Shivering with a chill that wasn’t physical and thankful for my invisible dreamself, I continued down the hallway, noticing the faintly glowing orbs set at regular intervals where the walls met the floor, bathing everything in a bluish light…This place was illuminated with fey stones?
Fey stones, which were really nothing more than plain old rocks that gave off light and had nothing to do with fairies, had been nevertheless credited as the impetus behind the Magic Wars. Obviously, if you knew how to create a fey stone, you had no need for electric lighting, but since most people weren’t Elementals, entities like the power company just shrugged off the loss of a few customers. Then, about thirty, thirty-five years ago, an enterprising young mage had figured out how to set a charged stone into a lamp base, so Mundane users could also take advantage of lighting that would never set the drapes on fire or need replacement bulbs. Suddenly, homes all across the land were lit by fey stones that would last centuries, each one of them costing less than a dozen donuts. The power company was not pleased by their abrupt drop in revenue, and neither were the politicians they donated to.
Harmless fey stones conveniently became one of the excuses the government had used for declaring its war on magic, why my father had disappeared, and why my brother had been abducted. Stupid things. I’d rather carry a flashlight. And now, adding insult to injury, I was walking through a Mundane building lit by the bane of my existence. If hypocrisy were a virus, all these Peacekeepers would have keeled over a long time ago.
I reached a set of metal doors, the sort found in public school hallways. I leaned on the push bar to no effect; right, dreamself. Having no other options, I took a deep breath and slipped through the doors.
Once the weirdness of passing through a solid object had worn off, I took a good look at the room I’d entered. It was huge, like an auditorium, with blindingly white walls and a black and white checkerboard floor. It was filled with tables and shelves and what looked like gym equipment, all made of clear plastic, giving it the appearance of a bad science fiction movie. Suspended tunnels full of right angles and curlicues dangled from the ceiling, and a central area was filled with dangling ropes and gymnastic mats. For a moment, I wondered if I had discovered a training camp for gigantic hamsters. Then I saw him.
Max.
I was surprised that he was older, which was silly. It had been almost ten years since his arrest, and time had marched on, making my teenaged brother into a man. Despite the years, he was still skinny, and his hair, a shade or two darker than my own coppery hue, was just as unkempt as ever. He looked to be unconscious, and he was held upright inside a clear plastic cylinder with tubes and wires stuck all over him. The cylinder held a clear, greenish liquid that reached his chest, and lights embedded in the cylinder’s walls blinked in a halo around him. They, whoever his captors were, appeared to be monitoring his vital signs, but for what purpose I couldn’t guess.
I was at his side in the instant way of dreams, and stepped through the plastic wall. The liquid was warm and thick, almost comfortable. “Max,” I whispered. “Max! I’m going to get you out of here.”
“Sadie?” he rasped, without opening his eyes. I noticed his lips were cracked and dry. He was probably being fed through one of these tubes and hadn’t had real food or drink in who knows how long.
“Sara,” I corrected. “The older one.”
Max cracked an eyelid, then gave me a weak grin. “Pest,” he murmured. Suddenly serious, he realized that I wasn’t a mere figment of his imagination; really, what brother dreams about his sister? “Sara, you shouldn’t be here.”
“They won’t know,” I soothed. “I’m dreamwalking.”
“Here, they know.” Both of his eyes were now open, wide and terrified. “They know if you dreamwalk, and they will punish you for it. Look!”
I followed his gaze, and saw a control room separated from the auditorium by a large, clear plastic panel. Inside the room, people in lab coats looked over various monitors and readouts, most likely the information gleaned from the many wires stuck in my brother’s body. Despite Max’s warning, I was still confident in my anonymity, until one of the labcoats turned around.
Shit.
Juliana was in the control room.
I saw the badge around her neck, and my hope that she was also a prisoner died. My best friend was a Peacekeeper. Just as my heart skipped a beat, she looked directly at me. Shit. Shit shit shit.
“They know,” Max repeated. “Get out now, before they find out who you are!”
