Forsaken Dreamscape (Nevermor) Read online

  The Second Book in the Nevermor Trilogy

  Forsaken Dreamscape

  By Lani Lenore

  Text © Lani Lenore 2001-2013

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be produced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Cover art by Omri Koresh © 2013

  Table of Contents

  Introduction

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Introduction

  I’ve always been drawn to the darker side of things. Especially in writing, it seems that my fondest wish is to take something light and then find the hidden darkness within it. Therefore, it seemed only natural for me to take stories that were innocent in childhood and uncover the way that they might appeal to my adult senses.

  On this note, Forsaken Dreamscape was born, and it began as a twisted, dark fantasy sequel to Peter Pan.

  I began this book as an original project around late 2001. At that time, it was simply called Neverland. I began posting it online and it was well-received, but I didn't finish it until years later when I reworked the entire thing, finished it, and posted it again as Neverland: Forsaken Dreamscape.

  For years, it has lived online and has been merely a fanfiction – until now.

  In September 2012, I decided that I would be brave and set myself on the road to self-publishing. I've rewritten many fairytales into darker versions over the past several years, also penned a few original works, and yet none have been quite as popular as my dark fantasy sequel to Peter Pan. I decided that perhaps this was a good one to start with, but despite how popular it was among readers, I was never happy with it myself. There were good things about it, but there was something wrong, and I couldn’t quite pick it out.

  I looked at it again, and after researching the copyright on Peter Pan as well as examining my own unhappiness with the story, I decided that the only way to solve my problem was to change it so that it wasn’t Peter Pan anymore. I wanted to do something new – to break away from the old story and make something of my own. I realized that in order to do that, I had to create my own story as a base, to put in front of the ‘sequel’ volume I had already written.

  To resolve these issues, I wrote the book Nevermor in order to create a new story to set the stage for Forsaken Dreamscape, now the second book in the Nevermor trilogy. I changed it from being Peter Pan into something of my own.

  For those who have read it before in its original form, you will no doubt notice a few changes, but I feel that changing the story to Nevermor has given the entire project a new life that I could not help but nurture. I know readers will still see the same passion in the words that they respect me for.

  That is the brief history of this book. That said, I simply hope you enjoy the dark side of fairytales as much as I do.

  - Lani Lenore

  Forsaken

  Years have passed, the seasons fade

  A sacred world bleeds; dark decay

  The angels weep for ruined dreams

  As demons choke the land to screams

  An aged wonder, all forsaken

  A missing force forgotten,

  Awakened

  Prologue

  Storms… This is a night of storms. That was all Wren could think as she walked along the narrow ridge of the roof beneath the darkened sky. A vicious wind blew her fair curls all about as the moon shone down on her from beyond a cloudy haze. The beacon winked at her mischievously, and she began to feel doubt.

  Wren remembered the tempest – the way lightning had flashed so violently as thunder growled in the amber sky. She had not been away so long that she had forgotten. She could recall the storm – though perhaps not as well as the way Rifter’s face had looked when he’d peered adoringly into her eyes.

  Rifter… He was the one who cared about her – the only one who could save her now. She wanted to see him again, desperately, but he was not here. Wren did not understand, and could not quite ignore the circumstances. Could this not be put off until the storm was over? A soothing flow of whispers discouraged her from thinking. Through her tangling hair, she saw a tiny spot of light dancing before her, and though she could not understand the language of the fairy creature, she understood the message.

  It was from Rifter. He was inviting her back to his world of dreams. Nevermor was calling.

  The line of orphans – all eighteen of them from Miss Nora’s Home – marched along the roof, guided by the light of the fairy wisp. Dark tendrils of smoke rose from chimneys in London’s twilight, adding to the dark shadow of night overhead. She could smell the smoke, a sure sign of warning on most occasions, but no alarms were set off in her mind.

  Rifter had promised to come back for her – had promised not to forget – but yet he had sent his companion to retrieve her instead. Wren was almost certain that this wasn’t right, but she could not question it, perhaps for the soft reassurance of the fairy’s spell, urging her forward.

  I will go, Wren thought languidly. Yes, I will fly there.

  The others had already gone on before her – had already taken flight off the eaves of the house, laughing gleefully. Wren would join them. Without questioning further, she closed her eyes, and with a contented smile on her lips, she prepared to step from the roof.

  Chapter One

  LONDON, 1877

  1

  It was the sound of screaming that drew Wren back from the outer nothingness.

