Chapter 7 #2
“How so?”
A twitch of discomfort set in, but she asked, so he had to answer. “Because even the thought of it reminds me of Sestinn and Castien and men like...” He almost said Gennady and was terribly relieved he had a truthful alternative. “Your dead husband.”
Elloven just watched him with a gentle, inconsistent nod.
“Nothing to say?” he asked.
“I’m not sure what to say. It sounds like you’re punishing yourself for what others do, which doesn’t really solve anything.”
“It’s not a punishment,” he replied. “It’s an aversion.”
She pulled her mouth to one side. “But you do have urges? You must if you’re able to... do what you do, night after night.”
Having one right now. “All the time.”
“You never indulge them?”
“Never. Not like that.”
“Not even in here?”
His fingers stopped moving. Her question had frozen him solid. “What are you asking me?”
“You know,” she said with a nervous chuckle, “I’m not entirely sure myself.”
Jesstin’s mouth spread in a measured grin. “Are you propositioning me, Dream Elloven?”
“I’m...” She trailed off, blushing. “No. No, no, no. I’ve just never had anyone I could be this open with. It’s like being shown what my life might have been like if I’d had the freedom of thought and choice and words.”
“It still could be,” Jesstin said. He found himself standing, going to her. She slid down from her giant’s chair and met him halfway, dried leaves crunching under their boots. “You have too many fucking years ahead of you to think all that’s left to you is what’s behind.”
The windows on the left rattled. Then the floor shuddered. Jesstin’s balance wobbled as he tried to adapt, but the shaking stopped after a couple of seconds. “That’s new,” he said, frowning.
“It’s me, isn’t it?” Elloven sounded contrite, but when he looked down at her, she was smiling.
“You tell me, Dream Elloven. Can you make groundquakes?”
“What’s a groundquake?”
“Who knows? I made it up,” he said, and they laughed together. He wanted to repeat it, just to hear the sound of her joy again, but the moment had passed.
“What are we doing here, Jesstin?”
“I wish I knew.”
“This feels real.”
“I know.”
“Yet also not at all.”
“I know.”
“Do you think the bond caused this?”
Jesstin was surprised he hadn’t thought of it. “That or... or your magic.”
Elloven wiggled her fingers in the air with an impish grin. “Or ooh... fate.”
Until she said the word fate, he’d forgotten how Rhiain and Asterin could share dreams. After Mathias had erased the Edevanes from their memories, dreams were how they found their way back to each other, against nearly insurmountable odds.
Listening to them recount their dream adventures was the only time Jesstin didn’t roll his eyes when someone claimed “fate” was at the helm.
He’d never met anyone who’d fought as hard for each other.
Being around Elloven did feel... inevitable. Destined. As he watched her, considering this, drinking in the sparkle in her untroubled eyes, his gaze lingered on her a moment longer than it should have. “If this is fate’s doing, it would be the first time it got a damn thing right for me.”
She lowered her arms with a troubled look. “What if I can’t come back?”
Jesstin didn’t know the answer, but she seemed so small in the shadow of her sadness, and he found another way to offer the truth. “I want you here. Maybe that’s enough.”
“I want to be here,” she said. “Maybe that’s enough too.”
He couldn’t even fathom either of them saying those words when awake. “I’m, uh, surprised it allowed you here at all, honestly.”
“Oh?”
“My head is one massively warped establishment. Even I don’t always want to be in it.”
“Maybe mine is just as warped?” Elloven covered her hand over his wrist, and the sensation raced through his entire body. “You can’t corrupt me, Jesstin. That horse left the barn years ago.”
“Is that a challenge?” His mouth may have said the words, but it was another part of him entirely that responded.
“Depends. Are you up for it?”
Oh, I’m up. All the way up. “You’ll just have to find out in the next act of Jesstin and Elloven’s Nocturnal Misadventures.”
“I’ll be thinking of nothing else.”
“You wouldn’t say—you wouldn’t mean that if you could really see what’s going on up here.” He tapped his temple.
“Jesstin. Nothing you say, you do, could surprise me or scandalize me or...” She inhaled sharply, and he saw she wasn’t playing anymore.
“I won’t be reduced to the ideas others carry of me.
If you take nothing else from this dream back to the real world, take that.
Please. Be angry with me, be annoyed with me, be ready to hurl me into the sea and be done with me forever; I can take that, but please never reduce me to an idea. Not you. I’m so much more.”
