D'rai awoke with a cloud of dust in his face--sandy dirt kicked up by two children, clad in rags, who had run past him, playing some game of pursuit. He sat up, snorted the dust out of his nose, and rubbed at his scratchy eyes. The place was familiar--the alleyway between two buildings of familiar make--Daphne had compared the material to adobe. The sun was beating down, the air bereft of humidity, making the place like an oven even in the shade. It was the dominion. He was home.
       He looked around just to make sure. This was the straw pile where he had his bed--and over there, down the alley and across the way, was Lendi Rýlx's fruit stand, and over there next to it was Old Nam's spirit shop. This was the long, wide alleyway where he lived. I must have been dreaming, he thought. How long had he been asleep? ...Was he still a criminal? How wary should he be?
       He got up. After brushing the straw out of his hair, he ducked around the side of the somewhat-crumbled building that made up one of the alley walls (the alley didn't end in a building's back--there was a narrower alley perpendicular to it; it was into this that D'rai went). Leaning up against the building's back door, flask of spirits in his hand, was an unkempt figure he knew well--young like him, but towheaded, with crooked front teeth, and without a beard: a fellow bounty-hunter in the war, Yannu T'be [tih-BAY].
       T'be, who hadn't bothered to brush the straw out of his hair from his bed elsewhere in the village, looked up and grinned at him. "Good day to you, Emphi D'rai!" He held out his flask hospitably. "Have some panyye? ...Or are you still recovering from last night? It's past sun-zenith, you know. We had to carry you home last night, Old Nam and I. Lucky for you that we still had our wits about us, or you'dve found yourself still at the spirit-shop doorstep, being trodden upon by all and sundry."
       D'rai shook his head, refusing the drink. "I've had the strangest dreams, T'be, and apparently I can't tell reality from drunken vision. Tell me, have I been in jail anytime during the past few seasons?"
       T'be laughed. "Have you amnesia, D'rai? Yes, the Rojanes had you in jail two days ago, but then the war ended--the Rojane great-leader was slain, and they surrendered. The A'Laudes set you free from their prison last night, and you were so thrilled to be out of there that you and I met up, took chunks out of our bounty-purses, and proceeded to celebrate a very successful business venture. With all the spirits you downed, I'm not surprised you had some funny dreams. I've never seen you take so much."
       So it had ended in the jails. No pigtailed girl to take his place...no fighting for the Rojanes after that...no Indilani prison...no Indilanis at all? And nothing after that? "It feels as though I've slept forever," D'rai said wonderingly. "What I dreamed was supposed to be three seasons chronologically, and I could swear to you I was awake for them. ...But what I dreamed about could only have been spirit-induced. I dreamed a girl had come to save me--to take my place in the cells, and take a beating for me. Something about helping some boy named Gavin."
       "Gavin? An outlandish name, D'rai. What happened with this heroine who came to break your chains?" He grinned amusedly.
       D'rai made himself grin back. "I killed her. Turned the crowd against her at her beating, threw her over the Low Tower of the jail buildings."
       T'be laughed appreciatively. "You're ruthless even in your dreams. I'dve seen what kind of girl she would've made me first, though."
       D'rai laughed in echo. "Not this one. I even called her a scrapling to her face. Had a strange one, at that, and wore her hair funny, all gathered up at the sides. ...So there's no group called the Indilanis at all?"
       "Indilanis? Not that I know of, no. They in your dream?"
       "Yeah, and too much more to even tell. The strangest thing that's ever happened to me, waking up after being all these foreign places."
       T'be laughed once more. "Well, I was waiting for you to wake up. It's time for us to make names for ourselves, D'rai. Our bounty-purses...even after last night's drinks, we're rich."
       "Rich?" D'rai asked in awe.
       "D'rai, don't you even remember how much money you made? Go back to your bed and look, if your brain's still spirit-muddled--it's in your compartment under the straw. I'd say what kind of drink was muddling it, but you had so many last night, like I said--finally had the money for the good stuff..."
       But D'rai had already gone back to the bed. Transforming himself into a small snake-like creature, he slithered through the hay and through a small locked compartment--rather like a cubbyhole--somehow built into the ground and covered by the bed. His tube-like body tripped some tiny form of hinge inside the compartment, and it sprang open. He slithered through the now-open door, through the hay, and morphed back into human form. Then he looked into the pigeon-hole of sorts. "By Tabor's hast-horn!" cried D'rai in shock. "How did I make so much money, T'be?"
       "Over time, friend D'rai. Didn't you watch it grow as you went? You've been hiding it here all this time--crept out at night and found the bodies you'd hidden, taken them to the exchange house, fetched your price, then hid the money here before you shifted to some rapid-running animal and hurried back to catch your sleep before the day began. I did the same, and so did Polõ Ndora, before he was killed."
       "Ndora's dead? I don't remember that. How?"
       "In battle, the imbecile. Didn't watch himself and was run right through by a Rojane spear."
       "Who got his money?"
       "We split what little we could get. The rest went to that accursed girl of his--said she'd expose us if we didn't give it to her. Remember now?"
       "Yes," said D'rai, although he didn't.
       "Anyway, I only bought this panyye to keep me company until you woke up--I was more interested in finally getting a good meal in me than in drinking last night. Had the finest melted renole last night, after we took you home, that the dominion has to offer--the best food I've ever eaten in my life. I couldn't believe anything could taste so good, or fill a stomach so well. ...We'll never be stepped on again, D'rai. Never. It starts today--we'll go to the outer markets, where no one recognizes us. We'll buy the best clothes we can find, and get our hair cut like the nobles have it. We'll come back here and pose as wealthy vagabonds--we'll make up some story on the way. We'll win everybody over--we'll rise to power--we'll take it all! ...And then, the ones who called us worthless, the families who waved coins before our noses and then snatched them away...we'll pay them back with our own charity."
       D'rai had listened to the speech half-dazed. All a dream. The other dimension, everything...all a dream. ...Wasn't it? He was to be tested...
       But, no, here was T'be. It all fit. It all made sense. All a dream. Only a dream. No Daphne, no Maik, no Illuminati. No conflict. No warning.
       Only himself, and T'be, and their money from the war. And the finest in life awaited them. He wished he could remember the spirits he'd enjoyed last night...but there were plenty more to be had, and he was rich beyond his highest wartime estimations. He'd killed many, but for such a price? Never in his wildest dreams. But there it was, in his hole. He picked up a bundle of it, locked the compartment back up, and scattered the straw back over it.
       "Lead on, T'be," D'rai said. And so they went.