by Elle Cross
“Yeah, okay bye!” And I finally ended that nightmare.
Not for the first time did I believe that my mother secretly or not so secretly played to other people’s discomfort because that would have been featured in their nightmares.
I slumped down to the floor, head in my hands like I had just survived a battle.
“So I see your mother called on you, my queen?” West’s voice was full of unspent laughter.
“I swear on all the gods, don’t you dare laugh right now.”
To his credit he didn’t laugh.
“Was the entire court watching?”
I looked at Enver. “Just about. For what it was worth, they seemed to be very happy that I am now the Queen of Shadows and more, whatever that meant, and they toasted their congratulations.”
“The more part means that you have another power aligned to you that has yet to manifest. Wonderful news, my queen.” West kissed me to emphasize it. He continued musing, “I didn’t realize that it was customary to also fall into a revel after one toasts another’s good fortune.”
I snorted back. “Didn’t you know? It’s a gala for your eighteenth birthday, orgy for when you are marked with power.”
West and Enver laughed, and I joined in. Man, my family. I got up, and their eyes lit up seeing me, and realized that I was very naked.
“Do not get any ideas. I’m putting on some clothes and going to find out whatever it is that smells so good because I’m starving.”
I wandered into my closet and threw on easy lounge clothes wrapped in a robe. My mother wore power glyphs, customized dresses, a raven-wing cape, and carried a scepter.
I was barefoot with a long t-shirt, leggings, legwarmers, and a plush bathrobe.
Well, if you couldn’t dress the way you wanted to dress, were you even a queen?
Karina
WITHOUT THE DISTRACTION OF my mother, I sank into a depressive funk thinking about Taran and Havoc. It was the not-knowing where they were that kept me agitated, more so than worrying for their safety.
They had to be okay. I couldn’t even entertain the possibility that they would be otherwise. Enver and West kept me entertained all day, distracting me. Losing Taran and Havoc was not part of the plan.
Enver had recounted those lost moments. They had decided to split up so that they would break up the attention between the Shrikes. The Hounds and other Hunters had joined soon after. Enver ran off, and was supposed to draw the second batch away, but somehow the rest of the Hunters were called off his tail. He had gone back to where they had split. That was when the other Hounds scented him and chased after him.
He was surprised that they showed signs of intelligence. Usually they were chased down or easily distracted. This tied back to that theory that there was something else manipulating things here, and that we needed to be careful.
I picked at my food listless, and only finished my plate because I was sure that either Enver or West would hand feed me if I didn’t eat enough.
Not like that would have been that big of an inconvenience.
I let them train and do what they needed to do while I read up on the case files again. I was happy to see that I had a computer set up here in this house, and I was able to work on it a little bit to compile data and do some research on the area.
It didn’t turn up a lot, but at least I was able to figure out the lay of the land here and figure out directions to major landmarks, addresses to key and relevant people, and more importantly, who I was going to be in this world.
The Shades would need some kind of cover story even when I flit into their lives for only a bit. I decided that I couldn’t go wrong with continuing to be Karina Bright, Information Analyst. There were transfers all the time, so I could be one of the transfers, too.
I watched the sun set behind the house. The black coffee smooth and delicious, a spot of warmth in the cooling evening.
The ghost at the edge of the property was troubled again, and he was projecting images and faces out. I sighed, not knowing how to help him, yet wishing I could. I threw a blessing out there toward him, hoping he would find peace. He just kept mumbling to himself, and flickering those images up into the air.
The men sought me out to give me comfort, but I was restless and unsettled. I didn’t like plans going off script.
“We’ll find them, my queen,” Enver assured me, before kissing my cheek.
With one last reassurance that I did in fact want to be alone, I wished them good night. I barely wanted to be in my own company, let alone subject others to it.
Karina
I woke in the middle of the night.
It was easier to fall asleep than I thought.
I had wanted to stay in the smallest room in the house that was deemed the most defensible position, but now it felt too small. I should check out the master bedroom suite later. Or at least think about making this into a master bedroom suite. The way the house accommodated my wishes, it wasn’t too much of a stretch to assume that it would do something like that to make me happy.
As much as I loved having my guard in my life again, and as much as I loved no longer being lonely, this was different. I had to relearn what it meant to make room and share space again. And I sure as hell needed to remember to guard my thoughts and shield.
Or, most likely, stop getting caught up in what other people thought of me.
I had draped a cloth over the mirror in the bathroom. The mirror of course had been spelled to keep out anything evil, for which I was relieved. However, I didn’t want a repeat of my mother’s conversation. If I had to nearly witness her participate in an orgy again, it would be too soon, thank you very much.
Before retiring for the evening, the men would have searched the house and made sure that it was locked up tight and would not have any intruders. I knew though that I must have forgotten something. And there, I realized that there was a little handheld mirror that had come with this house.
It was enough.
The ghost shimmered in the dappled moonlight from the windows. For a moment, I thought it would be my Una, but this one felt different. Forlorn, like one of the newly dead.
