Visioness

by Lincoln Law

  “No, you’re not having this,” he said, pulling back the hammer.

  “No! You don’t understand!” she sobbed, grabbing at the hem of his coat. “He’ll kill me if I fail! Count Therron! He’ll kill me!”

  “Judging from the way that battle is going out there, he might kill you anyway,” Rhene said, pointing out the window. “If I don’t kill you first.”

  Lady Morphier crawled the few inches between her and the window and stared out, horrified as her crimson-cloaked Oen’Aerei were mown down. Only two of the Nhyxes remained and even then they were tired from battle. One of them was still leashed, dragging the body of its master behind it as it ran. The body was stained with blood and mud, flesh and muscles torn and bones broken from the madness of the Nhyx’s struggle.

  “We’re losing,” she whispered. “Despite everything, despite our preparation, we’re losing.”

  And despite the Dreamless not having their leader, Rhene added in his mind, the hole in his hand spiking with pain.

  “I’m dead,” she whispered.

  “Maybe not,” Rhene said. “You’ve made a mess of things. My suggestion is to call of the men at the door, go out there and stop this battle before there’s any more death.”

  He could feel Adabelle’s thoughts now, and he was sure Lady Morphier could, too. Therron’s secret…the truth he’d kept hidden. He could feel it now.

  He loved her mother, he thought. And he still does. He loves her like he loves his daughters.

  It was a shocking thought, but it somehow made sense. He looked to Lady Morphier, at the way her expression changed from fear to sadness.

  She did not speak it, but she mouthed it. He doesn’t love me. He still loves her. The last bit she whispered, and Rhene felt the pain, too. The truth she couldn’t bear to hear; the truth she had known all along.

  “He was using me,” she whispered. “I…I have nothing.”

  “You always have something,” Rhene said, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. “You have a choice. You’re facing a crossroads now and you can take one path or the other.”

  Lady Morphier’s eyes shifted about madly, as she processed his words. “I have a choice.” She muttered the words. “I have a choice.” She nodded. “A choice.”

  “And you know you have a choice. Go out there,” Rhene said, tone blunt. “Go out there and stop this battle if you have nothing to live for. Call off your army, demand a parley. I can assure you, the one who wanted this most of all is gone.”

  Lady Morphier’s mind was reeling, but she nodded, if a bit vacantly. “Very well,” she said. “I will go.”

  She rose from the ground, and walked to the door.

  Rhene listened, hand on the gun in case she tried anything silly.

  “Take me out to the battlefield,” she said to the men at the door. “I must end this war.”

  Finally, Rhene whispered.

  Rhene turned to Charlotte, who herself had not yet stirred.

  “Where am I?” said Aunt Marie, who was shifting in her chair. “What’s happening?”

  “Aunt Marie!” Rhene said, standing up. “There is so much to explain. But in a little while. I have to go keep Adabelle safe.”

  “What?” she said.

  “We haven’t got time,” he said. “I have to go.”

  And then he entered the Dream, through Charlotte’s mind.

  The second he was within the Frequencies, he heard that familiar song, and that familiar scent. He saw Adabelle, too, standing alone in the mists, sobbing.

  Adabelle wiped her eyes. The cold isolation of that Dreamspace set in once her mother faded. She looked about, at those rolling white mists. One more minute. That’s all she wanted. One more minute to speak to her mother, to keep her close, to imagine at least for a moment that she was still alive. A scent drifted in on the silent, unfelt wind. It smelled mildly like vanilla. Her mother! Her mother was returning!

  But then it faded again. No, not faded. It was replaced, but a different kind of scent. A warm scent, like cinnamon and cologne. It drifted in, soft and unobtrusive, different to the scent that preceded her father.

  Rhene emerged from the mists

  “Adabelle!” he cried, running up to meet her. “Adabelle! It worked! Aunt Marie is back to normal. I mean, she’s a bit confused, but nothing an explanation won’t fix.” He paused. “Why are you crying?”

