Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
In his dream, Nick was walking through a forest he recognized and didn’t. He was himself and he wasn’t.
He knew the feeling and tried to turn, tried to run, but he couldn’t. His legs moved, his head wouldn’t turn, he couldn’t breathe, except his chest was rising and falling and he did nothing. He could do nothing. He was trapped.
“No,” Nick tried to say, but smoke curled out of his mouth instead of words. He kept walking until he saw a single burned tree in the middle of the forest. It was old. Its bark was charred, and Nick knew who the tree was.
Darkness. Shadows jumped in the corners of his eyes, and Nick’s heart pounded, his mouth clenched so tightly that he had nothing, he was muted as though his tongue had been cut out.
Nick tried to scream again, but the smoke that came out of his mouth flowed impossibly down, spreading around the exposed roots of the tree that was Darkness and reforming into a humanoid shape that was a person and a tree and Nick screamed because he knew who it was, he knew, he knew—
“Nick!” Parker’s voice was loud, a shout that left Nick’s ears ringing. Parker was crouching over him, both hands on Nick’s shoulders. His eyes were sparking gold in the darkness, and around them Nick could feel a curl of magic like a physical thing.
“Nick!” Parker said, more quietly but with the same desperation. “Are you with me?”
Nick nodded, coughing. He gasped, turning onto his side and coughing as though the smoke had been real and he’d inhaled a forest fire.
Parker leaned against Nick’s back, rubbing a circle between Nick’s shoulders.
He didn’t reach out, but the bedside light snapped on, and Nick kept coughing until he gasped in a desperate breath.
“You here?” Parker asked.
“Yeah,” Nick croaked. He was looking over the side of the bed, into the dark shadows of the bedroom. “I had a dream about Darkness.”
Parker’s hand froze on Nick’s back and he didn’t say anything.
“I dreamed I was in a burned forest. Like the one you saw, I guess. But it was night and this smoke kept coming out of me. It wasn’t like Darkness but it was. The smoke made a new tree.” Nick could still see the impossible shape, tree and human at the same time.
“Darkness and Sun are dead,” Parker said, his voice gentle.
“I know, I know.” Nick closed his eyes, but that was too close and he swallowed before sitting up. “I know.”
“Okay,” Parker said. “Was it just a nightmare, or do you think it had something to do with what’s going on?”
Nick shrugged, the movement uncomfortable. “I don’t know. Being called god killer? It must have just reminded me of what happened.”
“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Parker said firmly. He squeezed Nick’s shoulder, tugging Nick over. “Do you hear me?”
Nick rolled and looked at his husband. He tried to smile, but knew it felt wrong. “I know. But what we did with Gile? That felt like the sort of choice Darkness would make. A gray choice.”
“No.” Parker shook his head, then grabbed the back of Nick’s neck tight, bringing their foreheads together. “No, you listen to me. That was an us choice. You didn’t make it alone. We made it together.”
“I know,” Nick managed. “I know.”
“Okay, good.” Parker leaned against Nick, his whole weight pressing Nick into the mattress, grounding him. “Darkness and Sun are gone. You and me? We aren’t. We’re here.”
Nick lifted his arms, wrapping them around Parker so tight that he wasn’t sure how Parker was breathing. “Yeah.”
“Good,” Parker said. “Good.”
The next morning, everything felt even farther away. Parker was still eyeing him as though he thought Nick was going to run screaming into the hills, but Nick only shook his head. “I’m fine.”
“Right,” Parker said, scooping up some cereal and eating it without looking at it. He was eyeing Nick as though he thought he was going to explode.
“I’m really alright. It was just a nightmare.” Nick raised an eyebrow. “I am not the only one in this relationship who wakes up in the middle of the night.”
“Okay, but all of my nightmares recently have been about the bureaucracy of running my court these days. Do you know how long it takes to get your father to stop trying to do-si-do with the fae monarchs? Also, the other day we got stuck on the absolute quagmire that was Prince Talon trying to gift King Hawthorn a dog? Like, there was a whole thing about whether it was a slight against the other courts? None of them even wanted a dog and then your dad chimes in saying that the human realm already has a dog—Prometheus. So by the way, your dog is now a statement of political alliance between the human realm and the Dark Realm. Just… you know, putting that out there. Maybe we can write off his food as tax deductible since he’s a political necessity? ”
Parker was watching and when Nick started to laugh, his whole face relaxed. He kept going for another minute or so, listing all the other things he wanted to write off his taxes, including the Tylenol he had to take and the emotional strain of keeping the whole world on his back.
