by S H Cooper
Something cool rests against my feverish cheek and I lean into it, grateful for any relief.
“Rest now,” the woman says.
Her voice is soft and sweet.
I want to, but I can’t. Not until I know the others are safe.
“All will be well, Mary. Your brothers are alright. Sleep.”
She sounds so certain. So soothing. I let my eyes close, and I sleep.
Chapter Twenty-Six
I don’t know if I’m dreaming or awake. I hear people, sometimes, or I see them leaning over me. I recognize my brothers most of all, but there’s also Torren and Daiomas and Silvermoon. And the woman. When she is near, I feel most at peace. I can barely make sense of my own thoughts. They flutter about in my head like so many butterflies. I can’t catch any of them long enough to understand them.
They escape off into darkness, leaving behind the clashing of steal, screaming, the shriek of a giant eagle.
Meverick haunts me. The way he smirked as he waited for my brothers to make a wrong move. How he had looked down at me, so certain of his victory. I still feel how easily the dagger slid through his clothing and the skin beneath. I keep seeing that certainty drain away into stunned realization. I try to hold on to that image: the one of him, wide eyed, hateful, but afraid. Finally afraid.
It shimmers and fades like all the others, until I am left in a pitch black, with twin serpents of fire and ice slithering inside of me. There are moments where it feels as if all I am is pain, and then, when it becomes almost too much to bear, I fall in a merciful nothingness where I don’t hear or see or feel.
I’m not sure how long I stay like that: trapped between the waking world where I hurt more than I knew I could and the dark place where I keep seeing my brothers fighting Conan’s men. Time doesn’t exist for me.
Not until I open my eyes to a room of wood and greenery.
I’m lying in an unfamiliar bed beneath a window. Threads of pale sunlight stream through and fall across the leaf-patterned quilt spread over me. I start to lift my head, setting off a chain reaction of aches and pains that run through all of me. I groan and drop back on to the pillow.
“She’s awake?” someone mumbles, then louder and with more urgency, they say it again. “She’s awake!”
Joseph sits on the edge of the bed with a watery smile, careful not to disturb me. Drake appears over his shoulder. Both have dark circles under their eyes and look as if they haven’t slept in days.
“You’re with us again then, lass?” Drake asks.
“I think so?” I’m not entirely sure myself. Everything still looks fuzzy around the edges, like it’s not quite solid yet.
“You’re talking!” Joseph says to me, then to Drake, “She’s talking! That’s a good sign!”
“Is it, though?” Drake frowns teasingly. “Because once she starts, you know how hard it is to get her to shut up again.”
My weak laughter makes me wince. “Where are we? Where’s Torren and —”
“Around.” Joseph shushes me. “We parted with Reena and her people outside Conan’s castle. They had to tend to their wounded and dead and thought it best to do so at home. She promised to write to you once they made it back. Daiomas carried you here and took his rest before leaving yesterday morning. He wanted to tell you goodbye, but you were asleep for five days and he couldn’t wait any longer to return to his family. Don’t worry; the others will come see you in time. We’re in Thalirian. It’s an Elvish city! It’s all built into the treetops and you have to walk between rope bridges to get anywhere and —”
It’s almost too much for me to take in. I’m at least able to grasp that my friends had survived. That is the important thing. Everything else just sounds like noise clanging about inside my head. I touch my temple with a grimace that catches Drake’s attention.
“Slow down, Joseph,” Drake says with a gentle punch to his shoulder. “You don’t have to say it all in one breath.”
He grins sheepishly with a mumbled apology.
“Thal…” I attempt to say the city’s name, but trail off. My tongue is too dry and tired to try and pronounce such a strange word just yet. “How?”
“Silvermoon,” Joseph says, and Drake’s lip curls slightly at the elf’s name. “It’s his home.”
“Aye, now if we could just get him to go to his actual home. He’s been hanging about like a lost wee puppy,” Drake grumbles.