  Peering through the dark of her room, she could hear nurses bustling down the hallway, muted as nuns in their soft-soled shoes. Shadows of hulking orderlies played along the bricks as they fought with the shrieking inmate in the cell across the hall. A screeching door gave way to tears, and the patient’s shadow flailed about, her limbs slinging violently in all directions.

  Wren lay still in her own cell, and after a few moments, the screaming faded in the distant corridors. The manic patient had been silenced, unconscious now; off to dreamland and the bloodletting chambers. The ward was quiet once again. Wren kept herself quiet as well. She did not want to be next. Instead, she rolled over and pulled the thin blanket up to her chin.

  I must try to sleep, she told herself, but she nev
er did sleep – not anymore.

  Perhaps it was impossible that she did not sleep at all, even though she was convinced she did not, but she was even more certain that she did not dream. She could not remember the last dream she’d had – not a sensation of wonder, impossible fantasy, or whisper of a kiss – especially now that she was here in this place. This discouraged her, and at that thought, she felt trouble brewing in her stomach until she could no longer lay still.

  Wren sat up on the thin mattress, through which every spring of the iron frame twisted into her back. She reached beneath the bed to retrieve the journal she’d been allowed to keep, along with a blunt pencil. It was her only possession within the stark room that could offer her solace. The pages would be her confession.

  Turning to a fresh page, she began a new entry of her thoughts, though she did not know the date.

  Once again it has been a night without dreams, she wrote, and therefore no nightmares, but I awaken with the same fear. I fear that…

  Her hand hesitated on the page. She thought of what she would write next – thought of Witherspoon reading it – and she could not bring herself to go further. She closed the journal, put it away with the dust, and rested back against the bed in resignation.

  But her fear did not leave her.

  Wren’s inability to dream kept her constantly troubled, for if she could not dream, then she could not hope to get back to the place where she belonged.

  I may not find Nevermor again, she thought sadly. It was not the first time.

  Wren had never forgotten it, that secret land beyond the sea of dreams. She longed for it daily, but could not get back, no matter how hard she wished or how often she tried. It could only be found through dreams, after all, but since Rifter had brought her back from that place as a last favor, it had been impossible for her to create her own dreams, let alone see that sandy beach where she had first washed ashore.

  Was it her own fault that she could not find that world? If she'd ever sought escape, she needed it now more than ever. Never in all her life – despite what other fears she’d had – had she ever imagined that she would be locked away in an asylum, accused of a debilitating madness. Then again, she’d not predicted most of the details of her life beyond her father’s house.

  She remembered the first days here, crammed in a cell with many other girls – some as timid and frightened as she was, others explosive – and yet they were all the same in the eyes of their captors. They were faceless and less than human. They were a collection of pretty dolls with long hair and glass eyes, meant to be observed and occasionally toyed with.

  Though she had been caged like an animal, she was thankful to have been ignored. She’d kept quiet and let herself blend in, and while some of the other inmates might occasionally keep too close or try to eat her hair, Wren knew there were worse things in the world. She had seen some of them with her own eyes.

  Here, the creatures in the dark are of a different sort.

  Wren had dealt with what she was given, relieved to still have her life after what had happened at the orphanage, telling herself every day that this trial would not be for long. Rifter would not abandon her. He would come.

  She had held onto that belief, but it had begun to slip over time.

  As in Nevermor, time seemed to have no relevance at the asylum. All of the days blurred together into masses of vaporous nothing. There was no hope of gaining and no fear of losing. Her existence spun like wheels in mud. Though she could not quite say when it had happened – after weeks, perhaps months of being locked away – eventually the quality of her life within the asylum began to change.

  Overcrowding had become a problem, and it was decided that the ranks of inmates should be thinned. Some were to be sent off to distant country asylums, and Wren had feared being taken to another place. She’d wanted to keep herself constant until Rifter had found her.

  As fate would have it, she got her salvation in the form of a doctor named Witherspoon, a logical man with an intelligent forehead and deep-set eyes. While the directors had been sorting through the patients, he’d become interested in her story, insisting she stay close. Though she was not quite ignored any longer because of him, things got a bit better for her after that.

  Wren was put into her own individual space. Though it was merely a small cell, she was glad for the solitude. She was allowed to take walks outside with the others in an attractive courtyard surrounded by high walls. An aviary was added within the ward, where the songs of cheerful birds could uplift her. The condition of the hospital was much improved.

  Still, she avoided association with the other women there. Some of them were wrongfully accused, just as she was, but the last group she had told innocent stories to had wound up dead because of her. She could not let it happen again.

