That was the scream I’d heard in my dream.
Then she was hurtling to the ground.
I lurched into motion, reacting instinctively. Logic took hold at the same moment I reached the base of the tree again. Just as I suspected, there was no one to help. The screams had cut short. I looked up, confirming that the children were gone now. Faded from sight, just like Astrid had.
My mind burst into a dozen directions, thrumming with confusion. I backed away again, wanting to see the bigger picture, both figuratively and literally. There were so many pieces missing, though. One bothered me more than all the rest.
“Why were you running?” I whispered. I could feel Oliver looking at me, but he didn’t respond—he knew I wasn’t talking to him. I stared at the spot where the younger me had fallen, but in my mind’s eye, I saw the beginning of the memory play out again. The two children, their shrieks piercing the air. They’d climbed the tree as if their lives depended on it. As if something was chasing them. Damon had treated it like a game, of sorts, but I hadn’t been. I knew that much.
“There must be more,” I said out loud. “More memories, I mean. That’s what this is, right? A memory? And if I hid this inside my own head, there are probably others.”
Oliver nodded, a chunk of golden hair falling into his eye. “I think so, too.”
I finally tore myself away from the tree and faced him. My friend was still preoccupied, his brow furrowed. I studied his profile. In spite of everything that happened between us, he had turned around and come back, all because he thought I’d want to know about this place. He was still thinking of me, my needs, even when he was trying to move on.
A lump formed in my throat, and now I thought about how it had been his words, his voice that gave me the strength to beat Belanor. Not Laurie’s, not Collith’s. It was Oliver’s.
I didn’t know how to express any of this to him, or whether I even should. Nothing had changed, not really. He was in here and I was out there. I’d fallen in love with someone else.
“I’m not going back,” I said at last, holding my backpack straps tight again. Oliver looked at me. “I want to keep looking. You don’t have to—”
“We should make camp tonight,” he interjected. Oliver rarely interrupted me, and I was so taken back that I didn’t glare as I should have. “You’re tired, and I have a theory that if you fall asleep here, you’ll slip into REM sleep. If I’m right, you might actually get some decent rest for once in your life. We have a lot of ground to cover, so you’ll need it in the days to come.”
We have a lot of ground to cover, he said. So Oliver was coming with me. I had hoped he would, but I still swallowed a sigh of relief. That was why he’d interrupted; I’d been about to tell him he shouldn’t feel obligated to come, and Oliver had probably found the suggestion so ridiculous he wouldn’t let me finish it.
“When did you come up with this theory?” I asked instead, raising my eyebrows. I swung my backpack to the ground.
Even in the dark, I could see Oliver’s cheeks redden. He shrugged and turned away to do the same with his backpack. “While I was gone, there wasn’t anything to do. I was just walking through wilderness. The mind wanders.”
As I unzipped the bag and pulled out several tent stakes, I glanced around again, daunted at the sheer size of this strange world I’d created. “Tomorrow, do we just… pick a direction and start walking?”
“Maybe we should aim for that mountain pass first,” Oliver said, glancing in that direction. It was out of sight, since we were at the bottom of the hill now, but I could still picture it, too. “I’m curious why your mind would create a separation from the land that’s on the other side of it.”
We refocused on setting up camp. I kept my head down and did everything mechanically, lost in thought. I remembered that view from the top of the hill.
My past could be out there, I thought. Memories, maybe dozens, lay tucked inside those pockets of wilderness and wild things. One of them might be the memory of that night. The night they died. What if these hills and mountains held the secret to what really happened? I’d seen something else in the house, I was sure of it. But the details had always been so hazy. Murky. Like everything had taken place at the bottom of a swamp. This might be a chance to learn more about my parents’ murders. If I could learn who’d taken them from me and Damon, I could make them pay.
My grip tightened on the tent stakes I held, and I peered toward that black mountain pass as if there weren’t miles between us.
I couldn’t wait to get started.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Somewhere between the dreamscape and coming awake, I lost a handful of memories. Which meant that, when I opened my eyes to a strange, darkened bedroom and felt a bare chest against my shoulder, panic screamed through me. I tensed as I prepared to shoot upright.
“It’s just me,” a familiar voice said, his tone low and soothing.
The tightness eased from my body. I remembered now—in the real world, I was at the Seelie Court. I’d fallen asleep in Laurelis Dondarte’s bed. Gil was transitioning to a full vampire in the next room.
Letting out a breath, I rolled over and found my face so close to Laurie’s that I could feel his breath. Somehow, though we’d probably been sleeping for hours, it still smelled fresh and pleasant. Not like toothpaste, but like the forest after an intense rainstorm. How did he always manage to smell so good?
It wasn’t until Laurie gave me a sleepy smile that I realized I’d voiced the question out loud. Strangely, he didn’t answer with one of his clever quips or innuendos. Instead, the faerie searched my expression with an inscrutable one of his own. I’d been about to comment that he hadn’t stuck to his side of the bed, but the words died on my lips.
It was strange, falling asleep in a tent with Oliver and waking up in a bed with Laurie. I couldn’t seem to move away, though. The fire was almost gone, and dying embers cast the faintest glow over the floor, flickering every few seconds. The weak light made it possible to see more details of Laurie’s face.
The last time I’d been able to study him at this proximity, he’d been about to kiss me outside Creiddylad’s tomb. Laurie’s eyes were half-lidded, the irises almost black in the dimness. His eyebrows were dark and straight. Dramatic, just like him. The planes of his cheeks were smooth and pale, but a hint of stubble had appeared along his defined bone structure and strong jawline.
Something about the sight of that stubble affected me. Heat spread through my lower stomach, followed immediately by the flutters of panic. Oh, God, what if Laurie could sense even this small burst of arousal?
“Why did you do it?” he murmured, his voice still thick with drowsiness.
I frowned, silently ordering my heart to slow down. “Do what?”
“Try to destroy yourself with dragonfire.”
As quickly as it had come, the rush of desire retreated. Laurie’s words replaced the feeling with a memory. I saw that flash of scales on Cyrus’s throat and the devastated look on his face as fire hurtled toward me. Shame filled my throat. I lowered my gaze and stared down at our arms. Laurie and I each had one resting on the bed between us, not quite touching.