Veil

Chapter 28

______________________________

Veil dreams.

Vivid dreaming is his gift and affliction, the lash of memory and a guide to justice, a mystery and sometimes the key to mystery, prod to violence and maker of peace, an invitation to madness and the fountainhead of his power as an artist.

Now vivid dreaming is also his passport to the land where his love is lost. He searches, does not find her, and escapes from the mist the way he has always escaped from dreams, by rolling away. But he searches again and again, until in one dream he finally finds her, exactly as he left her, the process of disintegration halted by his unsuccessful attempt to bring her back along an electric road.

Together they reaffirm the truth that love and courage, while not antidotes to death, are the heart and spine of hope. They meet and talk many times—of their love, of the near-death experience, and of dreaming and escaping from dreams.

Then one dream, when all the mechanical things have been disconnected from her body, Sharon is able to allow Veil gently to lift her in the arms of his mind and roll her away with him. . . .