that is
A Short Tale of Nausea, a Not-Quite Sinister Deal, Darkly Dreaming, the Child, the Lady of the Glen, and Wounds to the Heart
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She came awake with an anguished scream and a lunge to try and escape the grasping hands that had tried to pin her down in drug-induced dreams. When she realized that leather straps held her tight to the narrow hospital bed, she screamed again. "John! John, help me! John!"
And miraculously, he was suddenly there, cradling her face and murmuring, "It's okay, it's okay. I'm here, it's okay. Just breathe, D. Breathe. It's okay." Over his shoulder, John called, "Hollis, can we get her out of all this?"
"Let me out," she pleaded, sobbed. The leather straps cut into her wrists. The entire bed rattled when she jerked at the restraints. "Let me out, let me out, let me out, please, please! Don't put me in the dark, please-"
"D, calm down," John said earnestly, stroking her cheeks. She was so cold. Her eyes were wide in terror, the pupils dilated impossibly wide until the yawning black almost swallowed up the moonlit blue. Her stupid job wasn't worth this. "It's okay. Hang on, we're gonna get you out of here. Hang on. It's okay." She'd fought against the restraints even while unconscious, he thought, studying the vicious, raw-looking bruises on her fragile wrists. There would be more across her chest and her knees, at her ankles despite the socks and tennis shoes she'd worn. The twenty-one-year-old swore silently. Hospital procedure, my ass, he thought, but didn't say. Only kept murmuring soothingly to his frantic twin.
Hollis undid the straps across her forehead, chest and knees first. Ankles next. Wrists last. Dylan threw herself into John's arms and sobbed into his shirt. "Don't let them put me in the dark, John, please, please, don't let them, don't let them, John! Don't let them, the dark, not the dark, no please not the dark please please!"
"Shhh," John whispered, stroking her hair. "Shhh, it's okay. I won't let them hurt you again. It's okay."
"Don't let them, please don't let them, no, no, pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease..."
It took him nearly two hours to calm her down. He had to explain why they'd restrained her (violent panic attacks and convulsions were a known side-effect of pentothal and diazepam), and why he hadn't stopped them. Even Doctor Hollis, a dark-haired and ridiculously handsome man with piercing blue eyes, reminded Dylan that hospital procedure dictated that if a patient had to be sedated due to violent tendencies (whether naturally-occurring or drug-induced), they had to be restrained.
Dylan trusted Doctor Julian Hollis. Even liked him. But just then, she almost hated him for the clinically detached way he explained why she'd been forced to relive one of her worst nightmares.
"He drugged me," Dylan mumbled once she'd grown somewhat calmer. Her words slurred together. Now that the adrenaline and terror weren't pumping through her so hard, she was starting to feel drowsy again. And nauseous. "Too much diazepam. Tried to make me... panic...."
"We're looking into that," Hollis said non-commitally.
Dylan dropped her head against John's chest and sighed. "He rigged it. Didn't ask the... right questions. He... not fair." Her stomach churned. "Am I still... suspended?"
"You'll probably have to be reevaluated," Hollis replied. John stiffened. Dylan whimpered. "But, this time, I don't care what buttons he pushes or strings he pulls, I'll be the one doing the Eval. Okay?"
For a long, tense moment, she was tempted to say no. Tempted, actually, to yell "screw you and the horse you rode in on." Tempted to just give up and quit. The NYPD could take a flying leap off a cliff. But then she thought of Lisa. Tomorrow was Rafael's funeral. Could they even make it?
"Sure," she muttered. "Whatever. Don't care right now." A sudden surge of greasy nausea hit her hard in the stomach. "I'm gonna be sick," she managed to gasp out.
John plunked the small trash can between her knees in time for her to throw up.
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"I wanna die," Dylan groaned as she fell onto her bed an hour later and covered her eyes with one arm. Fragments of her skull were sloshing around in the gelatinous mass that had been her brain before the onset of a migraine-sized headache. "Jeez."
"You need to eat something," John said, sinking down onto the edge of the bed beside his sister. Technically since the people in Psychiatrics had had to sedate her, Dylan had had to actually be discharged from the hospital, but Doctor Hollis had made sure it went smoothly. The trip home had been a bit less smooth. They'd had to stop every ten or so minutes for Dylan to throw up on the side of the road. Even after her stomach was empty, the dry heaves hadn't quit. "And rehydrate yourself. I know you don't feel like it, but you need to."
"Ugh," she mumbled, and pulled the pillow over her face. Inhaled the lingering scent of forests. Felt a bit better - and in all the ways that counted, a lot worse. "No food. Please. I just want to..."
She'd been about to say, "Sleep." Changed her mind. Another side effect of sodium pentothal was very intense nightmares. Funnily enough, Dylan thought without any humor, that's one of the long-term side effects of thorazine. Thorazine, the poison they'd shot into her veins for years when she was a kid trapped in the institution. Prolonged usage - like, say, eleven years - often meant the side-effects would never stop. Sleeping was not on her list tonight. At least, not until the other two drugs wore off completely.
