Chapter 28
CHAPTER 28
I follow Talan into a small, round room with a window view of the kingdom. The snow and ice glow with shades of periwinkle and peach as the sun dips lower, hanging just above the city walls. Pillows nestle on curving benches, and I settle down on one next to the windows.
Talan lights a few candles in sconces.
“And what should I expect to find in your pretty head?” I ask.
He turns to me, a lock of his black hair falling across his sharp cheekbones. “Scared of what you’ll learn about me?”
“No.”
“Could be anything, Nia. I control other people’s dreams but not my own. Sometimes, I dream of memories, and other times fears. Occasionally, it’s pleasure. Let’s hope for your sake it’s the latter.”
“And what, exactly, should I be practicing?”
“Your job in my dreams is to remember who you are. You need to remember your separate identity as Nia.”
Ah. Well, then, I’m fucked. At this point, after months and months of faking, who knows who the real Nia is?
“Don’t get lost in my unconscious,” he warns. “Don’t forget who you are because you’ll need your magic and skills.”
He sits next to me and touches my face. His magic washes around me, a soft caress of dark power that skims over my skin. I’m keeping my own protections up, not letting him into my head, and yet, I feel myself falling into his mind, plummeting into his shadowed depths, and fear claws at me.
I curl up in a cramped space and inhale in the scent of mold and dirt. It’s oppressively dark in here. I can’t breathe, but no one expects someone to breathe in a grave, and I’ve been buried for years. You’d think your heart would stop beating after they inter you, but mine keeps going, slamming against my ribs, refusing to stop. If I were human, it would have stopped long ago. Do they realize their fragility is a mercy?
The panic never goes away, not even after you’re dead. Sometimes, I wonder if I ever existed, or if I have always been here, trapped in the dark.
I’ve always hated not being in control. Locked up.
When did I become claustrophobic? My breath is faster now, and I’m inhaling particles of dirt. I hate being trapped.
This isn’t me. This is Talan. These are his feelings. His dream.
Screams pierce the stone walls from outside. Or maybe from within my skull. I’ve been suffocating in here forever.
A deep ache settles in my chest, the feeling of being abandoned.
I’m not really dead. I’m buried alive in a tiny, cramped cell in the dungeons. The Fey don’t die so easily.
I’m Nia.
I claw my way to the surface. Even if it’s only a dream, I need to get out of this coffin. The small, dark space is maddening, so disorienting that my muscles cramp, bent at odd angles to fit. Panic rakes at my thoughts, and I still can’t breathe.
For years, I’ve wished I’d never been born.
The door opens, and soldiers stand before me. I brace myself, knowing they are going to burn me. A traitor’s fate. This was always going to be my destiny: tied to a stake, set aflame by dragon fire, flesh blistering?—
But they’re calling me Your Highness . Since when is a condemned man afforded that respect?
The light hurts my eyes, and I can no longer stand.
I’m above the surface now, looking out from a balcony in Castle Perillos. Below me, flames rise at the stake. Tarasque unleashes another gout of flames on a traitor, and smoke coils into the air. Screams ring out.
Carnage everywhere.
My father has arranged stone slabs for disemboweling prisoners, racks for stretching them, horses for pulling them apart. But it’s my name above them all…Prince Talan.
This is why he pulled me from the prisons, not just because Lothyr is dead. I’m here to take the blame.
The scent of blood and burned flesh coils through the air.
I grip the balcony tightly. I will become king in Father’s place. I only need to wait for the right moment.
Screams ring out, the noise rattling in my skull. I lived in silence for so long, and now the shrieks deafen me.
I’m not the prince. These aren’t my memories. This isn’t my world.
A dark wave of terror crashes over me as I fight my way to the surface, scrambling to remember who I am.
I’m Nia. From Los Angeles.
Now, I’m stalking through the palace halls, drunk on mead. A blonde, nymph-like woman staggers by my side, more drunk that I am. I can’t remember her name.
The mead makes my thoughts softer, duller. It burns my throat and turns down the volume on the world.
She reaches for my neck, pulling me closer, and whispers in my ear, “I want you to fuck me here in the halls. I don’t care who sees us.”
I terrify her, and that turns her on.
I see the way people look at me. They think I was behind the slaughter.
And why should I tell them otherwise? Better to let them fear me. Because one day, I will bring down the king. And if I want to succeed, I need them to be more afraid of me than they are of him.
I’m in the dungeons again. In dreams, time isn’t linear, and I’m trapped here once more—buried alive. Forgotten. I’m starving. I can feel my ribs protruding through my skin, a skeleton trapped in stone. I’m not sure if I died long ago but my mind hasn’t caught up…
I’m Nia , I scream in my mind. I’m from California. This isn’t me.
I’m lying on a bed beneath a sycamore tree, watching the branches sway in the breeze. I’m whole again, bathed in lemon-yellow summer light.
In the hollows of my mind, I hear a voice, the one that has kept me company these past few years. The voice I crave for companionship.
Her mother has poisoned herself with too much drink. She’s taking her to a healer. Again.
She just wants rest.
She longs for a quiet room, a stack of books, a way to shut out the noise of the world.
And I want to give her that.
My eyes snap open, and I’m in the round tower room again, staring into his eyes. The sun has set, and stars twinkle in a purple sky outside.
“Was that a memory or just a dream?” I ask, catching my breath. “Did you really take the blame for the things your father did, or is that what you wish were true?”
“Were you able to separate yourself from my dreams?” he asks, avoiding the question.
I nod. “A little. But I need more practice.”
And if I spend enough time in his head, maybe I’ll finally learn the truth.