cobalt-shackled, he couldn't use his will to end his own life, so he engaged the Scath in what he had called a game.

This was the part that made the fine hair on Kara's arms stand on end. He'd called the game: Something Scary. The rules were simple: it had been Rigby versus the Scath. Rigby began by asking, “Do you want to see something really scary?” He turned his back on the Scath, and then spun around with the most horrific facial expressions he could manage.

When it was the Scath's turn, they would do the same: “Does fleshling want to see something really scary?” The Scath would then whirl and writhe until, at last, becoming some fearsome sight, each more terrifying than the one that came before. According to the Scath's rambling recollection, they had played five rounds, but on the sixth round, the Scath had revealed what they called “their inner black.”

“Did Rigby know about your inner black?” Kara demanded.

“Don't know.”

“Rigby studied us.”

“Learned from the Lurker, maybe.”

“Don't show me!” Kara ordered. “Explain to me. What is this inner black?”

The Scath shuffled nervously. “Inner black is what made us.”

“Nightmare flesh.”

“Pure, rotten evil.”

“Mask of death.”

Kara swallowed again. The Scath, she reminded herself gravely, still had their secrets. From their origins as Sages in the Garnet Province Libraries to their corruption by an ancient Nightmare Lord to their current subjugation under the possessor of the Shadow Key, the Scath were full of mysteries. Dangerous mysteries.

And, by Rigby's trickery, the Scath had literally frightened Rigby to death.

She looked down on him and felt pity. Yes, the Scath had killed
him, but it was no different from cowardly suicide. “Poor Rigby,” she whispered. “I thought you were made of stronger stuff than this.”

Her eyes blazing once more, she rounded on the Scath and unleashed a violent torrent of will. Like invisible hands made of hurricane winds, Kara corralled the Scath, tossed them headlong into one of the chamber's many rooms, and slammed the door shut. Kara willed the entire room to harden into cobalt and found herself silently exulting at the Scath's screams of agony echoing through the metal.

Kara turned, took a final look at Rigby, and marched all the way out of the Karakurian Chamber. She collapsed onto her throne seat, but she did not weep. Instead, she thought about where current events had left her. She no longer had Rigby as a resource, nor as a source of entertainment. It meant there were more things to figure out on her own, but that wasn't a problem. After all, she'd studied Doctor Scoville's first papers and experiments with lucid dreaming. She'd learned the techniques and even developed more effective methods.

Doctor Scoville.

Kara felt a chill at his name. Doc Scoville or, as he was known in the Dream, the Lurker, was not an opponent to be taken lightly. And Rigby had said that Doc Scoville had completed even more research.
Things I know nothing about,
Kara thought dismally.
He might know things that could interfere.

And if Doc Scoville found out his cherished nephew had died while imprisoned by Kara, well . . . he wasn't likely to become an ally then, was he?
No,
Kara reasoned with a sad laugh,
no, he'd probably storm Dream Inc. Tower.
Even if he couldn't defeat Kara in her stronghold, he'd likely batter himself to death in the attempt.

No, Doc Scoville could not learn of Rigby's death. And, just like that, all the pieces fell into place for Kara. She suddenly knew, step-by-crafty-step, what she needed to do to pull this off. She'd begin immediately.

“Scath!” Kara flexed her will to open the cobalt-encased room within the Karakurian Chamber. “Come to me!”

And this time, the Scath were more than punctual. They raced from the Karakurian Chamber as if pursued by ghosts even more frightening than themselves.

“What does master want?”

“Thank you, kind master, for releasing us.”

“Hurt room hurts us.”

“We are sorry for dead fleshling.”

“None of that,” Kara commanded. “Listen to me. I want you to take Rigby's body. Go beneath the Veil and hide his body someplace where no one will ever find it.” The thought struck her pointedly: how quickly a living person—a
he
—could become inanimate matter and be called an
it
.

“We obeys!”

“Hide the fleshling good!”

Kara stood up from her throne and stared down at the Scath. “You listen to me: you hide his body well. Mess this up, and I won't kill you. I'll lock you in a cobalt prison . . . for eternity.”

Doc Scoville stood in the kitchen of his home and sipped on a steaming cup of coffee.
It's a beautiful afternoon
, he thought, staring out through the window above the sink.
Much warmer in January than it ought to be
. The snow had mostly melted away. “What's this?” he muttered, slowly setting his coffee cup down on the counter. He craned his neck a bit and smiled. A happy little group of bright red cardinals were playing in the backyard evergreens. They f littered from limb to limb, resting on a swaying branch for only a moment before leaping to a new perch.

Absolutely stunning day
, he thought, lifting the almond-flavored coffee to his lips once more. The sun lit the yard in golden hues and caught
on the already-budding branches of the ornamental cherry trees. It were as if spring had broken through the gate of winter to capture this day.

It was, Doc Scoville thought, a welcome invasion. He took his coffee to the kitchen table and sat down to ponder important decisions to come. After all, it was clearly a day for a walk.

He put down his coffee cup and began to scroll mentally through the many exotic pets he had in the basement zoo. Which one would he take on the walk?