  “It’s nothing,” Adabelle said, wiping her eyes. “I’ll tell you later. For now we have to worry about Th—”

  “Hello, Adabelle,” Therron said, stepping out the shadows, dressed in a coat and top hat. “Hello, Rhene.”

  “Therron,” Rhene nodded, stepping between Therron and Adabelle.

  “Come now,” Therron said, “not this again. Did I not already hurt you enough in our last battle? Surely you know I have no intention of hurting my daughter.”

  “You won’t have her,” Rhene said. “She’s not going to help you out of here and that’s that.”

  Therron’s eyes widened in disbelief. “I believe my daughter was born with a mouth. I think she can speak for herself.” His body leant slightly to look past Rhene.

  “I’m not going to help you out, Therron,” she said. “One thing is for sure, though: your tyranny ends here.”

  “What makes you think you have a choice?” he asked, continuing to approach in his slow, careful manner that Adabelle found so terrifying. “What makes you think you can do anything aside from bring me out of the Dream? As Rhene discovered there is no way for anyone to kill me here. Use that pistol on me, if you want, Rhene, but the bullet will go right through me and I will keep on living. I’m but a Dream, an idea! I assure you I will come back again and again.”

  She didn’t want to believe him. She wanted to deny him, to end him, and yet she couldn’t. She knew it to be true, and that made her heart ache.

  “I need you, Adabelle,” he said. “I have come to you for a second chance at life. Is that too much to ask?”

  She simply stood there. When Therron realised she was not speaking, he went on.

  “A touch of reality,” he said, pinching the air. “Just that; that’s all I ask. I want to enter the world again, a new man, and start over. I made many mistakes, as I have already told you, but I did one thing right. Without a doubt, creating you was my greatest act, the one I am most proud of.” He was close now, uncomfortably so. “To feel the wind, the touch of the sun. To taste real food, rain running down my face; to know what it is to love again! That is what I want; that is all I ask. From my own flesh and blood, I ask for freedom.” He held his hands wider, modestly. “Can you not grant an old man that one wish: a second chance?”

  “No,” Adabelle said, immediately and bluntly. “No, I won’t. Life is short and, at times, uncertain, as I have come to discover. One chance,” she said, holding up a single finger. “One chance is all we ever get. That’s part of its terrible beauty. We only get once chance to get it right, and if we stuff it up, we have that opportunity to fix it, but if we don’t fix it then it only gets worse.” She paused here, thinking of Mrs. Abeth, of Larraine, of her mother. Mama…. “You have made so many short, cut off the candle’s wick before it has even begun to burn. Why do you deserve a second chance, when no one else is allowed one?” She pointed into the shadows. “Somewhere out there is my sister, on the ground because of a lock you put on her mind. If anyone deserves a second chance at life, it’s her! Despite everything, she still loves and cares and fights. She is brave and strong and resilient! She is everything I can’t be, and that kills me and makes me stronger at the same time. Give her a second chance, Therron. Give that girl the chance I will not give you.”

  She felt tears well in her eyes, but these weren’t sad tears. They were impassioned tears: furious, fervent, loving tears. “You have deprived her of a mother all her live, deprived her of her dreams, and used her as a vault for your own lies. You say you sealed away that sliver of my mother because you loved her: no! That’s not love. You can’t love anyo
ne and do what you have done to my family! And you can’t go about spouting that you did any of this for love! You did this because of your selfishness, because you wanted a second chance at life, so you killed others to get there!”

  Her heart was racing now, her breathing shallow. She had Rhene’s hand in her own, though, and his other arm was around her stomach, keeping her close. Keeping her safe and warm.

  “I have changed, Adabelle!” Therron said, extending a hand. “I have changed for the better. You’re my daughter! Can’t you hear that?”

  “Don’t call me your daughter!” she roared, pushing against Rhene’s tight hold. He was the only thing stopping her from pummelling the man before her.

  “You are my daughter, though,” Therron said. “You are my flesh and blood, and you are the only one who can bring me out into the world.”

