The Last Dream Keeper

by Amber Benson

  “They had to go, Grammie. They’re not here anymore.”

  Dev realized she was no longer cold, that the chill had left the room along with the two Dream Walkers she couldn’t see. She squeezed Marji tight, proud of her.

  “You did good, sweet pea,” Dev said, stroking Marji’s hair.

  “Thanks, Mama,” her daughter murmured, then quickly squirmed out of her lap. “I’m gonna go make Frosted Flakes.”

  Marji crawled to her feet and slipped on her fuzzy duck head slippers.

  “It’s not so scary,” she added, and bounded for the door, leaving Dev and Melisande alone in the room.

  “Mom . . . ?” Dev asked.

  “I’m okay,” Melisande replied. “It’s fine. I’m just grateful to Eleanora for telling me.”

  Dev pulled at the hem of her robe, trying not to look at her mother as she asked the only question that was on her mind: “Who is he, Mom?”

  Melisande sighed, rubbing at her mouth with her hand. Dev knew what this meant—her mom was trying to decide what information to divulge.

  “He was . . . is . . . someone who was very important to me,” Melisande began. “From before I met your father—and then one day he just disappeared and I never saw him again. That’s it. There’s nothing more to say that isn’t personal between him and me. Stuff that’s not for sharing. Even with one of my favorite daughters.”

  “Ha!” Dev said, and laughed. “We’re all your favorite daughters.”

  Her mother smiled.

  “You know all my tricks, Devandra.”

  Dev wished she could agree with her mom, but, sadly, she understood the opposite only too well: As hard as you tried, you could never really know anyone.

  * * *

  “Hello, Melisande.”

  Thomas was still mostly bound to his chair, but Freddy had taken pity on him and freed one of his hands. Now he was holding an aluminum can of Pabst Blue Ribbon that was ensconced in a foam coozie emblazoned with the words Beer = Life.

  “Freddy,” Dev said, when she saw this. But he just cocked a dark eyebrow, as if to say: Sorry, babe, but I felt bad for the guy.

  She sighed and shook her head, her annoyance at Freddy quickly dissipating when she caught sight of her mom’s face. Melisande stood in the doorway, staring at the strange man, the sheen of tears in her eyes catching the twinkling yellow lights of the tiki bar.

  Her mother swallowed and looked away, wiping at her cheeks with the back of her hand.

  “Don’t cry, Melisande,” Thomas said. “It’s not so bad, is it, really?”

  She remained silent, but from the rapid rise and fall of her chest, Dev could see that her mother was working hard to control herself.

  “Melisande, my love, let me get you a chair,” Freddy said, working that ridiculous charm of his—the same charm that had captured Dev’s heart the first moment she’d laid eyes on him.

  He was compact and muscular, and even when he was exhausted—as he was now—he moved with the fluid grace of a dancer. One moment he was pulling out a chair for Melisande, the next she was seated and Freddy’s handkerchief had been discreetly tucked into her hand.

  “There you go,” Freddy said, patting Dev’s mom on the back, then stepping away to give her some space.

  She was lucky that her parents had taken so well to Freddy. He was older than her, Filipino, and a nonpracticing Catholic—it could’ve easily been a fiasco when she’d brought him home to meet her parents. But his kindness and charm had won both her mom and dad over within minutes, and that was that. He’d become a part of their family. Though they’d never married—neither of them had ever seen the need to—he would be her better half for all of time.

  She knew this because it had been Freddy’s face she’d seen when she’d joined the coven and been metaphorically mated to the Horned God. The ritual induction ceremony was one of the most important rites of the coven, and it was here that each blood sister saw her true love’s face imposed upon the visage of the great Horned one.

  Freddy came to stand beside Dev, taking her hand and squeezing her fingers tightly between his own. She was happy for his presence, pleased that he had her back, no matter what. She didn’t know many men who would just accept their partner’s weird eccentricities without comment, who would get up at three in the morning to stand watch over a strange man their lady had tied to a chair and stashed in their converted bar/garage. She thanked heaven every day that the man she loved was as chill and patient as a saint.

