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“That’s pretty solid.” Asha makes the room around us match her enormous living room in the Escapist world. “I think we’d better start with the more difficult tricks and work our way down.”
“Like what?” I ask.
“Voila.” She shrinks until she’s the size of Pom. “Have you ever played with perspective like this?”
Pom and I just gape at her diminutive form.
“I’m ashamed to admit this idea has never occurred to me,” I say. “Not even after reading Alice in Wonderland.”
Asha gives me a confused look and in a high-pitched voice asks, “Who’s Alice?”
“Oh, just a book on this primitive world I frequently go to,” I say. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Ah, okay,” she says. “I wouldn’t beat yourself up for not trying this particular idea. It’s not very practical, especially given how you’ve been using your power. Besides, if you did try, you’d find it harder than it seems. Chloe hasn’t been able to master it, and even Kojo is terrible at it.”
Really? She’s right in that it doesn’t seem that hard, in theory.
Asha grows back to her normal size—and keeps growing until she’s a giant.
I look up enviously and will myself to grow as well.
Nothing happens.
Asha shrinks to her normal size. “To do this, you have to picture yourself made out of molecules.”
Closing my eyes, I do as she says, visualizing myself as made from molecules of water, oxygen, DNA, hemoglobin, ATP, digestive enzymes, cholesterol, and as many other things as I can recall from my chemistry and biology classes. My fear of germs works to my advantage here. There have been times when I’ve pictured getting attacked by bacteria and viruses in a mental exercise that’s quite similar to this.
“Now grow the molecules as you would a random object,” she instructs.
Hmm, okay. The number of cells in the body is something like thirty trillion, and each cell can contain up to two trillion molecules. That makes the total number of my molecules something unfathomable, like a septillion.
I will those septillions to grow.
When I open my eyes, I’m the same size.
I repeat the exercise, but it doesn’t work on the second try either. Or third.
“Use your emotions to your advantage,” Asha says.
Pom turns light orange. “Emotions help with dreamwalking?”
“Of course.” Asha shrinks to his size, then goes back to normal. “There’s a strong connection between dreams and emotions in general.”
Of course. I can’t believe I haven’t figured this out on my own. It makes so much sense. “You’re right. I did some of my best dreamwalking when I was fighting the Nutcracker, and I was teeming with emotions that time. Well, one specific one: fear.”
Asha smiles mischievously, and we appear in a new room, one that looks like the largest dojo in the history of martial arts. “Let’s leverage your fear.”
Before I can say anything, a throwing star pierces my shoulder.
“Hey, that hurts!”
With a speed almost too fast to perceive, Asha manifests another throwing star in her hand and launches it at me again.
I dodge, then materialize a hundred-pound jar of coconut pudding above my sister’s head and let it fall.
She neutralizes my delicious attack and makes a sword telekinetically jump into her hand from the nearby displays.
Pom watches us, his fur pitch black. But hey, at least he hasn’t disappeared on me this time.
Asha leaps at me, sword raised.
With a move we practiced for the subdream battles, Pom jumps onto my wrist and becomes a furry katana—just in time for me to parry Asha’s thrust.
She delivers a flurry of attacks.
My breathing speeds up.
“Are you scared yet?” she asks.
“A little.”
She stops and grows to the size of a giant, sword and all.
“Grow if you want to live,” she booms and slashes down with her sword.
Chapter Twenty-One
Rationally, I know Asha must be bluffing. Yet I’m afraid. Very afraid. I think it’s a combination of the adrenaline coursing through my system from the fight and the lizard part of my brain reacting to a being that large swinging a sword at me.
A horrific thought flits through my mind. What if she doesn’t know I’ll go insane if she kills me? Could that knowledge be something she’d locked away and didn’t recover today?
Okay, if fear was the desired goal, I’ve got plenty of it now. Maybe too much.
Channeling it as well as I can, I will my molecules to grow.
There’s a moment of vertigo, then I find myself blocking Asha’s sword with my Pom katana.
We’re the same size.
I look at the room around us. Yep. Everything else is tiny.
Suddenly and without my willful participation, I shrink back to my usual size.
Asha does as well, then changes the dojo to the previous living room and evaporates her sword. “I’m so proud of you. Few people manage to do this on their first day.”
Pom separates from my wrist and lands on my shoulder. “You grew me too,” he says excitedly. “That was awesome.”
