Alysia listens to the static rumble of car engines as they hurtle down the highway, in the ebb of the thriving city. The beeping of card machines at the over ground light rail stations, the glow of cool lamplight piercing the darkness, feet hurrying home; private, unsympathetic, achingly alive. Headlights, little moons in their own orbit. Concrete structures yearning for the sky like sprouts kept too long in the shade.

One small star twinkles high above, lost like millions of other stars, collective heartbeats struggling for meaning, and in doing so, not one bit individual.

Orion.

Alysia stretches with feline eagerness, stooping, her dressing gown brushing months of accumulated worthless riches. Antique coffee tables from the 16th Century, a death mask of Blake rubbed matte by reverent palms, a pharaoh’s sceptre, a scorpion traced in amber, a replica of a Manchurian soldier, embedded with the sands of time. Like the storm swirling above the vortex of her tower, now; the lights unfurl below in the city. Dazzling. Artificial, they are dead things giving the appearance of life.

She had not uttered Orion’s name for many, long years. Oh, how she missed him. It was grinded down into cannon fuel, for the right blend of ammunition she needed. A stranger, a nobody, she could navigate along a path that lead to simple, pure and satisfyingly well deserved - destruction. She would wait. She would plan, and when the time came; by God, she would have her revenge.

Now, she rolls the glass vial of pills in her palm, warming the glass, a salt shaker. They roll about like sea urchins caught in a net. The blue grey of oceans. But bitter, like marmalade. Except these pills are the worst thing she has tasted; worse than coffee beans. She had done well to escape from the witch, but without these pills to stop her from dreaming, who knew what would be waiting for her back in that land.

“You will look after the shop tonight, no?” A slender girl bounds up the stairs, taking two at a time. She has silky, thin hair that glides to her waist, and strong arms that now, support a stack of new catalogues. Leaves of gold, red and black used as bookmarks, spilling from the pages. A sneeze. The stack falls aside to reveal navy-blue contacts bordering electric purple, the latest fashion in Asia.

Alysia hides the vial of pills, just in time.

“I need windscreen wipers for these huh,” she jokes, pushing up her glasses, as Alysia rushes forward to help.

“I had a friend who got Tuberculosis from reading an ancient manuscript,” Alysia confesses shyly, “It was kept in the cellars beneath the foundations of Augustina library, can you believe that? Back in the day of course…”

“You had a friend?” Anna laughs in good humour, surveying her father’s employee at their antique firm in Hong Kong and lately, partner in crime. The girl with an abundant knowledge of unimportant facts, keen eye for detail, intrepid curiosity of exploration (the dangerous kind) and superb book keeping skills. “You will close up shop tonight la? No visitors after 8pm. The dinner you know, we Cantonese like to eat late on special festivals.”

“I know la.” Alysia mimics happily. “You found it?”

“$36,000, but I don’t know why you covet it so much.” Covet- a new word. Anna desired to show her learning.

Alysia greedily scans the print, a colour portrait of a jade in the shape of a cicada. It is the same, the one, down to the purple silk ribbon and impenetrable jagged marks running through the soft green, like the underside of a downy petal.

“It looks like a shard of a dinosaur egg.” Anna breathes, unaware of its significance yet spellbound with a wordless wonder she cannot name. “You want to buy it?”

“Of course not,” Alysia whispers.

“I want to be an antiquities dealer, but still, the crazy lengths people go to buy old items. I will never understand. Bye Bye…don’t stay up too late.” She becomes the darkness, the dancing shadows leaving Alysia's wondering mind circling the confines of a trove full of forgotten treasure.

It is not until four hours have passed that she remembers the bitter pills. She selects two and swallows them dry, almost retching with the effort. It is as it must be. For tonight she will be dreamless, sleepless, hidden; a small price to pay-

to be safe, from the Dream Devil.