15. Where No One Can Reach Her #7
Luko watched his friend ride toward the highlands, platinum hair streaming behind him like a banner, and wondered if Malec would find Allora before he lost himself completely.
Or if losing himself was the only way he'd ever catch her.
Allora slept curled in the carriage, one arm wrapped protectively over her stomach. Kalemon dozed beside her, chin tucked against her cloak. Outside, Leira guided the reins, her silhouette steady against the pale blur of falling snow.
Allora's eyelids twitched, her body sinking deeper into fevered unconsciousness. But inside her dream, the world was quiet.
The birch forest stretched before her, the sky above black and hollow, moonless and starless. The ground was soft, cushioned with moss and grass, layered in fallen golden leaves that gleamed faintly in the dark. She stepped into the clearing where she had first seen him.
The child was there.
He was humming, tossing a glowing orb into the air like a toy. When he spotted her, he abandoned it with a shrill cry. "Ma-ma!"
He flung himself at her, and she caught him easily. His little arms wrapped tight around her, and she smoothed her hand over his head. When he tilted his face up, she startled.
He had changed.
The boy's features were no longer vague shadows or half-formed suggestions of what might be.
He had a face now, fully realized and breathtaking in its strangeness.
A mouth, small and perfect, curved into a smile.
A nose, delicate and upturned slightly at the tip.
His skin had deepened into a warm medium-brown, not as dark as hers, not as pale as his father's, but a beautiful middle ground, luminous in the strange light of the dreamscape.
His hair had thickened into curls that fell to his shoulders, silver as starlight and impossibly shiny, finer than her own coils but carrying the same wild pattern. Each strand seemed to catch light that didn't exist, shimmering with an otherworldly gleam.
But it was his eyes that held her.
Completely black. No iris, no white, just depthless voids that should have been terrifying but instead felt ancient and knowing.
They looked at her with such awareness, such understanding, that she felt seen in a way she had never been before.
And strangely, impossibly, they were relaxing.
Like staring into the night sky and finding comfort in the infinite dark.
She knelt and asked softly, her voice barely above a whisper, "Are you my child?"
He nodded, those black eyes never leaving hers.
Her chest tightened. "So you've been protecting me this whole time so you could be born?" Perfectly normal, she thought grimly. Just another day in whatever drug-induced fever dream her life had become.
She sat in the moss with him in her lap, trying to make sense of it.
He looked up at her, lips moving carefully around words, the voice of someone who had only just learned how to shape them.
"The bad one is coming. We need to go far.
I'm using most of my magic to shield you from him. But it's draining me and you both."
Her breath caught. "Is that why I'm getting sick?"
He lowered his gaze, guilt clouding his face. "Yes. I must protect us but I need the energy." He hesitated, then added quickly, "The blood helped. It recharged me. That's how I was able to pull you back here."
Allora sighed and wrapped her arms around him, surprising herself at how natural the gesture felt. The demon child she had never wanted, and yet, somehow, she was growing attached to.
She pressed her cheek to his silver curls. They were soft beyond measure, like spun silk against her skin. "What's your name?"
He stood abruptly, laughter spilling from his mouth like bells. "You already know my name!"
"I've never met you before," she said, folding her arms.
The boy stomped his small foot into the moss, defiant. "Yes, you do! You just forgot. I'm waiting for you to remember."
Allora snorted, shaking her head. "If you come out bratty like this, I'm going to spank you every day until you learn respect."
The child wilted, though a tiny smile tugged his lips. "I must save my strength now. I need to sleep. I won't be able to watch over you as well but when you reach the house of the thin one, you'll be safe for a while. Just don't trust her fully."
"Alright, kid," Allora muttered, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Noted."
He burst into a scatter of glowing lights, his form dissolving into a thousand shards that drifted upward like fireflies. She didn't see his face again, but she heard his voice echo faintly around her, brushing her ears with soft endearments and love.
Allora lay back in the moss, the golden leaves rustling beneath her like whispered secrets. Overhead, the orb he had left behind burned brighter, hotter, until the whole clearing glowed like fire in the dark. The warmth spread through her, chasing away the cold that had settled in her bones.
If only she could stay here forever. Safe. Untouchable. Somewhere no one could reach her.
The dream held her gently, cradling her in its strange beauty, while outside the carriage rolled on through snow and shadow, carrying her toward an uncertain future.