Struggling to her feet, Dylan began to pace. She tripped every few steps. Her feet felt half-numb. Diazepam, she thought bitterly. Stupid half-life. Stupid sedatives. She raked shaking hands through her tangled hair. Kept pacing. There was no way she could sleep tonight. Probably couldn't sleep the next night, either. All three of the drugs swimming in her system - the faint, never-gone traces of thorazine; the nauseating sodium pentothal; and the dangerously soft, sleepy diazepam - would ensure the worst nightmares she'd ever had in her life. Considering how bad her nightmares had always been, she wasn't sure she could take that. Was actually fairly certain she couldn't.
"You need to eat," John repeated. "Drink some water."
"No," she said, shaking her head frantically. "Mmm-mmm. Can't eat or drink." She'd just throw it back up, anyway. Instead she kept pacing. One foot in front of the other. Tiredness pulled at her, wrenched at her. She ignored it. Her hands, clamped tightly around her upper arms, ached from the pressure of her own grip. She knew she'd have bruises later. "Can't sleep, either," Dylan added. "Won't."
"You have to sleep," he reminded her gently. Watched her with worried eyes as she hunched her shoulders and shook her head savagely. "D, the funeral's tomorrow."
"Can't go," Dylan replied. Her tongue was thick in her mouth. Her eyes burned with tiredness. Sleep sounded like heaven. Sleep sounded like hell. "Still on suspension, remember? Can't get Lisa. Can't go." Which meant probably no one was going, darn it. She would've cursed Westenra, but profanity was against her religion. And she couldn't seem to remember any relevant cusswords at the moment, either. She could barely walk straight. It wasn't fair. Rafael deserved someone to be at his funeral.
"D, would you just sit down for a minute?"
"No!" A wealth of hot fury and ice-cold fear in that one word. "No. Won't sit down. No. Can't. Won't." She could feel the drugs skittering like roaches through her bloodstream. Shuddered. She hated the drug-induced nervous tension that sizzled beneath her skin and buzzed inside her skull. Couldn't rest, not even for a second. She was so tired. So very tired. But if she sat down, if she laid down... if she even stopped moving for more than thirty seconds she would fall asleep.
"I'm sorry I wasn't there," John mumbled, running a hand through his hair. "I'm sorry-"
"Shut up," his twin snapped, then came to an abrupt halt in front of him. "Don't make me punch you. I'll crack my knuckles and you'll feel obligated to say 'ow' even though you're not the one who's damaged." Suddenly she reached out and poked him in the chest. "I love you, jerkface. Don't sweat it."
Quick as a flash, John reached out and tugged her ponytail. "Love you, too. You sure?"
"Seriously, don't sweat it. You have the most rancid sweat of any guy I've ever met. Seriously. When you go to the gym, you come out as a walking bio-hazard." She was starting to sway on her feet. Her skull was pounding. With a grumbling sigh, the pacing began again. "I remember having to do your laundry when you were in high school. Memories of your gym socks still give me nightmares."
"Hey, I had to wash your bra that one time at the Auto-Mat."
"And now you're scarred for life, I know. Don't worry. I'll pay for your therapy."
"Okay, look," her twin mumbled, blushing hotly. "There are certain things brothers know about their sisters just as a matter of course." At Dylan's raised eyebrow, he flapped a hand. "Reproductive stuff and... and lipstick and thongs and all that stuff. I understand that. But I really, really did not need to know that my sister owned a hot pink, lace bra! Okay?" As embarrassed as the memory still made him, he was glad when Dylan laughed.
"Consider it payback for that time I walked in on you and Bethany Fisher making out on the sofa. You know, the sofa where I slept."
"She was wearing her bra," he muttered testily.
"Yes, but I seem to recall finding a lime green silk tho-"
"Okay, okay. Fine. Payback." John held up his hands in surrender. His twin laughed again, and he cracked a smile. It hurt because of the black lump on his jaw, but he didn't care. If Dylan could laugh after what had happened, she was okay. Shaken, but okay.
Dylan stumbled suddenly and fell against the side of the bed. "Crud. Ow, my head hurts." Strength suddenly gone, she slumped onto the bed again. Crawled back to where John sat and dropped to the exquisitely soft blankets. The softness called to her. Encouraged her to close her eyes. Just sleep. She pressed the heels of her palms against her temples and groaned, "I hate this. And my head is killing me."
"You're seriously dehydrated. Drink this." John helped her to half-sit up so he could press a bottle of water to her dry lips. She sipped it gingerly. Made a face. "Drink it, Dylan. Or I'll pour it down your throat."
"Tastes like garlic and rancid onions."
"That's the pentothal," her twin replied, and held the bottle to her lips again. Glaring at him half-heartedly, she took the bottle and drank.
After a few minutes she said, "You never told me where you got that goose-egg."
John instinctively touched the black lump at his jaw. Winced when it twinged at him. Thought about how happy his sister would be (or unhappy, rather) if he told her that he'd gone wandering in the abandoned subway tunnels that she'd always told him to stay away from. Gone wandering, just so he could rage against that pompous little Elf prince she liked so much. She'd probably try to bite him. But he said, "I'll tell you if you eat and drink another bottle of water."
Dylan shook her head. Winced when her skull informed her in no uncertain terms that head-shaking was bad juju. "Ow. No dice. Don't wanna know that bad." She thought for a moment and then grinned wickedly. "Now, if you agreed to, say... letting me give you a full-blown mani and pedi, then maybe I'd agree to eat."