  “I will bring you into the world to die, then,” she said. “I would turn your memory to slivers as you did to my mother and let you fade to nothing if I knew how. I would seal you away in a mindlock, if I was sick enough to make a person suffer that fate. But I am not going to burden someone else with my own fear, my own lies as you have done to Charlotte.” She stepped forward, breaking free of Rhene’s hold. “I will end you.”

  Therron stood before her, expression impassive. His lips were quivering, though, with a pent up emotion he had kept inside. Her words were hurting. For the first time, she felt she was doing something.

  I’m missing something, she thought as she stared down Therron. Things weren’t right. There was something she was forgetting. A part of the puzzle she was missing. Now was the chance she had to stop Therron, but until this other piece fell into place—whatever it was—she wouldn’t be able to complete her task.

  Another figure appeared from the shadows, stepping into the Dream.

  “Charlotte?” Adabelle asked, confused. “What are you doing here?” She realised the answer before she had a chance to respond. She was asleep now, in the room from which Adabelle had watched the battle. Her mind was unlocked, now. They were there, now. That’s whose mind they stood in. Hence why it was so barren: it was not used to thought.

  “The battle is ending out there,” Charlotte said. “Lady Morphier has gone out to the battlefield now.”

  “She did as I told her,” Rhene said. “Good.”

  “It’s over?” Therron asked.

  “She’s surrendering,” Charlotte said simply.

  Therron’s mouth quirked, the quiver in his lips turning into a quake.

  “You are a Dreamer, Charlotte,” Therron said. “My beautiful daughter.”

  “Hello, papa,” she said, glancing quickly at Adabelle who stared at her for calling him that.

  “Will you not help your father escape?” he asked. “Will you not forgive your papa? Let him feel freedom once more?”

  Charlotte looked to Adabelle. “Don’t do it,” Adabelle said. “Don’t do it.”

  She can’t do it, she quickly realised. She’s his flesh and blood, but she’s not a Sturding. She’s still asleep.

  Charlotte looked to her sister. Something about the expression frightened Adabelle. It was brave and defiant and…terrified. There was a dark truth behind those words, behind that façade. It said, I have a plan, though I do not know if it will work. It was something about the way Charlotte spoke that made Adabelle’s heart flutter with fear.

  “I am his flesh and blood, Adabelle,” she said, “and I can make that decision for myself.”

  “Yes! Good girl! Do this for me!” Therron extended his arms, opening them wide, welcoming her towards him. She took her first few steps.

  Does she know she can’t do this? Adabelle thought suddenly. She realised Rhene’s hands were wrapped once again around her waist. She had barely noticed it before, but he held her back again. She tried to run, to stop her from making this mistake, but Rhene held her firm.

  “Let her go,” he whispered. “She knows what she’s doing.”

  “How can she know?” Adabelle replied, turning to face Rhene. “How can she possibly know?”

  “Because we spoke about it,” he replied solemnly. “While you were away, we talked about how we were going to stop Therron. She knew what she had to do when the time came, if the time came. She has accepted it.”

  That’s the missing piece, she thought, as everything fell into place. She’s what I was missing.

  Charlotte.

  “She’s only a girl,” she whispered. “She has so much to do.”

  “This is her choice,” Rhene replied. “Let her make it.” He looked up to her. “She has been so very brave.”

  As Adabelle turned back around and found Charlotte hugging Therron. It terrified her.

  “I can’t do anything,” she whispered. Only I can free him. She can end him, though. She realised the truth. She was the one who was always meant to end him.

  “The gifts of the Sturding,” Therron said, rising up from the embrace. “Giving a man a second chance at life.” He smiled down at Charlotte, his jubilation almost childlike. “Thank you, for your gifts.”

  “I am no Sturding,” Charlotte replied, turning to look up at Therron.

  This was it, the moment. Adabelle tried to run for Therron. She tried to push Charlotte away. There had to be another option! There was always another option!

  Yet in the moments that came, she quickly realised there were none. If this was to happen, it had to be this way.

  “No!” Therron cried, before Charlotte tried to pull him from the Dream.