How could he tell her he’d already seen her as she wanted to be seen, that that was the entire backbone of his dilemma with her and what she’d done in Mythgarde? He saw her. She saw him. It was all so simple, yet nothing had ever felt more morosely convoluted. “I won’t.”
“Good.” Her hand fell away. It took the air with it. “Now—”
The ground shook again, but harder. When she stumbled, he reached for her, but all he grabbed hold of was her necklace. Then the stones split, and he tripped backward, still gripping the pendant.
Jesstin jolted awake. He looked down at his hands, one still fisted around Dream Elloven’s necklace. He glanced over at her, seated on the other bench, where she was patting her chest.
No. Couldn’t be.
But he quickly abandoned that concern for another.
The carriage was no longer in motion.
Elloven’s eyes dilated in alarm as she looked to him for answers. Hands upturned, he shook his head. The carriage rocked so hard, they all rolled and slammed into the other side.
A scream outside was followed by a thud of something heavy hitting the dirt.
Their hired driver.
“I think we’re being robbed,” Taven cried, lunging for the carriage door. “Run!”
Elloven had to find her anchor. Most crises were manageable once she had it, but first she had to understand what was happening. She didn’t know how long she’d been asleep or how far they’d traveled. She was still half chained to the strange, shared dream. She’d lost her necklace, and—
But she hadn’t been wearing one, at least in the real world.
The real world.
Sunlight cut through the gaps in the curtain’s edge. Taven released the fabric and rammed his shoulder into the door. “Come on, come on.”
“There’s a handle, princess.” Jesstin’s sword, as long as the bench was wide, was laid over his lap as he dug into his belt. “But I wouldn’t do that.”
Taven threw his body against the door again and went sprawling into the mud with a thick splash. Elloven started after him, but Jesstin grabbed her elbow and shook his head.
“Wait.”
Elloven nodded and moved behind him. She wasn’t too proud to admit she was scared.
Jesstin climbed out and led with his sword pointed down, his dagger to the side. Elloven squinted against the harsh sun as she slowly followed and caught only a glimpse of Taven’s cloak disappearing into the forest.
“So gallant, that one,” Jesstin muttered. “Stay back. I need to see—”
A large man fell from the sky and landed on Jesstin, their collision scored by a rough chorus of breathy exchanges as they went rolling into the ditch. Elloven stumbled back from the carriage and tripped on the lifeless body of their poor driver.
“What are you doing? Run!” A scream followed Jesstin’s plea.
“I’m not leaving you here!” Elloven conducted a frantic search for anything she might use as a weapon. A thick branch, a rock. She hadn’t saved Jesstin’s life only for it to end on the side of a road.
Her boot hit something; a branch. She grabbed it and crouched low, working her way around to the other side of the carriage. Her heart thudded so hard against her breastbone, it was a wonder it didn’t announce her. It was all she could feel and hear. Even Jesstin seemed too far away to matter.
But he’s still in the ditch.
She returned to the front for a better view, but the trench was so deep, she could only hear the commotion of flesh connecting with flesh.
When the robber leaped to his feet, Jesstin crawled toward his sword in the leaves, and the man kicked him in the shoulder. Jesstin clutched his arm as he collapsed near a tree.
He twitched in irritation when the man’s sword tip pressed against his throat. Blood ran down his face, but there was more on the robber’s. “Go on then. No need to take your time with it.”
“I don’t have to hurt you if you give me the girl.” He gave the sword a light jab.
Jesstin didn’t flinch. “What girl?”
Jesstin’s sword was still propped on the side of the embankment, its hilt tilted her way. Like it was waiting for her.
“The witch who murdered Lord Quinlanden’s son.” The man spat on Jesstin’s boot. “He’d like his prisoner back.”
“Haven’t seen a witch or a prisoner.”
Elloven froze. The men weren’t robbers. They hadn’t outrun the danger. It had found them.
“I don’t care about you or your craven friend who ran into the woods.”
“He’s no friend of mine. Maybe he’s seen your little vengeful witch.”
The bandit hesitated. A subtle glance over his shoulder confirmed what Elloven already knew must be true, that there was at least one more of them.
She took a step and twigs snapped, grabbing the attention of both Jesstin and the thug, and she sprang without thinking, tripping and falling as she dove for the sword.
“Elloven!” Jesstin screeched.
She scraped one hand along the ground until it found worn, hard leather, and wrapped it tight, then inched backward in the mud until a sharp blade landed on her chest. Her eyes shuttered in defeat, but she’d been held at point before, and she wouldn’t go down without a fight.
“Got the witch!” the man cried with a cackle.