I tore my eyes away from Juliana and back to my weakened brother. “I’m coming back for you,” I promised. I found Max’s hand in the viscous liquid and squeezed, then melted out through the plastic. The labcoats were busy watching Max and their readouts, none of them noticing my noncorporeal form as I crossed the room right in front of the clear panel. They actually looked rather foolish, all bustling about as they made minute adjustments to their forest of knobs and toggles. All I had to do was relax, and then gently wake myself up. In a few heartbeats, I’d be safe in my apartment.
“There!” one of them yelled, pointing directly at me while his eyes remained fixed on a computer screen. Any hopes I had of his meaning anything other than me were dashed as a team of Peacekeepers burst into the room behind me and leveled the strangest weapon I’d ever seen in my direction. It looked like it was made of high-density white plastic, with tiny green lights blinking across the barrel. I did not want to learn what it was or what it could do, so I ran across the room and through the wall, past the scientists with all their strange equipment. I didn’t stop until I was back in the corridor. I was still my dreamself, and still confident that they hadn’t actually seen me. But how had they known I was there?
Then a group of labcoats burst into the hallway, and I left off my wonderings. I ran as fast as I could, until my lungs burned and I wondered why I needed oxygen in a dream. I also wondered why I wasn’t waking up, why this hallway was so long, and what the hell were they doing to my brother? Finally, I turned a corner and saw another set of double doors limned in light. Freedom was close at last, or so I thought.
A Peacekeeper shoved the doors open and stepped into the hallway, not pausing before he fired his odd weapon at me. It hit me square in the chest with a bolt of green energy, and I was there. I mean, I was there.
The bolt from the Peacekeeper’s gun had pulled my physical body to my dreamself, and now the situation was a great deal more dire. I was stunned, my body still in the throes of waking, and I could hardly raise my arm to shield myself against the Peacekeeper. He grabbed my shoulders and pushed me against the wall, lifting me up until my feet dangled above the floor.
“A pretty one,” he leered, groping me through my sweater. I whimpered in protest, so he slammed my head against the wall. “Quiet,” he growled, raising his arm to backhand me.
Instead, he jerked and fell unconscious, taking me down with him. I struggled out of his now-limp grip and into a crouch, dimly aware of the labcoats rushing down the hall behind me, their sensible shoes click-clacking on the linoleum. A second and then a third Peacekeeper flew past me, both striking the wall with sickening thuds. I pressed my back against the concrete, steeling myself against whatever this new threat was. Then I felt a hand on my shoulder, and I assumed it was over.
“Come, my Sara.”
I whipped my head around, not believing the voice I was hearing. He stood over me like a silver statue, hair floating about his ears like storm clouds. Micah.
“You’re here?” I gasped.
He responded by jerking me to my feet and dragging me behind him at a breakneck run. A Peacekeeper barreled toward us, but Micah didn’t slow his pace, waiting until the last moment before releasing my hand and striking the Peacekeeper in the center of his breastplate. The black-armored man flew back into the wall, but I didn’t look to see if he was still alive. I only wanted to escape.
We skidded around a sharp corner, only to halt. The corridor ended abruptly
at a plate-glass window. Micah grabbed something from a pouch hidden in the folds of his cloak and flung it at the glass; in the next instant the glass shattered, a deadly and beautiful spray of diamonds. Micah pulled me into his arms, and we jumped through the window.
As luck would have it, we were only on the second level, and a few ragged shrubs cushioned our landing. Micah sprang up instantly, hauling me to my feet as we hurtled toward the cinderblock wall topped with barbed wire that encircled the building. Micah flung another handful from his pouch, and a heartbeat later there was a hole in the concrete fence. It was such a perfect circle it was almost comical, the edges black and smoking, as if a gunpowder charge had just gone off, though there hadn’t been a noise or flash of light.
We leaped through the hole and fled into the trees. The wood was dark and damp and looked like a scene from a bad horror movie, but behind me I heard sirens and voices over loudspeakers. Whatever lay ahead had to be better than what we’d just escaped. Once we’d made it a few hundred yards into the trees, I caught my sneaker on a root and fell to my knees.
“We must keep moving,” Micah panted. Despite his words, he knelt beside me. “This land is not good for those like you and me.”