  “Melisande?” Thomas said, voice smooth as honey, but with a slight catch at the end. Like he was just as moved to see her mother as her mother was to see him.

  Her mom cleared her throat, dabbing at her cheeks with Freddy’s clean white handkerchief.

  “I know you didn’t go away on purpose.”

  Thomas let out a long sigh, beginning to tear up himself.

  “Really? You mean that?” he breathed, his jaw clenched tight as he fought back the waves of emotion that seemed ready to overwhelm him. “Because it’s the truth. I wouldn’t have gone. I would’ve done anything to stay.”

  Her mom nodded, apparently not trusting herself to speak.

  “That night at the Beltane fire . . . it was the greatest night of my life,” he continued. “You were everything.”

  Her mom started to cry in earnest, and Freddy squeezed Dev’s hand, holding her back, so she wouldn’t rush to her mother’s side.

  “Let her be,” Freddy whispered into Dev’s ear, then followed his words up with a soft kiss on her cheek.

  He was right, of course. If she’d intervened, she’d have ruined the moment, and it was obvious her mom needed this, needed the closure that this meeting would bring her.

  “You’re so young,” Melisande murmured—at a loss for a better way to say it. “How can that be? I don’t understand.”

  Thomas shrugged, a bit of his beer spilling out over his hand.

  “Without going into the physics of the thing . . . time runs differently where I hail from,” he said, sadly. “All those stories about humans getting lost in the fairy world, where no one ever seems to age? Well, those stories come directly from your people falling into my dimension. We’re not fairies, of course, but the rest of those tales have their roots in the truth.”

  “But I’ve lived a whole life,” her mother whispered, “my whole life without you.”

  Thomas stared down at his knees.

  “I know. And it’s been almost no time at all for me in my world.”

  Dev watched as the tears poured down her mom’s cheeks. She wished she could go and comfort her, but Freddy’s presence still held her in check.

  “You’ve met my oldest daughter. I have three more. I’m a grandmother, even.”

  Her mom laughed, and the years fell away. For the first time, Dev saw how beautiful her mother must’ve been when she was a young woman—so beautiful that this strange young man from another dimension had fallen hopelessly in love with her.

  “You’ve had a good life?” Thomas asked, and finally looked up at her mother again.

  “Yes, I have had a good life,” she said, grinning through her tears. “But not a day went by that I didn’t miss you.”

  “Good,” Thomas said, a little cocky now. “That makes it all right, then.”

  They smiled at each other, and Dev’s heart ached for what could’ve been. Dev loved her dad, but this connection her mother shared with the stranger went beyond anything she’d ever seen between her parents.

  “Now you have to listen to me, Melisande,” he continued, letting his look encompass Dev and Freddy, too. “The Flood is coming to wipe you out. All of you except your granddaughter. Her, they want to control because she’s special—”

  “No,” Dev cried. “They can’t have her. I won’t let them.”

  “They’re coming. There’s nothi
ng you can do. Only the power in your blood will protect you. But you need the others, all of the Montrose women. Make that happen and we might still survive the night.”

  “Man, this sounds really out there,” Freddy said, turning to Dev. “But if you tell me that’s what’s what, then I believe you. I mean, I haven’t lived with you all these years without seeing some crazy shit.”

  Dev snorted, not fully believing what she was hearing.

  “I didn’t know you were paying attention—”

  “C’mon, Dev, I’m not blind,” he said, shaking his head. “The tarot cards are one thing, but sneaking off into the woods . . . let’s just say, I may have gone after you once or twice to see what you were up to.”

  He looked over at Dev, sheepish.

  “I may have also seen more of Eleanora than any man really wants to see of an old lady’s—”

  “Okay, I got it,” Dev said.

  Freddy grinned.

  “So I guess we gotta get your sisters, then?”

  But it was Melisande who answered.

  “That’s the easy part,” she said, a strange resolve in her eye. “It’s raising the dead ones that’s going to be difficult.”

