Chapter 4: The Echo of a Dream

The fall hadn’t killed me. The landing, however, had done its best. I woke with a gasp, every muscle screaming. My head throbbed, and the only things I knew were the scents of damp earth and pine needles. The absolute blackness of the chute was gone, replaced by the pervasive blue glow of the Evernight moon filtering through a canopy of skeletal trees.

I pushed myself up, my bones groaning. I was in a small, grassy clearing, surrounded by a dark forest. There was no sign of the mansion, the city, or the terrifying hole I’d fallen through. The air was cool and crisp, carrying the clean scent of the wilderness—the first natural smell I’d encountered here. A quick pat-down confirmed I was in one piece, the fractured watch still cold and heavy on my wrist. The portal had spat me out and vanished.

Panic tried to rise, but years of living on a knife’s edge had taught me to smother it. First, you assess. Then, you act. Towering over the forest to my left was the dark silhouette of a mountain. Every thief knows the high ground is the best ground. It’s where you cast the joint, to understand the layout. This was just the biggest joint I’d ever had to figure out.

The climb was grueling. The slope was steep, covered in loose scree that tore at my stolen, fine-leather boots. The silence here was a living silence, punctuated by a real breeze rustling the petrified leaves. It was a deeply unsettling combination of life and death. By the time I reached a clear overlook near the summit, my lungs were burning and my legs felt like jelly.

But the view was worth it. The world laid itself out before me like a map.

To my right, there was Chronostead. A breathtaking jewel of brass and light, its clockwork towers and Magitek spires reaching towards the blue moon. Even from this distance, I could see the grand avenues and the dark shape of Thorne’s mansion. It was exactly as I had left it—a perfect, silent machine.

But to my left, nestled in the long shadow of the mountain, was the city's forgotten half. A cluster of simpler buildings made of wood and rough-hewn stone. There were no grand towers here, no glowing runic advertisements. A few thin plumes of steam were frozen rising from chimneys. A single, winding road skirted the mountain, connecting the two sides, but the mountain served as a formidable barrier. It was the worn-out, frayed edge where the gleaming fabric of progress met the simple, hard reality of the past. It was a world I understood instinctively.

I sat there for what felt like hours, a king surveying a broken kingdom, memorizing the layout. I traced the path of the winding road, noting landmarks—a collapsed watchtower, a fork leading to a quarry, a bridge over a dry riverbed. It was a long walk, but a straight shot back to the gilded cage. With a plan solidifying, a sliver of control in a world of chaos, I began my descent.

I chose a game trail that seemed to head in the right direction, eyes fixed on the distant gleam of the city. The further I walked, the stranger the feeling grew. A knot of wrongness tightened in my gut. I passed a trio of twisted, ancient oaks, their branches woven together like the fingers of three old crones. I knew them. Not in a vague way. I knew the way the moonlight caught on their petrified bark, the precise way one branch reached for the sky.

Further on, the path curved around a massive, split boulder that looked like a cleaved skull. I knew the fissure running down its center, the patch of moss frozen near its base. It wasn't a memory from my brief time in this world. It was an echo, a phantom limb of a memory from a life I’d left behind. Back in my attic room, I’d had dreams—feverish, disconnected flashes of strange landscapes I’d always dismissed. I was walking through one of those dreams now.

My logical mind screamed, Go left! Stick to the plan. But my gut, tangled in the tendrils of this impossible dream, whispered, Go right.

I went right.

I abandoned the plan, a fool chasing a ghost. I followed the path as it wound deeper into the silent woods, each step taking me further from my goal. For a while, the familiar landmarks continued—a dried-up stream bed, a clearing where the trees grew in a perfect circle. But then the dream-trail faded. The uncanny markers vanished, and the woods became a simple, anonymous tangle of trees and shadows.

I was lost. Utterly and completely. I had traded a clear path for a whisper and ended up with nothing.

Just as a sliver of real despair began to creep in, I saw it. The path led to something. In a small, secluded clearing, nestled amongst the roots of an enormous, petrified ironwood tree, was a chest.

It was old, made of a dark, dense wood and bound with straps of the same dull, coppery bronze as the watch. It wasn't large, but it radiated an aura of immense age. There were no visible locks, only intricate, shifting symbols etched into the bronze bands, similar to the ones on the watch.

Suddenly, the cold dread vanished, replaced by a jolt of pure adrenaline. The familiar, predatory hum of my old life sang in my veins. This was a box. A locked box. And my job was to open locked boxes.

I knelt beside it, my fingers tracing the cool metal. I ran my picks along the seams, searching for a keyhole, a tumbler, and a pressure plate. Nothing. The lid was sealed tight, the bands fused to the wood. I tried to pry a corner with my knife, but the blade skittered off the bronze. I tried to lift it; it was impossibly heavy.

Frustration mounted. I was a thief, mocked by a box. It was a personal insult. My old skills were useless here. This world is played by different rules. This chest wasn't a mechanical lock; it was something else.

But then, an idea sparked in the frustrated darkness of my mind. I didn’t have the tools. But I knew where they were. Thorne's saws that could cut through any metal. The sonic drivers that could vibrate locks apart. The strange, arcane devices I didn't even have names for. They were all in that basement, right next to their frozen, genius creator.

A new plan formed, audacious and simple. I couldn't open the chest here, but, what I can do is move it. And I happen to know exactly where to take it.

I looked from the chest to the fractured watch. One ancient, bronze artifact had sent me to this world. Maybe another could be my key to understanding it. I just needed the right tools for the job and guess where I can find the tools? Mr. Throne, I’m coming back!