“What the hell was that?” I rasped, searching the sky, straining to hear any sound.
“I don’t know,” Oliver said. There was a storm in his voice and the rigid lines of his body promised violence.
Then the ground started to shake. Alarmed, I raised my gaze at the same instant the entire mountain… shifted, and I realized that what I’d thought was a craggy stone wall was something else entirely. Rocks separated and shifted, moss parting, and then dozens of figures turned around, revealing faces.
They had long hair and thick beards. Their ruddy skin looked uneven, rough, and after an extra beat of staring, I realized that I was seeing the ridges of scales. Every single figure held a javelin.
Giants.
Oliver slowly pulled his gun out and said from the corner of his mouth, “You need to run, Fortuna. I’ll keep our new friends occupied.”
“No fucking way,” I snapped, reaching for my own weapons.
The giants lumbered toward us. They weren’t very fast, apparently, and they still had to cross the river to get to us. “The rules have changed in this place, Fortuna,” Oliver said through his teeth. “If one of those things kills you, you could really die.”
“I’m not letting you fight a bunch of giants alone.” I took the safety off my gun and pointed at the giant closest to where we stood, but I could already tell our bullets would be useless.
Oliver had reached the same conclusion, because he was looking for another way out, a solution to these uneven odds. His attention moved to something over our heads. “I think that’s a cave,” Oliver said, nodding. “You can cover me from there. No, Fortuna, don’t. If you try to stay, I’ll let those things flatten me into a pancake.”
It wasn’t an empty threat. I knew what he was doing—getting me out of harm’s way and trying to disguise it as being helpful—but there was no more time to argue. Shooting him a glare, I relented and whirled to scrabble up the rocky slope, grabbing hold of roots and brambles as leverage. The cave mouth he’d mentioned was higher up than I’d expected.
Behind me, Oliver’s gun went off. He shouted something, the pass all around us swallowing his words.
I reached my temporary shelter without any difficulty. It was deeper than I’d expected, but I didn’t examine it further. Readying my gun again, I hovered near the edge of the rocky doorway and looked wildly for Oliver. The giants seemed to be doing the same thing. Wearing vague expressions of confusion, they communicated to each other in a series of grunts and guttural clicks. None of them noticed me, or cast a single glance toward the cave entrance. Not fast, and not smart, I thought.
Oliver arrived a few minutes later.
He was panting too hard to speak, sweat streaming down his neck. He must’ve led the giants on a merry chase. Relief escaped me in an audible exhale. I retreated into the shadows and took him with me, searching his body for wounds. “Thank God. I was about to—”
A long, hairy arm shot into the cave. Both of us leaped back, slamming into the jagged wall. A jolt of pain went up my spine, and I crumpled, wheezing. In my peripheral vision, I saw Oliver aim his gun again. Sound exploded in my ears, and there were three flares.
The giant yanked his arm back out, growling. The gunshots had probably felt like fire ant bites to him, but he didn’t try to grab us again.
Oliver had put his body in front of mine. His attention was still on the mouth of the cave, but my gaze dropped to the shoulder of his coat. There was a sheen to the material that didn’t belong. I sucked in a breath when I realized I was looking at blood. It had soaked through the green nylon. “You’re hurt.”
Oliver didn’t react. “It’s just a scratch.”
“Can’t you heal yourself?” I asked tightly, even though I knew the answer. Worry ping ponged through my middle, bouncing off sensitive inner walls. Suddenly the pain along my spine was easy to ignore.
Some of the tension had eased from Oliver’s posture. “I’ll work on it while you’re sleeping,” he answered, facing me at last. “Speaking of, we should make camp. I don’t think the giants will bother us while we’re in here, but I doubt they’ve given up. We’ll have to wait them out, unless you want to face whatever might be living down this tunnel.”
“Camp,” I said instantly. “Making camp sounds good.”
There was a ghost of a smile in Oliver’s eyes now. He pulled the backpack off his shoulders—which looked broader than usual, for some reason—and set it in the dirt. The muscles in his legs bunched as he squatted, pulling out a water canister and a bottle of lighter fluid.
“Uh, what do you think you’re doing?” I questioned. Oliver cocked his head, eyebrows raised. I made a shooing motion at him. “You’re injured. Sit your ass down and just concentrate on looking pretty. And not bleeding out, that might be important, too.”
Oliver didn’t try to argue, and he settled on the ground, looping his arm around his knee. Smart man, I thought.
A companionable silence surrounded us. I built a small fire to lend us more light, then turned my attention to the tent. Once that was finished, I went through our bags in search of the space heater, and I discovered packages of food. There was no need to eat in the dreamscape, for either of us, but I started the process of making a meal anyway. There was comfort in the routine, and after the adrenaline of facing those giants, I needed it.
I’d just poured batter onto a mini waffle maker when something moved in the dark.
My body went rigid and I reached for the knife in my boot. I paused halfway down when a familiar scent reached me. A scent I never thought I’d encounter again.
Oliver’s voice, sharp and hushed, faded into the background. I was aware of nothing else except the figure in front of me. The shadows clung to her, trembling at the light of the fire, but she left them behind and stopped beside me.
“Mama?” I whispered, arching my head back to stare at her. I was still sitting on the ground.
She didn’t react. Her gaze remained riveted on the entrance to the cave, her face pale and lined. She held something against her body, a child-sized bundle wrapped in a star-covered blanket. I recognized that, too. It was one of the few things I’d brought with me to the foster home, even though I’d been a bit too old for such things. I still remembered the day it vanished from my bed, probably stolen by one of the other children. I had cried myself to sleep that night, and for two weeks afterward.
We’d found one. By sheer luck—or maybe some kind of guidance from my subconscious—we’d found another memory.
I squeezed Oliver’s arm, trying to get his attention without looking away from my parents. I saw his head turn in my peripheral vision. I couldn’t focus on anything else but the other figure in the tunnel.
“Hi, Daddy,” I whispered.
He didn’t respond or look at me. I knew he couldn’t see me, of course, but I still felt a pang of hurt. There would always be that small part of me, no bigger than a sliver, that would crave Matthew Sworn’s approval.
As they passed, I caught a glimpse of my younger self, and the sight made me blink. It was disconcerting, to say the least, to see my own face as it had been then. Young, unlined, unafraid. The other Fortuna nestled against our mother’s chest, awake and silent. Suddenly I could remember that night, that moment. Mom had been so warm. Despite the fear radiating from her, it hadn’t even occurred to me to worry about where we were going or why. As long as I was with my parents, nothing bad could ever happen.