Chapter 9
Hunter stared at his boss and brother with a sickening churn where his stomach was.
Worth noting, the wrongest part wasn’t that the Dreamscape had been breached, somehow.
No, it was the look on Dorian’s face. It was fury, controlled, terrifying, and aimed at whatever had dared to violate his dominion.
And that meant there was going to be some serious ass-whupping.
Hunter was so here for that.
He gave Daphne’s hand a squeeze and stood. “Elaborate on that, boss?”
Dorian slowly adjusted the lapel of his coat, his voice mild. His eyes, however, were anything but. “Something is slithering in,” he said. “The bugger is... how can I put this? It’s overwriting itself within the threads of the Dreamscape.”
He didn’t pace–Dorian would never do something as undignified as milling around–but his coat flared dramatically as he turned, spine straight as a gallows, and wiped a smudge of nothing from a shelf.
“I’ve authorized both the Devils and the Shadows Keepers to neutralize any and all manifestations, but there’s not much they seem to be able to do.
This thing doesn’t follow dream rules; it’s not a nightmare.
It’s anchored to the Dreamscape, or something’s anchoring it to it, but it’s not of it. It’s separate. Bloody parasite.”
Hunter nodded. “Let me get her home, then I’ll join the Devils.”
He had already turned, already reaching for Daphne’s hand when Dorian’s voice stopped him cold. “No. You stay with her.”
Dorian’s expression shifted fractionally, but that small, almost gentle smile he offered Daphne made something ugly twist in Hunter’s chest.
“Whatever this thing is,” Dorian went on, “it started with her dream-memory, and it’s still gravitating toward her proximity.”
Hunter’s hand tightened around hers, pulling her behind him, fear seizing his chest. “She might be in danger.”
“I don’t know. Yet.” Dorian’s gaze sharpened; glacier-blue eyes bored into Daphne like he could find answers in her.
“The nightmares are spreading in pockets no longer near her, which means it’s gaining strength.
” He looked at her like a puzzle he was going to solve no matter what, and murmured, “She might be the key to stopping it.” Then, as if dismissing the heaviness with a flick, he brushed at an invisible thread on his immaculate sleeve. “Stay with her. I’ll be in touch.”
And with that, he vanished into thick, black fog.
She wrapped an arm around him, settling at his side. He kissed her hair as, despite everything, this all felt every shade of right.
“Nothing of what he said sounded good,” she commented blandly.
“Nothing of what he said was good.” He took her hand and started guiding her to the office. “You’ll be safe, regardless.”
She pulled at his hand to stop him. “Thank you.”
“Don’t,” he said, brushing his thumb over her knuckles. “You don’t thank gravity for holding you down. You just trust it’s there.”
“And that’s what you are?” she asked.
He nodded. “Yeah. The one who’ll never let go.” Then, with a lopsided grin, he added, “Unless we’re talking about being between your thighs. Then I absolutely plan to let go.”
She rolled her eyes, but he smelled something different. “One more thing, for honesty’s sake. I can smell everything you feel.”
That stopped her. Looked at him with eyes that were growing bigger as she realized the implication. “Everything?”
He nodded slowly. “Every. Thing.”
“I really want to punch you right now.”
“Nah, you want me naked and pounding on you, which is reasonable, since that’s what I want too. So, let’s get your stuff and go home.”
“It’s too early, I can’t...”
His retort never made it out because her voice trailed off as she stood, eyes wide and fixed somewhere far past him. Her lips moved, barely a whisper. “Hush now, darling, don’t you cry. They only come when you ask why.”
He went to stand in front of her, took her cold, clammy hands. “Daphne. Look at me. Where did you go, sweetheart?” But her eyes remained on something too far away. “Look at me. Damn it.”
Her gaze was distant, blank as frost, as that line kept falling from her mouth like a broken ballerina music box. “Hush now, darling, don’t you cry. They only come when you ask why... Hush now, darling, don’t you cry. They only come when you ask why...”
He turned into fog and then into nothing on a swear and dove into her subconscious, searching every corner of it. But there was nothing. Just a vast, echoing emptiness. He snapped out and back to human. It had all taken less than a second, but it felt like an eternity carved into his chest.