"A full-blown manicure and pedicure?" He stared at his twin in abject horror. "I love you. I love you more than life. You're the other half of my soul and I adore you to distraction, D. You're my favorite sister in the world. But there is no way in Hades that I'm gonna-"
"Yes there is. With sparkly nail polish, too. Royal blue sparkly nail polish."
"No! Heck no. No way."
"Oh. Gee. I guess I'm gonna starve then."
"Why?" He moaned, every inch the disgruntled brother. "Why do you want to do this to me?"
"I need practice. You know I suck at painting my own nails. And the New Year's Eve charity dinner is less than two months away." She yawned, then slapped her cheeks lightly to keep herself conscious. "So I would like some practice with the nail polish because I don't want to go to the salon to get my nails done." In fact, she never, ever wanted to go to a salon ever again. She'd been coming home from the salon that cold, December night when... when the wolves...
When I met Nuada, Dylan thought firmly. The night I met Nuada. Which made her feel better, and worse. Ugh, she growled at herself. Stop acting like a lovesick little girl. Yeah, he's your first real crush but so what? Grow up. He's a guy. An amazing, extraordinary, wonderful guy, but still - he's just a guy. There are other guys in the world. He didn't even like me that much.
Oblivious to her thoughts, John sighed. "Eat three packages of crackers and drink two more bottles of water and... I'll let you do the nail polish thing."
That distracted her. Oh, crackers. Keebler club cracker and cheddar sandwiches. Her favorite crackers. And the club crackers would be good for suppressing the hideous urge to toss her cookies all over her nice, comfy bed. She gave her twin a disparaging look.
"You're evil. If the crackers make me nauseous, I'm throwing up on you."
"That's my girl."
He laughed when she grinned, grabbed his hand, and hugged it to her scarred cheek. When all was said and done, it could've been worse. She could've wanted to try out eyeliner and lipstick on him like she had in college. He could handle some sparkly nail polish. He just... needed to make sure there was acetone around when all this went down. That's all.
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John stayed because he knew that night would be bad. Exhausted as Dylan was from lack of real untroubled sleep and the drowsiness-inducing drugs Westenra had pumped into her system, there was no way she could stay awake until the effects wore off. Luckily he'd managed to get the day off. He didn't have to be at work until eight Thursday morning. He could stay with his emotionally fragile twin for a couple days, at least.
He'd gotten a call from Doctor Hollis earlier. Dylan needed to come in for another psych-eval sometime in the next week. Hollis would make sure he was the one to conduct it. Westenra wasn't in trouble for "over-medicating" a patient because, apparently, his professional medical opinion was that a woman of standard weight and height needed four-hundred-fifty milligrams of a sedative that was normally taken in no more than fifty-milligram doses. Five-hundred milligrams of diazepam could induce coma. But somehow, Westenra wasn't in trouble for that. Or for combining the sedative with more than a double-dosage of truth drug. Nor could they prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the psychotic doctor had deliberately goaded Dylan into a panic attack.
Well, wait till Lt. Charlotte Peabody found out about that. She'd throw ten kinds of fits - and probably some furniture. Maybe even Westenra's severed head.
I hate that guy, John grumbled, stroking the hair back from his sister's far-too-pale face. Dylan slept, her entire body curled around one of her pillows. Her face was buried in its softness. Even as he watched, she made a soft sound of distress and clutched the pillow tighter. Mumbled, "Nuada... please... please, don't...."
The twenty-one-year-old government agent bit back a curse. She was dreaming of him. The pointy-eared jerk who'd ditched her just when she needed him. Why? Why did she call out for him in her sleep? Why did she dream about this guy? He was clearly a waste of her time. Most of the Fair Folk were, actually. Sure, they enjoyed screwing around with a human every now and then. But after they got tired of their current human toy, the faerie moved on to something newer, more exciting. And the human? They were left broken and desolate by the loss.
"I'm gonna kick that guy's ass if it's the last thing I do," John told his sleeping twin softly. She scrunched in on herself and whimpered. "If he doesn't fix whatever happened between you two, I'm gonna beat him into a grease spot on the floor."
A sudden frisson of fear skittered down his spine and he frowned. Dylan moaned softly in her sleep.
"D?" John touched her shoulder. Yanked his hand back when she jerked and shuddered. Cried out softly. Shoot, nightmare, he thought, and tried in vain to wake her. He called her name. Shook her once, twice. After twenty minutes of hearing her moan and mumble "no, no, stop, please" over and over again while still trapped in sleep, he even slapped her.
His twin didn't wake. Only sank deeper into the dream, and further out of reach.
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The night was too still.
Nuada didn't know why it seemed that way, but it made him uneasy. Even the honking horns and gutteral cursing from the foul clots of night-time traffic did nothing to disrupt the bizarre stillness of the night. The Elf prince frowned and scanned the marred night. Electric lights still polluted the darkness. Humans still infested the concrete jungle of New York City. Tiny white snowflakes blanketed the city. There was nothing to explain his sudden unease.
Perhaps it was that he was going to see her again. He couldn't imagine how the situation might even begin, much less how it would play out. The leash on his temper was frayed already. If it snapped, he might be tempted to say more things that struck at the very heart of the human he meant to visit this night. More things that not only struck, but ripped the heart from her chest.
If she even had a heart.
The cold winter night breathed around him as he traveled from shadow to shadow. Avoiding the humans that shuffled along the city streets was second-nature to the Elf now. That made it possible for Nuada to think about what he meant to do this night while he made his way toward Central Park.
