Chapter 18
Darkness envelops me. I can’t see. Can’t hear.
The only sensation my body can feel as it breaks down is his touch on my forehead.
I move to slash him away but am unsuccessful.
“Wanderer. Wanderer, wake up. You’re having a night terror. Whatever it is, it isn’t real.”
My husband’s voice, the same one that used to warm my skin, now sends my hairs standing on end.
Get away from me, I cry out, except no sound comes out, and my lips—they don’t make the correct motions.
I can’t see. Can’t speak.
All I can do is feel.
Feel him.
His hand that was just on my forehead has slipped down to the side of my arm, and how he’s gripping me firmly with both hands.
“Tink,” he says. “Tink, you need to wake up.”
I thrash about, panicked at how my limbs are restricted not only by his arms, but also the plush sheets of the bed.
“Wanderer,” he says, “it’s me.”
Something about his tone, the softness with which he says it, jars me. It’s not that it comforts me, but the gentleness, the sincerity of his usually carefree voice stuns my mind just enough.
This time, when I open my eyes, light breaks through. It’s just a sliver, the kind made by a cracked door, and it’s cutting across my husband’s face.
No, not my husband, though that’s exactly what he’d been in my dream.
The Nomad stares down at me, and he must glimpse the flicker of recognition in my eyes, because he sighs. I watch his chest fall.
“See?” he says. “Just a dream.”
I blink, then hurriedly push myself up onto my elbows, glancing around the room. There’s no one else here. It’s my room, not the Nomad’s, not the room we had shared in my vision when he and I…
“A member of the crew who rooms across the hall heard you and alerted me,” he explains.
I turn my head back toward him, still addled from the vision, still confused.
My body is here, in the present, but my mind keeps shifting back and forth between here, in this room, and the future.
It’s too close—the Nomad sitting on the bed with me, too close to the vision itself, and I feel my mind tottering between the two, the sight before me flashing back and forth.
Just then, something about what the Nomad said snags my attention. I wrench myself out of his grasp and grab for the quill and parchment next to my bed.
How did they hear me? I write. I can’t scream.
“They said it sounded like you were struggling with someone. They tried to come in and help you themselves, but the door was locked.”
I frown, just now noticing the sweat on my brow, and stare at the light coming in from the hallway.
I’m here. On the Nomad’s ship. I can’t speak. I have no children. And the Nomad and I—
“Does this happen often?”
I dart my attention back to him and weigh my response. If I say no, perhaps he’ll think the weight of the heist is getting to me. If I say yes, well, he’ll guess the answer anyway.
I nod as nonchalantly as I can muster with my nightgown soaked in sweat and my hands still trembling.
“May I ask what was so terrifying?”
His words are even, his tone calculated. The perfect level of only casual interest. The drawer of the bedside table squeals as he opens it, retrieving my quill and parchment.
I hesitate before taking them and writing, Someone was trying to murder me.
The Nomad stares at me, like he’s calculating something. “Not particularly original for a night terror, now is it?”
What can I say? My subconscious isn’t all that creative.
At that, the Nomad lets out the first syllable of a chuckle. “I doubt that.”
When I don’t respond, he says, “Did it at least make your death interesting—your subconscious, I mean?”
It was new to me, I write, watching him carefully.
For a moment, I think he’ll press me further, but then he goes to stand. “You seem recovered, but if you need me, you know where to find me. I’ll leave my door unlocked tonight.”
I’ll be sure not to utilize that invitation, I write.
“Oh, it’s a much more innocent offer than it sounds. We never quite grow out of needing to know there’s a bed we could crawl into at night if our dreams are too unbearable, do we?”
And with that, he leaves.
I’m left wondering all night what I did to change the future.
How I end up married to the Nomad.