Dread flooded me. It was all for nothing. I tried to be quick, but the kidnapped girl…
The ghost tilted her head.
Do not worry, Brightling. You do not know me. She told me you would worry.
I blinked. The ghost was talking to me. This was new.
“She? Una? Where is she? Is she okay?”
She tilted her head again. I realized that it was like she was hearing something that only she could. She is weak. Please hurry.
“What do I need to do?”
I got up out of the tangle of sheets, throwing my clothes on.
She flickered. Dammit. She was losing energy.
I didn’t know what to do to keep her cohesive. “Can you tell me where she is?”
She held out her hand. And then the world around me turned dark as she walked us hand in hand outside. We passed the ghost at the edge of the property, and I felt something like relief coming from him. A knot untied in my stomach as I realized that he had been waiting for this moment. That he was possibly waiting for me to get to this girl and find her justice.
He had been a witness of sorts. An observer.
That’s when I also realized that the images in his head that he had been pressing into my mind were so many. Too many. Were they all dead or missing?
The ghost beside me called for my attention. I felt like we were walking in place, and I wondered where this would go. When the darkness lifted, we were in front of a warehouse-looking place. Except instead of a meat-packing plant, this was one of those trendy night clubs.
Gotta be honest, I didn’t think they had places like these in a state named Indiana.
The ghost walked us past the people waiting outside, corralled by velvet roped stanchions. When I passed, it was like I was living snippets of their lives. I felt the impatience of their waiting. Ached with the
m wearing their stupidly high-heeled shoes. Felt self-conscious in too-short or too-tight dresses. Wondered if my hair looked good.
I had reached up to fluff the ends of my hair before I realized what I was doing.
It was surreal. Was this what it felt like to be a ghost? To pass through people’s thoughts? I wondered if that was how some ghosts became charged with negative energy and became poltergeists or hauntings. Were they just annoyed with all of these people’s energies?
If I had to listen to this for any length of time, I’d be annoyed too.
We went into the club. My gaze lingered on the bartender. I felt his eyes on me, though, that was crazy. I was in a dream, so there was no way the bartender could see me here.
He was there though and watched everyone like a hawk. But when he lingered on me, I didn’t feel like his eyes slipped over me like the other people’s gazes did.
My dream mind must have thought that he was important.
The girl tugged my hand.
I was to go upstairs with her. That was interesting. The club had an upstairs that looked as if it would be able to see the floor beneath. The ceiling looked to be glass like the one-way glass used in the police precinct I’d worked at.
Considering how easily I could feel mirrors vibrate, it was fun for me to figure out the nature of glass and one-way mirrors. There was that energy of intention there, that the person installed it in such a way to watch people around them.
As was typical in the nature of dreams, it was like I floated through the roiling mass of flesh. And it was like how it had been outside with the waiting line, but amplified. The thrumming music, the writhing bodies, the rising thoughts of sex, lust, pleasure…they were all mingled and thrown around.
That energy clung to me, splattering over me as if it were something physical. I tried my best to clean up my shields, which I was happy to have placed on me even before we had left my bedroom.
I went upstairs, and the air felt different. My ears popped from the pressure difference like I’d climbed to a tremendous altitude. There was a quiet here that was more than quiet. It could not be attributed to good insulation or anything like that. It was as if this place was completely separate from the rest of the club.
I saw the girl drift forward, and I wanted to grab her before she went into the hallway. It was too long, too white, and too silent.
Stop, I yelled at her from my mind. Stop, this doesn’t feel right!
She only turned and looked at me from over her shoulder. She didn’t stop though. She couldn’t.
This was not her dream and she had no power here.
The door at the end of the hall opened, and steam poured out of there. It was never a good thing for steam to billow out of a room that didn’t intend to have steam pouring out of it.
What was worse, it was like something in that room throbbed and was alive and the girl kept walking toward it, and I was frozen in place, no matter how much I tried to move forward.
A figure stepped out of that room, and the silhouette was thrown in harsh relief against all the bright white. It was just a shadow, but I could tell it was male, and he was holding out his hand toward her, and she placed her hand in his, but looked back toward me and disappeared into the white.
I yelled for her.
I yelled even harder when hands came down on my shoulders.
Karina
I WAS IN BED, and looked up to see two concerned faces looking down at me in various stages of worried to rage. Enver and West held my arms down, trying to talk to me, while their legs were thrown over mine.
It took several moments to bleed in my skull that I was safe in my own bed with my men around me. The soothing voices registered, and their nonsense words about having a bad dream and being safe finally registered.
I stopped struggling, and they released my limbs. I sat up, shivering. My teeth chattered, uncontrollable.
Enver hissed out a violent curse, wrapped himself around me, and pulled me against his bare chest. He was warm. It was intoxicating, the change from freezing cold to fiery heat. If my cold body bothered him, I could not tell.
