Chapter 26
He wanted to do something nice for Rayn. Something that would make him smile, or at least make things a little less awful after everything he’d been through.
It was at least the dozenth time that I’d skimmed through the impressions of Raj’s thoughts, slight as they were, because that was as close as I could get to spending time with him.
Because even though he’d brought me dinner, I knew that was just to make me feel better.
A follow-up to make sure I was okay. A professional courtesy.
I hadn’t seen or heard from him since, not that three days was all that long. Especially since we weren’t… anything. Not even friends. Barely even friendly acquaintances.
My arm hurt—it would be another two weeks before they evaluated whether they were going to remove the fixator—and I felt… adrift.
The case was… not over, but wrapping up. There was nothing more for me to do, at least not at the moment. Ward had made it clear that I shouldn’t come in to work until after my arm was doing better.
I felt like I was losing my mind.
I was both restless and exhausted. Sleep eluded me, and when I did manage to drift off, it was broken by nightmares. Revisiting Tranquil Brook or the dingy room in Garraway’s mansion or the bottom of the well. Or some combination of them. At least I’d kept them out of anybody else’s dreams.
And yet I felt like my whole body itched—not literally, the way my arm was starting to, but metaphorically. Like I couldn’t sit still. Like I had to be doing something, but there wasn’t anything for me to do.
I’d given in and ordered groceries to be delivered, since I couldn’t very well carry things home with my broken arm, and I’d baked cookies and made lasagna, including slow simmering my own tomato sauce just to make sure it took me an entire day.
I touched everything.
I’d gone, in a few months, from never wanting to touch anything to desperately trying to find something that resembled companionship from the objects in my apartment.
I wanted to call Raj. To ask him to come over. Offer lasagna and cookies. Or whatever he wanted, really.
Part of me was very, very tempted to visit him in his dreams again.
But while he might have allowed me to do it when I was trapped at the bottom of a well, he undoubtedly wouldn’t be as forgiving if I did it again simply because I was restless and bored.
So I kept my dream-hands to myself and satisfied myself—or didn’t—with running my fingers over my mug again and again to experience that snatch of Raj’s thoughts. Evidence that he didn’t despise me. That he might even like me.
But even if that was true, he’d been clear in the car when he’d dropped me off that nothing would ever happen between us. That I was too young. That because we’d have to work together, it wouldn’t be professional.
That I’d betrayed his trust.
He hadn’t said that one, of course, but I knew it was true.
Because I had.
I may not have caused him physical harm or been cruel to him, but I’d hurt him all the same.
There maybe were degrees of difference between me and someone like Garraway or my uncle, but only degrees. When it came right down to it, we were the same.
Self-centered and ego-driven. Selfish.
“Oh, you poor thing!” Melissa hugged me gently, and I shielded myself not to get any thoughts from her shirt as I hugged her back. “Does it still hurt a lot?” she asked, her hazel eyes focused on the cast and the fixator still sticking out of it.
I shrugged. “It’s not bad,” I said honestly. “Sore, and itchy, but it only really hurts if I bump it on something.” I grimaced. “Showering sucks, though.”
“Ugh, I bet,” Sam said, giving me a one-armed hug so that he didn’t hit me with the bulging tote bag he was carrying. “You gotta put a garbage bag on that thing?”
I smiled. “Not specifically, but it looks a lot like one.” The hospital had given me a big plastic bag thing that wrapped around my upper arm with a stretchy latex bit that created a seal against my skin.
“Bet it makes washing your hair super awkward,” Sam said with a lopsided smile.
“That, too,” I replied, and he laughed.
“Haven’t lost your sense of humor, at least,” he remarked. “That’s good.”
I didn’t want to upset him by point out that I hadn’t been making a joke, so I let it go, instead asking him what he had in the bag.
“Dinner!” he announced proudly. “Sausages, of course, and some baby potatoes and carrots to roast, and Melissa made rolls.”
I smiled. “Sounds great.”
“And we brought a puzzle,” Melissa informed me. “It’s psychic-safe and everything.”
I smiled again, pleased more that they’d thought about me when buying it than I was about the fact that it was psychic safe. I was so much better than I had been the last time I’d seen them.
I guessed that would give us something to talk about.
I dramatically underestimated how much they wanted to hear about the case, my kidnapping, and all the details. Including my trip back to Tranquil Brook.
