Aya, a goatherd of Silky Farm in the region of Dashi, often felt she'd been born just a little too late. Her home had bowed their heads and surrendered their Summoner's Castle to the Sovereigns when she was still a small child, and now life was so, so dull. The elders would tell scary bedtime stories of how, before the Sovereigns started their campaign, the sky had thronged with summoned winged monsters who would swoop down to steal away misbehaving children!

Young Aya thought that sounded wonderful and spent many hours imagining where they'd steal her away to. Her austere mother hadn't appreciated it when, at age 8, she'd shouted, "Aya! Do you want to get stolen away by sky demons?" and Aya had shouted back, "I'm trying to, Mama!"

8-year-old Aya met the proposal that sky demons would only want to gobble her up with implacable skepticism. She pointed out that any hungry sky demon who could tell if she was good or bad would also obviously be able to tell just how much more fun it would be to pick her up and take her on an adventure.

This proved so powerful a defense that not only did she get out of trouble, but her previously stern mother took her on a picnic to a circus and (much to Aya's chagrin) completely forgot to sell her.

That became the pattern of her life. Unlike most people, Aya lived in a world where those things could happen. And so, for Aya, they did… although in ways she never quite acknowledged. She was so busy looking up, she usually missed the miracles under her nose.

By the time she was fifteen, she'd had the most relentlessly mundane life of adventure imaginable. Opportunities that challenged her were rare.

"Hey!" said the little blue men. "Can you spin these moonbeams into thread for us?" She'd been spinning since she was three.

"Oh!" said the talking mole. "Can you churn this serpent's milk to butter?" And oh, she knew churning.

"Aya!" commanded the goblin queen. "Stalk this nightwraith across the moors on a starless night!" Child's play compared to finding a black goat in a rainstorm on a scrubby mountain.

Just the other day, she'd watched a flying beast bearing two people soar over the occupied Summoner's Castle, laughing. It hadn't been in the livery of the Sovereigns, either—but nobody else had seemed to notice them, even when they swooped close to the walls and talked so loudly Aya could hear fragments of words from her mountainside.

"Miss!" said a sorcerer in white. "My, you are a big dreamer, in a pleasant voice that cut across Aya's imaginary world.

"Hey!" said Aya, although she didn't quite wake up even when she shook her head wildly. The tiny presence buzzing in her head was not dislodged, though.

"Shh, shh,"whispered the presence. "Your big dreams are going to be great! I can really do a lot with these. That is, if you'll let me? …It might be a little bit dangerous."

Aya brightened up. It was true, she'd spent at least as much time dreaming as churning butter, so was probably likewise good at it. But she'd never had a chance to be judged by a real pro, not the same way Inori down the road had certified her butter.

Without a second thought, she blurted, "Yes, of course I'll help you!" She beamed as the presence in her dreams smiled.

That was how Aya of Silky Farm began to sleepwalk through life.

Aya was hunting a monster through the deep jungle. It was hot, sweaty work, and there were many moments when she wondered if she was the prey instead. Her blood sizzled with the hot lure of death potentially lurking around every tree. Birds chattered around her, occasonally falling ominously silent. The giant flowers hanging from the trees seemed to whisper in their own language, while in the sky overhead, two presences, one light, one dark, spoke as if completely unaware of her hunt.

"Was this really necessary, magus?" asked the darkness, who was also known as the Count. "I'm not fond of using children in the schemes of men."

"Oh yes, definitely," said the light, who was the magus, and also Merlin. "That so-called witch queen is looking for me now. She found me when I was poking around some of her spell constructs and my goodness, she was nasty!"

In the sky, the clouds formed pictures. A tall, beautiful woman confronted the image of the light, waving a hand imperiously. Storm spilled out of her palm and encircled the pair of presences before a wind from the light blew away the image.

"And thus you ran away," said the darkness sardonically. "Into a child's dreams."

Aya hissed under her breath, but didn't look up at the figures hovering overhead. She'd found a new trail. This one led up into one of the oversized jungle trees. They were hard to climb alone, but luckily, there were many convenient vines. She wrapped two of them around her fists and began to scramble up the tall, thick trunk.

"Hey!" said the light. "I needed a workshop anyhow, and it's not like I didn't ask permission first."

