by Shona Husk
The screams from his nightmares filled his ears. He couldn’t be that man. He had vanished long ago with good reason. But the reaching hands of his memories clawed at the inside of his head, wanting to be remembered. He gritted his teeth and raised his eyes to where the horizon blurred between land and sky. He was goblin, not human. Whatever thoughts broke the surface of his mind were nightmares planted by the Shadowlands. One he was gray again he would be healed.
Meryn drank without looking at his face or the color of the water. It tasted worse than it looked and left a residue on his tongue like he’d licked the digestive tract of a half-rotted deer. His stomach clenched but held onto the liquid. Hunger and thirst were human traits that had no place in the Shadowlands. He had no place here. He shouldn’t be so thirsty he was forced to drink from the slippery river. He fondled the gold in the pouch on his belt. It was cold and heavy and reassuring. Gold he knew, even if he didn’t want its comfort or find satisfaction in its shine.
He spat the taste of the water out of his mouth and wiped his lips on his sleeve.
He had to gain an audience with the king of all goblin kings. The spire castle of the Goblin King rose up out of the ground as a jagged warning. Smart goblins avoided it. Those who went near it were never seen again. Did the Goblin King kill them and eat them? Did he let them join him? No one knew, and it added to the mystery of the most powerful goblin to ever walk the dust of the Shadowlands.
And he was almost there.
And when he got there?
How would he convince the king to remove this pink humanity and give him back his gray skin before he was killed and eaten?
Maybe it would be better if he was killed and eaten. His nose wrinkled at the thought. He didn’t want to die. He wanted to stop the unnatural pain that had invaded his body when he’d turned human. He closed his eyes for a moment and tried to find the emptiness that had filled him.
Being goblin was easy. Gold and battle, was there anything grander?
There should be. But he didn’t know what, and the memories that held the answer were too raw to explore. He didn’t want to know what had caused the wound, only that it had something to do with the endless screaming.
He had to stop the screaming.
***
Dai’s apartment was suffocating him. He needed sleep and for that he needed daylight. Crossing the globe would test how far he could travel, but he knew exactly where he wanted to go. In a step he was on his way to the Andes. Nestled into the side of an east-facing cliff was a ruined temple. No one had been here for centuries, except him. It was his place when he needed to think in fresh air without interruption. He wrapped the blanket around himself and sat in a corner out of the wind. The sun shone on his face but offered no heat. He didn’t care; he just wanted the light. He was so tired. Tired of running. Tired of fighting.
He couldn’t win, but he refused to be defeated and he wouldn’t surrender.
His eyes closed. What other options were there?
***
Claudius’s cape billowed out and stained the gray sky like a crimson dawn. Again they faced each other in the Shadowlands. Would there ever be a night free of his dream?
Fight. Kill him. End it. Dai swung his sword, ready to fight. But Claudius was dead. He was fighting a nightmare kept alive by the Shadowlands. At the edges of his vision a goblin crept through the blackened, skeletal trees. He risked a glance. Like last time, the goblin wasn’t right. It was…it was more like a man, but he was too swathed in clothing and dust for Dai to be sure.
He frowned. His dream wasn’t right. There were supposed to be goblins, heaps of them. Where were they? This dream was more like a reminder of what it had been like during the first few decades of survival. Hungry and covered in dust, hoping to blend in to the bleak landscape.
Claudius advanced, laughing. “Like old times. A boy in a man’s body. You know how I like it when you fight back.”
He let himself be distracted as he tried to figure out what was wrong with the dream. He stepped back several paces, keeping the distance between them constant. Dai needed to attack, stab his sword through his heart, through his neck…hell, he wasn’t fussy; any killing cut would do.
He kept one eye on the not-quite-a-goblin and one on Claudius. He shifted his weight and drew out a knife for his other hand. It was cold in his palm. He glanced down. Goblin bone. When he looked up Claudius held Mave in a vicious grip.