Wink was so certain Dylan hadn't betrayed him. Was so certain that he, Nuada, had been the one to commit the treachery. Which was absolutely ridiculous. And besides, even his most trusted friend and brother-in-arms could be deceived. Had not the mortal woman deceived him, Prince Nuada Silverlance? Not once, not even twice, but many times? A troll warrior could be fooled just as easily as an Elven prince.
Unless he hasn't been fooled, Nuada thought. Unless I was mistaken, and Dylan actually... He felt the faint stirring of hope in his breast. Ruthlessly, the prince quashed that hope. It would serve no purpose but to distract him. The Silver Lance could afford no distractions tonight. Not if he were to discern the truth of the matter.
But hope is a tricky thing. Always has been, whether the one who possesses it is mortal or Elf-kind. No living thing can survive without a small ember of hope smoldering in its breast. The crown prince of Bethmoora was no different. He did not want to have such faith. Faith that was then shattered always led to disappointment. Surely the son of King Balor had felt enough of that in his forty-plus centuries. Surely he deserved some peace.
Yet at the same time, Nuada could not shove that tiny ember away completely. Memories kept it rooted in his heart - memories of gentle touches, deft hands soothing away his pain, an embrace that gave him that long-desired peace, and delighted laughter in the night. Memories of sanctuary and solace. Which was why the pathway through the woods to Dylan's cottage now knew the tread of Elven boots.
Nuada tasted the pain, the fear and the rage on the air even standing several feet away from Dylan's front door. He immediately cast out with his senses. Felt the odd, muffled sensation that meant she was asleep, and dreaming. He rapped hard on the granite door and waited.
Becan opened the door and stared up in surprise at the prince. "Your Highness! I... we..."
"You!" At the furious shout, Nuada's eyes raked from the startled brownie to the enraged - and all-too familiar - human that stood in the entryway to the living room. Dylan's brother was white-lipped with fury. His eyes blazed. "What the hell are you doing here?"
"Master John!" The brownie yelped, horrified. "This is-"
"I know exactly who the douche bag is," John snapped at the brownie. He didn't wrench his eyes away from the icy, bronze gaze of the Elf prince who'd broken his twin sister's heart. Becan cringed when the prince of Bethmoora slowly and deliberately stepped across the cottage threshold and stopped just inside the doorway. John didn't back down. "How dare you come here? Especially now. She doesn't need you here. Get out."
"Where is she?" Nuada demanded, as if the insolent human whelp had not just attempted to eject him. "I would speak with her."
"Well, she's otherwise engaged so get the hell out before I kick you out!"
"Master John," Becan snapped. The brownie's sharp tone arrested both the mortal and the Elf's attention. "Milady's nightmares are bad enough without your shouting adding to them. Perhaps His Highness can help Lady Dylan." To the prince, the wee faerie added, "We can't awaken her, Sire, and these dreams... they are very bad."
"The worst she's ever had," John muttered, raking a hand through his hair. Nuada watched him with deliberately disinterested eyes as the human male slumped against the wall. The fight seemed to suddenly drain out of him. "They're the worst ever and we can't wake her up because of the damned drugs they gave her. She didn't want to sleep," he added softly. A faint stirring of unease and memory shivered through Nuada. I do not wish to sleep. "She was so scared to fall asleep. She knew the dreams would be really bad this time because of the drugs. I can't even reach her through our link. We... we've tried everything."
"Please, Sire," Becan said, gazing up at the Elven warrior. "Can you perhaps reach her? Your mind magic is not as strong as your sister's, but surely you can try to..." The brownie trailed off as the Elf prince strode past him without a word, heading for Dylan's bedroom. John said nothing. Just let him go.
Standing outside Dylan's bedroom door, Nuada hesitated. He could hear the muffled sobs and desperate cries from the other side of the door. Hear that soft, tortured voice crying, "No, no, no." The brownie and the other human were waiting where he'd left them. And she waited just beyond this door. Waited for him to rescue her. But should he? Should he offer succor to one that had betrayed him? Nuada closed his eyes...
And snapped them open the next moment when a bone-chilling scream of pure anguish ripped through the night. Somewhere in that awful, animal sound, the Elf prince recognized what might have been his own name.
The crown prince of Bethmoora made his decision and opened the bedroom door.
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She lay tangled and trapped on the bed. Her head tossed frantically from side to side. Her hair, nearly black in the dimness, spread around her like a tangled halo. Nuada could hear her heart pounding. Her breathing was too rapid and shallow. The desperate sounds that escaped from between her lips sickened him.
"No," Dylan moaned, thrashing. Sobbed. "No, get off. Stop it, stop it, please. No, no. Nuada, please!"
He went utterly still.
"Nuada, please, help me, help me, please, I'm sorry, please!"
Her entire body tensed, straining. Every muscle taut with desperation and fear. He went to her as she cried out again for him. Sank down beside her on the bed. Studied her in the dim light from the half-open door. There were bruises on her death-white face. Raw, black marks like shackles at her wrists. When he shot a quick look at her bare feet, he saw the same dark bruises on her ankles. Shadow fingerprints on her bare arms. A cut on her scarred bottom lip that had reopened and now trickled blood down her chin. A fresh cut over one eye.