“Wh-what…mean?” I choked out.
“There is no metal,” Micah explained. “Not in that edifice, not in the ground. The guards wield plastic guns.” He looked skyward just as I felt cold droplets. “Rain is good. Rain will obscure our trail.”
It didn’t feel good as it ran down my neck, but I kept quiet. I must have shivered a bit, since Micah drew me into the folds of his cloak, rubbing my arms. When my breath had calmed, I asked, “Were you following me?”
“Yes.” He didn’t elaborate, and I didn’t think it was the right time to question his motives.
“Micah,” I began, but he touched my lips. Then, he cursed.
“Dogs,” he hissed, again pulling me to my feet. “Can you run?”
He didn’t wait for my response, since our only options were to run or become dog food. Now I really was glad for the rain, but it didn’t do much to dissuade our pursuers. At times, I swore I heard the dogs’ teeth gnashing, could feel their hot breath on my neck. There were Peacekeepers out there too, and… and men of metal, like the footmen who guarded the Iron Court. I heard them more than saw them, their limbs grating with rust.
Before I had a chance to wonder if the metal men were there to help or hinder us, the Peacekeepers began firing blindly into the trees. At least, I assumed it was Peacekeepers; I didn’t exactly turn around to check. I kept hoping they’d hit one of the dogs and lessen at least one of our problems, but they were better shots than that.
After we had run for a small eternity, Micah halted so abruptly I collided with his back. We were in the midst of a clearing and Micah was staring straight ahead, slowly turning in a circle. The rain had become a torrential downpour, and I could hardly see the trees through the sheets of rain. I could not fathom why we weren’t moving, or what he was looking for, but I was panting so hard I couldn’t ask. And I didn’t think Micah would be pleased if I told him that I thought I was about to pass out from exhaustion.
“There!” He pointed at a massive oak, grabbed my shoulders, and shoved me through a crack in the bark. Only, I didn’t end up in the center of a tree, but something more like a cave. The interior was vast and quiet, with a packed dirt floor, and walls comprised of living wood. Those wood walls stretched far overhead into darkness. Most importantly, it was dry as a bone.
“What is this place?” I murmured.
“A hiding spot,” Micah replied. “Remember, the oaks are my allies.” He quickly shed his cloak and set about collecting twigs and leaves, making a heap of them in the center of the chamber. Once my eyes adjusted to the dusky interior, I realized he was gathering kindling.
“Wouldn’t a fey stone be faster?” I ventured.
“Yes, but fire is warmer.” As I watched Micah arrange the bits of wood and detritus, soaked to the skin, with his silver hair hanging in clumps around his face, I wanted to kick myself. I’d insulted him so gravely, yet he had come for me. No one had ever rescued me before. Sure, there were the times Max had gotten me away from the neighborhood bullies, and Mom could scream a blue streak at whoever was doing us wrong at the moment, but for the most part, the only one who’d ever looked out for me had been me.
Micah had put his life on the line for me, even after I’d treated him like dirt. Even though we’d been apart less than a day, I’d been despondent without him. I never wanted to feel like that again.
I never wanted to be away from Micah again.
My hands shook, whether from nerves or the cold I couldn’t tell, and I knelt in front of him. “Micah,” I began, but he didn’t look up or pause in his intricate arrangement of twigs. “Micah, are you angry with me?”
“Is there cause for my anger?” he asked levelly. Well, I had nothing to say to that. My head drooped forward, and a fat drop of water fell from my hair to the kindling. Micah must have thought it was a tear, because he abruptly put down the wood. After another heartbeat, he tilted my chin upward.
“I understand that my ways are foreign to you,” he said softly, “just as yours are to me. But please, have faith in me. I would never do anything to harm you, or those you hold dear.”
“I know.” I reached up and threaded my fingers through his. “Micah, I’m so sorry. I was angry, and confused, and—and I shouldn’t have said those things.” His eyes softened, and he leaned over the wood to kiss me. It was soft and gentle, just the way I’d worried he’d never kiss me again.
“I was angry as well,” he conceded, “but not with you.”
“The Iron Queen?” I asked, surprised by my deduction.
