Breaking Normal (Dream Weaver #3)

by Su Williams

  Nick crouched, cradling his wounded hand with the other and staring at the ground. Slowly, he rose to his feet, still favoring the hand. His eyes traversed the ground between us until they found mine. I prepared to phase with Eddy anywhere away from him. I had nothing to defend myself. No sai or katana, no taser or pistol. Nothing. And didn’t think I could raise one against him if I did.

  “Nick?” I squeaked. Please be in there. Please be okay.

  He staggered a step forward like a creature from The Walking Dead. Then, with the dry dusty voice of a zom, he spoke one word.

  “Emi…” His body toppled forward and crashed with a sickening thud to the ground.

  I scrambled to his side and delved into his mind, but all I found was Nick. No Wraith. Just Nick. His mind, his memories, jumbled and mutinous.

  “Nick?” I whispered as I pulled him into my lap. I rocked him in my arms and stroked his hair from his face. After several moments, Eddyson nudged under my arm and rested his chin on Nick’s chest, golden eyes wide, brows arching and questioning. I had to do something. I had to get him home. But if I phased with Nick, I’d leave Eddy out here alone and vulnerable. And I didn’t think I had the power to take them both. Pressing my lips to Eddy’s soft head, I whispered to his mind. Go home, Eddy. Follow the path and meet me at home. The pup’s ears cocked like hearing a strange sound, but he rose beside me and turned toward home. I’ll see you there in a minute, boy. Now go! The pup lit out through the quarry, across Yale Road and down the path through my wooded acreage. Tiny dust tornadoes erupted with each paw step.

  I clutched Nick against me and willed his body to phase with mine. “Come on. Come on!” I raged at myself. Like sands trickling through an hour glass, our bodies evanesced and drifted toward home. Sabre! My house! Now! Nick’s hurt. Thomas…just come!

  Sabre phased into the house the same instant I drifted onto my bed with Nick. I laid him gently against the pillows, launched myself off the bed and scrambled to the back door. I swung the door open, expecting to have to call for the pup, wandering distracted by his nose. But Eddy sat wagging his tail and blinking happy, satisfied eyes at me. I scooped him into my arms and kissed his dusty head.

  “Good boy, Eddy.” I stroked his ears and gave him a treat, before setting him on the couch and returning to Nick’s side.

  “What happened? His head’s too screwed up for me to get a read. And any memoryprints have been scoured off somehow—like last winter, when Thomas attacked you.”

  “Shit!” I clawed through my hair, tugging on handfuls of spikes as though it would wrench everything, all of this chaos, into place. But I didn’t need everything fixed. Just Nick.

  Nick’s fingers unfurled like blossoming flowers in a time lapse movie. Underneath his eyelids, his eyes reeled at some unseen drama that played for his eyes only. Sabre sat by his side, but I couldn’t bear to be too close, for fear he’d awaken in the same mind as at the quarry.

  “Kiss him,” Sabre commanded after many silent and stifling moments.

  “What? No. I can’t.” What was Sabre thinking? That this was Sleeping Beauty? It didn’t seem like his kind of bedtime story and doubted he’d ever read it. I broadcast the images of Nick’s attack to Sabre.

  “Emari…”

  “I can’t, Sabre! I can’t bear to see that rage on his face, again.” I paced the room while my fingers paced over Ari, resting cool against my skin.

  Sabre stood and sauntered over to me. His hand pressed mine over Ari’s cool body. “She knows. Only the reality of your touch, your voice, will drive the pollution from his mind.” Since when did Sabre acknowledge that Ari was distinctly feminine? “And you know it too.”

  “Sabre. I can’t. I’m too afraid.”

  “So, what’s new?” he chided.

  It was true. The new norm seemed to be riddled constantly with fear. But the source of the terror shouldn’t come from our own side. “Why me? Why can’t you do it?”

  “I’ve tried!” he growled. “The memories that tore him up were of you. Perhaps his mind needs a reminder of who you are to him.”

  I barked a laugh. “Ha! I don’t even know who I am to him.”

  Sabre gently squeezed my arms, his mouth open to words that refused to come out. Finally, he smiled, a wry sort of grin. “Besides, my kiss would only drive him deeper.” I rolled my eyes but couldn’t resist a small giggle. “I’ll leave you to it, then.”