  Lizbeth

  Daniela herded them out of the sunlight toward the shaded portico of the smaller structure across from the villa. They took the stairs in single file—like schoolchildren, Lizbeth thought—letting Daniela lead the way.

  “C’mon—” Daniela began, but the words caught in her throat.

  Daniela froze at the top of the stairs. The others, unaware of her distress, piled into her back.

  A frail old woman in a gauzy dress stood in the doorway, her long gray hair flowing past her shoulders and down her back. Her face was deathly white, and there were deep fissures of age in her flesh. She lifted a paper-thin arm—the wrist as tiny as a child’s—and waved in greeting.

  “Buona sera, amore mio.”

  Daniela’s face went slack with shock, and the old woman’s wide grin quickly disappeared. She reached out with a frail hand, trying to touch Daniela’s cheek, but Daniela stepped out of her reach.

  “It’s Francesca,” the old woman said, frowning now. “Don’t you know me?”

  Daniela shook her head.

  “No . . . this can’t be . . .”

  Lyse moved to Daniela, almost touching her shoulder. Then she swiftly retracted her fingers, remembering how dangerous even one touch could be.

  “What’s wrong?” Lyse asked—but Daniela wouldn’t look at her.

  Instead, she continued to stare at the old woman.

  “But they said you were dead,” she whispered, her face as white as a sheet. “That you died with my mother.”

  Her eyes rolled up into her head and she fainted.

  Weir ran for Daniela, trying to catch her before she hit the ground.

  “Weir! No!” Lizbeth cried, but it was too late—Weir had his arms around Daniela’s unconscious form, careful to steer clear of her gloved hands as he gently set her down on the porch. Thankfully, there was no one else on the portico to see what had happened—just the strange old woman, who seemed as worried about Daniela as they were.

  Weir moved Daniela’s body toward the side of the porch, where a large hedge grew, blocking the view from the gardens into the portico. Lizbeth and Lyse ran to their friend, Lizbeth kneeling by Daniela’s head and Lyse tucked in by her side. Both of them watched with bated breath. If Daniela started seizing, it meant Weir had triggered her empathic power and, though it wasn’t horrible in the moment, the cumulative damage to her brain was irreparable.

  “I hate that we can’t touch her,” Lyse said, and Lizbeth nodded. She knew exactly what Lyse meant—but then her mind went to Temistocles, who existed in the dreamlands and, as desperately as she wanted to, could not be touched, either.

  “Was I wrong to catch her?” Weir asked, realizing that he might’ve done something wrong.

  “She will be fine.”

  Lizbeth looked up as the old woman—Francesca, Daniela had called her—squatted down on Daniela’s other side, cradling Daniela’s limp head between her hands. She realized that this was the same Francesca from Marie-Faith’s notebook, and that she was a Dream Keeper just like Lizbeth.

  “I’ve watched her since she was a baby. I know all about her ‘difficulties’—and I know that when she is sleeping or not in her head,” Francesca continued, stroking Daniela’s hair, “that it is safe to touch her. Even the hands.”

  Lizbeth reached out a tentative finger to gingerly shift a few strands of pink away from Daniela’s face. She looked over at Lyse, encouraging her to do the same.

  “Are you sure?” Lyse asked Francesca. “I . . . I think I might be a different story . . .”

  Francesca shook her head, her long hair a wispy cloud around her face, but the way she looked at Lyse was frightening. Lizbeth could feel the hostility pouring out of the old woman’s eyes, her gaze fixed solely on Lyse.

  “I know what you are. And even you can’t hurt her now.”

  Her tone was even, but Lizbeth could sense her underlying hatred even as she tried to suppress it. Weir also picked up on the old woman’s vibe, and he moved to stand over Lyse, offering her his silent protection. The old woman shook her head, the wind catching bits of her hair and blowing them across her face.

  “I’m not the one you need to worry about, tall one,” she said to Weir before pressing the back of a birdlike hand to Daniela’s forehead. “We should wake her up now. I’ll do a spell.”