Dylan gasped for breath and convulsed. "No! No, not the dark! Please! Don't put me in the dark! Don't leave me in the dark! The monsters will get me! Mommy! Daddy! Please, please, please!"
"Dylan," Nuada said sharply. No pause, no jerk to wakefulness. Not even a flicker. "Dylan! Madoigna, wake up now. Wake up." When he touched her, she screamed and cried, "No, please! Please don't, please stop, please don't, please don't!"
We can't wake her up because of the damned drugs they gave her... She knew the dreams would be really bad this time because of the drugs.
Steeling himself, Nuada grabbed Dylan's hand and laced his fingers with hers. If he could not wake her from reality, he would wake her from inside the dream. He could get his explanation later. She needed him now. He would have to be a monster to leave her in this kind of torment. Betrayer or not, she did not deserve this. So Nuada took a firm grip on that slender, trembling hand and slid swiftly and surely into a mortal mind once again.
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This was more than dark dream. This was memory mixed with nightmare, and because of that, Nuada found himself alone in a long, dimly corridor. The tread of his boots on the cheap tile floor echoed off the walls. Walls once white and pristine, but they were now spattered with blood. The air stank of rust and slaughter. Somewhere far off the Elf prince could hear the muffled sound of weeping.
He didn't have his lance here. Not here, where no battles could be fought fairly. It wasn't the edge of Elven silver that would break this nightmare. It was magic. And only if he could find Dylan before her already-strained sanity fragmented under the onslaught.
Laughter richocheted off the blood-painted walls. Male laughter, low and taunting. Young. Twisted. He heard the words whispered like sweetly-poisoned lies in a twelve-year-old girl's ear. "No one can hear you down here, little girl. Scream all you want because no one can hear you. Do you like this? Admit it, you like it. Little slut likes it. She wants it." Heard the words. Tasted rage on his tongue like hot blood. Kept walking down the endless hallway searching for the source of that weeping. He had to find her.
Hours passed, or so it seemed. Those vicious words, and others, snarled through the darkness. When he heard her agonized screams, he ran toward them. Ran and ran and ran. Never reached those screams before they died away into desperate sobs again.
Finally he reached the end of the corridor. It branched off in two directions. One way turned into stairs leading downward into darkness. The other led to a door lit with a single fluorescent beam above the white-painted door. The door was pristine, though the walls around it were splashed with scarlet. Elven eyes noted the smears of crimson on the top two steps of the staircase. A handprint on the landing near the toe of his boot. Nuada went to the stairs. Vaulted over the bloodstained steps and descended into the nearly choking blackness below.
He almost tripped over her. She was curled up into a tight ball on one of the steps, pressed against the wall, crying softly. The voice was years younger, but the recognition still hit him hard in the belly. Nuada knelt, careful not to touch the weeping girl. "Dylan," he whispered so very gently. It was still so easy to speak gently to her. "Madoigna."
A hitching breath. The sound of shifting and he saw the gleam of her eyes in the dimness. She sniffled. "Nuada?" Disbelief. Hope, but also fear. She was so afraid to hope. "Are you... are you real?" She made a sound then. One he hoped to never hear from her ever again - a sound of bone-deep pain. "You're not real. You're not, you're just a dream. Go away. You're not real. Not real. Go away."
"I am real, Dylan," he said. "I'm here, I'm real."
"No, you can't be, no. You hate me, you can't be here. You said... you said I was... you're not real." Such grief in those words. "I'm dreaming and just when you trick me into thinking you're real you're going to disappear and leave me alone. Please go away."
You couldn't lie to yourself in dreams. Even dreams that weren't your own. What he felt here, now... there was anger. There was that damnable hurt that should not be because she was just a human and he should not have cared so much. But not hatred. Not for her. Impossible as it was, there was no hatred for the human that had pledge him her fealty and broken her word. "I do not hate you."
"Of course not, because you're not really Nuada. I'm dreaming." She drew a ragged breath that shuddered out of her again in a choked sob. "I always dream about you. Always. You come and I think I'm safe and then you leave me and it starts all over again. It won't stop. It never stops. You're never coming back."
"I've come back now," Nuada said firmly. He reached out and gently grasped her wrists. She whimpered. "I am real, madoigna. Feel me. I'm real." He gently but firmly pulled her hands away from her chest and brought them toward him. "I am here now. I'm here. Touch me and see. I am real."
Trembling fingers touched his face. Nuada fought to keep his breathing even. Dylan's fingers were light as snowflakes on his skin as she traced his features in the dark. She didn't even breathe. Her skin was warm against his face, despite the chill of the frigid air conditioner. Nuada could actually feel the butterfly-hammer of her pulse through those delicately seeking fingertips. Her fingers brushed over his forehead, the whorls at his temples, even his eyelids like soft wind. Tickled against where his golden lashes feathered against his cheeks. Then she touched the royal scar carved deep across his face. Trembling fingertips caressed once. Twice.
"Nuada?" Her indrawn breath was almost a sob. "Nuada?"
Then she was in his arms, sobbing, clutching at his shirt and he could feel her pain even though it was only a dream. He smelled the hot iron stench of fresh blood. Her hair was damp and sticky with what he knew to be more blood. He could dimly make out the paleness of her face, and it was smeared in places with a glistening darkness that he knew also to be blood. What had happened here? What memories had played out in this stairwell?