“He’s barely left your side since we arrived.” Joseph grins, which earns him a smack on the back of the head from his twin.
“Don’t be looking so pleased, lad.”
“Mary finally wakes up and this is how you two behave? Don’t make me send you to bed without supper!” Torren’s chiding voice comes from the doorway and I stretch as best I can to see her fluttering with her hands on her hips.
She squeals in delight and zips over to land on the pillow beside my head. She brushes a few strands of hair from my face and tuts, trying not to let the tears sparkling in her eyes show.
“You had us all very worried, you know. If you had wanted attention so badly, there are better ways of getting it, young lady! Honestly, I’ve had just about my fill of humans.”
“Why didn’t you come to Gladfife?” I ask seriously despite Torren’s levity. My parched throat turns my words into a croak. “What happened?”
“We were stopped. The portal was cut off after you went through,” Joseph explains.
“How?”
“We don’t know,” Drake says. “The fae believed someone interfered with their doorway...spell...thing. They didn’t find anyone nearby when they looked, but it’s not like it takes a genius to figure out who was behind it. By the time they were able to open another, you were gone from Gladfife, but we found your friend, Reena. She’d come to the city to look for us. She said she’d met you and you’d stayed with them until one of their own betrayed you. That’s why she and her war party came with us, to make up for it.”
I struggle to piece together the rest of the battle. “The eagle,” I say slowly. “What was that?”
He pulls the small silver bird the Halofain had given him from his pocket and turns it over in his palm. “We were set upon by bandits on the road one night. Even with the Faunir, we were outnumbered. I thought we’d have to fight our way out. She just about burned a hole in my pocket before I could pull her out and toss her to the ground. That was the first time she came to life. But since the fight, she hasn’t responded when I call to her. I don’t know if she’s alive or...well…”
He frowns at the figurine, troubled. I hope the creature within is only taking its time to heal and will return soon. But the fate of Drake’s eagle companion is not the only one I’m worried about and I have to ask.
“Meverick,” I struggle to sit upright with my brothers’ help. “Is he dead?”
“No.”
The answer comes from a tall, elegant woman standing just inside the room. She’s dressed in a sapphire gown that glimmers in the sunlight. Her hair, the same silvery-blonde as Silvermoon’s, spills almost to the floor. There is a regal air to her and, when she makes herself known, the other three dip into small, but respectful bows.
“Mary, this is her majesty, Queen Nauria. She has been looking after you since Silvermoon brought us here,” Joseph says reverently.
The queen inclines her head graciously. “I have done little. It is Ilyana who has seen to much of your care.”
“Ilyana?”
The woman’s face, the one that lulled me to sleep and brought me such comfort through my pain.The handmaiden, Ilyana. Except she hadn’t looked so meek and young. There had been something different about her, a change that made her seem so much stronger than the lass I had come to know. Queen Nauria smiles slightly at my confusion.
“Shall I summon her? I am sure you have many questions.”
“Yes!” I say eagerly, then, remembering my manners, I hastily add, “please.”
Ilyana, accompanied by Silvermoon, arrives momen
ts later. The elf’s bruises have faded and the gray rags he was wearing when we’d met have been traded for a light tunic and trousers. Ilyana, likewise, is dressed in a pale purple gown and her hair, which has taken on a glossy sheen, is braided into a crown around her head.
When Silvermoon moves to stand at my bedside, Drake looms over his shoulder, his arms crossed over his broad chest.
Silvermoon glances back at him. “Something I can do for you?”
“No,” Drake says gruffly. “Just watching.”
“Right.” Silvermoon snorts and kneels. “How are you feeling?”
“Fine,” Drake answers for me.
Joseph hides his amusement behind his hand and pretends to take an interest in something at his feet while Torren drops her head to one side and rolls her eyes at me.
“I didn’t know you could throw your voice, Mary! Or that you could sound so much like a lad.” Silvermoon feigns surprise and when I giggle, Drake’s eyes narrow.
