Mist curled above the endless, gentle ocean. Tyrian pushed the gondola along. Night winds helped propel the vessel and calm waves lapped at its sides. The passenger in front of him was the same as always. A young woman whom he had watched grow up, night by night. In her pajamas, she brushed back long blonde hair from her eyes as she stared into the mist. The only whisper in the night was that of the wind and the water. They would arrive at the first island soon. As a Dream Ferryman, it was his job to get the passenger to their dreams. The two didn’t speak to each other. It wasn’t his place to talk to his passenger, but she had told him her name once, when she was little. He doubted she remembered him night after night for so many years, but Tyrian remained the same.
The faint outline of a land mass approached. Tyrian slowed the gondola. The young woman in front of him took a sharp breath. No one ever knew what was on the islands and no two were the same. Occasionally, they would return to one, but that would rarely happen. The boat jerked forward as it hit the gravelly shore. Tyrian stepped into the water and helped the girl out onto the shore.
“Good luck,” he said like he always did. She looked back when he spoke. For a second their eyes met, but they quickly glanced away. He got back into his boat, and she traveled into the heart of the island. Tyrian thought she was smiling. He didn’t touch the island. If he did, he would be a part of her dream, and the ferrymen were not supposed to be a part of their passenger’s dreams, because then she would remember him.
Tyrian rounded the island and waited for his passenger. He could glimpse a sunny glade and a pleasant aura surrounded the land. Tyrian smiled. It was a good dream.
Time passed. It might have been a few hours or a minute, he could never tell when near a dream island. Tyrian soon spotted the young woman in pajamas walking out from the mist. He helped her into the gently rocking boat and they traveled on. Her eyes had a glazed look in them when they were swallowed by the mist. The two continued in silence until another mass emerged from the mist, but it wasn’t another dream island. It was the harbor.
Tyrian tied off the boat to the pier and assisted his passenger off the vessel. She didn’t look at him again. The pier led to a sheer cliff, but the path didn’t stop. A tunnel was carved into the mountain. Already, passengers from countless other gondolas walked into the shaft. Tyrian watched until his passenger entered the tunnel. At the end of the path, the passengers awoke from the dream world. Tyrian waited on the pier as the dawn stretched out over the horizon. People filtered in and out of the tunnel throughout the day, finding their own Ferryman, but Tyrian waited. He waited and watched the sun ride across the sky and finally end in a dazzling show of orange and red. They did share one thing with the “real world” as it was called. As the moon rose, thousands of people walked over the salty boards and stepped into their boats.
Tyrian spotted his passenger. She stepped into the boat as usual. The night was cool, and with a brisk wind, he only needed to steer. The first island appeared through the mist.
“Good Luck,” he said again, and she left, walking into the unknown island.
As Tyrian waited on the other side, he tried to see what the dream was, but he couldn’t spot anything. Finally, through the mist, he saw movement high above in the black sky. The island’s aura suddenly hit him like a thunderbolt. A cold tingling crept into his toes.
“No, not a nightmare.” Tyrian’s hands began to sweat. A high pitched scream broke through the mist. She was close, maybe running to the boat at this moment.
There! He could see her. A flat stretch of withered grass was between him and his passenger. Behind her was the winged beast he had seen high in the black clouds before. Tyrian wanted to jump out of the boat and help her, but he couldn’t. Before he could make up his mind, the girl had reached the boat and jumped in, the monster clawing at her. The momentum pushed the gondola away from the shore and Tyrian quickly pushed them farther into the open sea. He shuddered. Tyrian was glad he couldn’t dream. He couldn’t imagine facing the terrors of his imagination. He remembered his passenger’s dreams when she was just a toddler, the ones where he knew she had woken up screaming, and was glad she couldn’t remember those.
Tyrian looked down at the young woman huddled at the bottom of the boat. Her shoulders shuddered from sobs. Tyrian stopped what he was doing and sunk to his knees.
“Hey, it’s ok, you’re fine now,” he whispered in soothing tones. “It was just a dream.” He shouldn’t have spoken to her. He shouldn’t have touched her, put his arms around her, but he did. Tyrian couldn’t be a ghost to her any longer. He didn’t care that she wouldn’t remember him, and maybe wouldn’t even remember her dream, but he needed to help. He wasn’t a heartless creature to let her be alone and afraid at the bottom of the boat.
Tyrian sat with her for a long time. He didn’t see where the boat took them, but it eventually came to a stop on a sandbar. A trace of salt permeated the air. The tide lowered and the gondola beached on the white, sandy island. Tyrian was on the island, a part of her dream, but he didn’t care. There was nothing he could do now.
With the decreasing tide came the warm, bright yellow sunshine as the island expanded. The warmth woke the two from their frightened daze. The girl looked up, recognition dawning on her face.
“I know you. I couldn’t remember you before, but I know you…Tyrian. You saved me from the nightmare. Why couldn’t I remember you?”
“Dreams, they’re the only thing you’re supposed to remember of this world. This is a good dream. You should rest here.” She didn’t argue. Tyrian could still see the confusion in her eyes, but there was a hint of recognition. He was the feeling of incomprehensible familiarity in the back of your mind. Like when you smell or hear or taste something and you get an unexplainable feeling, the place between dreams and reality, the ferryman.
“Will I ever see those nightmares again?”
“I wish you wouldn’t, but I can’t control where the gondola goes.” A foolhardy plot came into his mind. “You could stay here, live on this island with me and never go back to the nightmares.” They were both sitting up now, meeting eye to eye. The woman took a long time in answering.
“I would stay, but this is not my world. I don’t belong here. I’m only a passenger.” A pained expression was on her face. “Tyrian, don’t you understand? This is your world.”
“You are my world,” Tyrian whispered, almost to himself. “If you were to die, I would find another to ferry. That is all I do, and I’m never seen, never remembered, always to stay in the boat, look on in helplessness or jealousy.”
“But I’ll remember you.” Her words stuck in the air for a long time, or maybe it was only a few seconds. Tyrian knew he couldn’t win. She had a family, another world that he could never get to, but he would still hope.
The wind began to pick up, pushing waves with the light boat from the beach.
“I will remember you, Tyrian. I’ll see you in my dreams.” She smiled at him and turned in her seat as they left the island. The moonlight again glistened off the smooth waves as they rode of to the harbor.
Tyrian remained silent. The gondola docked at the pier. The young woman got out of the boat. She had the same glazed look. She could not truly see the harbor or the ocean. Tyrian watched as she left, hoping they would truly see eachother again.
“Good luck, Sara.”
