The lamp-bright moon lit the eastern sky. All traces of the evening meal had cleared away, and with it most of the other passengers. All who remained were Keir's group and the few travelers who sat in the row with them. Chuck relaxed in his seat with the feeling of contentment from being full of good food in a nice, comfortable place to sit that was neither too hot nor too cold. He enjoyed it, although the sensation wouldn't last, of course. Good things never stayed good around him.
The gaslights on the walls were turned down very low, making it possible for him to watch tiny lights out on the horizon. Above them, glittering stars spangled the sky like diamonds on black velvet. On one side he could see nothing but blackness. They must be rounding the inner curve of the mountains, just as Keir had said. Keir aroused Chuck's curiosity. What was he doing on this trip? Was he a guide all the time, or was he ever anyone else's client? How did he get to do what he did—that is, of course, if he was real. Chuck had to take that into account. This whole Dreamland place was very convincing, but he had no idea whether or not any of it had tangible existence outside the trance state. The same went for the other members of his group. What if they weren't real people? An odd thought struck Chuck: What if he wasn't real? What if someone else was dreaming him, who imagined that he had an existence in the physical world? Hastily, he pushed the consideration aside. It was too big a question to ask, when he was so comfortable.
A few of the others were looking outside, too. As the train rounded a curve, Persemid glanced at the face of the full moon, jumped up, and dashed out of the car into the corridor. Chuck heard the sliding of doors or windows.
After a short while she came back and plumped into her seat, all without explanation or apology. Chuck desperately wanted to ask what she had been doing, but one look at Persemid's closed face, and he could have zipped his mouth shut permanently. Keir was in another row, ministering angelically to Pipistrella. The tall woman, now an autumn-bright vision with red-gold hair and a sprinkle of tiny, bewitching freckles on her nose, was gabbing away at him about crystals, rainbows and other pseudo-occult things. There was no disturbing them; Pipistrella was as secure in her privacy as if she was in a confessional. She truly didn't care if she was overheard. It wasn't long before Chuck tuned her out. She was a very pretty woman, and pleasant to travel with until she opened her mouth. Persemid was more of a challenge, but at least she didn't babble.
Now that he had a moment for free thought, Chuck decided to see what was in all those suitcases he had been carrying around with him. He wasn't sure if he owned enough things to fill the gigantic, blue steamer trunk, let alone the other four. Once the dinner table had disappeared again, whisked away by the efficient crew of waiters, there was just room to get the trunk down and open it. Chuck took hold of the handle with both hands. Hiramus was reading a newspaper. His precious carpetbag sat on the shelf over his head next to the trunk. Chuck yanked the trunk partway out and touched the carpetbag by accident. How Hiramus knew that he had, Chuck couldn't tell, but he suddenly became aware of the older man glaring at him.
"Sorry," he said. Being more careful he pulled his case all the way out. Just as he did, the train started to shimmy. He lost his balance and knocked into the older man's feet. "Sorry."
A harrumph came from behind the paper, and an eye slit like one in the door of a speakeasy appeared in the front page. Chuck smiled uneasily and shrugged at the pair of disapproving eyes. The slit slammed shut.
His trunk had eight locks, including a padlock like the one that had been on his high school gym locker, but they all fell away when he touched them. What was so precious that it needed to be secured like that? He noticed everyone looking at him, and wondered if he should pull the trunk away somewhere to go through it in private. But, no, that would make everybody more curious. He knew he'd feel that way. This was supposed to be a journey of revelation, catharsis, and cleansing. Better to get it all out into the open, and be done with it. He flung wide the lid.
To his disappointment, the big case was full of junk. On top was an ancient pullover sweater in royal blue, bright green and orange. He rubbed the weave between his fingers, and dropped it at once. The unpleasant feel couldn't be anything except cheap polyester. It wasn't his. He hadn't worn anything like that for many, many years. Underneath it was a plethora of ugly ties. One brown leather shoe, the sole worn thin from use begged the question as to the location of its mate, a question Chuck was unable to answer. He rooted through outdated clothes, crumpled school folders stuffed with mimeographed and photocopied assignment papers faded by time, a grass-stained raincoat.