“Does it look the same?” Sam wanted to know
I hadn’t been really thinking about that when I’d been there, but I tried to remember now, for them. “I guess?” I replied. “Dustier, but when the police shut it down, they didn’t really give anyone a chance to do anything. The files were all still there, and everything.”
“They didn’t even pack away our medical records? Isn’t that illegal?” Melissa asked.
Both Sam and I looked at her, then each other.
“Mel, hun,” he said. “What they were doing in the first place was illegal. I don’t think anybody there gave a rat’s ass about illegal.”
She sniffed once, her eyes wet, although no tears fell. “But the police…”
“Were only interested in evidence,” I said softly. “I’m sure they took some files—those that were pertinent to specific criminal cases.”
“You think the lawyers took any?” Sam asked me. “From the law suit?”
Several families—including Sam’s and Melissa’s—had sued Tranquil Brook for medical malpractice, exploitation of at-risk individuals, and falsifying medical records.
“No idea,” I replied with a shrug. “I didn’t see either of your files, but I also didn’t look through all of them. Only those the FBI handed to me.”
Sam huffed, then took a long swallow from one of the beers he’d brought at the bottom of his bulging tote bag. “Something else to tell the lawyers, I guess,” he muttered.
We sat in silence for a long moment before Sam shook himself.
“Dessert time,” he announced.
“I’ll do them!” Melissa interrupted, jumping up.
‘Them’ was a sheet pan of premade artisan cookie dough from one of the other vendors at one of the farmers’ markets Sam’s family regularly sold at.
The vendors usually gave each other discounts, so Sam’s family always had stuff like that—fresh bread and herbs, wild honey, vegetables, apples, goat cheese, and so on. And cookies.
They were delicious—triple chocolate chip in peanut butter.
We ate the whole tray while putting the puzzle together.
At the end of the night I felt better than I had since being grabbed in the alley.
No.
Better than I’d felt since Raj found out that I’d invaded his dreams.
Maybe even before that.
I still wasn’t sure what I was doing with my life, exactly, but Sam and Melissa reminded me that there were people who loved me. People who had my back, no matter what.
And people who would sit by my hospital bedside, and bring me dinner, cookies, and puzzles. People who would risk life and limb to rescue me.
I was lying in the darkness, staring up at the ceiling and trying desperately to think of something that would keep the nightmares at bay.
But everything that slid into my consciousness was dark. Haunted. Agonizing.
Sylvia? I could have spoken out loud, of course, but I felt more comfortable talking to her in my head. I wasn’t sure why, since it was just me and the four walls.
What’s wrong, sunshine? she asked gently as she shimmered into view. I almost never summoned her. Usually she just appeared to say hello.
I wondered if I should summon her more often. If summoning a ghost was more like a phone call or dropping by unannounced. Because I didn’t want to bother her, but if being Sylvia’s friend meant that I should be summoning her more often, then I wanted to do that.
Do you like it when someone summons you? I asked her. Or is it annoying? Or rude?
She laughed. Oh, sunshine, don’t worry. If I’m too busy for you, I just won’t show up. Then her smile softened. Unless you seem in distress. Then I’ll come anyway.
You can tell?
Of course I can tell. She let out a little huff. Was that why you asked me here? She at least sounded amused rather than irritated.
No. I sighed. I—I’m lonely, I guess, I confessed. And after… everything…
Not sleeping, sunshine?
I shook my head. No.
Nightmares? she asked.
I nodded again. I keep dreaming I’m still in the well. Except it isn’t, because I can see the sky, far, far above me. Like a star, but bigger. One you could never wish on.
Of course you are, she murmured sympathetically. And you will for a little while.
I know. I didn’t like it, but I wasn’t surprised by it. Sylvia?
Yes, sunshine?
I killed one of them. I’d told Hart this, of course. I assumed he’d told Raj and whoever else needed to know. Or maybe he hadn’t. Nobody had said anything about arresting me.
One of the men who tried to kill you?
Yes.
And how do you feel about that? she asked, and I was surprised that there was no judgment in her tone.
I—don’t know, I admitted. I’m not upset he’s dead. He was one of Garraway’s cronies. But I didn’t actually mean to kill him.
What did you mean to do?
Kill Garraway, I replied honestly. But he pushed the magic away somehow.
Technically, that sounds like Garraway killed him, she informed me.
The death magic was mine, though.
Do you really think he couldn’t have diffused or deflected it somewhere else? she asked pointedly.