By the time Laurel got to their apartment, Nick felt almost back to himself. Laurel narrowed her eyes at them, before saying, “Both of you didn’t do any world saving magic last night, did you?”
“Just sleep.” Parker held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor.”
Laurel shook her head. “You seem alright. But if this starts to go sideways, I know you want to save everyone, but I am calling it. Okay? Neither one of you two has the final call here.”
“Hey!” Parker said. “Again, we have done this a lot and been fine almost all of the times. I think we’re grown-ups here.”
“I used to think Nick was,” Laurel said, glancing at him and shaking her head in disappointment. “Then he showed up yesterday looking in shock and halfway into Santa Muerte’s territory.”
“In his defense,” Parker said. “We’ve been doing some Freaky Friday nonsense and I’m just as unhappy as you about it.”
“What?” Laurel looked at Nick but he shrugged, grabbing his keys off the hall table.
“Should we get going?” He glanced at Parker. “You’re sure about the location?”
Parker held up the map, folded so the dot they thought was the next location was in the center. “I remember him going here.”
The dot on the map turned out to be an intersection with a park, a library, and a gas station, all on opposite corners.
“The park.” Parker frowned at the foliage. “What if they’re gone?”
“I don’t think they are,” Nick said. “Everyone else has been exactly on the line of the spiral. Even when they got infected elsewhere, like the CSI tech and Gile.”
“Like they were drawn there?” Parker looked around, murmuring silently to himself. “Okay.”
As they walked into the tree line entrance, Parker leaned over, brushing a hand over a tree trunk.
“We’re looking for someone who isn’t acting like a normal person in the park. Maybe someone who has been here for a while.” As the tree responded, Parker’s face relaxed, curving into a smile.
Laurel leaned over. “What’s up? You’ve been quiet all morning, and I don’t think that Parker has stopped talking since I got to your place.”
Nick looked up ahead at where Parker was still talking with the local flora. “I had a weird dream last night. It brought up some stuff for us.”
“Like… Sugar stuff or like trauma stuff?” Laurel asked, trying to make it a joke, even as she searched his face.
“You know what the parasite called me when we first met it?” Nick looked away, because he didn’t want to see Laurel’s face. “God killer. Because I killed Darkness.”
Laurel blew out a breath. “Wow. That’s just a complete misreading of what happened in that situation, you know? No one who was there would say you killed Darkness.”
“I did, though,” Nick said. “A creature older than time is dead because of me.”
“Santa Muerte will be the first one to tell you that the gods had all died and come back more than any living creature should. It was their time. Or at least it was Darkness’s and the Sun god’s time.
” Laurel reached out, grabbing Nick’s forearm.
“You saved the thousand realms. Just like we’re going to save these people. ”
Nick managed a tight smile. Ahead of them, Parker was striding forward with purpose and Nick jerked his chin toward him. Laurel didn’t press again, and the two of them caught up with Parker.
Before he and Laurel could say anything else, Parker was moving. “The trees said someone hasn’t moved from a bench in days.”
As Parker walked, they trailed behind, and Nick tried to see if anyone else was around. They couldn’t afford to have anyone get caught by the parasite, not now that they might finally have a solution.
In the corner of the park, a bench was nearly hidden by an overgrown tree. It faced toward the street beyond. A man sat on the bench, hands moving back and forth as though weaving some invisible thread.
“You ready?” Laurel whispered.
“Yeah,” Nick murmured back.
“Hey,” Parker said, crouching down in front of the man.
He looked unhoused, wearing thick layers of coats and clothes. His eyes were vacant until Parker spoke, and then they flashed bright green.
“You,” the creature inside him said. It was the same rough, dragging voice that Gile had used. “Are you here to kill me like you killed the others?”
“It doesn’t have to be like this,” Parker said. “We can find another way, but you can’t live inside him.”
“Why not?” the thing said.
“Because it’s his body, his mind, and no one but him has a right to it.” Parker’s voice was low. “But we can find you another home.”
“Lies.” The creature reached out, and the circle that hit Parker disintegrated on impact, shredding into a thousand pieces before disappearing. The knife spell Parker had set up worked just as well as it had the day before.
Still, Nick’s stomach clenched, and he glanced at Laurel.
They couldn’t take the risk that the spell would find a vulnerable spot, like Parker’s face or hands. He waited for Laurel to do her part first.