Underneath was a small, flat, waxy packet that he didn't even need to see to identify. He smiled as he withdrew it and turned it under the lights. It was an unopened package of baseball cards. After a moment's pause, he decided no one would be upset if he opened it. The wrapper yielded to his hands with the ease of the locks. Just as he remembered it, he counted ten cards and that bonus of a paper-thin stick of hard, pink bubblegum that came in each package. He lifted it to his nose and took a deep breath. Yes, it was still redolent with the scents of rubber, wax, ink and powdered sugar that had been so addictive when he was eleven. The smell brought those summers back to him, sitting on the floor of his room with his best friend, trading cards back and forth until they'd completely mixed up whose was whose. Neither of them were serious collectors; they vacillated between wanting to have one of everything and just making sure they had the cards of their favorite players. How many happy days he'd had then. The realization came as a surprise. Somehow, and not just here in the Dreamland, he'd blocked all those joyful memories, replacing them with negative images. The items here in this case summoned up long-buried recollections.
Chuck dropped the cards back into the box. None of these items actually belonged to him. They only reminded him of things that he'd once had. He glanced around for Keir, wanting a personal interpretation of the peculiar contents, but the spirit guide was not in the car. He had assured Chuck that he'd be there if he really needed him. Chuck guessed that this was not really one of those times. He didn't really need to have the meaning explained. He could figure it out for himself.
He hated to admit it, but Keir had been doing a pretty good job of juggling five very different and demanding clients. It still bothered him that he had to share the guide at all, but Keir had kept his word: he came if Chuck called. And the shape he wore had been chosen especially to aid him in his search for the truth. But Keir also wore shapes special for the others, those four strangers he was forced to travel with. Resentment raised its head for a moment, but Chuck fought it down. He was determined not to let it bother him again that day. He wrestled the trunk back onto the shelf and plopped down casually in the window-side seat. Hiramus was still engaged in his newspaper. Persemid sat looking out onto the landscape lit up by the moon.
"So," he asked her, casually, "why did you come on this journey?"
"Why did you?" she shot back.
Chuck remembered that he wasn't too crazy about her. She was so abrasive. But that might just be her way of talking. He'd take the question at face value.
"It's hard to remember exactly," Chuck said, honestly, searching to the bottom of his feelings. "I keep trying to think about my life outside here—up there? back there?—I don't know. Everything's foggy. I've just been miserable for so long I can't stand it. I ought to be, well, happy. I'm pretty sure of that."
"Why? Is there a written right to happiness where you come from?"
Chuck sat back, and wondered why he was unburdening himself to her of all people. He ought to be having this conversation with Keir. He must have looked shocked, because she put on an apologetic expression for exactly one second, then wiped it away completely, like the change of face she'd gone through in the first alteration, but she was still listening.
"It's not like that," Chuck said. This was going wrong, just like everything else he ever did. "I didn't say I thought I deserved it. It goes deeper than that. Much deeper. Sometimes I'm so miserable that it hurts to breathe. I'm choking, and no one else can see. It stops me from really living, from being fulfilled. I could do so much more if only I could break through the blackness. It's getting so that I'm afraid to be alone, but I don't want to be with people, because then I don't matter. I don't belong anywhere. Nothing I accomplish makes me feel truly content with myself. Perhaps it's selfish, but I'd like to learn how, if I can."
Persemid made a noise like a snort, but it wasn't directed at him. She gave him a one-second smile that lit up her face charmingly. It was gone in an instant, but the impression stayed with Chuck. "That's honest, anyway."
"What about you?" he urged.
It proved to be even harder for her to say what was troubling her. At last she appeared to make up her mind to trust Chuck. He sat very still, determined not to make judgments that would make her withdraw again.
"I wish it was so easy as misery that hurts. I've been experiencing . . . well, I guess you'd have to call them self-destructive tendencies. Not suicide!" she added, fixing him with an imperious eye.
