...It was a beautiful day. The bright sun was shining in the turquoise sky, emerald shadows of the tree leaves leaping across the marble paths in the garden, flowers swaying lightly as breeze rocked them to sleep.
Anya looked around, perplexed. Everything was so...
Perfect? Too perfect to be real, yes.
Apparently, it was a dream. But where and when did Anya fall asleep? She chewed on her lower lip, striving to remember. The daitias, the journey to Cusco, Manco Capac and his insane legends... What those legends were about? Not a single word in Anya's memory.
Why am I here?
She scanned the garden once again, roamed about, and inspected each and every corner of it. She discovered a narrow trail beginning by a statue of a noble goddess and ending near a pond with a small fountain. A high wall with golden images of falcons and jaguars rose on the left.
What is this place? Another vision of Da'Ariya?
Only when Anya stopped by the water, did she realize what actually troubled her. The sound—its absence. Anya could hear no leaves murmuring above her head, no water splashing in the fountain, no tapping of her own sneakers against the ground. Nothing. A flawless silence choking the world with its dumb grip.
Panic rose to her throat, but then receded when Anya reminded herself she was just sleeping. She squatted before the pond, put her hand in the water, but felt nothing as if she was a ghost. Her fingers ran through the liquid, leaving no ripples on the surface.
That's not good.
At the very bottom of the pond, something sparkled. Peering into the glittering, Anya saw it was only a refracted light coming from somewhere under the wall that divided the pond in half.
An alluring thought rushed over Anya's mind. Nikk used to say the astral reality is subject to no laws of physics. Anya closed her eyes, took a deep breath and... She was on the other side of the wall in no time.
Blinding sunlight hit her eyes. Squinting for a long minute, Anya finally managed to make out three high arches leading in different directions from a large hall she was standing in now. But no sound so far.
Somebody touched her shoulder, "Anya?"
Momentously, noises flooded her world as though one pressed the on button. Birds were twittering outside, water gurgling in the fountain, and harp music coming from a distance.
Anya flinched and turned around. Nikk was staring at her expectantly.
"Nikk?! What are you doing here? What am I doing here? Is it another of your dreams? Or—" she trailed off, realizing she could continue the list of her questions forever.
"No, it's not my dream," Nikk shook his head slowly, his expression troubled. "Yours?"
"Are you mocking me? I don't know how to make astral projections." Anya's heart skipped a beat at the sight of massive columns supporting the ceiling. She could never build something that giant by her mere thoughts. "Whose dream it is then?"
Nikk didn't reply, for the words didn't reach him. He was at the other end of the hall already, cocking his head to look through one of the arches.
"Where are we?" Anya repeated, louder, and was horrified to hear no voice of hers. "Nikk!"
Nikk turned to her, his eyes puzzled. His lips moved, but not a syllable was audible.
"Don't you hear me!" Anya shouted at the top of her lungs. "Don't you—"
Nikk appeared beside her in a blink of an eye, "I do hear you now, don't scream."
Once again, Anya marveled at the astral reality. You didn't need to spend time walking around—all you needed was an intension. But where did the intention bring Anya and Nikk today?
"It turns out we can only talk to each other when we're close?" she watched Nikk frown. Surprisingly, his auburn hair was smooth, not mussed after the wind in Cusco as Anya remembered. And his boots showed no sign of the mud they'd been trotting through on their way to Capac's house.
"Seems like it," Nikk rubbed his forehead, preoccupied. "The astral projection isn't stable enough probably..." He raised his head to look at the ceiling. "What is this place?"
Anya's eyebrows involuntarily shot up. "You don't know?"
"Should I?"
"You're a dream creator here."
Amusement flickered over Nikk's face, the corners of his lips twitched in a teasing smile as he met Anya's eyes. "And you're a dream hacker then. You crawled into my dream before I knew you existed." Then his expression was back to serious, "If this dream is not controlled by either of us, it's actually pretty bad."
"Why?"
"Because," Nikk sighed heavily. "If we're somehow got dragged into someone else's mind and that hypothetical person wishes to harm us... Well, if we die in here, we also die in reality."
"Ooh." A trickle of fear formed in the back of Anya's mind.