"Your idea of asking permission— No. Nevermind. I recall we're allies here. I suppose I should ask you once again what exactly your goals are, magus. Are you not supposed to be finding your mistress while I deal with the enemy? Why did you reveal yourself to them?"

"I told you, she found me." The light didn't sound overly worried by this. "Don't scoff at her magic, Count—"

Dryly, the darkness said, "It's not her magic that worries. Attractive, is she?"

The light hesitated before answering. "That's completely irrelevant. I'm not looking for a date, Count."

The branches of the canopy tree started about halfway up, and Aya threw herself onto one of them and then chinned herself up until she could swing her legs over. Then she crouched on the branch, as wide as a broad fence beam, and looked around for her prey.

The darkness said, "I suppose I can believe that. Your heart—" But when the light hissed much like Aya had, the darkness changed its statement. "Why do you need a workshop, though?"

After a moment of silence, the light said, "She is hidden somewhere. By something. There's no other explanation. Finding her will require breaking the enemy's defense. I think I know who can do it. I just have to teach that person how."

Aya scrambled higher in the tree, having gotten a better bead on her target. The undergrowth rippled below as something moved by, close to the ground. Though she couldn't see it, she could tell it was very large.

Skeptically, the darkness said, "You're just going to sit somewhere safe, putting others in harm's way, while you train somebody else to defeat your enemies?"

"Well, I mean it's worked before," pointed out the light. "Some battles can only be won by those who have something to lose."

"Yes," said the darkness, very slowly. "You are a fool, magus."

"I do my best!"

With an irritated sigh, the darkness said, "This is why I prefer not to work with you. If I didn't owe your mistress some kind of service—well, nevermind that. But surely you could have built your workshop somewhere else? Some other individual's dreams? Surely an infant, or a dreaming elder, would be far safer than an adolescent with chores and expectations?"

"Don't you worry about that," said the light. "She's doing just fine. The poor thing, nobody expects much of her."

Aya edged out along a thin branch, concentrating hard on keeping herself stable.

"In fact," went on the light, "it's crucial I use somebody like her. I'll be bringing my trainee here and to really unlock her latent potential, I'm going to need somebody with a big imagination—"

With a mighty leap, Aya threw herself into the air, reaching out with her whole body, stretching out her fingers. She would make it! She knew she would, even if only by the skin of her teeth!

Her fingers brushed something solid and she twisted like a cat to give herself that extra bit of momentum. Then she hung from Merlin's boot, grinning fiercely. "Caught you!"

"—just like this girl." Merlin peered down at the teenage girl dangling from his foot. "Er. Hello, Aya. I was having a meeting—?"

Aya swung herself back and forth and then grabbed his ankle with one hand. "I could climb you just like that tree," she told him smugly. Then she eyed the darkness. This close she could make out the hat and the burning eyes under the shadowy cloak. "Who are you?"

He grinned at her toothily. "I'm the King of Nightmares, Aya. Maybe you should go back to where it's safe."

After squinting at him for a moment, Aya began to swing herself back and forth. Then once again she threw herself into the air, aiming herself at the so-called King of Nightmares. It was obvious to anyone that she'd fall short. With a muttered curse, the Count stepped toward her flight and caught her hand in his.

She beamed at him as she came to a graceful landing on the air beside him. "I knew you'd do that!" The Count met her gaze impassively, but he continued holding her hand were white-knuckled. If she noticed that, she gave no sign. Instead she turned her attention to Merlin. "Hey, you said we were going to do something really exciting, like overthrow the Sovereigns. This monster-hunting is just busywork, isn't it?" Swinging the Count's hand like she was on a stroll with a suitor, she said, "I need more!"

Merlin grinned back, and the Count couldn't tell if he was amused by Aya, or by the Count's predicament. "How about learning to turn yourself invisible?"


Author's Note:

Ren will be back with us soon... I hope. I miss her.

This week was a little harder than expected, but nobody in my household is sick and part of it is still employed and I'm gonna take that as a win. I hope you enjoyed meeting Aya. I think she's a little more than either 'dream king' bargained for.

Update: I have created a Discord server. /qey3vdW is the invite link. Please feel free to join me if you'd like to chat with me or other readers of my work (or just want to talk about FGO...)