City of Torment by Bruce R. Cordell Read Free Book Online

around the space as if he were a real noble. Over the fireplace hung a slender long sword, which was scribed, right on the blade, with the Marhana crest. Anusha’s father had, by all accounts, been an able swordsman in his youth. The servants in the front hall couldn’t see her. They didn’t react to her presence. Why should they? It was her dream� her world! On impulse, she glided right through the front door as if it were nothing but smoke. A moment of darkness and disorientation, then she was through. Laughing, she ran down the wide front steps. Anusha passed through the thick iron gates that separated the manor from the street, feeling only the slightest tug of resistance. “How wondrous!” she exclaimed. A passerby started, glanced sharply around. Anusha studied the man in garish noble garb, but his gaze slid right past her. She covered her mouth to stifle a giggle. Small noises escaped anyway, emerging like a strangled wheeze. The man’s eyes widened and he hurried off, pursued by a laugh she could no longer restrain. Skipping, she set off down the street. She had to explore all the fun possibilities of this dream before she woke up! First, she’d visit the docks. She loved the tall ships and handsome dockhands with stories of far places. Imagine seeing those same sail-topped silhouettes by night! She ran unseen through the street, straight on down toward the dock district. Despite Marhana’s active role in shipping, they kept their mansion far from the piers. So she had to run quite a ways, over a mile. She didn’t mind�it was her dream, and she decided not to feel tired by the exertion. Just as she neared the first wharf, a strange pinch pulled a gasp from her. The sensation felt almost like the sudden jerk of an invisible cord. She slowed, but continued to move forward. The pinch came again� Anusha opened her eyes in her bed. The saffron lengths of linen that swirled around her bedposts glowed in the candlelight from the single night-flame on her bureau. “Oh!” she groaned, realizing she was awake, leaving her brilliant dream behind. If she didn’t think too much, maybe she could recall it. Sometimes good dreams could be picked up again, if she didn’t clutter her mind with too many other thoughts. And she was still so tired from so many nights of too little rest. She turned on her side, closed her eyes again, and tried to recall the dream. She had wandered, conscious of herself in the dream, walking where she would, going where she wanted without others dictating restrictions, unseen by other dream dwellers… Again Anusha found herself standing next to her apparently sleeping body. She clapped her hands in triumph. She was back in the dream! This time, she’d avoid the docks. She’d try someplace else. How about… the Marivaux revelry! If she couldn’t attend the Marivaux party in reality, perhaps she could dream about it. She exited the Marhana manor, unseen as before, and ran down the street. What must have been a full hour of wandering forced her to admit she didn�t actually know where to find the Marivaux home. She had expected she would merely come upon the place, as such things happen in dreams. But that hadn’t happened. Just seedier and seedier storefronts, separated by larger and larger tracts of completely empty, broken structures�victims of the interregnum following the retreat of the wharf. Was she lost? Anusha frowned. Was she not the author of her own slumbering fancy? Perhaps it was time to wake up, after all. She didn’t like the direction in which this dream was headed. Then she saw Japheth. Anusha gave an involuntary gasp. Japheth walked the dark streets with his black cape drawn around him like a raven’s wings, striding purposefully as if he, at least, knew where he was going. Japheth was one of Behroun’s agents. Anusha had seen the man around the manor and even exchanged a few words with him. His hair was black, as were his eyes�like wells reflecting a starry