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pressure. He left me no choice. My right fist collided with
his jaw as my left moved to pry his immense hand from my
neck.
He didn’t move or speak, but only squeezed tighter. The
fire from his eyes burned across my face as he held me closer.
I could see my sisters standing behind him, their smiles
gone. Now, both of my hands were trying his individual
fingers. They were immovable, squeezing tighter still. My
father’s eyes poured fire into my mind, and I could feel
certain memories crisping and curling within the inferno. I
tried to open my eyes against his own, to dowse his fires in
my silence, but all I could do was gasp. The Deadworld was
opening, and I could feel waking sensations move into my
fingertips as my father’s grip began to crush me out of sleep.
Beyond the burning dream, within the smoldering ruins
of so many deadened memories, I could see Marvin, his
body renewed in stitches and staples, aiming a whisper in
my direction. Before I heard my neck-within-a-dream snap
like a twig, I heard the hushed words of the man-monster.
“Serpents are far deadlier than wolves, my friend—and your
bed is teeming with them.”
When I awoke, the sun was burning into the retreating
night, and my throat still vibrated with a phantom pressure
that refused to submit to waking. I replaced my sisters to
their sleeping places and made ready to depart, my itinerary
ever-growing. Though I had my sights set on Tom Hush and
Doctor Joshua Link, my mind was pinned to the dream of my
mother, and only to a slightly lesser extent, the whispered
words of Marvin the lunatic. His warning burned like a
small fire in a dry field, an infant inferno. Even under the hot
light of the sun, I could feel the burning gaze of my father,
watching. I put down the dream-memory and walked away
slowly, waiting for the sun to fall away. I had no intention of
entering the next city in broad daylight.
The eastern entrance to the sprawling metropolis of
Nighthead was littered with the lingering machinations of the
168 | Mark Anzalone