  “What?” I clasped his wrists as his body began to fizzle from the room. “No! You can’t leave.” And apparently, he couldn’t. “Please Sabre. I need you here—just in case. I don’t want to have to hurt him if he attacks me again.”

  Sabre glared at my hands on him, but I refused to release him until he swore he wouldn’t leave. Could I really trust any of Sabre James’ promises? “As you wish,” he grunted. “Now. Release me.” Barely bridled fury flared through his nostrils. My hands dropped away from him. “How the hell do you do that anyway?”

  I returned one of his cavalier shrugs, then searched his dark chocolate eyes. With still-raging trepidation, I crossed the room and sat at Nick’s side. My fingers shied away from contact with his skin. He laid so still, though violence broiled within him.

  “Why did you use French—when you asked me not to tell him about the—the vision I had?”

  Sabre snarled. “Hasn’t anyone told you that the ears don’t stop hearing despite the mind’s conscious state?”

  I quirked a smile at him, but didn’t turn to face him. My eyes were glued to Nick’s dark, bruised eyes and thick fluttering lashes. “Yeah. I’ve heard that a time or two,” I said wistfully. We were both silent for several long moments, ruminating on our own separate thoughts.

  A bustling French street market unfolds in my mind. A refuge to secret away a private conversation. Sabre sits at a quaint little café, sipping a coffee and gazing into the crystal blue eyes of a beautiful buxom blonde. He mind-jacks the language from her pretty little head while she flirts with him.

  “Nick was not with me when I journeyed to France. It was well before his time with me. There are things—many things he does not know of my life before he entered it. And I have danced on the edge of darkness all my life.” Carriages rumble past, the clip-clop of horse’s hooves bounce from the street to the shop walls and ricochet away. “Nick doesn’t know the French language,” he says, returning to a less-formal speech—as informal as Sabre gets. “I hoped the words would bring you some comfort. It can be such a melodic language, don’t you think?” Whimsy colors his voice but reality returns and shadows his features. “Emari Jewel,” his voice is hypnotic. “Your mother aptly named you. Even before you became Caphar, I could see glimpses of the treasure in you. If…when my time comes, I will be free to leave him in your good graces.”

  Turning from Sabre’s gloomy face, I grazed my fingers across Nick’s brow. They only trembled a little. A kiss for Prince Charming. But I couldn’t bring myself to lean forward into his face and press my lips to his. The images of his wrath were still too fresh. I stretched myself out beside him, and felt Sabre’s eyes still on me. I drew a bracing breath. “You can go now,” I told him, and before the ‘now’ was out of my mouth, he was gone.

  I trailed still-jittering fingertips down Nick’s cheek, and thumbed the dark circles under his eyes that seemed to be growing darker with each passing day. Many shadows, many worries plagued this beautiful man that lay by my side. So many times he’d sheltered me from the storms, mended my sails and set me adrift once again. I stroked his face and gifted what little peace I’d attained into his brain. The violent virus implanted in his memories converged and attacked my offering. Their darkness all but overwhelmed my precarious calm, but I rallied my courage and pushed back. Minutes or hours passed as I warred with the chimera in his mind.

  Are you a man? Or a mouse? Timothy Q. Mouse from the Disney movie, Dumbo spoke into my thoughts, and I knew I was growing giddy and fatigued. Yet, I pressed on. Bit by grudging bit, the dark damaged places in Nick�
��s mind sparked back to life. By the time Nick’s eyes rested peacefully under his lids, I was spent.

  Eddy hopped on the bed and burrowed a nest between our bodies and laid down. I smiled and tugged his velveteen ears, closed my eyes and fell into an exhausted sleep.

  *

  “Emi?” Nick’s voice was soft and desperate. I nuzzled against his chest, until the visions of the night before assailed me again. I scrabbled to the foot of the bed and hugged my knees to my chest. Nick’s hands raised, placating me. “It’s okay, Sweets. I won’t hurt you.” He scanned my face. “Emi…I’m so…”

  “Stop! Don’t you dare apologize for that,” I barked. But grief still twisted his brow, and desperation pinched the corners of his eyes. “I’m done,” I said with a note of finality. Panic convulsed in his breast. “I want Thomas gone. Dead. If that’s the only way to get some peace around here. I don’t care what it takes. I just want him gone.”

