The Girl In Between series: Books 1-4

by Laekan Zea Kemp

  “What’s happening?”

  She looked up, the pools of her eyes so deep I was afraid of getting caught in their current. She squeezed them shut and said only one word. “Spiders.”

  The forest crackled with the sound of skittering legs. The trunks of the trees ignited into a thousand moving parts, the snow pocked with leaves that climbed towards us like a wave, everything the most grotesque shade of black.

  “What do we do?” I said.

  Scarlett’s mouth hung open. “We don’t.”

  “What happens in the dream?”

  She took a deep breath that shuddered all the way down. “I die.”

  The rustle slowly morphed into a storm, the crack of tree branches like lightning. Scarlett’s focus wandered and I raised my voice above the chaos. “You don’t die, Scarlett. You wake up.” I found Sebastían, his hands already itching to blaze. “Light everything on fire.”

  He pinched the tip of a branch between his fingers until it sparked. The flames caught, his eyes dragging them down until they were jumping to the next tree and the next, Scarlett’s nightmare turning to ash.

  She tripped just as a fiery branch came straight down, sending up a cloud of smoke between us. I fanned the ash and saw the spiders rising above the flames, clawing over each other and falling from the trees like stars. But I didn’t see Scarlett.

  Sebastían leapt onto a tree stump. “She’s not gonna make it.”

  The heat stung my face, the canopy already filled with smoke as I searched for a way through.

  Sebastían stood in my way, reading my mind. “Bryn, no.”

  “I have to. I’m the only one who can help her.”

  “You don’t know that.” His face was hard. “It’s her nightmare, her fear. She’s the one who has to overcome it.”

  I remembered Kira and Rami; they’d needed my help, my touch. I knew that Scarlett needed me too. I didn’t know how far behind she’d fallen or if she’d even made it out of the flames, but something pulled me forward, my feet dodging stones and my arms carving a space between the smoke. It thickened, blinding me, and I slammed into something hard, my back meeting the snow.

  Scarlett sobbed next to me, spiders disappearing beneath her clothes and tangling in her hair as she tried to pick them off. She cringed, so shaken she could barely stand.

  “We have to run, Scarlett.”

  “No!” She threw herself on the ground, fear turned to fury.

  I tried to pin her down, the silhouette of things I couldn’t see dancing in her gaze. Her lips fumbled, fighting for words, but she was speaking to a stranger in a voice that wasn’t her own.

  “Scarlett?”

  Heat barreled over me like a wave, the mud beneath me steaming. I could barely see past the tears and smoke.

  “Scarlett, please get up.” I gripped her, pouring everything I could into that touch, forcing it down inside her.

  She screamed, wracked by pain. The spiders tore at her lips, filling her up until she wasn’t just lost or mad but dying. She was dying in my arms, our skin flush, her body absorbing nothing.

  “Scarlett!”

  I shook her, the spiders raging over both of us, sharp pricks covering my skin. Scarlett twitched, silent, animated only by the thing she feared.

  She was mad. Just like Mona. She was gone.

  I felt a deep sting, something sucking at the vein in my neck. The spiders needled beneath my clothes and I clawed and itched and held my breath, trying to scrape them off as they shred my skin like paper.

  “Bryn!”

  Sebastían dragged me into a run. We dodged falling branches and ash, embers scalding my cheeks. The flames were too hot, every ounce of fresh air incinerated before it could reach my lungs.

  They gnawed at me, their bodies carving so deep I could barely keep back the bile in my throat. Sebastían winced too, hissing with every step. They hung to the back of his neck, trying to wriggle past his ear lobe. He squeezed his head, screamed.

  I heard a crash, this one long and strange and deep.

  “Hold your breath!” Sebastían yelled.

  I looked back and chasing us through the trees was a giant sheet of water. I sucked in as much clean air as I could and then we were under. I spun, my hands grazing the forest floor as the wave sent me tumbling. I saw Sebastían pulling at his clothes and I did the same, letting the pressure of the water rise up my shirt and down the waist of my pants.