  It all happened in the blink of an eye. To Adabelle, it seemed to take forever.

  Therron fought against Charlotte’s grasp, but she held on too tightly. She tugged his arm, reaching for reality, reaching for wakefulness. She smiled all the way, bravely facing oblivion with the courage of a soldier. The entire fabric of their surrounding seemed to groan in defiance as the rules of reality were broken, as the universe tried to rectify that error. There was a brilliant flash of light, a snapping like thunder, and then the pair were gone.

  Adabelle and Rhene were ejected from the Dreamspace as it began to collapse, crushing them, pushing them, winding them with its force and then kicking them out before it dragged them into Oblivion with it.

  “Charlotte!” Adabelle screamed. “Charlotte!” But there were no words to be heard. They were consumed by the vortex of shadows and mist and memory as the entirety of Charlotte’s mind collapsed and consumed itself.

  But in that moment, she understood, too. She knew it had to be that way, that it was the only outcome possible. She herself could not do it, and neither could Rhene. Charlotte had made the choice. Yet still the pain flowed and her sadness and her anger ran as red as the blood that filled the streets.

  All this madness in the destruction, the chaos of all things ending, the noises like the tearing of reality and the flashes of a mind breaking.

  And then just silence and the void.

  There was nothing.

  Oblivion.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The Price of Freedom

  After the end, time continued.

  Adabelle sobbed into Rhene’s arms, screaming her sister’s name, begging if she wished hard enough she could have Charlotte return.

  But she was gone, her mind lost to Oblivion.

  “I have to get her,” she whispered. “I have to go back. I have to get into Oblivion and save my sister. It is the only way!”

  “You can’t get her, Adabelle,” Rhene whispered, softly into her ear. They sat in the room where Adabelle had drank tea with Lady Morphier, beside Charlotte’s still, silent body. He life leached from her, her once warm brown skin seemed cold, like stone. “She’s gone. She can’t come back.”

  “I’ll go in her place!” Adabelle sobbed. “I’ll go and she can come back. She needs another chance!”

  “She chose this fate herself. She knew what she was doing.”

  “She’s just a girl, though!” Adabelle screamed. “Just a child! How can
she know?”

  “She was fifteen, Adabelle,” Rhene replied. “And a lot older and wiser than you give her credit for.”

  She turned to her sister’s body, wishing she could enter that mind again and reel back the life that had once made her so. But she couldn’t. She couldn’t make that happen, and that confused her and made her angry.

  She didn’t even notice Aunt Marie to the side, no longer in the wheelchair. She didn’t want to notice her for a time at least. She wanted it to just be her and her sister.

  “She didn’t deserve this, though,” Adabelle whispered. She looked like she was sleeping, Adabelle thought. Like she was dreaming. A tiny part of that gave her hope, even if she knew it was false. “This can’t be the price of our freedom,” Adabelle whispered. “This isn’t fair.”

  Rhene didn’t say anything in reply. He simply kept her close, stroking her arm gently, comfortingly. It was all he could do, in truth.

  Eventually, the police arrived and took the body to another room, where she lay upon a bed. Adabelle kept by her sister’s side, speaking to her, apologising as if the girl could hear her. It was too late, but it gave her some small iota of comfort.

  “I always underestimated you,” Adabelle whispered, having calmed down enough to speak. “I always thought of you as a child and I treated you as one. I never stopped to consider that you were almost an adult yourself, that you were growing up just like I was. I didn’t want you getting in the way or getting into trouble. I wanted to deal with things alone, and that made me selfish. You were willing to help, to shoulder the burden, and I just dismissed you like a child. I didn’t tell you about Therron to begin with because I didn’t want to scare you, when I should have been honest from the start. I should have told you everything. I should have let you see my worry and see my fear so you could hug me and take me away. And when you asked me what was wrong, I should have told you honestly. But I didn’t. I didn’t want you to see my weakness. I didn’t want you to worry, or to see me cry.” She inhaled deeply, the air coming in stops and starts. “But now I’ve lost you, and all I want to do is cry.”