Nuada could not think about that now. Could only think about shattering this dream that held her so tightly, that tormented and terrorized her. But when he pushed at the confines of sleep with his magic and his mind, there was no give. No yielding at all. When he shoved harder, the dream began to slip away from him. Dylan's fragile weight against his chest began to slip away with it. Nuada pulled himself back into the cage of the nightmare and cursed.
"You can't," she mumbled against his chest. Her voice was hoarse and trembling. "The drugs will keep me under for a while. At least a few more hours." She clutched his shirt tighter. Pressed her face harder against the solid wall of his chest. "Are you... are you going to leave me again?" Her shoulders began to shake as her sobs increased. "No, please, please no. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I know you hate me and I betrayed you and I'm sorry and I'll never do it again I swear but please, Nuada, please don't leave me in this place. They'll come back," spoken with a soft horrified certainty that chilled him. "They'll come back and... and they'll... they'll hurt me again. I can't, I can't do it, I can't stay here, please, please Nuada don't leave me!"
"Never," Nuada growled, folding his arms around her. So small. So fragile. She wasn't the woman he knew... yet she was. Younger, but she was still Dylan. Only the confines of the dreamscape made her into this fragile maiden again. He could feel the... the youngness in her mind, the innocence that, as an adult, was tarnished in the depths of her psyche. She was so much more vulnerable here, now. And though he was still furious with her, he could not leave her here. "I would never leave you in a place like this. Come with me, mo bheag amháin, my little one." Carefully - he had no idea how badly she might be hurt - he lifted her into his arms and rose slowly to his feet. Began walking up the stairs again.
The darkness was kind. The harsh fluorescent light was not. When it struck the shivering girl in Nuada's arms, the Elf froze in shock. The scars were gone, but what did it matter? The young, delicate features were battered and bruised almost black in places. Her nose was broken, though it had long ago stopped bleeding. Blood smeared across the corpse-white skin. A necklace of violet smudges told him someone had wrapped their hands around that slender throat and tried to choke her. Probably to silence her screams. Her shirt, a plain black t-shirt, was ripped at the neck. One round shoulder, striped with purple bruises, lay exposed. Dylan tugged at the ripped shirt absently, trying to cover the exposed flesh. The black skirt was heavy and wet. When Nuada glanced down, he saw that it dripped blood onto the white floor. Hot blood was soaking into his sleeve.
He must have made some sound, because Dylan reached up and touched his cheek. "It's okay. It was worse before. When it happened. It's not as bad in the dreams."
Worse? How could this have been worse, short of death? Molten bronze eyes scanned her face, her haunted eyes like moonlight behind the maelstrom. In their depths Nuada glimped fragments of memories - proof that indeed it very well had been worse before. She was only twelve. Twelve years old. Gods, she had only been twelve. She was barely more than a child in this place, in this dream.
He took her to the room behind the pristine white door. When that door swung open, the Elf prince saw it opened to a little room with a twin bed and a desk and chair, a closet full of plain clothes fit for a young girl, and a narrow door that probably led to a bathroom. There were bars on the window. Moonlight filtered through filmy curtains. There was no lamp to give light. Only shadows.
Nuada kicked the white door closed. Set Dylan gently on the bed. Knelt on the floor beside her and took one ice-cold hand in his. "We have much to talk about," the prince said softly. Her hand was so cold. Like ice. He rubbed it between both of his, trying to bring some warmth back to her. The Elven warrior forced his mind to near-numbness. He could not think about what had been done to this battered woman-child in that darkened stairwell. She didn't need his fury or his hatred now. "Some things must be said, on both sides," he added. "But not now." Shading his voice with apology, he said, "We need to see how badly you're hurt, madoigna. It is only a dream, but I can feel your pain. I can help ease it."
Dylan drew a shuddering, sobbing breath, but nodded. He helped her draw off her shirt. Didn't need to remove the breastband that gave her at least a bit of modesty. He could see the damage easily enough. Gentle fingers and sharp Elven eyes found vicious bruises striping her shoulders and back, even the back of her neck. "From the stairs," she whispered. Dark handprints on her arms where someone had grabbed her. Bracelets of painful shadow where someone had pinned her wrists. Scrapes everywhere, and even a ragged, sluggishly bleeding bite on the side of her neck. Magic soothed the dream aches. But Dylan's breath hissed between her clenched teeth when he touched her knee.
"No!" Their eyes met. Her mouth trembled. She shook her head. "It's fine."
"You are bleeding. I can feel your pain."
"I don't care, I can't... it's just a dream, I don't care. Please. I don't care, it doesn't matter." She was shaking again, hugging herself, gulping air. "It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter, it's fine, I'm fine, I don't care, I'm fine, just don't, please it's fine, I'm fine, it's all fine, I-"
"Madoigna," Nuada said. Took her face carefully between his hands and forced her to look at him. There was panic in her eyes, an animal fear that stabbed at him. That terror swirled on the air in the room. Made it thick and choking. "A stór, a thaisce." Tears were swimming in those impossibly blue eyes. Hurt and grief and a silent plea because she still thought he meant to leave her in this brutal place. "A stóirín, ainm ceana," he whispered soothingly. Pet names to calm, to soothe, to ease the fear. It had worked before, that night in Findias. It worked now, smoothing away the panic. It left her vulnerable to him, though, in a way he had never noticed before. Or if he had, never understood before. And he remembered again, when the last four words spilled out like a secret, like the blood on the stairwell, that you could not lie to yourself in dreams, and inhibitions were made flimsy beneath poisonous recklessness. "A ghrá mo chroí."