“She is a woman of questionable loyalties,” Micah stated. “And she is your father’s enemy.”
We were sitting on the ground, but my stomach felt like we had just plummeted down an elevator shaft. “Do you think she had something to do with his disappearance?”
“Nothing about her would surprise me.”
I tried to say more, but was overcome with shivering.
“Get out of those wet clothes. I will have the fire started soon.”
I nodded and stood stiffly, the cold rain having reduced my muscles into hard, stony lumps, and proceeded to struggle out of my clothing. The sweater wasn’t too difficult, but the laces on my sneakers had swelled to twice their normal size. I yanked them off, followed by socks that now held enough water to turn a desert into an oasis. My sodden jeans were the worst, the rain and dirt having rendered the denim rather argumentative.
As my clothing landed in a shapeless heap of wet on the dirt floor, I heard a strange squeaking noise close to my ear. Apparently, the oaks hadn’t shown me all of their tricks, at least not yet, because I was shocked to find a mouse sitting on a thin branch. He (or she) gestured wildly, and I gradually realized that the branches were meant for me to hang up my clothes while they dried. When Micah had claimed that the oaks were his allies, he hadn’t mentioned this concierge service. When I had stripped down to my tank top and underwear, having dutifully hung up the rest of my clothing, I turned back to Micah. I’d meant to ask if he’d like me to hang up his gear as well, but the sight of him before the fire nearly made me forget my name.
The fire was, indeed, blazing away and my naked elfin consort lounged before it, his cloak spread atop the dirt floor. While I understood that elves, like all Otherworldly beings, weren’t big on modesty, I was more than a little shocked. I tried not to stare at the fire licking across his caramel skin as I sat beside him, and though Micah raised an eyebrow at my undergarments, he said nothing. Instead, he wrapped his arm around my shoulders and I huddled against him.
“I missed you last night,” I mumbled.
“Then you shouldn’t have walked away from me,” he countered.
“You were yelling at me.”
“I was not yelling,” he bit off. “I only wish I had known all of
the facts before we arrived.”
“I don’t even know all the facts,” I pointed out. He kissed the top of my head.
“I should have known, when you showed me your mark,” he murmured. “How many bloodlines bear a copper raven as evidence of their power? I wasn’t thinking clearly.”
“You weren’t?”
“You have that sort of effect on me.” He stroked a long line from my temple to my cheek, down my neck, his fingers at last coming to rest on my shoulder. Then he flicked aside the strap of my tank top and kissed the flesh beneath. “May I see your mark again, my Sara?”
I knew why he wanted to see it, but I leaned forward anyway and drew up my tank top. Just as before, Micah began by tracing the outline of the raven, his fingers moving from its crest over my spine to the tiny pinfeathers that hovered above my hips, and then he slowly stroked each and every feather. His touch was light and delicate, like a ghost against my flesh; nevertheless, my mark heated up. By the time he’d reached the raven’s maw I wondered if I could burn him.
A strangled, desperate noise, one that I would have been thoroughly embarrassed by in any other circumstance, issued from my throat. Micah’s arm snaked around my waist, and I leaned back to kiss him. Somehow, I twisted around without breaking the kiss, and in another moment I was pressed against him, my legs wound around his hips. Then my clothes were gone, and Micah laid me beneath him, settling himself between my thighs. His caresses were gentle, but I didn’t want gentle any longer. I wanted him. Now. In the next moment he pushed forward, and… There. No going back now.
Abruptly, he stopped. “Sara,” he murmured, his face a mask of concern. Oh, right. I’d forgotten to tell him I was still a virgin.
chapter 12
I know, you probably think it’s a little weird to still be a virgin in your mid-twenties, especially well after your college days; not so long ago, it would have been. Sadly, in that day and age it was more the norm, especially when one bore a magical sigil emblazoned across one’s back. The Peacekeepers maintained fairly close tabs on all of us young people, espousing the virtues of abstinence and monogamy, until you thought you’d puke if you heard another “wait for your mate” commercial. And since they’d pretty much eradicated all religion after the wars, theirs was the only voice you heard.
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