As of Thanksgiving, I completed my NanoWrimo goal and finished the first draft of my new book, Of Teeth and Dreams. It started as a short story and now has a full life of its own. I am very excited with the way it turned out, though it will be a few drafts before I share the whole book with anyone.

But I do want to share an excerpt from the first chapter as Dream attempts to harvest a good dream, known as a blissbubble, before he runs out of time.

This scene sets the story in motion and is a good example of the general aethetic, atmosphere, and thrills that fill its pages. I had a lot of fun writing this, especially since it is the first time I have attempted horror.

I hope you enjoy, and I look forward to turning this into something more soon.

The boy’s chest inflates with each breath and the air leaves his body like the whisper of a Mithermoth. A bubble of spittle pops in silence, and Dream shuffles uncomfortably. He glances at the Glimmerglob, his countdown in the form of living shadows: He still has time.

Of course if he simply obeyed his directive, this would be easy. Nightmares are easy to trigger. A little dark, a little whisper, a little trace of a nail across the skin, and the child’s instincts kick in, triggering a shock of fear from the amygdala that plays out a nightmare across the child’s hippocampus and beyond. Dream could easily capture the terror and bring it home. That is his job.

But if he can capture a blissbubble, something like baking cookies with grandma, eating cupcakes with rainbow sprinkles, or riding a park slide with an exhilarating laugh, those are worth so much more. Nightmares are easy. The market is saturated with them. But a blissbubble. One is worth enough to keep him going for more than a week.

Also, Dream likes them. They are quality, but they only happen naturally, which means waiting. And with every moment he waits and every flicker of the Glimmerglob, the danger grows.

Because it is coming back. It always comes back.

The sounds of night continue: the song of cicadas, the occasional traffic at the intersection on the corner, and the prowling of the neighborhood cats. The Glimmerglob’s flickering shadows on the walls spark and displace each other. Sometimes they live like a scene from a grainy black-and-white movie, faces or horses tramping across the horizon, but only for a twinkle, and only from the corner of the eye. They slowly transform into something harsher with deeper lines and spinning scrolling specters.

Dream’s breathing thickens as the time steadily runs down and cold sweat breaks out across his gray-gold skin and his thin spider web wings. He should leave. Come on, come on, he wills the child to dream, for something beautiful to emerge before…

The crackle of a campfire and sweet-soft crunch of toasted marshmallow fills the air, and Dream takes a trembling breath in relief. He raises his golden net. The warm squish and chunk of biting through graham cracker and chocolate dances behind the child’s closed eyes, and Dream sweeps his net down through the toddler’s head like a ghost.

He admires his find, a glorious swirling globe of color blazing like a prism just as the Glimmerglob goes dark. Fear scatters Dream’s satisfied smile across the room as the silent scream of wings descends upon the house.

It has returned.