A ghrá mo chroí. My heart's beloved. You could not lie to yourself in dreams. Could not fight the instincts and the tangle of churning emotions in his belly enough to fight back the words. My heart's beloved. She knew what it meant. He could see that. Could see how she fought to reconcile the words with the fury she sensed in him. Saw the moment she stopped trying and let herself believe in the words, in the gentleness of his hands framing her bruised face. When the tears overflowed, he cradled the back of her head and pressed her to him ever so gently. Let her cry. Whispered, "Forgive me for not coming sooner."
"It's just a dream," she mumbled through her tears. "It's okay, it's just a dream."
No, Nuada thought, throttling back his fury and his lust for vengeance. He refused to let his hand shake when he stroked Dylan's hair. Not to you. It will always be more than a dream to you.
It was a dream, though. Would he remember this moment? Remember finding her broken and bleeding in the darkness just like he had the first night in the subway? Only then it had been blindingly bright and the blood had been so red against the concrete. Not black and glistening in the dark. Would he remember the truth the dreamscape had forced from him? Would she? He doubted it. But it helped her now. That was what mattered.
"I have an idea," Dylan said after the tears finally stopped. "You can't wake me up but... can you take me somewhere else? You walked my dreams before. Can you get us out of here? Take us somewhere from your memories maybe?"
He studied the hopeful girl in front of him. If he took her somewhere else, would the injuries fade? Would the pain saturating the air disappear? Would the sick rage and the horror in his gut, the grief in his chest, ease up a little?
"I will try."
And he closed his eyes. This time, there was a little give, a little yielding of the confines of the dreamworld that had settled around her. It let him have his way because he wasn't attempting to bring the human out of sleep. He only wanted to alter this place of memories and dreams. The feral-eyed Elf prince pushed with his magic. Pushed with his mind. Refused to relinquish his hold on the human consciousness that was Dylan. When he finally opened his eyes, the little room was gone. The night had faded to a lightening dawn. The air didn't reek of slaughter and atrocity. And, most jarring, the mortal in his arms wasn't twelve anymore.
The scars were back, slashing across the pale skin. She had traded bruises and blood for those scars. Instead of ripped, blood-soaked clothes, she wore pajamas. The same black tanktop and shorts from the night he'd suffered the nightmare. No jacket, though the air was warm enough she didn't need one. No bruises marred her fair skin. Just the scars he remembered. And where had he brought her? Where had his heart taken them?
Breezes shivered across lush grass. Rustled the leaves of the trees that ringed this glen. Set the little, pink wildflowers dancing. The little river babbled and chattered gaily as it flowed across glittering stones. Its banks were made of soft, white sand. Dawn had just barely broken. There were still stars in the lightening sky.
"'To see the world in a grain of sand,'" Dylan whispered, slowly sinking to the soft grass. "'And Heaven in a wildflower.'" Her eyes found his. "Thank you, my prince." More than just gratitude in those words.
"We need to discuss some things," Nuada said.
"All right." Only acceptance. Only obedience. The Elf turned away from the human to watch the river. Easier to concentrate that way.
"I understand... why you don't want to go back to Findias," he said softly, watching the early-morning light spread across the glittering water. "But why did you wait so long to tell me such? It would have been better if you'd said as much that first night."
Better, because he would not have walked through her dreams that first night. Would not have accepted the sweet seduction of her arms around him. Demanding nothing. Offering everything. And the sound of her voice singing a lullaby in his ear as she held him to her; the crackling fire and a velvet-shadow lullaby and her fingertips tracing circles over his arms. As if I am falling...
"I had some selfish reasons, but mostly because you were happy," she said softly, shattering his thought. "Because you'd finally smiled - really smiled. You never really smiled before, not the way you did that night on the roof when we watched Hyakki Yakō ride through the East Village. You were happy then. And after. I didn't want to take that from you any sooner than I had to." Now Dylan bowed her head. Gently caressed one of the pink and white wildflowers by her knee. "That was wrong of me, but I didn't mean to deceive you. And I made the promises I made because I meant them. If you'd demanded I go to Findias, I would have gone. I probably would've cried my eyes out like a wimp, but I would've followed you because I will always follow you. You are my prince, Your Highness. And I... I've come to a decision, if it makes any difference."
"What decision?" Had to focus on that. Could not think about the rest of it just yet. Could not think about promises that may or may not have been true, or about loyalty that may or may not have been true, either.
"If you asked it of me... if it's what you want me to do... I'll quit my job and go to Findias with you. I'll stay there if that's what you want me to do. I always keep my promises, Your Highness." Her eyes met his, calm determination clashing with shock. "I swear on the Darkness That Eats All Things, on that living Darkness that lives beneath Faerie, that if you ask me to go to Findias with you to stay, I'll go."
He closed his eyes. Tried to remember how to breathe, but how was he supposed to remember when the words kept replaying in his mind and snatching the breath from him all over again? I swear on the Darkness That Eats All Things... And other words. Other promises, once thought broken, now reaffirmed. I go when you go. You are my prince. Do with me what you will. I love you. In nine simple words she had pledged to him her life and her livelihood. A pledge that could not be broken except through her own death.