  “That’s what we’ve been trying to do for ages, Em. He’s just grown so powerful, with all the gifts he’s stolen, that we can’t really get a handle on him. We can damage him. We just haven’t been able to end him for good.”

  I rose from the bed and walked toward the door. With my hand on the door knob, I said, “Well, this time, he’s going down. For good.” I thought I caught a proud smile on his lips as I marched from the room.

  Chapter 29 Dirty Work

  With hardened determination, I put myself through my paces every day for hours on end, between testing sessions on my computer for graduation. When I wasn’t beating the hell out of the heavy bag, I was honing the Caphar abilities that filtered to the surface one by one. None of us really understood why I, in particular, had more than a single gift, like most Caphar. But I wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth if it meant I could rid the world of a plague like Thomas.

  “Why does he hit and run like that?” I asked between punches.

  Sabre ignored the question like he was too involved in his project, or too exasperated with my incessant questions to answer, but Nick responded. “We don’t really understand why he does what he does. It doesn’t really matter though. He always comes back, healed and whole. Ready to tear us up again.”

  “Each time he comes back, does he have some new trick to use on you?” I asked.

  “It seems so.”

  “Then he’s out conquering other Caphar to usurp their powers, so he can come back and use them on you.” Usurp. Isn’t that an SAT vocab word? Nick shrugged and I bristled. How could they have such an apathetic attitude about all of this? “Well, like I said, I’m done. This ends now. I will not be made to live in fear the rest of this damned eternal life.” My phone rang in my pocket. I stuffed my bloodied, tape-wrapped hand in and retrieved my phone. It was Molly. Blood smeared across the gorilla glass as I thumbed the answer button.

  “Hey! Guess what! We got the dog back. The perp was exactly how you described him.”

  “That’s great! Was he okay? The guy didn’t hurt him any, did he?”

  “No. Hadn’t fed him anything for three days, but he’s no worse for wear. Anyway, I was wondering…well, the Chief was wondering…we have a case we’re having some difficulty with. Could you come into town and meet with him? See if you can pick up anything off the evidence?”

  I chuckled. “So, the boss man actually believes?”

  “He’s still skeptical. But finding the dog went a long way to getting him to believe. Can you come?”

  “Well—I suppose,” I teased, like it was some big hardship for me.

  “You’re awesome, Emari.”

  “Not as awesome as Ivy,” I taunted.

  The cop giggled—a momentary slip out of cop mode. “I’ll be by to get you in an hour.”

  “Works for me.” I was still grinning when I hung up and stuffed the phone back in my hip pocket.

  “Are you out of your freaking mind?!” raged Sabre.

  “Again, says the man straddling the darkness.”

  “Listen, little girl!” he fumed and shook a threatening finger in my face. “First, you savaged Nick’s mind. Then, you’re contemplating the nightmares you can induce. And now, you’re revealing our kind to humans. I think you’re nearly as crazy as me.”

  Nick cringed, but didn’t intercede. Maybe he and I were thinking the same thing: that Sabre James had already stepped over the line.

  “I’m going to go get shower and feed the little man. Molly will be at the cottage to get me in an hour. I’ll be back later to work out some more,” I said as I toweled the sweat from my face. Before either of them could argue, I faded from the shop.

  *

  The Spokane Police Chief sat by my side. A suspect sat across the grey metal table in a stark interrogation room with a one-way mirror. Stern and fierce, Chief Houser put the screws to the guy, who visibly trembled in his seat. The suspect wore a ratty T-shirt and holey jeans, his hair in a spikey mess, but not sexy messy.

  I pushed my chair away from the table and stood. “Perhaps, Chief, when you’re done playing games with me you can let me know.” I strode to the door.

  “Miss Sweet. Wait. I apologize. I just had to know for sure. Officer,” he said to the ‘suspect’, “thank you for your time. You’re dismissed.”

  With that, the undercover cop rose, gave the Chief a curt nod and left the room.

  “Are you quite done fucking with me now?” I growled.