  I was soaked, my throat aching from moving so much without any air, my chest convulsing as I tried to stay conscious. The wave collapsed at once, letting go of us, and I landed on my stomach next to Sebastían.

  He coughed, rolling to his feet. “Are you okay?”

  I tried to sit up, the pounding in my skull driving me back down. I waited for the cold to hit me again but the fire’s memory still pulsed from the ground. The trees were still smoking, a few stray leaves flickering with light.

  Christine found us first. “Scarlett? Did she wake up?”

  There was no way to know the true answer to that question. I knew Scarlett was gone but to where exactly I wasn’t sure. She could have woken up. She could be sitting up in her own body in her own bed. Or she could be dead.

  “I couldn’t…” I looked down. “I couldn’t save her.”

  Charlotte frowned, cheeks covered in soot. “It’s not your fault.”

  “It was too late,” Sebastían said.

  “But Kira and Rami…”

  “You didn’t save them. You weren’t meant to save them. You…”

  He stopped at the sight of the other Dreamers stepping out of the trees. There were only six of us now. I didn’t bother asking what had happened to the rest. It wasn’t their nightmare but that didn’t mean they weren’t being tested. We all were, so far both on how fast we could run and how well we could keep still. And whether that was to reveal our abilities or to render them useless, none of that mattered now.

  It didn’t matter how senseless it was that some could conquer the dreams and others couldn’t or that I couldn’t help Scarlett; that I couldn’t save her. All that mattered was this—I was still conscious. I was still in control of something. Even if it wasn’t the other Dreamers, even if it wasn’t the nightmare itself. I was still in control of me. I was still me.

  I turned to Sebastían, finishing his thought, “I was meant to save myself.”

  30

  Roman

  “She can’t see us.”

  I couldn’t take my eyes off of the girl in front of us. She clawed at herself, at the ground, at the bark of the trees. Dani...

  Bryn took my hand. “Just like I can’t see you.”

  “Why not?”

  Bryn scratched at her hairline, remembering. “I’m not in there.”

  My mouth was dry. “You’re in a nightmare. Is this…Are you someplace like this? Is this what’s happening to you?”

  Bryn didn't answer. I remembered standing in Dani’s bedroom, the look she’d given Felix, the flat tone of her voice. I’d searched her eyes that day, waiting for a monster to peer out at me, but she hadn’t seemed angry. She hadn’t seemed lost or possessed. She’d seemed numb.

  “Is this real?” I asked, remembering my mother’s warning about my own darkness. “Is Dani really…?”

  Bryn let out a tight breath. “Is she really broken?” She shivered, nodding. “I broke her.”

  “You didn’t.”

  Dani wailed, my entire body recoiling at the sound.

  “She’s alone now,” Bryn said, "just like the rest of us.”

  “Alone?”

  “They’ve separated us, forcing us to fight things we can’t see.”

  Dani jerked and crawled and tried to escape, fighting a war that was invisible to the rest of us. Was that the reason she kept her distance from Bryn? I was fighting something too, and not just when the shadow showed its face, but all the time. All the time I felt the darkness inside me, trying to take control. Is this what would happen if I let it?

&nbs
p; “There must be two of me.” Bryn crept towards Dani, splaying her palm against some invisible wall between them. “Maybe there’s two of all of us. Or maybe there’s more than that, an infinite number of pieces, some sleeping and some awake.” She looked back at me. “What if we’re all just pieces?”

  “I feel like I’m just pieces,” I admitted.

  “That’s what they want.” Bryn looked back at Dani. She was writhing on her knees; speaking silent words to no one. “This is the piece Dani hates most. The one that’s afraid.”

  I took Bryn’s hand again. “What piece are you now?”

  She almost smiled but something sad swept it from her face. “The piece that forgives you.”

  “Tell me how to get you back and I’ll do it,” I pleaded. “Just tell me what to do.”

  She unlaced our fingers, lifting our hands, palm to palm. “You were right before. You can’t reach me. You can’t save me.”

