The Wizard of Ooze by David Farland

Author:David Farland
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Fantasy, Children
Publisher: Deseret Book Company
Published: 2012-01-05T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

DREAMS

There are those who wish that their dreams would come true.

I, for one, fear that day.

—RUFUS FLYCATCHER

Deep in the shadows, she could make out something dark and slimy and huge.

In his dreams, Benjamin Ravenspell was chained to Amber. They were in some rocky barrens, with snow and ice all about. Coyotes yowled in the distance, their voices rising and falling eerily. Amber was trying to leave him, to run off to the coyotes, and Ben kept tugging, tugging, trying to pull her back to safety.

But suddenly Ben realized that the coyotes were coming to get him. He turned and tried to run, but Amber held onto his chains.

“Amber, let me go!” he cried, and he turned to see a huge coyote looming behind her, as large as a hill. Its fangs were bared, and its red tongue lolled out.

Amber stared at Ben with glazed eyes. “I’ll never let you go,” she intoned softly. “You’ll always be my slave. You’ll always be my mouse.”

* * *

In his dreams, Bushmaster the vole was lying in a burrow, warm and dry, with a belly full of seeds.

Young voles were running all around, leaping onto his stomach, and then jumping high up into the air as if he were a trampoline.

* * *

Amber wandered through her dream in a dark tunnel. Ahead she could hear the beautiful sound of wormsong, as clear as a waterfall.

Her tiny footsteps on the floor echoed loudly from the stone walls, and Amber peered ahead.

She padded past moldy rocks dripping with slime and past the bodies of dead mice, decaying in the darkness.

She spotted a form that she recognized.

“Mother?” she said. “Is that you?”

She lunged forward and peered down, sniffing.

She smelled the sweet, comforting scent of her mother. But the mess of bones and hair that was rotting on the floor would never give her comfort again.

Filled with rage, Amber stood up and peered down the tunnel ahead.

Deep in the shadows, she could make out something dark and slimy and huge.

Gripping her needle in her fist, she rushed forward to do battle.

* * *

But of all the creatures that slept, Thorn’s dreams were the worst. He dreamt of whispers, of an evil mouse whispering, and some part of his mind, perhaps only a tenth awake, listened intently.

A mouse named Dearth stood in the snow just outside the burrow. He held his paws over his ears, trying to block out the wormsong that could be heard just above the howling winds of the storm. The mouse was whispering, “Please, don’t eat me, master. I’ve found them. They’re asleep, just as I promised!”

As if through Dearth’s eyes, Thorn peered into the snow. There was a blizzard outside, winds screaming through the crags and rocks, blinding white snowflakes piling in drifts. The very sight of it made Thorn shiver to the bone.

“Please, don’t eat me,” Dearth whispered.

And suddenly, Thorn saw eyes there in the snow, a pair of black eyes like tiny stones. He saw white shapes moving toward him stealthily.

Weasels! Three of them.

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