Chapter Four: No Rent Charged in Dreams

“Pop quiz,” the cat announced. “Calculate the thickness of Wen Jiu's skin three centuries ago.” Su Li pinched herself. It hurt. Xie struck his tuning fork, drawing the mist back. The man woke and apologized. His name was Meng Yao, a dream tapir. Whenever he slept, his dreams leaked. He had forced himself awake for seven days. He worked as a human sleep therapist, secretly eating nightmares. Two weeks earlier, he had treated a girl who dreamed of drowning. Instead of dissolving, her nightmare had grown inside him. Now sleep dragged everyone nearby into it. “Dream-Returning Soup,” Wen Jiu prescribed. “One fear the guest cannot admit, a ray of moonlight without a shadow, and a portion of the manager's wakefulness.”