13. Drinking the moon.

  “Hogwarts? Are you kidding me?” Our footsteps echoed down the empty stone corridor, our echoes bouncing from the high, vaulted ceiling. The torches in their brackets flickered unevenly, casting long, dancing shadows across worn tapestries and age-stained portraits. Ross, in spite of his snide comment, had conjured himself a surprisingly elegant set of dark robes, the fabric whispering around his ankles as he walked. Winsford, flanked by Sophie the Psychologist, paused before a heavy oak door with iron studs and an air of long-forgotten secrecy. It creaked open at his touch to reveal an abandoned classroom—cobwebbed, cold, and dimly lit by moonlight coming through the windows. It smelled like old paper and dust.

  Winsford strode across the room and pulled back the covering cloth from a tall wooden framed mirror.

  “So… we’re gonna find out our deepest subconscious desires now or what?” Ross said.

  Winsford ignored him and stepped back so we could see inside the mirror. It was… empty. The room was there, but as we looked inside, none of us were.

  “This is the kind of anomaly we mentioned before” Sophie said. “In this case, a mirror with no reflection. We have tested it and can confirm that this is, indeed, a portal into the subconscious.”

  “The first time is always a bit disorienting. We’re not going to try anything too much for now, just start to get a feel for it. You might experience an elasticity of time, environments that take on surreal characteristics. Dream-like landscapes aren’t particularly uncommon. At times, it will be exactly the same as a normal thought-casting environment. At other times again it will be quite a lot different in other unpredictable ways” she said.

  “There’s one other thing you should be aware of down there” she said, her demeanour shifting just a little. “Your senses may behave in strange ways at times, and your pain and pleasure receptors will also be more sensitive.”

  “Hang on,” Chen interrupted, “you’re telling me that pain dampeners don’t work down there? That’s kind of a big deal.”

  “It’s not that they don’t work, it’s just that their ability is more limited. There’s no reason to think that you will find yourself in a situation where pain is more likely, and there’s also no reason why you can’t either defend yourself, or simply get back to the portal and make an exit. It is a risk, but it’s a low risk. Besides, it has an upside, the potential for pleasure is also higher – maybe even more potent than the real world.”

  “Ok, enough chatting. Let’s get to this” Winsford said. And with that, he turned around, stepped into the mirror, and simply disappeared. We each followed him, one by one. I ended up being second last, right before Sophie followed after me.

  I stood in front of the mirror, it was unnerving. No reflection? Was I about to lose my soul? Don’t be an idiot Peterson. I stepped forward. What followed was one of the most intense experiences I’ve ever had.

  The world folded in on itself without collapsing. One moment, I was passing through cold glass, and the next I was standing in the same classroom. But it wasn’t the same. The air shimmered like it had been soaked in too much light; the moon outside was enormous, impossibly close, its glow pouring in through the windows like liquid silver. I felt the strange urge to drink the moonlight. The cobwebs were still there around the room, but they hung suspended in a kind of perfect stillness, catching the light and glowing.

  The others were there too. Ross’ robes now trailing little echoes of movement, like his shadow wanted to get back inside. Chen’s outline was blurred and radiant, as though she were humming with some hidden frequency. I felt a joy, a serenity rising in my chest. I felt like I was on the edge of discovering the final answer to a question I hadn’t even known I was asking.

  “Cool, isn’t it?” Winsford grinned. “C’mon, let me show you around a bit.” As we followed him through the door of the room, I glanced back at the mirror. The room beyond was still there, still visible. I tried to will myself out of the program, just to test Sophie’s words. She was right, I couldn’t get out. I felt a surge of alarm, even though I knew the portal was right there. I took a deeper breath to calm myself a little. The portal was right there, no need to panic.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  As we walked through the door, though, all sense of fear evaporated. It wasn’t the dark corridor beyond that waited for us, it was a paradise beyond anything I’d ever imagined.

  A gentle breeze, warm and fresh and fruity met us as we stepped outside. It was a garden full of sunlight. I saw rolling meadows beyond with gentle slopes and wildflowers of gold, blue, and white. The grass was impossibly green, and groves of trees dappled the landscape with soft shades.

  A river wound through the landscape, wide and slow, its surface reflecting a second heaven. There were willows on its banks, flowers and birds singing songs the world had never heard.

  “It’s beautiful,” Chen whispered beside me, and there was something reverent in her voice.

  No one answered. We didn’t need to. It was like this place was an answer for our souls. We forgot where we were, forgot the mission, forgot the risks. Nothing else mattered here, just the garden, somehow untouched by any sorrow.

  As I walked slowly to a nearby grove, my wonder only increased. The air was cool, delicious, and refreshing. The light, golden and warm, danced off rippled reflections from a pond. The air was thick and sweet with the fragrance of blossoms and fruit, and I looked up to see golden orbs, almost glowing, handing down from the cool, green, canopy. They shimmered gently, like embers about to extinguish, but they never did. Without thinking, I reached out and took one in my hands.

  It was warm… and cool to the touch. I could smell it, it was overwhelmingly… good. I bit down into the fruit, it’s taste opened doors in my mind. Sweet memories, joy, sorrow, sound, colour…

  Cailin…

  My head snapped up. I looked around, looking desperately for the face that belonged to that voice. But I was alone.

  “Mum?”

  I started walking, peering behind trees, almost seeing something, or thinking I did… or wanting to… but still, nothing was there. I moved faster, searching.

  “Cailin?”

  I spun around, but it was Winsford this time, walking toward me. He called me Cailin. He’d never called me by my first name.

  “Are you ok?”

  I blinked hard, heart still pounding, and tried to pull myself together.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Just... this place is… intense.”

  He nodded once, slowly, then glanced at the fruit still in my hand. “Careful with that stuff.”

  I looked down at the fruit, and then back at Winsford’s warm, friendly smile. Then his face suddenly twitched. His head jerked violently, and then jerked again in the other direction. He pulled sideways, and as he did…. there’s no other way to describe it: a second face emerged from the side of his head. A second arm broke free from his own, and it was as though another person was trying to escape from his body. I stepped back, watching on in horror, wanting to run but unable to tear my eyes away. Winsford fell down on all fours, straining and shouting.

  It was a woman, she looked familiar, but I couldn’t remember where I’d seen her before. She looked at me with terror in her eyes, trying to say something. And then she was gone. It was just Winsford, stooped on the ground, breathing hard.

  “Sorry you… huff…. had to see that… huff... Peterson. As you can probably guess, I’ve got issues” he said.

  “What the h… What on earth was that?” I can’t lie, I was freaked out big time.

  “I’m working on it with Sophie, I guess sometimes the subconscious can be a little... hard to control.”

  “But what was that? Just… what was that?”

  “That was a manifestation of trauma” Sophie said, striding quickly to join us.

  “It’s ok, we can tell him. I’d want an explanation too if I just saw what he saw” Winsford said.

  “That was a manifestation of Mr Winsford’s third wife, or at least her ripple effect on his mind. As you might guess, it was a very traumatic marriage.”

  “Geez, does that sort of thing happen often down here?” I asked.

  “This kind of manifestation may arise in cases of extreme trauma. Ms Winsford, at the time, attempted to kill her husband. It left an… impression on him” Sophie said.

  “I’m sorry you had to see that, Peterson. I really am. Sophie has been helping me to work through it” he was standing up again, his composure back in place. “Come on, let’s go find the others.”