"No, of course not," Chuck reassured her. "You sound too sane for that."
"Oh? And how would you know?"
She was so prickly, but Chuck knew he'd made a misstep. He fumbled to put his thoughts in order and found himself with a double handful of marbles. "Well, I've heard that the people who talk about it are the ones who are least likely to do it."
"Oh, that's reassuring!" Persemid snapped. "So everyone who doesn't talk about suicide is a candidate?"
"No, that's not what I meant," Chuck said, wondering whether to mention the partial memory of his thoughts of suicide, as the marbles dropped through his fingers, scattering on the floor. The clatter attracted the attention of everyone in the car. Chuck apologized and dove to pick them up. He stuffed them down in between the seat and the wall, where they made an uncomfortable lump in the upholstery. When he came back to his seat and the conversation, the moment of the confessional was over. Persemid had withdrawn into her thoughts and her contemplation of the moon. He was sorry to have offended her. He was only trying to be friendly, but it backfired badly. She was one of the most difficult people he had ever met.
For a moment he wondered if part of his ordeal was to make friends with everyone in the group, or if this was one of the tests that Keir told him about. He hoped not. The four strangers had co-opted his guide. They were riding along with him, and they might have other aims than his. Though he and Persemid were on the same journey she was a complete stranger. He had to make the best of it, and treat every conversation he had on board as if it was of the greatest importance.
"What about you?" Chuck asked Sean. He was curious about the long, private conference the tall man had had with Keir earlier in the day. "What brings you into our group?"
"I don't want to talk about it, thank you very much," the man said, in clipped, unfriendly tones.
"You sound Irish," Chuck said, trying another tack. "Where are you from?"
"What's it to you?" The tall man turned his face toward the window, and didn't look around again.
Chuck was frustrated. He didn't want to go to sleep yet. He wanted to chat. Hiramus had wrapped himself up, literally, in his newspaper, like an inflated paper mummy, black and white and reading intently all over. Bergold was chatting with the salesman across the aisle. Kenner, in what Chuck thought of as bravery above and beyond the call, had engaged both Persemid and Pipistrella in conversation. He wouldn't have done it alone. Mrs. Flannel was having a baby-talk conversation with Spot, who had assumed the form of a handsome African parrot. She chucked him under the beak, and he crooned. Keir was nowhere in sight. That left the couple from Elysia. They were having one of those unmistakable "married" discussions, he in the quiet, intense way of someone who is very angry, and she in the oblivious fashion of someone who had already won the argument. Sighing, Chuck gave up and stared out of the window. The huge mountains to the north were picking up light from the sun beginning to set behind the train.
* * *
Morit noticed the Visitor glance their way while he was talking to the red-haired woman. Chuck's patronizing attitude annoyed him. How dare he behave as though all the world liked him so much? Morit felt a sudden cramp in his back and wriggled irritatedly to ease it. These seats displeased him, and the blinding glare from the sun made his blood pressure go right up through the roof. He hated sitting on the sun side of a train. Their reservation specifically called for them to be in the shade throughout. That dolt of a conductor had just shrugged and pointed out that things change. Things change? Nothing changed, nothing fundamental. He and Blanda still got the smallest and worst of the meals, the most uncomfortable seats, the least service. No matter where he moved to sit in the car the sun shone in his eyes, and the coldest of the night breezes blew right down his neck. He hunched over, working the spring-tight muscles. Of course they wouldn't loosen. It would take a major wave of influence to help. He was sure the Visitors had more comfortable chairs than he did.
"I have always been convinced that the best of everything went to those the Sleepers favor," he muttered under his breath to Blanda, "and now I have proof of it."
"We are all favored by the Sleepers, dear," Blanda said, imperturbably. "We exist. That is the greatest measure of favor anyone could ask for."
"Bah. I mean their fellow Waking Worlders, these Visitors." He spat out the word. "Look at that! They even have extra pillows. And blankets." He especially resented that lack every time a fresh blast of frigid air came out of the register over his head. And why was the register always over his head?