  Lizbeth caught Lyse’s eye and smiled because her friend’s expression seemed to say: This old bat is crazy.

  “Uh, so how do we do a spell?” Lyse asked, brushing her bangs out of her eyes.

  Regardless of the old woman’s strange attitude, Lizbeth—and Lyse—were curious to see her in action. Neither of them had ever witnessed someone treat magic like, well, magic. The coven performed rituals, meeting at preordained times, casting protective circles, reciting canon that had been passed down from the old covens of yore. But what exactly the rituals accomplished when compared to “real” magic, that had always eluded Lizbeth.

  She knew all about the five talents—that Daniela could see inside of a human’s soul, Arrabelle could manipulate plants, Eleanora could enter the past and present as if she were a thread in the woven fabric of time, Devandra gave voice to fate with her cards . . . and she, Lizbeth, was a Dream Keeper, who could walk in the dreamlands—she just didn’t understand how “real” magic worked.

  “No one teaches anyone anything anymore,” Francesca muttered under her breath and, with creaking bones, hauled herself to her feet. “Spells and manipulating the fabric of time . . . all of that knowledge has been banished . . . leaving only the five weak forces. But maybe that will be changing.”

  She wiped her palms down her white shift, avoiding Lyse’s proffered hands and heading straight for Lizbeth.

  “Give me your hands,” she said to Lizbeth.

  Boy, she’s really anti-Lyse, Lizbeth thought.

  “Come now, don’t be shy,” the old woman said, her gnarled fingers searching out Lizbeth’s youthful ones. “It’s so simple, really, but none of you are taught the old ways . . . all these centuries the Council has been scared we’ll get ourselves burned at the stake for witchcraft if we do anything out of line . . . and now this. The Flood coming and none of you can protect yourselves—it’s just wrong.”

  “Is that the truth?” Lizbeth asked, her voice scratchy in her throat, reminding her of how blessed she was she could speak again. “What else is there? We want to learn.”

  She turned to Lyse, who nodded, blue eyes earnest. She was standing close to Weir, his hand brushing her wrist. It made Lizbeth happy to see them touching; Weir had been out of sorts since Eleanora’s memorial service, and Lizbeth thought it had something to do with Lyse. Her broth
er wouldn’t say as much, but he was usually so even keel that she knew he was upset. And then she’d seen how strangely he’d behaved around Lyse the other day. Acting as if they weren’t an item, like he wasn’t all gaga over her friend.

  “It wasn’t an option either of us knew existed,” Lyse replied, agreeing with Lizbeth. “Show us, please.”

  Francesca frowned, then looked over at Lyse.

  “You understand what it is, though,” she said, staring into Lyse’s eyes. “Magic . . . ? Where it comes from?”

  “I will be as honest with you as I can be,” Lyse said. “Until a few weeks ago, I didn’t even know that blood sisters existed. I’ve been as in the dark as Weir, here, has been.”

  Lyse patted his arm, her fingers dancing across his bicep.

  “Sorry to use you as an example,” she added, smiling at him.

  He shrugged and looked sheepish.

  “S’okay.”

  “But I meant what I said,” Lyse added, returning her attention back to Francesca. “We want to know and we’d be grateful for anything you can show us.”

  The old woman bowed her head.

  “The rituals are to bring together the five powers in a place filled with the energy of the flow lines,” she began, taking Lizbeth’s hands in her own. “A coven of five—five feminine forms who possess the sacred blood: Earth, Wind, Fire, Water, Spirit—when brought together in these sacred spots, they hold the power to create and sustain life. Not just human life, but all life.”

  She stopped speaking and the everyday outdoor sounds of the world filled Lizbeth’s ears. The bleat of a car horn in traffic, the roar of a plane as it passed overhead, the chatter of a group of men and women walking past the small round building . . . with her eyes closed, Lizbeth could almost “see” the sounds as images . . . almost see Francesca’s face in front of her as the old woman’s breathing grew more relaxed.

  —You can trust no one but Daniela. Marie-Faith trusted and you can see where that got her—dead.