Then, Doc Scoville heard something entirely unexpected. The front door to the house opened. There were footsteps in the foyer.

Strange,
Doc Scoville thought.
I wasn't expecting a visitor today.

He started to stand, but then plopped into his seat at the sight of a young man coming around the corner into the dining room.

“Rigby?” Doc Scoville whispered. “Is that you?”

Rigby smiled and scratched at one of his long sideburns. “Of course it's me, Uncle,” he said. “It's a beautiful day outside. Care for a walk?”

FIFTEEN

O
PENING
S
TATEMENTS

“A
LL RISE
!” T
HE BAILIFF-WARRIOR
'
S VOICE WAS A CLARION
call to the courtroom. At once, deep, demanding, sacred and solemn—it was a voice no one would ever dream of defying. “The most honorable High Chief Justice, Michael the Archelion, is presiding!”

Archer bounced to his feet, and so powerful was the moment he had to fight the urge to salute.

The rest of the cavernous courtroom, which had been abuzz with conversation, went absolutely still and silent. It seemed somehow impossible: the courtroom was absolutely enormous. Intricately carved and stained wood paneling divided at regular intervals by tall columns of marble—the interior looked worthy of a palace . . . or a museum. The four chandeliers that hung from the vaulted ceiling high above—each one seven feet in diameter and lit with a hundred candles—flared suddenly.

“Be ye warned,” the bailiff-warrior continued. “Leave all deceit behind, and darken not this hallowed court with thy vain ambitions, lest . . . ye . . . die.”

Archer swallowed.
No lies. Check.

A pair of magnificent fourteen-foot-high doors stood on either side of the magnificently carved, throne-like judge's bench. Archer wasn't sure which pair of doors to watch, but the doors to the left opened suddenly, and in strode a being very similar to Master Gabriel, only greater in every way imaginable.

The judge, Michael the Archelion, stood more than half as tall
as the doors, was broad shouldered, and clad in Incandescent Armor, but the markings and engravings upon the plates seemed somewhat different from Gabriel's. Or maybe the markings were just more numerous upon the judge's armor. Archer wasn't sure, but either way, the designs gave Justice Michael undeniable authority.

The capes didn't hurt either. The judge wore a black cape, a silver cape, a gray cape, and an indigo blue cape, and they were somehow layered and intertwined so that when he ascended a hidden stair to the judge's bench, a hypnotic ripple of color followed behind him.

Unlike Master Gabriel, the chief justice was clean shaven, but his jaw was square and his expression, grave and determined underneath a full head of long, dark hair layered with dignified ribbons of silver. A single cord of black and silver metal encircled his high and regal forehead conveying an air of royalty. Michael's brow was heavy, and both the size and ferocity of his eyes reminded Archer of a bald eagle's glare.

“Be seated!” the bailiff-warrior commanded.

Archer sat, and for the first time was collected enough to notice anybody else in the courtroom. He noted the seating galleries on either side of the courtroom were now full, populated by scores of armor-clad warriors, both male and female. They sat in unison with such precision that Archer sighed.
So much for a jury of my peers,
he thought.

Even without them, the intimidation factor, on a scale of 1–10, was a 13.5. Archer had done class projects where he'd had to speak in front of the whole class. Once, he'd even spoken to an auditorium full of adults for a school fund-raiser. But he'd never spoken on a stage like this one. And the stakes had never been higher.

The only consolation, if there were any, was that Bezeal didn't seem too comfortable, either. The diminutive merchant, now Archer's chief accuser, sat at a desk across the center aisle from Archer's desk that was far too big for him. His feet dangled comically beneath the chair.

It was the very first time Archer had ever noticed Bezeal's feet.
They were predictably strange, just like the rest of Bezeal. He wore black boots, but they were squat things, tapering from the shin to a blockish heel. The strangest bit was the boots had no toes. There was the back heel but that extended forward into a kind of angular wedge. How much odder could he get?

The bailiff-warrior spoke once more. “The court will now hear the capital case of
Dreamtreader Archer Keaton vs. Humanity
.”

The judge looked at a scroll in front of him, and then leaned forward to speak; “Am I to understand, Dreamtreader Keaton, that you will have no counsel other than yourself?”

“Yes, your majesty,” Archer mumbled.

Justice Michael blinked. “I am no king,” he said. “
Judge
,
Justice
,
your honor
, or even a simple
sir
will do here, Archer.”

“Yes, your maj—er . . . sir.”

“Are you certain you want to do this alone?” the judge asked.

Want to?
Archer thought.
Well, no, I don't want to, but what choice do I have?

“Judge, I will be my only counsel—”

Poof!
In a cloud of purple smoke and blue sparks, Razz appeared. She was wearing a slate gray pantsuit, a black tie, and dark heels. She carried a leather briefcase that was just her size and plopped down to the desktop next to Archer's left hand.

“I apologize for my lateness, your high judgeship,” she said, toning down the squeak of her voice a little. “As I'm sure you know, things are not going well with the Waking World down there.”

“Razz,” Archer hiss-whispered, “what are you doing here?”

“Gabriel sent me,” she said. “I'm your co-counsel.”

SIXTEEN