"So do we, my dear," Blanda said, reaching underneath the broad seat and coming up with an antiseptically-sealed plastic bag. She pulled it open and spread the blanket over his shoulders. It was light, soft and warm. "There, isn't that nice? And such a pretty color. Russet, I'd call it. Isn't that a comforting-sounding name for a color?" She tucked the white pillow behind his neck, fluffing it so it supported his head. Morit waved his hands at her to make her stop fussing over him. She paid no attention. She never did. Confound the woman.
"We've got all we need, my dearest. Don't worry about a thing. We've got our clothing, our hats and sunscreen, a little snack or two, my little kit, a book to read . . . ." Blanda babbled on. Morit tuned her out as he always did.
He could hardly contain his frustration. The train should have derailed straight into the pit back there, taking all the Visitors and that annoying man with it. How could that plan have failed? Hundreds of his companions had used up all their influence to wreck the tracks, tear open the land, reroute the signals, and keep word of the destruction from getting back to Mnemosyne. The train had rushed toward its doom, all unaware, and that man, that Visitor, had stopped it from falling in!
Morit's like-thinkers had plenty of other plans in hand, but he fervently wished the first one had worked. Then, it would have been all over, and he could be at peace. No more invasions from the Waking World. No more Visitors throwing off the balance of nature. Now they'd have to await another opportunity. And if nothing else worked, they had one final, fail-safe fallback. There were your three F's for you!
Chuck Meadows was doing his best to be a nosy pest. There, he was pestering the quiet man in the corner. Was there no one he wouldn't chatter to? He was worse than the insane old woman and her silly pet across from him. Morit observed the others move from conversation to conversation, shutting Chuck out temporarily. Morit felt oddly pleased that Chuck had run out of people to yack at.
The Visitor noticed him looking. Yes, there it went. He was going to open his mouth.
"Gorgeous sunset, isn't it?" Chuck asked. "I never thought that I'd see whole days and nights change here. This is all one night where I come from. At least, I hope so. I've got work tomorrow." The Visitor frowned. "I thought I remembered something about my job, but it's gone again."
Don't trouble yourself, Morit thought. One way or another you're not going to have to worry about your Waking World job—or tomorrow.
Pushing himself to do the hardest thing he'd ever done, he forced a pleasant smile at the Visitor. He must ingratiate himself with the party, to keep them from suspecting that disaster lay ahead.
"We have more glorious sunsets in Elysia than they have here," Morit said, gushing in a manner that he had copied from Blanda. "Sometimes more than one a day. You can watch them from the mountains, or along the waterfront, or even through the curtain of cut glass that lies on the western frontier. It is the most beautiful of all the provinces. The Sleepers favor us."
"Really?" the Visitor asked, his mouth gaping open with wonder. "Wow. Elysia. I think I saw that on the map. Isn't that where Enlightenment is now?"
"Oh, yes," Morit assured him. "A very nice place. You would like to visit there. It'll be an experience you'll never forget." No one will, Morit thought, with grim satisfaction, if they get that far. "You will never again see the equal of the scenery you will behold in Elysia."
Chuck nodded eagerly. "I'm really looking forward to it, Master Morit! Thanks."
"See? Honey's the way to catch more flies," Blanda said to Morit in an approving whisper. "He's such a nice man. I am glad you're getting along so well, now."
Morit could not believe his mate's obtuseness; surely she understood why he was doing what he was doing, to make certain of luring the party to their destruction. She'd heard all his discussions and arguments, even though she ignored them most of the time. But she just saw what she wanted to, which was him being nice to people. Bah. If he could drown the Visitors in honey, he'd raid every hive from here to the Nightmare Forest!
| Title: | The Grand Tour |
| Author: | Jody Lynn Nye |
| ISBN: | 0-671-57883-9 |
| Copyright: | © 2000 by Jody Lynn Nye |
| Publisher: | Baen Books |