  My throat clenched and I could feel the dream fading. “Please, just let me try.”

  “You did.” She smiled a real smile this time, one that lit a fire in my chest. “But it’s not me you have to save this time. It’s you.”

  My phone rattled against my nightstand. Felix. I hadn’t talked to him since the night I’d stormed out of the restaurant.

  “Hello?”

  “Wow, got you on the first try.”

  “Yeah, and I was sleeping. This better be important.”

  “It is,” he said. “Are you sitting down?”

  “Shit, what happened? Is Bryn—?”

  “No,” Felix said. “It’s nothing like that.”

  “Well?” I pressed.

  “Okay, so you know how I said that besides all of these coma outbreaks there’s been some other strange stuff happening sort of under the radar?”

  “Yeah, the kidnappings.”

  “Well, I did some digging. Do you remember those stills I showed you from the surveillance cameras outside that girl’s apartment building?”

  “Yeah, they showed the suspect, right? Big guy? Long hair?”

  “Right. Well, there was another kid who went missing in New York City the same week and someone claimed to have seen him on the subway that very afternoon. They released some surveillance footage just yesterday and it shows him getting on with his backpack.”

  “Packed and ready to go just like that other girl,” I said.

  “That’s not all they have in common.”

  My phone buzzed and I clicked on the link Felix had just sent. I scrolled through the news article, examining the stills from the surveillance footage, a faint yellow circle drawn around the boy’s face. It wasn’t the only thing that made him stand out. The photo looked distorted and milky as if something had been smudged over the lens of the camera. Except it didn’t seem to affect any of the other passengers. Just the boy. Just his face. It was pale and so was the rest of him, the lights and windows of the subway car just barely visible through his skin.

  “Looks like a fucking ghost, right?”

  “Or like he’d just seen one,” I said. “Wasn’t there something wrong with the photo of that other girl who was taken?”

  I remembered the photos Felix had shown Vogle and me at dinner. The girl had looked strange too, almost transparent.

  “And apparently they had the same travel companion too,” Felix said.

  I scrolled down, re-examining the photo of the boy entering through the sliding doors of the subway. There was a man right behind him, his face shielded by the hood of his jacket. They both stayed close to the doors, both reaching for the same handrail. That’s when I saw it. One still, one flash of the mystery man’s right hand.

  “He has a tattoo,” I said.

  “What?”

  “The third frame. Look at the big guy’s hand.”

  “What is that?” Felix asked. “A snake or a—”

  “An infinity sign.” My blood ran cold.

  “How can you tell?”

  “Because Michael had one just like it.”

  31

  Bryn

  A current rumbled beneath me, deep and deafening. The ground shook so fiercely I could barely find my footing, the soil tearing away as one side of the forest fell into the earth. We all lay on our stomachs, scrambling away from the edge of the cavern as it carved towards us. I clutched the grass, my ankle wrapped around the root of a tree. Stones tumbled over the side just inches from my face. I braced for the fall...and then everything stopped.

  The earth grew still and quiet. I looked up, afraid of setting off another ripple, of the earth falling out from under me. Sebastían was already on his hands and knees, creeping towards the cliff face.

  He craned his neck and choked, “It’s gone.”

  “The forest?”

  “Everything.”

  I trembled as I crawled to meet him. When I looked over the edge there was swirling dust and deeper than that nothing.

  “Is it trying to force us back?” I said.

  “No.” I turned at Clarke’s voice, the only other man left. He was still hugging the ground, staying as far away from the edge as possible. “We jump.”

  I got to my feet. “This one’s yours?”

  “I watched my brother fall into a gorge when I was ten. I’ve been dreaming about it ever since.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He stared at the abyss, finally making his way toward it. “Me too.”

  We formed a line as if waiting our turn at some morbid theme park. Clarke led his toes to the overhang, his face red, chest heaving. A few rocks tumbled into the fog and he held his breath, trying to steady himself.

  “Take your time,” Christine said.

