Some were tactile; comforting dreams of half-forgotten sensations. Dreams of sweet, cool water; of hands on my face; of linen sheets; of shady trees and the good scents of wet soil and vegetation. Trapped as I was, deep underground, barely able to breathe the air, always fearful, always in pain, always hungry and thirsty and sore, those dreams were my link to a sweeter world, and I embraced them fervently.

But as time passed I found the dreams becoming increasingly violent. The arc of a fountain of lava erupting from Chaos into the Worlds, bringing destruction in its wake. The journey of a flake of ash ascending from a bonfire. Dreams of fire; dreams of smoke; abstract dreams of Chaos. Burning buildings and fortresses falling into twilight; visions of the Folk at war; the Maggots; the Rock Folk; the Ice Folk; the gods . . .

At first it seemed almost too perfect. That violence, so akin to my own; I sensed the potential for a trap. And so I entered carefully, skirting the dreams with caution, occasionally adding a couple of small details of my own to see if he would take the bait.

Well, I say he. It isn’t always easy to identify a dreamer. Dreams are complex structures, difficult as prophecies to interpret or understand. Identities are particularly hard to determine, as the dreamer tends to appear in many different Aspects. I took a different Aspect every time I entered Dream; one day a hawk; the other a cat; the next perhaps a frog or a spider. At first I had to force myself not to move too quickly, exploring the dreamer’s landscapes without trying to make any obvious attempt at communication, or trying to make him reveal himself.

I’ll admit, it was frustrating. But I knew I had to be patient. I’d found myself the perfect mind – clever, receptive, imaginative, and with just the right level of repressed violence to make us nicely compatible. I didn’t want to frighten him (or her) away with my eagerness. I already knew so much about my dreamer; his thoughts and feelings; his intelligence; his imagination; everything but his identity.

And then, one night, I found myself more than just a spectator. At last, I had made a connection beyond the mere subconscious. In spite of my attempts to hide, the unknown dreamer had spotted me.

The dream was an oddly comforting one; a long, deserted summer beach, with trees almost up to the waterline and the scent of flowers and ripening fruit.

At one end of the beach, a small girl was busy building a sandcastle. Could she be the dreamer? I thought.

I moved a little closer. I’d assumed the Aspect of a little redhaired boy – an Aspect which I found both practical as well as nicely unthreatening.