Nightmares and Daydreams (The Blood Falls Book 4)

Dray paced his office floor. “It has to be Ender.”

“Whoa there cowboy. Slow down.” It was way, way too soon to be jumping to conclusions.

“Cowboy?”

I rolled my eyes and groaned at all my ingrained human sayings. “I’m referring to your desire to go off and make baseless accusations like it’s the wild American West.”

“It’s not baseless.” He came to a stop and glared.

“But it is. All Atsila said is that he thinks there is a traitor. He doesn’t know for sure. Yes, the wolves are acting strange. And yes, we’ve had a lot of strange things going on around us and none of it has been good, but that doesn’t mean the wolves making moves is nefarious.”

“They turned the Heida away. They met alone in the woods. Seems nefarious to me.”

He wasn’t wrong. It didn’t make any sense for the wolves to turn the Heida away. Just as it made no sense at all that the wolves were massing at the Heida border. Everyone—absolutely everyone—left the Heida to their isolationist tendencies. There was nothing in the North that we couldn’t get elsewhere. “You can suspect. You can ask questions. But you cannot accuse someone without proof. It could be totally innocent, and you’ll end up burning an ally.”

Dray glared some more, but I also felt his anger ebb as he calmed down. “I will not jump to conclusions. However I will ask questions. And I expect answers. There has been one wolf in my house and he has said nothing.”

“Two.”

“What?”

Was he really that dense? “You’ve had two wolves in this house. Ender and Ivy.”

He grew very still, then slowly nodded. “You’re right. To assume someone so kind is automatically innocent is a blind spot of mine.”

“I like it when I’m your blind spot.”

“You,” he pulled me into his arms, “are not innocent.”

“I never said I was.”

“You seem upset.” Rain sat with Leena on the couch.

“Of course I’m upset. Aren’t you?” I tried really hard not to acknowledge the concoction of worries that now clogged the back of my mind. If I didn’t acknowledge them I couldn’t be overwhelmed. Right?

“I’m disturbed but not emotional. You’re emotional.” Rain frowned. “Maybe we should postpone for today. Try again tomorrow when you’ve had time to process.”

“Nope. This can’t wait. I need to see my mother and I need answers.” I blurted that out. Probably should have kept that to myself.

Too late now.

Rain traded a look with Leena. “I agree that Marhysa has a lot more information than she’s shared with us, not that it’s her fault, but she reacts strongly to your emotions. I think this will be unproductive.”

“Well luckily you’re not the boss of me.” I sat across from her and closed my eyes. “I’m going whether you come along or not.”

“Fuck,” Leena swore. “Might as well. I’ll be on standby.”

“Thanks Leena.”

Their voices faded into the background as I connected with the Plane. The familiar tracks stretched out ahead of me, but the gray-silver sky was completely gone. The shadow that I used to think of as a black blanket now covered everything. Ahead there was no light at all. Just overwhelming darkness. I turned to the left and right to find echoes of reality spread out as far as I could see in the dim light. Almost everything had shadows covering parts of it. It reminded me of an abandoned town at night.

It changed so much since my first visit. Scary fast.

“Mom?” I reached out with my mind, searching the vastness for the impression of her mind. Whether she was near or far, she almost always came to me these days.

Cold filled me and then flashes of thoughts that weren’t my own. Someone absolutely terrified by what they saw. Someone else dying. Dray holding a sword and facing a monster ten times his size.

Then the images were gone and my mother floated in front of me. “It’s happening,” she thought. “The time is short now. Everything is coming together, and you can see it, can’t you?”

“Yes.”

“An answer came to you today. Go north. To the North.” She moved frantically. Constantly looking over her shoulder.

“Why?”

“That’s where they are. Where they’ve hidden them.”

“The banshees?”

I felt her yes instead of hearing it echo in my mind.

“The rifts?”

She swirled around me and stopped. “Maybe. I don’t know. Just that’s where they’re hiding them.”

“Who is they?”

She ignored me. “Where are your friends? Why are you alone? You shouldn’t be alone. It’s time, you know. Time. For her.”

“To go through?”

Mom startled, her essence lighting up like a lightning bug. “Yes! Yes! You see now. See what must be done.”

“Mom.” I foolishly tried to reach out for her even though there wasn’t actually anything there to touch. “Is…is someone here who shouldn’t be? Someone who has been here a very long time?”

She went stunningly still. Then her voice echoed in my head. “Yes, Rhysa. I did everything I could. I hope it was enough.”

It had been so easy to blame everything on Helena. To see the jealousy of sisters as reason enough to cause so much pain and suffering. But it was so much more than that. A puppet pulling the strings, playing on the weaknesses of ignorant fools. “Do you know where they are? How we can stop them?”

“Don’t waste your time on that. It’s too late. This era is over and all that came with it.”

“They tried to kill me.”

She flew at me so that only particles separated us. “You are Destiny! Without you everything ceases to exist! They failed!”

The air filled with screams, the temperature dropping fast. Rain appeared beside me, grabbing at me in any way she could. “We have to go!”

“I love you, Rhysa. The time has come. There is no turning back from here.” Mom vanished.

The screams grew louder and louder.

A shot of warm, electric energy flooded me as if I stuck my finger in a light socket. Leena. I followed Rain back out, leaving the Plane and returning to my body just as the banshees swooped down on us.