Tears ran down her pale face, her skin so bloodless. Even her lips had lost their color.
Hunter ground his teeth, his jaw locked in helpless fury. There was no reaching her through words, subconscious, or touch. Except... except maybe one way.
He pulled all his power, all his concentration, all his love into the flickering bond.
It was so thin yet, so threadbare, he could barely get a hold on it, but it was all he had left.
Come back to me, sweetheart. If you hear my voice, follow it back home.
I love you. Come back to me. Come back to me.
His words looped against her, a broken plea, again and again. Louder. Stronger. Fierce with love.
The bond trembled. Something on her side of it snapped like a splinter breaking free, and the connection stirred to life. Still delicate. Still a whisper. But there.
With a choked sob, Daphne crumpled, and he was close enough to catch her. “It’s okay,” he said, dropping down to the floor with her curled into his lap, holding her trembling form. His hands brushed her hair, his voice soothing. “It’s okay. I’ve got you.”
“What the fuck happened?” she whispered before grimacing and pressing a hand to her temple. He felt the pain crackle through her like a live wire. “My head,” she moaned.
He didn’t even have a flicker of healing power. How useless was he right now? “We’ll figure it out. Come on.” He rose, lifting her princess-style in his arms. She didn’t complain or make a joke, proof enough of how shaken she was. “Let’s get you home.”
~*~
Curled on the couch in her home, Daphne took the glass of water Hunter gave her with gratitude and swallowed the two ibuprofens like they were the Grail.
Hunter sat with her, reached for her foot, and gently tugged it onto his lap before beginning to massage it in slow, soothing circles. “Do you remember anything?”
“No. Or...” she frowned. “Not a memory, just a feeling of... fear, of helplessness, like I was hanging onto nothing?” She shook her head, then immediately winced because that hurt like hell. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
“You were singing a nursery rhyme. Hush now, darling, don’t you cry. They only come when you ask why.”
She closed her eyes. “My mom used to sing it to me when–” Her eyelids tightened further, her fingers curled into fists in her lap.
“When I was little. My father would start acting out if I were... inconveniencing him by merely existing. So she sang to me.” She sat up straighter, shifting to sit cross-legged in front of him with sudden, bracing focus.
“What Dorian said, that it all started with me. What started, and how did I start it? And what the hell is it?”
Hunter looked away–not worried, but serious–his usual cheekiness gone.
“The bullet version is this.” He started counting on his fingers.
“We don’t know what it is yet. Dorian’s working on that.
It popped out the night you recovered the memory about your father.
And,” he raised a third finger, “you didn’t necessarily do anything to make it happen.
You’ve had nightmares forever, which makes sense.
There was always a blind spot in them, though, that was shown when your brain finally felt safe enough to recover the most traumatic experience of your life. ”
She leaned back into the pillows. Here we go, she thought.
All the truth, nothing but the truth. This was going to hurt, no matter how loudly her heart screamed that he was hers, that he was a safe space.
Or how she could just tell something was messing with him, something raw.
But crap needed to be talked through. “You were the one in charge of my nightmares?” she asked.
“No. Dorian assigned me to you only recently.”
“Why you?”
He shrugged. “Because I’m the best. Because you need a little something extra when you’re dealing with a lucid dreamer with such deep trauma.”
“Lucid dreamer?”
“You can steer a dream. Or a nightmare.” He gave a half-crooked smile.
“The first time I dropped into your subconscious, you punched me. Or, well, the image of me you needed, which was your father. That never happens. And this–” he gestured to himself, “–this isn’t even my real form.
I’m that fog you saw. Things got complicated from there.
The night you remembered... something happened.
Something was born. I was there, I felt it.
But it was too fast for me to understand or stop. ”
She stared at him, hating the tension that suddenly came back on her shoulders. “I don’t know how to feel about that. About you, being in my subconscious, in my nightmares. Knowing things about me that are supposed to be mine only.”
His smile turned soft, heartbreakingly sweet. “You know how to feel about it. You just don’t like it.”