“I’m well, I think,” I say, turning to Ilyana. She’s standing at the foot of my bed, hands clasped in front of her and her head bowed. “Thanks to you, Ilyana.”
She looks up from under her lashes. “There was little for me to do, really. The physical wounds were not yours, so all I could do was ease your mind. You have a warrior’s spirit, Mary. You fought hard.”
“What do you mean the wounds weren’t hers?” Drake asks. “Whose were they?”
“We will get to that in time,” the queen replies patiently.
“Who are you?” I am too tired to be more polite about it. Ilyana has shed any pretense of being a nervous servant girl, so I don’t feel the need to keep pretending either.
She looks to the queen, who nods.
Ilyana lifts her head. “I am the one you were searching for. I am a daughter of dreams. A Dreamweaver.”
It feels as if the wind has been knocked out of me. My tongue ties around any word that tries to get out and I just stare, mouth opening and closing uselessly, at her. My brothers are also speechless and look from each other, to Ilyana, and back again. Even Torren is taken back by the revelation.
“I’m sorry I didn’t reveal my true nature to you sooner,” she says. “I had to be sure.”
“Of what?” I stammer.
I don’t know if I’m angry at her deception or relieved. Perhaps all at once. I mindlessly grab Joseph’s hand and squeeze it tightly.
“That you were worthy.”
The queen has chairs brought in for everyone to sit and they eagerly gather around my bed, all attention on Ilyana so she can tell her tale.
“Meverick came to us, my sisters and I, many years ago. He had learned of our existence from a clan of fae, he said. We did not know that he had tortured them for this information.”
In my lap, Torren stiffens and swallows hard, but does not speak. Ilyana must be speaking of her family. I place a comforting hand against her back and she reaches up to take hold of one of my fingers.
“He said he sought us out as a last resort to aid his family. There was no mention of war. Only illness, starvation. Suffering. My sisters turned him away, they did not want to get involved in human affairs, but he seemed so young and desperate. He was charming. I…” Ilyana collects herself, twisting her fingers together while she does so. “I took pity on him. I did not think teaching him how to give sweeter dreams to his people would be a bad thing. It seemed a kindness to offer them even a brief escape from their difficult lives.”
“But he lied to me. He did not want to bring peace to anyone. He took what I taught him and then he took my sisters. One by one, in the dead of night. By the time I realized it was him, it was too late. He’d already used them for his own purposes and thrown what remained to the sea.”
Anguish washes over Ilyana and wets her cheeks. She dabs at her eyes with a handkerchief the queen hands her and fixes her gaze on the window over my head.
“He corrupted our magic. He used only the dark parts and made them darker still. We Dreamweavers are connected to our magic. It is as much a part of us as our blood is. I felt it every time he used it to his own evil end. And when he used the nightmare sleep...I knew I had remained idle for too long. But I had grown mistrustful of humankind. I could not bring myself to aid another like Meverick Conan. So when I discovered he had taken the daughter of his victim, I snuck into his castle to learn about you. He thinks himself so powerful, but there are many things he does not yet know.”
“You made yourself my servant?” I ask in disbelief.
“The measure of one’s heart can be found in how they treat those less fortunate. It was the best way for me to know you.”
I cringe as I think of all the times I’d spoken sharply to her and tried to shake her off my trail. She laughs lightly at my expression.
“You were never unkind, Mary, merely spirited. Given your circumstance, I would never blame you for not trusting me then. And in the end, when it mattered most, you were willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to protect those you loved.”
“I wasn’t sure what would happen,” I admitted. “I had only just learned we shared pain. I didn’t know what would happen to me if I stabbed him.”
“But you did it anyway. That takes a special kind of bravery.”
“Share pain? What do you mean?” Joseph asks, but no one answers him.