Dai clenched his jaw but kept the hold on his weapons loose. He would not make that choice again. He circled slowly, inching closer while Claudius grinned like he’d already won. He always won no matter what Dai did.
“Stop.” A hand landed on his arm, coving the Sanskrit.
“Amanda?”
She smiled, and golden light burned his skin and traveled up his sword until it was ablaze. He dropped the blade then realized it wasn’t hot in his hand. He glanced back at Claudius, who stalked closer, dragging Mave with him. Dai raised the knife, ready to throw and kill. He wouldn’t be defenseless. Never again. He wasn’t a slave to be commanded anymore. He would kill Claudius and save Mave.
“Dai.” Amanda held out her hand to him. “Come with me.”
She lit up the Shadowlands with her perfect light. On her body he could see her scars had healed. That didn’t mean they didn’t hurt, but the wounds no longer ruled her body.
“I can’t.” And she shouldn’t be here. “I have to finish this.” His voice echoed oddly across the plane.
“None of this is real.”
“It is…it was.” It still felt real. The fear resurfaced every time he saw Claudius, but he cloaked it in anger and used it to make himself strong.
“You can’t change the past. No one has that much power.”
His eyes narrowed; did he have that much power? Could he unravel the Roman invasion of his lands and save himself? What of Roan and Eliza? They’d never meet. Changing the past would unravel the present and re-create it. Even subtle changes could destroy a thousand lives and re-write history and wipe out cultures.
He couldn’t go back and undo the damage without causing more.
“Get on your knees,” Claudius barked in Latin. Wine soured his breath. It was always worse when he’d been drinking. For a heartbeat, Dai wanted to obey just to get it over with. Gods help him, he was weak.
He should have run the bastard through, but he’d been warned. If he did, his sister and brother would pay the price. So he’d kept his silence and fed the rebellion in retaliation.
“Trust me.” Amanda’s lips curved and promised sweet refuge. Behind her, the sky lightened to blue, and grass pushed through the dust as she brought the perfect beauty of Summerland and turned his nightmare to a dream.
“Obey me, boy, or I’ll have you whipped.”
Dai flinched. Better the leather than the blade. Claudius kept Mave in front of him as a shield.
“Dai?” Amanda’s hand closed over his fist. “Don’t you want me anymore?”
He stared at her. Of course he did, who wouldn’t? She was beautiful, smart, and too kind to be wasting her time on the likes of him. He turned back to the man who made four years of his life worse than two thousand years in the Shadowlands. Amanda’s touch warmed his skin, tempting him. He had to choose where he wanted to spend his nights.
The Shadowlands or the Summerland?
The past or the future?
Battling Claudius or with Amanda?
He lowered the bone-handled knife, not in defeat. He couldn’t fight nightmares of his own creation and win. He saw that now.
But he could banish them. “You don’t own me anymore.”
“I will always own you,” Claudius yelled as he lifted his sword to Mave’s throat.
Dai sucked in a breath but refused to give into the nightmare. He shook his head. “No. I don’t give you that power.” He sheathed the knife and took Amanda’s hand. “I am free.”
The general’s armor tarnished. His body caved in, crumbling from the inside as
if the rot and corruption finally succeeded in eating him. The short Roman sword in his hand became dust as the body of the man who’d been in charge of slaughtering the Decangli toppled over and broke apart.
Mave stepped away from the dust and vanished.
Dai faced Amanda expecting to experience the perfect dreams the Summerland brought. Around them the sky darkened to black, but nothing hid in the darkness seeking his blood. He opened his mouth to speak and ask why he didn’t get a dream.
She kissed him gently, her lips on his for a moment. He ran his fingers ran through her golden hair and held her close, not wanting to let her go. Not ever.
“Sleep,” she whispered in his ear.
And he obeyed her command.