Nikk nodded, grim. "Yes, ooh." He was about to say something else, but muffled footsteps came from one of the arches. Anya and Nikk exchanged worried glances. In the hall they were standing there were only two floor vases with palm branches and several statues—nowhere to hide.
"Can we force ourselves to wake up?" Anya's voice faltered. Whoever the footsteps belonged to, those people were very close now.
"We can't," Nikk's shoulders tightened, unleashing his warrior's spirit, "because we weren't the ones who forced ourselves into the dream."
Two men appeared from the central arch. They were mature, but not old, wearing white tunics to a little above the knee that were fastened by golden girdles around their waists, leather sandals on their feet and strips encircled her brows, restraining dark hairs. One of the men had a line of strange symbols tattooed on his shoulder, and the other one was...
"Is this Manco Capac?!" Anya blurted out and instantly clapped her hand over her mouth, afraid to make another noise and draw attention.
But the two men didn't concern themselves with looking at Anya or Nikk; they entered the hall, talking.
"...say that lady Danann herself will attend the ceremony," the one with the tattoo was saying.
Young Manco chuckled, "You are a higher priest of the Universe and you still believe every tale they tell?" Anya's jaw dropped open as he jogged past her and Nikk without moving his eyes at them. "Danann died years ago, during the battle of Arimia..."
The priests crossed the hall and disappeared again into a passage behind another arch.
Anya swallowed. "What just happened?"
"Manco Capac and his friend just walked past us," Nikk echoed, his voice shocked.
"Why didn't they see us?!"
"I think they... Wait, I need to check something out," Nikk ducked into the passage after the priests.
Anya could do nothing but follow.
Thankfully, the men didn't vanish behind the corner of twisting tunnels yet, and Nikk was next to them in a couple seconds. He shook his hand before their very noses and shouted a few words of greeting so loud than normally anyone should have grown deaf. No reaction.
"One more try," Nikk stood, blocking men's way, with his arms folded on his chest. "Let's see."
At this time, a woman emerged from around the corner, her outfit exactly the same as the men's. She smiled at Manco and his companion, and they hailed her in return. None of them looked at either Anya or Nikk who was still standing a few steps before them.
Anya watched the chattering priests leisurely stroll right through Nikk's body. He was no more than an incorporeal, invisible phantom to them.
"It's not a dream," Nikk laughed nervously. "It's a memory."
"A memory? Of Paititi?" Anya looked around the hallway she was in now. Giant statues wearing glowing gold armor and holding real weapons flanked along the walls—people, animals, mythical creatures that could hardly be found even in books. The hallway was daylight bright, though there was no sign of a smallest window or a breach in the walls. "But... why would Manco show us all this?"
Nonchalantly, Nikk shrugged. "As you said, to scare us away." His lips suddenly twitched in a wicked grin. "How about we prove him otherwise?"
Anya gawked at Nikk whose eyes were mischievously glittering. "And what happened to the hypothetically-get-killed part?" She almost forced the words up her throat. Hell, Nikk's eyes weren't encouraging to stay safe—they were encouraging to chase wherever danger was waiting if it was promising any fun. Children who are about to do something what parents strongly forbid always have those eyes. Who cares that you can get hurt if your life is going to be a bit more interesting?
Anya sighed. Out of anyone, why would she get stuck in here with Nikk? She could easily do something foolish alone as well. And she would do it with no regret. "Let's prove him otherwise."
Meanwhile, the priests were at the far end of the passage already, and Anya and Nikk hurried after them.
The temple of Paititi turned out to be much bigger than one could imagine. Each corner revealed more halls, chambers and rooms that led further and further into the unknown. But this maze was nothing like Kelas. Every turn in here met at right angles, to contrast to the daitias' headquarters where walls were gently outlining mountain's shape.
An hour passed by in wandering through the passages filled with a slow, cool wind coming from the depths of the temple. Or maybe it was just a few minutes. Anya couldn't tell— astral timing was tricky.
At last, Manco and his friend came to giant stone doors and slipped behind them.
"Ready?" Nikk asked and held out his arm, his tone was firm, but eyes betrayed the nerves.
"Let's see what we got ourselves into," Anya took his hand and they both walked through the doors.