  I will not let anyone else be ruined because of me.

  As Wren rested there on her bed in the cramped cell, the night gradually turned into a dismal, gray morning. Wren listened to the noises in the deep, echoing halls around her as the asylum came to life.

  The birds in the aviary were chirping with the morning light, at peace with their lives of captivity. Doors were opening and nurses were talking, wheeling in squeaky carts of breakfast and medicine. Other inmates awoke in their cells, some louder than others, meeting the day with scattered emotions. Still, Wren saw no need to stir. She was tired and weak, but still a long way from rest.

  She lay there until her usual nurse, Mary, brought in her breakfast on a dingy plate.

  “Alright now; sit up and eat up,” the woman said, wheeling the cart toward the bed.

  Mary was a plump woman of around thirty, who looked much older around the eyes. She was always the same – her hair tightly wound, dressed in her uniform of a long black dress and white apron, topped with the typical white hat common to those sharing her profession. Wren did not think poorly of her, but felt that the woman had an oddly shaped shadow.

  Wren had seen Mary every day for months, yet there was never much warmth between the two of them. They never engaged in small talk or even shared much eye contact. For Mary, it was strictly business, and Wren didn’t have much reason to converse. She was unfit to talk to.

  She was a murderess, after all.

  Wren often toyed with asking Mary what she thought of her, but feared the answer. The nurses were all certain they knew the truth about her story, and Wren understood there was nothing left but for her to do as they said – to be a good patient and pray for deliverance.

  Forgiveness waits beyond the confession of sins. That is what they would have me believe.

  Once she'd swallowed the food down like Mary expected, the nurse helped her dress in a clean gown she’d brought in, which was plain and very similar to what the rest of the inmates wore. Mary maneuvered her as if she was a doll instead of a girl, but Wren could not protest. She had as much of a life as a doll had.

  When Mary was done and had wheeled the tray out to leave her alone again, Wren sat on the end of the bed for a long time, staring absently at her shadow that was cast against the far wall. She'd often wondered about it – whether it was a shadow as she had once thought, or if her mimic had returned with her here, but she never saw it move out of sync, and so she had no proof either way.

  Where are you, Rifter? Why did you leave me here? Haven’t I suffered long enough?

  She remembered the last time she had seen him, when he’d looked into her eyes – when he’d made her so many promises. I could never forget you, he'd said. Of all the things he'd sworn to remember, Wren had not suspected that she would be the thing that would disappear. Hadn't the other boys – Sly, Finn, Toss – remembered her? Why hadn't they reminded Rifter that he needed to go after her?

  Maybe I will die before I have answers. I will waste away here.

  It was at that moment that the cell door squealed as it opened once again, and Mary leaned her head inside.

  “Come on now, Wren,” she said with firm insistence. “It’s
time.”

  2

  In the drab office, a pair of large windows let in the gray light of the outside world. The buildings of London stretched out in the distance, each doing its part to block out the sun. The city served as an endless barrier to keep Wren from the world of her dreams, gradually closing in, reminding her that she had no world at all to belong to now.

  Wren sat before Doctor Everett Witherspoon, his half-moon glasses turned downward toward the journal on his desk. Wren didn’t think he was a bad man, but she couldn’t say that she enjoyed spending time with him. He was always judging her like the rest. She didn’t want to be judged. She wanted to be left alone.

  “You haven’t written much lately,” he commented, no doubt noticing the sentence she had begun last night, only to leave off without the desire to finish the thought.

  Wren did not respond. She watched Witherspoon open her casebook with steady fingers. The leather was worn around the edges from being opened and shut so many times. He must have known every word of it by now, having put most of the entries there himself, but she kept silent as he looked over the pages.

  Her eyes drifted over his shoulder, watching his shadow against the wall behind him, reflected by the light of day. It was faint and still – clearly not a secret imp. When Witherspoon finally lifted his brown eyes to hers, she knew what he would say before he opened his mouth.

  “I want to start at the beginning,” he said. Wren wasn’t surprised. He often liked to start at the beginning. “Can we do that?”

  She nodded. Wren had been through this so many times that the sessions no longer fazed her. Some of those memories had been difficult at first – some still were – but she knew that being agreeable with the doctor was better than trying to oppose him. She would comply.

  “When you were thirteen, something happened at home,” he reminded her as if she might have forgotten. “What was that?"

  Wren knew the answers to these questions as well as she knew her name. She always gave him the same replies, and though he might have been waiting for the day that she would slip, she would not. She knew her own story. It was all that had been looping through her head for years.