***
Dai’s muscles were stiff and cold. His body was screaming for motion. But he didn’t move. Sleep clung to the edges of his consciousness. Real sleep. The restful kind that he almost forgot existed. He opened his eyes. Above him, the moon hung close to the top of the Andes. He eased his legs out into a stretch after being crossed for too long.
Pins and needles filled his limbs as his blood began to move. He raked his teeth over his lip. The effects of Amanda’s kiss hadn’t worn off. But he didn’t fight the erection pressing against his jeans. He eased the denim and ran his palm over the hardened flesh. The lust didn’t hurt, and it didn’t try to tear him apart. So he let the heat in his blood remain as memories of Seiran, and everything they never got the chance to do mingled with everything he wanted to do with Amanda. He tipped his head back against the rock and let himself sink into the warmth of desire.
The talons in his chest squirmed and adjusted their hold. He clasped a hand over his heart and glanced down. He saw what he already knew—they were still there, trying to squeeze the life out of him. Claudius was gone. What did he have to do to be free?
He remembered Amanda holding out her hand to him in the dream. All he had to do was have the courage to accept what she was offering.
***
Amanda thumbed the pages of Flynn’s psych file, looking for a clue. He’d never appeared suicidal. What had she missed? Nothing. As Dai had said, she’d done everything she could. Sometimes people couldn’t be saved; they had to save themselves. Her thoughts remained on Dai. He hadn’t called her yet and she wasn’t going to make the next move—it was his turn.
It was the first time she’d tried seeing anyone since Matt; maybe she was reading him wrong and he wasn’t that keen. But in her heart she refused to believe that. She saw desire shimmer to the surface in Dai’s dark eyes. That wasn’t a trick of the light or the desperate fantasy of a woman who hadn’t kissed a man since before the birth of her daughter.
If he was attracted, why was he so hesitant?
The easy answer was she was too much work, she came with an instant family with high demands. But that wasn’t the logical answer. The silence was something she saw in her office every day. Each new teen who walked through her door went through a period where they tested the bonds of trust before opening up and revealing their wounds. Was that what was happening?
She pulled out more files that needed attention. If she kept busy, she wouldn’t think about him. Life was much simpler without wondering if he was ever going to kiss her again—outside of her dreams. Dreams that had been disturbed by Brigit’s nightmares. Eliza’s stories of goblins and the Shadowlands had freaked the child out. She would have to talk to Eliza about her choice of bedtime story.
Her cell phone rang. Without looking she picked it up and answered, “Hello.”
“Meet me for coffee.”
Her heart jolted at the sound of Dai’s voice, but she forced herself to remain calm. She wasn’t fourteen. She was an adult. “I’m at work. I can’t just leave.”
But she wanted to. She couldn’t sleep without dreaming of him. There was a moment’s pause and for a second she thought he was going to retract the offer.
“When are you free?”
She might be an adult, but she was too old to play games and make him wait a few days. “I have a couple of hours free this afternoon before I pick up Brigit from school.”
There went her errands and food shopping time, but there was food in the freezer. She could shop tomorrow. She could take Brigit out after seeing the healer and make it a treat with takeout dinner. Amanda closed her eyes as bubbles of excitement began forming in her belly. It was only coffee. She’d drunk coffee thousands of times before…but not with Dai. And he made everything different.
“At the tea house?”
“That would be lovely.” A smile formed on her lips. “I’ll see you in a couple of hours.”
Amanda put her phone into her bag. It would be the first time they were going out without Brigit. She wouldn’t have to watch what she said because her daughter might be listening. And Dai wouldn’t be worrying about watching the girl who looked like his dead sister.
When she got to the tea house on Cottesloe beach, Dai was already there. He was sitting at a sunny table, his hands cradling a cup. His gaze focused on the waves rolling in against the sand. His mask was down. There were no lines of tension scratching his face. She waited a moment, willing him to turn so she could catch his eyes and see how deep the water ran beneath the surface, but he was lost in his own world. He seemed different—like he’d lost substance, yet was more at ease as if just living no longer cost him.