  “If I do this, I’ll wake up.”

  No one answered, not willing to lie. Maybe Clarke would fall and wake back into his body or maybe he’d reach the bottom. Maybe it would hurt. Maybe it would kill him.

  “What about the rest of you?” he asked, looking to Chloe and Sam. I knew he was worried who might be next, or worse, who might be last.

  “It’s not our turn yet,” Sebastían said. “Right now it’s yours.”

  I was still trying to figure out why the others had disappeared the way they had. I didn’t understand why they were being tested at all. If Anso already knew I was the Dreamer he was looking for, why wouldn’t he just come after me?

  I followed Clarke’s gaze to Sam, Sebastían standing next to her. They were just inches apart, a visible vibration humming in the space between them. Like two magnets desperate to lock in place. I’d never seen it before, I’d never looked, but there was something frightening and beautiful about the two of them. Familiar. Powerful.

  I wondered if Sebastían could see it when I was standing next to her too. Or if it was the same charge I’d felt every time he touched me. After Clarke disappeared there’d only be five of us left. Then four. Then three. Sebastían, Sam, me. They were the only Dreamers I could imagine being there when it was finally time to face my own nightmare because they were the only other Dreamers whose abilities were almost as boundless as mine. Anso had already taken Sam once and now he knew the truth about me too. But what was the truth about Sebastían?

  Clarke swayed, caught himself. He was still hesitating.

  “Here,” Sebastían said, turning Clarke’s back to the void. “Don’t look down.”

  Clarke’s face flushed, something painful bubbling up inside him. I blinked back tears.

  “Now, close your eyes,” Christine said.

  He grimaced, doing as he was told.

  “Ready?” Sebastían asked.

  “Could you do it? Could you push me?”

  “That’s not how it works,” I said, remembering Sebastían’s explanation for why I couldn’t save Scarlett. “You have to face it on your own.”

  He ran his hands down his face. “Okay. I’ll jump. I’ll jump and then I’ll wake up.”

  Sebastían let go of Clarke and he eased himself over the side. The wind rippled past, sta
rtling him, but he didn’t run. He took one last deep breath and then he jumped.

  Sebastían looked away, jaw tight as he waited for the sound. Everyone else did the same, staring at the ground or their hands or the sky, anything but that ledge or what had just tumbled over it.

  It was silent for a long time after that, so long that Sebastían was finally forced to search the fog. He faced the group. “He’s gone.”

  “Maybe there’s no bottom,” Christine said. “Maybe we’ll just blink and be somewhere else.” I stepped forward but she stopped me. “You take the little ones. I’ll go next.”

  She faced us just like Clarke had, her back to the emptiness. I thought she might say something; that she might need to, but she just took one sharp breath and let herself fall. Sebastían watched her all the way down until her body disappeared beneath the fog. The look on his face made me feel like I was at a funeral, and when I took my place at the edge, it felt like my own. Sam moved to stand on one side of me, Chloe on the other.

  “Hold on,” I said. I knew there’d be nothing to hold onto the moment we took that first step, but what if once we did, something even stronger than gravity tried to tear us apart?

  Sebastían was the only one left and he looked just as afraid of being alone up there as I was of falling. I wanted to reach for him, to cling to something, anything. Because what if this was it? What if this was the moment we’d all finally be separated?

  “Bryn…” It was all he could manage and I knew he was thinking the same thing.

  “It’s okay.” It wasn’t okay. I was so afraid, too afraid to jump.

  I closed my eyes but a faint knocking made them spring open again. Sebastían stared into the trees, one hand on my arm as he tugged me an inch from the edge.

  “What is that?” I whispered.

  Something buzzed in my peripheral vision, circling my head until I was dizzy. A locust. More hung in the trees, thrumming against the bark until it was so loud I had to cover my ears. A few stuck to the sleeve of my shirt. I tried to shake them free but they tangled in my hair, burrowing in the nape of my neck. I shuddered, wanting to gag as I felt the prick of them on my back, tearing holes through my clothes.