And in four more words, just as simple, his anger was eased. Not gone, no, not so easily - but the fraying leash that held his temper in check was mended and the hurt did not sting quite so much. Because you were happy.
Would he remember this? He prayed he would; prayed, which he had not done in thousands of years.
"I do not know if... if I must ask it of you yet. But I will think on what you have said, and the vows you have given," the crown prince of Bethmoora said. If he deviated from the formal words, Nuada was almost certain his voice would shake. Instead he asked, "Is there anything else you would say to me?"
A tear spilled down Dylan's cheek. Sun-kissed diamond dewdrop against the scars. "No."
"You are lying to me."
"No," she said softly. "There's nothing else I want to say. I..." She closed her eyes and looked toward the river. Nuada could see the same struggle in her that he knew well - the seductive freedom of the unreal. The recklessness of dreams. The whip of suppressed pain driving her towards what she didn't want to deal with. "When you left," Dylan said suddenly. Each word was like a shard of glass that cut her and left her bleeding. "Right before you left. You... you said... you said that I was..." She bit her lip and he knew what she was thinking.
"I should not have said that," Nuada replied, but didn't reach out to the human that was only inches away. His fingers itched to brush against that slashing scar like rigid silk. To lightly trace the soft, scarred mouth. He had tried that trick with other women over the last few days. None of them held so still for him. None of them made that strange heat bloom in the pit of his stomach. None had such soft lips or impossibly silver-blue eyes like the moon over Bethmoora. Only her. Was that why he felt such guilt when he thought of them? But he could not touch Dylan. Would not give in, not even to his own weakness.
Her eyes shimmered with sorrow and hurt when she turned back to him. "'Shouldn't have said that.' But did you mean it? Is that really what you think of me? Do you really think what all those p-people at Findias think about how I'm just your stupid mortal t-toy and the only reason you keep me around is because you just want to-"
Now he reached out to her. Could not stop himself. The anger and the hurt in him were cooled a little by the shame of those vicious words. Cooled a little more by the jagged hurt in her own voice. His hand brushed her bare knee, the only touch he would allow himself. She flinched from him, and he tasted regret like ash.
Nuada shifted a little. Closed the scant inches between them. The wind shifted, too. For a moment he caught the tantalizing perfume of honeysuckle and morning glory. "Do you think I meant it?"
"I... I don't know," she whispered, and that hurt. "A few days ago, I would've said, 'No, never.' Disgusting, maybe. But not... not the rest of it."
"Come here," the prince commanded in a soft voice that nevertheless held a steely undercurrent of authority.
It took a long time. He could see the wariness, and the horror of memory, in her eyes. She moved like a thing of the wild - tentative, afraid, cautious. But when Dylan was finally seated on the grass between his legs, so like the way they'd sat that long night in Findias, he slid his arms around her. Freedom in the unreal. The chains of honor and duty. She wouldn't remember this when she woke. She hadn't remembered the other dream, either - not in waking, at least. But he might remember this one, just as he'd remembered the other. And if he actually did remember? Then what?
"You meant it, didn't you?" Dylan whispered, and he closed his eyes. "All of it." Her voice broke.
"No," he murmured in her ear. Felt her draw a shaking breath. "I did not mean it. I will never say such a thing again, madoigna. Never."
They sat that way for a long time, in wounded but healing silence. After a while she leaned her head back against his shoulder and sighed. "It will never be the same, will it? Between the two of us?"
"Not the same, no."
Silence. Then, "Tá brón orm, Nuada." And in English, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
He didn't speak. Could not. The words he needed to say were all crowding into his throat, trying to choke him. He only kept his arms around her slender frame and watched the sunrise with her. After a long while, Dylan added, "It's okay if you never forgive me. It's okay if you hate me. Just... just please don't take yourself away. Not completely. At least let me know you're safe or something. Come see me sometimes. Okay?"
"I... will think about it," the prince murmured. It was not, exactly, an answer. He felt her tense. Knew the instant the tears began falling silently because she also knew it wasn't a real answer. Knew that it really was not a promise of anything and that there was no guarantee he would come back again. But neither the Elf warrior nor the mortal woman said anything else.
As the sun crested the tops of the trees surrounding the glen, Dylan dreamt of falling asleep against Nuada's shoulder... and did.
And he stayed with her, letting her find some small rest at last, until true dawn came. He could feel the sunlight streaming in through the window in Dylan's room even though his mind wandered through her dreamscape. So the Elf laid the mortal woman gently upon the grass. Froze when Dylan whispered sleepily, "I love you, Nuada. I love you."
A ghrá mo chroí. My heart's beloved. You could not lie to yourself in dreams. Not even an Elf prince could do that. Did he want to remember this dream? Did he want to remember promises made by a mortal? Promises that could never be broken except in death. Promises that soothed that knife-stab of hurt and filled him with a guilt that threatened to strangle him. If he actually remembered this shared dream, what would happen to him in the real world? What would happen to them?
He had no answers. Did not know where to begin searching for them. Instead Nuada ghosted his fingertips over the scar on Dylan's cheek. Over her slightly parted, still so soft lips. Wondered if he tasted peace at last, or regret.
Then he pulled himself from Dylan's dream and back to wakefulness.
