The Forgotten Dreamer
The Archive had gone quiet again, but it wasn't a silence of peace.
It was the kind that listens.
The kind that breathes.
The kind that waits.
Cuco's hand still shimmered faintly, the light now no more than an afterthought, a dying ember in the vast dark. Around him, the others watched—quiet, cautious—as if unsure whether he might rise with new power or crumble into ash.
He broke the silence with a question that had been coiled in his chest since the mist receded.
"Who were they?" he asked. "The Hollow Ones. Where did they come from?"
Nox said nothing at first. Instead, she moved to the far end of the Archive and pulled a book from the shelves—a thick, dust-covered tome, wrapped in black cloth and bound with string that looked more ceremonial than practical.
She placed it into Cuco's hands.
"They're not from here," she said at last. "Not really. They're what's left of people who lost themselves between the worlds. When the boundary between dream and waking crumbles… that's what's left behind."
Tariq stepped forward, voice softer than usual.
"Some of them were like us once. Chosen. Called. But not all Keys stay whole."
Cuco opened the book carefully.
Its pages were thick, yellowed with age, and filled with names.
Sketches.
Notes written in ink that had bled through the parchment. Some of the faces had their eyes scratched out. Some were marked with strange runes. And all of them… looked eerily familiar. Like faded memories of teachers long retired. Friends he couldn't name but felt he once knew. Shadows from a dream.
Then he turned a page.
And froze.
A girl stared back at him from the worn paper. Her features were soft but sharp with quiet resolve. A faint birthmark curved just above her brow. Her eyes seemed to follow him.
Isabela Reyes.
The words beneath her picture read:
> Last seen near Hollow Creek. Dreamer-Class Initiate. Status: Unknown.
Cuco's mouth went dry.
"She was one of us?"
Nox nodded slowly.
"The last Key before you. Ten years ago."
"She vanished," Tariq said. "On the longest night of the year. No trace. No sound. Just… gone. But some of us still hear her. In dreams. Calling for help."
Cuco's fingers lingered on the page.
Hollow Creek. That name rang inside him like a bell.
"That's near where I live."
Nox's gaze narrowed.
"The gate's moving. The veil's shifting. Like something—or someone—is drawing it closer."
Cuco stood, the book still in his hands.
"I'm going there. Tonight."
Tariq caught his arm, eyes hard with warning.
"You don't just walk into Hollow Creek, Cuco. It's a mirror. A lure. What took her might still be waiting."
Cuco shook him off.
"Then I'll find out what she saw. Maybe… she's still alive."
The room fell into silence again.
Then, Nox gave a small nod.
"Fine. But we go together. And we go ready."
---
Later That Night
The moon loomed low over Hollow Creek, casting a silver sheen across the forest canopy. The trees leaned too far inward, as if eavesdropping. The air was colder here—colder than it should've been—and every breath felt stolen from a dream not meant to be remembered.
Cuco stepped forward.
The mark on his hand ignited with a faint, pulsing glow.
And the path appeared.
A thread of pale light unfurled before them, weaving between gnarled roots and hanging branches, drawing them into the forest's breathless heart.
"Once we cross," Tariq murmured, "we leave our world behind."
Cuco didn't hesitate.
He stepped into the light.
With each footfall, the world warped. Sound bent sideways. Shadows grew teeth. The forest whispered in languages not spoken since the first dreamer closed their eyes. Memories clung to the air—half-formed, forgotten, aching to be seen.
Then, a sound.
A voice.
Faint. Floating.
"…Hello?"
Cuco froze.
He knew that voice.
Not from his visions.
Not from the Archive.
But from the forest.
From years ago.
From the day he got lost in these woods as a child.
"Cuco… is that you?"
He turned.
And there she was.
Standing at the edge of the glowing path.
A girl.
His age.
Same face. Same soft determination. Same birthmark.
Isabela.
Unchanged.
Untouched by time.
Still dreaming.
Chapter 0: Isabela
Ten Years Ago
Isabela Reyes was thirteen the first time the mark burned itself into her skin.
It came in the middle of the night—searing into her palm like a brand from some ancient fire. She jolted awake with a cry, just as the lightbulb above her shattered, raining glass and sparks across the floor.
Her parents came running, confused, frightened.
She told them it was just a bad dream.
They believed her.
But the mark didn't fade.
And the dreams… only deepened.
Every night she returned to the same forest—twisted and unreal, stitched together with memory and nightmare. She heard laughter that didn't belong. Saw children running barefoot through the trees. And something else…
Something chasing them.
A beast made of shadow and smoke.
Every night, she got closer to it.
By the time the Circle found her, she was no longer an ordinary girl. She was stronger. Quicker. And something inside her had begun to lean toward the dark, like a flower bending toward a black sun.
Nox had been the first to approach her—barely sixteen then, but already weathered by secrets. Tariq followed soon after, younger, curious, eyes full of questions he never asked aloud.
Together, they trained Isabela.
They taught her how to listen for the Hollow Ones.
How to draw sigils that burned in the air.
How to drown out the voices whispering from the veil.
But no lesson prepared her for the day the seal broke.
It happened in winter.
Snow fell soft as ash.
The streets were quiet.
Too quiet.
She was walking home alone, her breath misting in the cold, when the world simply… stopped.
Time unraveled.
Cars froze mid-turn. Leaves hung motionless in the air. Even the snowflakes halted, suspended like tiny daggers in a frozen sky.
Then the earth cracked.
And something rose.
A Hollow One—towering and terrible, shaped from memories she didn't remember having. Its body was woven from smoke and shattered thought. Its voice didn't speak aloud—it entered her, cold and smooth as ice sliding behind her ribs.
> "You are the door," it said.
"And it is time to open."
Isabela didn't run.
She fought.
The mark on her hand ignited, a column of white fire surging skyward. She screamed, power tearing through her veins like lightning through wire, and the creature split apart in a howl of static and rot.
But as it fell, something else emerged.
A mirror.
Old. Floating. Fractured.
And inside it—her.
But not as she was.
This Isabela was older. Pale. Eyes black and endless. A shadow where a future should be.
And the reflection spoke:
> "You don't defeat it by fighting."
"You defeat it by becoming."
Her own voice.
Twisted.
Familiar.
Then the mirror reached for her.
And touched the mark.
Pain bloomed behind her eyes like a thousand suns exploding inward. Her scream fractured the air. She collapsed.
And in that moment, she saw it.
The First Dreamer.
Sleeping far beneath the world.
And now… beginning to wake.
She woke hours later.
In the heart of Hollow Creek.
Alone.
Her hands blistered. Her veins glowing faintly beneath her skin.
When the Circle found her, she didn't speak.
Didn't cry.
Just whispered, voice raw and distant:
> "The gate isn't closed anymore."
Then her mark turned black.
And she vanished.