The House of Grey- Volume 4 (30 page)

The eyebrow shot up
again.
“Why?”

“Just trust me. This
is not
something you are
ready
to see.”

Monson did as he was told
.
“
I
s this good enough?”

“
Yes,
hold on tight.”

“Hold onto what—
”

Monson shot into the air like a drunken firecracker. Thankfully the turbulence only lasted a moment
and he
came to an abrupt stop
. It felt
as if
he were
standing on
solid
ground.

“Walk around
,
” yelled Dawn from the ground far below. “You
will not
fall,
I have you
.
”

Monson started to walk around
and
examin
e
his surroundings
, trying hard to
ignor
e
the fact that he was suspended many feet in
up in the air
. He breathed deeply and continued his
inspection,
finding that thus far nothing really seemed out of the ordinary
—
at least in the current sense of the word. He
touched
one of the massive support columns laced intermittently throughout the
c
entral
c
hamber.  He touched it and found to his delight that if he focused
,
his hand did not go straight through it. It was then that a clue manifest
ed itself
.

“Dawn! Can you join me up here?” yelled Monson in a hurried voice.

“What’s up?” Dawn materialized
at
Monson’s side
,
startling him a bit. “
F
igure out something?”

“Not quite
,
b
ut look at this
.
”
Monson
pointed at various portions of the Tower
.

“I don’t understand what I
a
m looking at. What is it?”

“I don’t know either
.
”

Both Dawn and Monson, floating in midair
,
facing the huge carved mosaic, stared at it in shock.
From this vantage point, a
pproximately halfway to the top, Monson and Dawn could see all the paths, passages and stairs that Grayson’s
g
randfather mentioned in his journal. Th
at drawing
really did not do the Tower justice and
most definitely
did not
convey
how very large and intricate the structure was. Oddly enough,
 
the paths, stairways and even some of the external carvings
were not
complete
. It seemed like
they were part of some vast spectacular dream that, in his haste, the dreamer forgot to
finish completely
. In the
se unfinished
areas
was a glowing ooze of some sort.  Monson looked at Dawn
,
who nodded and instantly move
d
them towards one of the “missing” portions.

They
touched down near a large spiraling stone staircase on the
fourth
landing
, and were momentarily
blinded
by
the magnificence of the structure
before them
. They reveled in the Tower’s precise carving
s
, artful paintings
,
and detailed tapestries
.
Despite this, now that they were actually within
the Tower
,
the atmosphere got under
Monson
’
s
skin;
he had
a slightly eerie feeling
.
H
e found himself thinking that the whole of this...place...whatever it
was
,
 
almost had to be made out of magic based on what he saw on the landing alone. The paintings, carvings and other
works of
art were just a little to
o
surreal to be entirely plausible.
Could normal artists create something so beautiful? He wasn’t sure.

He pushed this thought aside, and found that as soon as h
e
allowed
that concept
to take
root
inside of himself,
belief welled up from within
.
He marveled at what a
n extremely curious revelation it was to suddenly believe.
He
felt a hand squeeze his shoulder
, and
turned to see Dawn smiling at him with
the
proud
expression
of
a mother
gazing
at an obedient child.

“You’re learning
,
” said Dawn in a quiet voice. Mons
on smiled back. Again,
words were not needed. He could actually feel Dawn’s emotions, could feel them coursing
towards
him. They were exciting and familiar, yet oddly foreign and scary
as they flowed
through
him. 

The
se feelings
triggered his
reminiscence
; h
e examined the feelings closely. They felt like they were probing him and were almost exactly like the one that assaulted him
when he
first arrived at Coren. He viewed that thought with embarrassment
,
contemplating the emotion and misstep that caused the scene with Kylie. How could he have forgotten? Monson’s mind reeled as he focused on that
episode
.  Was
that incident because of
Dawn that day
,
too?

And
a better question
yet
, who
was
Dawn?

Regardless of what th
e experience of probing light
may
have
mean
t,
one thing was for sure
:
Dawn
may look just like him at the moment, but he
was very different from him. To
Monson
’
s
surprise Dawn smiled at him with a knowing expression, but shook his head slightly.

Monson fought the sudden urge to throw his arms around
him
and thank him for his concern.

“What do you think we
’
re dealing with?”
asked Monson,
walking over to a glowing
, unfinished
portion of the Tower’s wall. “
I have a feeling we
’
re missing
something incredibly obvious
in
all this.”

“
D
o
n
o
t look at me
.
I
a
m as stumped as you are.”  Dawn reached out his hand to touch the glowing space.

“Dawn,
are you a reader?
”
A
n idea
had suddenly occurred to him
.

“What’s that?”
asked
Dawn
.

“
A reader—someone who likes to read…like books?
”

“
Monson, this seems like a poor time to engage in idle small talk,” replied
Dawn with a puzzled look.
“
W
hat does that have to do with our problem here?”

“
Sorry. I was thinking about something
Grayson said about seeking
truth
in one of the most invasive ways. When he said that it reminded
me
of a conversation
I had with Casey
. I did
n
’
t really give it much thought at the time,
but I find that conversation haunting me suddenly. Casey told me
once
that while fantasy stories are fiction
al
writing
,
they
are
often the most honest
—
because
they tell some truth about
the writer himself
.
”

For the first time Dawn stared at Monson in
utter
bafflement. Monson pushed forward.
“Let me explain.  I asked Casey once where he got his inspiration for
his
screenplay. He said that much of it came from pieces of other stories. Casey also
mentioned
that additional inspiration
s
for stories
often
come from the dreams
of the author, and that these
dreams
are
a glimpse
into
the heart. He went on to say that the hea
r
t is where truth
—
universal truth
—
resides and that’s why fiction
might
be
the truest form of
writing
.
Now this is the crazy part
:
W
hat if Grayson believes
what
Casey
does—
that dreams hint at this
truth of the heart
? What if the reason that he reads all those books is that he’s trying to find that truth? Basically
,
my theory would be this:
Grayson is looking for the
complete
truth of the heart
, which is scattered among
fiction
books,
in
an
attempt to gain insight to these other worlds.”

“It
i
s an interesting theory. Do you have anything else to go on?”

“Take us up a floor
,
” said Monson after a moment of trying to remember the exact layout of the building in front of him. He closed his eyes. “There is something I want you to see.”

Monson smiled inwardly
,
grateful
that Dawn was
with him.
If
he
had not come,
Monson would have had to find a way through the glowing portions of nothingness that littered the Tower’s face
.
N
ot that he was terribly worried
;
he felt confident that
whatever the substance was,
it would not hurt him, but he did not want to take that chance
on his own
.

They touch
ed
down in front of a very large mural of a being with long
,
shiny dark hair and
feminine
hands
.
And,
most conspicuous
ly,
a huge angel
-
like wingspan many feet
across
. Monson took a step back
and inhaled
deep
ly as warmth tingled his senses
. He
was not
sure what had
struck
him about
the image in that moment,
but seeing it up close made
it
feel
much more real to him. Apparently, Dawn felt the same way
,
as his awed expression mirrored Monson’s. Dawn stared at the painting with a look that Monson
could not
begin to understand
,
and for some reason, he felt right now probably was not the time to ask.

“What do you see?”
asked
Monson
,
trying to act as if he
had not
notice
d
Dawn’s behavior
.

Dawn gave a shake as if he was coming out of a deep reverie
.
“I
do not
really know
;
some sort of being that has wings
,
I guess.”