  “You have to understand how this would look to my superiors, using a psychic. I had to know beyond a shadow of doubt that you can do what you claim.”

  My eyes narrowed at him. “Fine. I can understand that. Now, do you actually have a suspect you want me to read? Or was this all just another test and you just wasted my f-freaking time?” I’d had enough of final exams for graduation to last a lifetime.

  “Yes, ma’am, we do have a suspect that we’d like you to sit in on the interrogation.”

  ‘Ma’am?’ I’m not old enough to be a ma’am. My mother was a ma’am. “Fine.” I was growing to resent this man by the minute.

  Houser tugged his suit jacket straight and adjusted his tie. “Okay. So this guy doesn’t have a single tell. Not a blink, or twitch. No picking at his nails. Nothing. We were hoping you could read him better.”

  My brow knit. “You keep saying ‘we’. How many people have you told about me? It was one of my stipulations: no one else knows.” Hey! Another SAT vocabulary word. I smirked at myself in the mirrored glass.

  “Only Officer Elliot, myself and the Commissioner. I’ve tried to honor your request, Miss Sweet.” I realized I hadn’t offered him use of my first name. That wasn’t an offer I extended to hostiles.

  I nodded and Houser waved in the officer who stood outside the door. He lead a man, who looked less like a criminal than their sham suspect, into the room. Man, I had a lot to learn about not judging people by their outsides. The man flopped down in the chair opposite me, slouched and spread his knees wide. He lifted his chin and puckered his lips at me. I fought to keep any response from my face—and to keep from diving over the table and showing him just how well-trained I’d become.

  Chief Houser began his questioning, and he was right. This guy didn’t have a single tell when he was lying or nervous. But I didn’t need a twitch or blink to alert me of deception. The Chief grew more and more angry at the smug suspect seated across from us, so I weaved some tranquility into his thoughts and nudged him to take a different tack and ask different questions. I was sure manipulating him wasn’t what he’d signed on for, but his hostility was only agitating the perp.

  “We’ve got the murder weapon, Mr. Standish. It’s only a matter of time until we link it to you,” Houser said as he slammed his palm down on the table.

  Standish smirked. “If you had anything, I’d be under arrest.” He looked at his watch. “And I’d say you’ve only got four more hours before you have to release me.”

  The glint of light off the watch crystal flared with hazy, bloody images. I pressed the thought
into the Houser’s mind to take the watch before he dismissed the suspect from the room. Standish snorted as he clunked it on the table and Houser escorted him out to waiting officers. I scooped up the time piece and pressed it between my palms. Minuscule traces of blood ringed the face and flashes of violence and brutality accosted me.

  “Miss Sweet? Are you all right?”

  I seemed to be hearing that a lot lately. I wrenched my mind from the savage images and focused on Chief Houser.

  “Uh, yeah.” But I wasn’t quite back to the present. “What did you need from me?”

  “Something to tie that asshole to this murder weapon,” he said as he thunked a butterfly knife in a plastic evidence bag down on the table. Blood stained the knife blade and smeared the insides of the bag. “Please tell me you don’t need to physically touch the evidence to do your thing.”

  I scowled at him. “‘My thing?’ Seriously?”

  Houser backpedaled. “I didn’t mean anything by it. I just…I’m not sure what to call it.”

  “It’s a gift, Chief. And yes, I can read the knife without opening the evidence bag.” I dragged the knife over the table top, closer so I could render the memories imprinted in blood. And I didn’t have to wait long for images to accost me, like the blood of the victim screaming for vengeance. “Try Diamond Pawn out in the Valley. They should have records of who they sold this to.” A strangled death-moan seeped under my skin. “And have your lab guys test for two types of blood. There’s a piece of Standish on this thing, not just the victim. It’s co-mingled, but I think there’s enough that they can separate his DNA from hers. And have them swab the watch too. Around the crystal.”

  Chief Houser nodded and scooped up the evidence bag. “Thank you, Miss Sweet. We’ll check into all of that.”

  “You’re welcome. Can I go home now?”

  “Absolutely.” He waved Molly in from the hall. “Officer Elliot will take you home.”

  “Great. Thanks.”

  “Thank you for all your help, Miss Sweet. But next time—stay the hell out of my head.”