it to Ursala when I went back to the seclusion.
One of the things I learned that second day was what we was all waiting for. Senlas had his plans for us, that was sure, but he wasn’t yet doing nothing about them. It was because of his dreams, is what he told me.
I was sitting on the floor next to him when he said it. His hand was around my shoulders, and his face was close to mine. He was murmuring the words so nobody else could hear, not even the hand people. His breath smelled strong of something I couldn’t name but didn’t like.
“Him that sent me, Koli Faceless, he’s got his own ways of talking to me. His own sweet, quiet ways. He doesn’t shout, for his voice is a thunder that would whelm the world. He sends me dreams, and the dreams tell me what to do. Tonight, or the next night, or the night after that, he’ll send me a dream about you, and then I’ll know for sure I’m right. That you’re meant to serve at my altar.
“But I’m not impatient, nor petuous. I welcome this time that we got now. I feel like I’m growing closer to you, and you to me. And most probably that’s needful if we’re to do miracles together. Most probably you got to become a part of me, so when I close my fist like this, your fingers will clench tight. And when I close my eyes, and open them again, you’ll go into the darkness and out into the light. It’s a blessing we’re being given, and we got to be thankful for it.”
Well, I was not thankful, but I said I was. I was not fool enough to gainsay him.
Towards the end of that day, a weak and wintry sun shone down through the hole again. I was watching closely and hoping it would come, so I didn’t waste any of that light. I set the DreamSleeve in the path of it, the way I done before, and kept it there for as long as I could. People was walking past our grating all the time, but all they seen was Ursala and me sitting side by side, looking back at them. For most of the time, we didn’t even talk. I had told Ursala about Senlas’s dreams, which made her laugh but not like she thought it was funny. “The longer he waits, the better,” she said. “We can’t move with your leg in the state it’s in.”
After that, there did not seem to be much to say. We was thinking about what we knowed and what we needed still to know if we was to get out of that place.
I was still thinking them thoughts when we lay down to sleep. The voices and movement in the cave got less and less, and then they stopped. My back was to Ursala’s, and we was pressed right up against each other in the narrow space so I could feel her breathing, slow and even, and I knowed she was asleep. The rise and fall of it felt somewhat comforting in spite of the trouble we was in.
Right then was when the DreamSleeve give a shake and waked itself.
“Hi, little dumpling,” Monono said right smack in my ear.
“Monono!” I said, trying to keep my voice to a whisper. “I’m glad you come back!” Although glad did not go near to saying what I felt. I gun to tell her about Senlas, and his madness, and his eyes that I could not look away from, and the altar and what it was used for. But she cut me off right away.
“You don’t need to explain, Koli. I’ve been listening in. Not just to Mr Fruitcake-with-nuts-in, but to everyone else down here.”
“How’d you do that, Monono?”
“With a directional microphone. Why, how would you do it? No, don’t answer that. You’re in a big, stinky mess, Koli-bou, and I don’t want to do anything to make it bigger. If you need to say anything to me, tap it out on the front of the DreamSleeve’s casing. One tap is yes, two is no and three is how can anyone so wonderful as you even exist?”
I tapped three times on the DreamSleeve and she laughed. It done me a deal of good to hear that laugh.
“You’ve got a plan to get out of here,” she said.
I tapped once. We had got the beginnings of one anyway. There was things we still