Drake broods beside him, shifting his weight in frustrated confusion, but he doesn’t interrupt. When Joseph tries to ask again, Drake just gives him a discouraging shake of his head.
There is so much to wrap my head around already, but one thing still hasn’t been made clear.
“Why did that happen? How is it that we can feel each other’s pain?” I ask.
Queen Nauria speaks when Ilyana turns to her. “You and Meverick Conan share an extremely rare bond,” she says. “You are opposites: beings born from a tangled thread of fate. Your families are bound by their shared past, an unclosed wound that is still felt through you and Meverick. Extreme pain, like the cut of a blade, is passed through both. I have been studying both of your clans since you arrived.”
“The Conans were an ambitious family who longed to be a kingdom of their own. They attempted to break away from the capital and take the lands surrounding their castle, but the king would not allow it. He summoned every knight in the region and placed them under the command of your ancestor, Samuel McThomas. Samuel was a great warrior and his men followed him to victory. The cost was great and many lives were lost, including that of Meverick’s father. The Conans were stripped of any titles and wealth. They lost everything and retreated behind their castle walls. I have learned that Meverick swore a vengeance oath after the war ended so he could not die until Samuel McThomas’ bloodline was ended.”
“His darkness has only grown over the last century. There had to be a balance. That is you, Mary. The first daughter born to the McThomas line since he took his oath. You are everything he is not, as he is everything you are not. The evil in him repels the good in you, but it works the other way as well. That is why you were able to break the spell on Silvermoon and the others.”
“Is that why I feel...frozen when he touches me?”
“He touched you?” Drake sputters, and he and Joseph jut forward in their seats.
“He’d grab my wrist or the back of my neck and I’d freeze,” I say.
My brothers settle back slightly, still prickly.
“Yes,” Queen Nauria replies calmly. “The light does not abide the dark. There is something more you must understand, Mary. Since his oath will keep him alive as long as a McThomas of Samuel’s direct line still lives, and you will live as long as he does, you are, technically speaking, both immortal.”
“As long as you don’t stab him in the liver again,” Silvermoon adds, earning him a thin look from his queen.
“Correct,” she says. “That is why he was desperate to find you. If he could keep you prisoner, safely locked in his castle, death would never claim him.”
“Th
is is madness,” Drake mutters.
“No, lad.” The queen is gentle in her reproach. “It’s magic.”
I fall back against my pillow, light headed and overwhelmed. It’s all too much. Oaths and opposites and immortality. I groan and squeeze my eyes shut, pressing my fingers to my throbbing temples.
“I know it is a heavy burden to place on you, Mary,” Queen Nauria says kindly.
“We do not have to think on all of it now,” Ilyana says.
I don’t mean to. Not when I still haven’t accomplished what I set out to do. I force my eyes open again and prop myself up on my elbows.
“I don’t care about Meverick, not right now,” I tell them. “I just need to know...will you help our father, Ilyana?”
She and the queen trade a short look and then she bows her head.
“Aye, Mary, but it will not be easy.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“To save your father from the nightmare sleep, you must enter into the dreamworld after him.”
Ilyana’s announcement, spoken with such quiet intensity, hangs in the air. I don’t realize I’m twisting my braid in nervous anticipation until Torren pulls at my sleeve to stop me.
“I thought it was a poison.” Joseph breaks the silence that has built around us. “Something you could cure.”
“To cure his body, you must first free his mind. While he is still trapped inside the nightmare, I cannot restore him,” Ilyana says.
“What does that mean, exactly?” I ask.
Ilyana folds her fingers together and rests her chin atop them. “I must send you into his nightmare. It is a dangerous spell, one that could put both of you at risk. Should you fail, you will both be trapped.”
“Then you will send me,” Drake stands, pointing to himself.
“No,” Ilyana says. “It must be Mary.”
“You’ve already risked her life enough,” my brother retorts, and Ilyana flinches and turns her gaze to the floor in shame. “I won’t allow you to do it again.”