Her lips curved as she slid onto the seat opposite him. “Hi.”
Dai flinched as if she’d woken him, but he managed a smile. For the first time his gaze wasn’t gridlocked with pain and secrets. They were still there, slithering among the shadows, and darting below the surface, but they didn’t have control. Whatever demons troubled him were sleeping at the moment.
“I’m glad you came.” His voice was warm.
A waiter came over and she ordered coffee. Dai asked for another tea, chamomile, and paid for them both. She would’ve argued, but he didn’t seem to expect her to chip in. It was she who wasn’t used to having anyone else pay. She was used to doing everything on her own.
“You don’t like coffee?” she asked instead of dwelling on the reasons why he’d asked her out and what the etiquette should be.
“It doesn’t help my insomnia.” As he spoke she could see his guard going up as if admitting he didn’t sleep was a defect.
He was telling her the things he thought she needed to know before anything else happened. The idea that the strange dance they were doing was drawing them closer was scary and exhilarating, and she had no idea how to do it without Brigit asking what was going on. Brigit was part of her life, a big part, but she needed to carve out something for herself. A few hours of being more than Mom.
She smiled and leaned forward a little. “How much don’t you sleep?”
He took a sip of tea. “A lot. I find it easier to sleep during the day, but it’s not the same.” He turned the cup a full rotation on the saucer.
She waited to give him the chance to continue. He did.
“Last night I slept all night. I can’t remember the last time I got more than a few hours.”
“You must be exhausted all the time.” She had a fuzzy recollection of being up half the night with a new baby, but that lasted only months, not years.
Dai just nodded.
She accepted her coffee from the waiter. The rich honey scent of real coffee perfumed the air. It was so much better than the freeze-dried supermarket stuff she had at home. The smell alone was worth the price.
“Do you know why you can’t sleep?”
He glanced out the window. The fine lines at the edge of his eyes bunched. Amanda wanted to reach out and smooth them away.
“Nightmares mostly. Things I can’t change.”
His sister’s death still kept him awake. She’d been on the beach when Matt had disappeared, but watching someone be murdered must be another level of hell. “Post-traumatic stress?”
He frowned like he’d never heard the term.
&
nbsp; “People who’ve experienced a shocking event or trauma often suffer flashback, panic attacks, and nightmares.” How did he not know this? “You never had counseling after your sister’s death?”
He shook his head and his dark hair skimmed his shoulders. In that moment, he looked younger than thirty-three. How had he never been counseled when he was a witness?
Was he just a witness? Roan never talked about their sister. Was there a family secret Dai wasn’t sharing? Did Eliza know everything about her new husband that she should?
“What about Roan?”
“He wasn’t there at the time.”
“Did you know her killer?”
He looked her in eye. For a heartbeat she thought she’d pressed too hard and he was about to bolt. “Yeah. I knew him well.”
The coffee wasn’t hot enough to remove the chill from the air around them. He was there and knew the killer. She asked even though she was sure she knew the answer. “Did he hurt you?”
“What do you think?” Then he shrugged. “He’s dead now; it doesn’t matter.”
It was no wonder he had nightmares. But if his sister was eleven, it must have been years before. “Can I ask how old you were?”
“Nineteen.” He poured himself another cup of tea with his long-fingered hands, careful and precise.
“It must have been hard on all of your family to lose her.”
“My mother died soon after Mave’s birth. My father…died when I was sixteen. They weren’t there.”
It was just the three of them, and then Dai was responsible for cutting them to two.
“I’m sorry.” Her hand clasped his and he returned her grip.
The room disintegrated around her until it was just the two of them locked together. She held her breath, not wanting to damage the moment. Would he share the rest and tell her what had happened? The tips of his fingers stroked her skin so gently she had to concentrate to feel his touch. The pulse of her blood became the only sound.
His eyes darkened like light night was stealing the day. “I can’t change the past, but I’m trying to move forward.”
