The Dreamfarer

17

"Yes! Excellent, Mae; you got it!"

Mae grinned. Granted, she was squeezing her eyes shut in concentration when she was supposed to be able to lock away her thoughts without really thinking about it, but she figured that would come easier with time. 

Centimeter by centimeter, she slowly opened her eyes. Folco's were happy, dancing, staring at her with excitement. Her mind was still focused on hiding certain thoughts away, but by his expression, she knew that opening her eyes hadn't unleashed them from their boxes.

"How do you know, though?" she wondered. Folco wasn't a mind reader, after all.

Folco hesitated, biting on his cheek. "That's kind of hard to explain," he said, but continued anyway, "I've discovered, over time, that I have more control over people's subconscious mind than just their dreams. Not in such a way as Kroma has control over reading conscious minds, but I've learned how to sort of... monitor them. You see..." he trailed off with a sigh. "This is much too difficult to put into words for you, Mae."

"Keep trying. Explain to me the difference between the two, maybe," she suggested.

"Between the subconscious and conscious?" he asked. When she nodded, he cocked his head slightly in contemplation.

"Well, I only know what I've learned from experience; from testing the boundaries of my Dreamfaring and by learning more about Kroma's own ability. I guess I've gotten some of the information from what adult warlocks here have shared with me. You probably learned more than me about it in school, which I never got to go to--"

"I don't remember anything about it, if I did," she cut in, and he acknowledged her words with a nod.

"Okay, well... all I'm sure about is that the subconscious is where dreams develop from, because that part of your mind is where your brain stores all the information you may not be consciously aware of. It's a huge storage bank of memories and experiences and sights, really, and that's why you dream so often of things you had seen before, or people you know, or things that you were thinking about the day before. Or rather, what other people dream about, and you experience through their minds," he explained.

"Okay..." Mae said, but her tone was still confused, and he could tell.

"Here, I'll give you an example. Tell me something you're scared of. Something trivial," he said, then leaned back into his sofa, eyebrows raised expectantly.

Lately, she felt scared of a lot of things. She was scared that her father would find and take her again. She was scared that she was really just some sort of demonic mutant, because of the way her father created her. She was scared that something would happen to Vivienne. She was scared that Caleb might hate her, might never be able to extend a forgiving hand again. She was scared that Kroma would invade her mind and destroy her chances of a warlock life, especially considering she had already turned her back on her human one. She was scared that Folco might not feel the same feelings that she did when she was around him. Worse, she was afraid that he knew the way she felt and still did not feel the same. That possibility of rejection terrified her almost as much as the thought of her father.

"I..." She took a deep breath and tried again, picking something seemingly harmless, "I don't like crowds. Being in the midst of one makes me feel claustrophobic and panicky. If I'm surrounded by so many people that I can't make out each individual face, it's too many. It's only happened one time in Swynborough, when there was some sort of evacuation drill at my school. They had all the students exit the school in a pack and then we were just expected to stand there, huddled together. I had a fit, and my dad - I mean, Dael - had to come and take me home."