So you’re saying I didn’t actually kill anyone.
Weirdly, that was disappointing. I wanted to have actually accomplished something in my own defense.
To have made an impression that wasn’t just leaving my blood on the property.
I didn’t think giving Gennaro a bloody nose counted as really accomplishing much.
Sunshine, you managed to get yourself rescued, Sylva replied.
I didn’t have much to do with that, I reminded her.
No? Rumor has it that a certain shifter needed your help to figure out where you were.
I grimaced at the reminder. I wasn’t supposed to invade his dreams, I admitted.
I really don’t think he had those particular circumstances in mind when he told you not to, she said mildly.
So you knew about that.
I saw his face, sunshine. When he learned what you can do.
I sighed. Oh.
So whatever happened in your shared dreams, or whatever didn’t, I know it changed things.
I nodded.
And that changed them again, then.
Another nod.
Would you like me to tell you a story? she asked after the silence stretched for a while.
Yes, please.
Sylvia had left an hour or so before, and I’d taken her advice and made myself some tea—I’d gotten myself a sampler at some point, and there were a few packets of Sleepy Time chamomile in there.
I’d drunk half of it, and now it was just getting cold.
I’d learned that I didn’t really like chamomile tea.
And I wasn’t any sleepier than I’d been before it, either.
I was staring at the ceiling when I felt it. This niggling, tingling sort of feeling in the corners of my brain.
A shifting shadow with tiny, scrabbling claws trying to find a way in.
Fear thrilled through me, strange and uncertain.
Again, I felt it, trying to find purchase, trying to reach me, to… Find me.
I drew in a deep breath, trying to calm my rapid pulse.
The fear wasn’t mine.
But I recognized it.
I closed my eyes.
I wasn’t sure where I was—this wasn’t my dream, it was his. There was no river. No tree.
I looked around me, trying to figure out where he was.
I was surrounded by ruins and brambles, trees and vines and brush overgrowing everything. Choking out the dim light from what had to be a half-moon or less, to judge by the darkness. Then again, light doesn’t always make sense in dreams.
How to reach him.
How to rescue him.
It wasn’t the same, of course. He wasn’t in any physical danger, not like I had been. But in his fear, he’d reached for me.
I couldn’t help hoping that it meant something.
I began to walk, the path I was following twisting and overgrown—tree limbs and brambles fallen across the path, thorns tugging at the fabric of the simple dark grey pants my dream self was wearing.
I always wore monochrome in dreams. Greys or blacks or whites. Never color. I had no idea why.
I didn’t know how to find him. But I knew he’d tried to find me, so I owed it to him to look.
I could still feel his fear, those little fingers pulling at me, trying to get at me. Trying to draw me to where he was.
I kept walking, despite the fact that it felt like I’d been traveling for hours, although it couldn’t have been.
I swore I’d seen the same crumbled pieces of wall, or the same broken, unidentifiable statue, or the same twisted vine…
but in a different configuration or next to a different tree stump or patch of gravel.
It was a labyrinth. A maze created to spin the walker in circles. To keep me away from where I wanted to go.
I paused.
Then I held out my hands and pushed at the vines—not physically, but with power. I’m a dreamwalker—controlling dreams is part of my magic.
I’d just always only ever controlled mine.
I’d always pulled others into my dreams.
But just because this wasn’t mine didn’t mean that I lost the ability to control it.
So I pushed and shifted, forcing the overgrown foliage to make a path that went the way I wanted to go.
I found him wrapped in brambles and briars, tangled so that, despite his strength, he’d only managed to knot himself even tighter with every attempt to break free.
I unwove the complicated knot that kept him trapped, exposing exquisite orange fur striped with black, the white on his belly stained with mud, the pattern of his coat vivid in the dullness of the rest of the dreamworld.
I stroked his fur, and those great golden eyes opened, staring, studying, assessing.
“It’s really me,” I whispered.
He stared up at me, disbelieving. In pain. Afraid.
“I’ll prove it,” I said softly. “Wake up.”
I opened my eyes, wiping at the moisture that leaked from their corners from where I lay on the mattress. I sniffed, then sat up, rubbing at them with weak fists.
On the small box that served as my nightstand, the screen of my phone lit up.
A text message from Raj.
Was that really you?
I debated answering, then sighed and picked up the phone.
Yes.
Dots formed at the bottom of the screen. Then, Thank you.