He kept shushing me and saying I was fine and that they were here now. It was all just a dream.
Was it though? It had felt so real.
West shared a look with Enver, and he disappeared.
I still shivered. West returned and shook his head at Enver who allowed me to break away long enough to let West wrap another blanket around me before enfolding me once more in his arms.
West sat down on the edge of the bed, rubbing my legs. “Are you all right, Karina?”
“Does she look all right?” Enver bit out.
West ignored him in his clinical way. “Tell us what happened.”
It all felt silly now. All this for a surreal dream. “It was nothing. Just my mind being stupid, is all.”
I repeated my dream anyway. After all, I would like them to be as prepared as possible in case this threat was really a threat.
"The funny thing, is that it sort of felt like a revel. There was dancing, music...like the thing that was waiting, that monster thing on the second floor, it was like getting power or getting energy or something from that club. I was not sure of course, but the people seemed to be having a damn good time."
A little too good. Some were having sex right in the middle of the club. I knew that some clubs could get raunchy like that, but I was very surprised indeed.
Enver brushed my hair back, pressing his lips to my forehead. "I think that we can safely say that at least for now, the threat has passed, and nothing can harm you at the moment. Maybe we could sleep in here with you, would you like that?"
I nodded. I had hoped speaking my dream out loud would make me feel better, but it hadn’t. Another fit of shivers racked my body. “I’m sorry for being so messed up from just a silly dream.”
Enver laid his hands on my back. The pulsing sensations of his power were better than a massage. I warmed immediately. “You are freezing cold, and calling for power. It was not just a silly dream.” His voice was soft and lethal. “My queen does not apologize for being attacked, even in dreams.”
“Indeed,” West said with equal anger.
Enver cradled the back of my head with his strong hand, massaging my head and neck. When I was boneless from the pleasure, he held me still. “My queen. We have wanted to support you, and protect you—”
“Maybe now is not the time to bring this up, Prince.”
They shared a look, and it carried a huge conversation. Something they seemed to have spoken about before.
“No, please. Tell me.”
They finally broke eye contact and brought their attention back to me. West ran his hands up and down my legs, more for the contact than for the purposes of warming me up I wagered.
Enver exhaled as if he braced himself. “My queen. We have a theory that you have cut yourself off for so long that you have not been able to draw on power. At least by yourself.”
“Draw on power?” I didn’t remember being told about that. Power could be conferred to me by someone like my mother. I could exchange blood and/or flesh for power. Or, I could be given power by the Deity, but that would be through their conduits, like the Oracles.
It had never been described as an active thing to me before. Always passive.
“When was your last revel?”
I blushed. “Over three years ago.”
Enver swore. “Okay, and when was the last time you have tasted power?”
I blinked. “The other day? With you and West?”
West’s face was like marble, his eyes chipped ice. “That’s what I thought. The little bits of power that we pushed to you whether through our bonds or that lick of blood the other day, they are like tiny drops of water in an empty reservoir.”
I swallowed at the analogy. “So what are you saying? I’m completely drained dry of power?” That was weird since I never felt like I had any power to begin with. Only the ones that my mother confe
rred on me as a sort of inheritance during my first Blessed Moon Revel. Before that, I was tied to my mother, so of course my powers were hers.
I never had my own. I said as much.
“That can’t be true. I didn’t have power to lose, aside from my mother’s, but I can’t lose that. It’s like on my skin.”
Enver caressed my face. “You may not have known how to access your power, my love, and the Oracles would have been charged to teach you, a queen, how you would manifest it. But you have power. As a queen, you were born with it.”
“It’s true, my queen,” West added, drawing my leg out from the blanket so he could massage my feet. “I wonder if that is why you have become so vulnerable lately. It’s a wonder you’re even functioning now. Your gifts that you learned as an Oracle’s apprentice and the blessings of your mother’s power over death are probably the only things that have kept you from fading once you entered the Shadow Realm.”
Fading. True death. To release my power into the Fade and strengthen the veils of this world. But my mother said that I was from the Shadow Realm…
“So, you noticed I’ve been…weak?” My voice was small, my fears of being a danger to those around me magnified.
West tsked, “No, my queen. Not weak. Just starved.”
“It is your choice to be bonded with us, and claim us for your court. I won’t force you. But the more…separate…we are, the harder it is for us to make sure your power base is strong.”
“But, doesn’t that mean you have to feed me your powers to feed my own? I never want to weaken you. I don’t want to chance that. And don’t we bond when we…” I should be able to say ‘sex’ for crying out loud. If I was adult enough to do it, I should be able to say it.
“That’s not it at all, my queen,” West explained. “Yes, you get stronger during a flesh or blood exchange. But think about electricity and being plugged in. Or having to be a battery that needs recharging. It doesn’t last, and it’s not as strong. Right now, the arrangement that we have is more like that battery you need to recharge. You’ll eventually drain out dry, and for too long, the damage would be irrevocable.