𝐍𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐰𝐚𝐥𝐤𝐞𝐫

The Fruitstand

 "What happened to—?"

 Before I could finish, Torin interrupted. "I'm going for a walk." Obviously not wanting to stay around for the remainder of the conversation, he quickly stalked off the dock and into the port town of Venix.

 We stood there in weighted silence watching him disappear somewhere in the direction of the woods. 

 Koral shifted, picked at one of her long nails. She seemed unsure of whether she should answer or not.

 "I'm sorry. It's alright if you don't want to tell me."

 "No! It's no problem at all... It's only natural for you to be— curious." Koral took a breath. "It's just I'm not sure where to begin... You see Somnium is a dreamscape. To get here you must first be able to access a mind space from where you can find the portal. Some humans use... enchanted items to help them. From there, you are taken to whatever place your energy calls out to most. You see... all Nightwalkers are from other worlds. They are mortals, but special in a way because they have an extra deep thought capacity, or intuition I guess," she laughed. "Wow... I've never tried explaining this to anyone before."

 "You're doing great," I said, encouraging her to continue— even though more than half of what she had said was a bit dizzying and only left me will a million new questions.

 Koral's nail chipped a bit at the tip as she kept at her incessant picking. "Well... You see, because Nightwalkers are truly not of this world, whenever one of you comes, you bring things with you. Things that none of us here possess— abilities. Well, mainly the ability to create."

 "Create? What, like life?"

 "Yes. And entire Realms. All the realms in Somnium were formed by Nightwalkers. By dreamers, as the ancient ones called them."

 "Wow." no way!!!  "You mean, I have the power to build worlds?"

 Koral nodded. "But you also have the ability to destroy them."

 "Okay... But why would anyone ever want to do anything like...that?"

 "Legends tell or rumor has it there used to be twelve realms, instead of seven," she murmured. "But that was long before I was created."

 I sat up straighter. "Wait, created? You were created?" My head was spinning. I had so many questions!

 "Here in Somnium we are all born of dreams."

 "So, you're somebody's dream?"

 "Yes."

 The sea port seemed to begin to blur around me as I tried to take everything in. How could any of this be possible? All those visions I have been having for years and...

 "I used to hallucinate when I was younger. Does that have anything to do with— all this?"

 "To that I must admit that I have absolutely no idea. Seems like a good question to ask Torin. He's—"

 "My guardian? I also overheard you call him that last night. What does that mean?" I couldn't tell if it was in the sense of a guardian angel (which would have been amazing), or legal guardian (which, based on his personality, would be the most probable). Wait. Torin was old. Like, really old. Could he be... my fa—

 "Oh, god no! Stop Wren, or you'll make me sick," Koral interrupted. My mouth tugged upwards. I had to admit, even for me, that was too insane.

 Since when did I think about that? Sure, I had always been a bit curious about who my real father was. But I had my moms. They were all I needed.