by J M Fraser
Rebecca’s history with Abigail stretched at least as long. Why did Abigail tell Brian in the lot behind Club Intrigue she’d done something so wrong she now embraced darkness in order to live with herself?
Because she’d stolen Rebecca’s quill pen?
No way. Something else was going to happen. Abigail and her cousin would somehow become triggers of the Salem witch hysteria and trials.
The spinning mirror tugged his sleeves. Gently at first. Then stronger. Harder.
Not yet. Not without her. He lurched out of its grip. “Rebecca!”
She raced out of the kitchen but stopped at the sight of the portal. Her jaw dropped. Eyes grew wide. “Get away from it, Brian!”
“No!” He stretched an arm to her. “Take my hand. It’s your only way out of here.”
Rebecca reached. Their fingertips touched.
The vortex yanked him into its darkness.
Chapter 27
“So that’s my tale.” Rebecca’s throat had gone dry from the telling. She stopped twisting the loose thread of a button on her sleeve and glanced across the kitchen table to read the impact of her saga in Agatha Christie’s eyes.
After a slow sip of tea, the writer met her gaze and winked.
Thank goodness. Rebecca leaned back in her chair. She hadn’t lost her World-of-Mortal-Dreams friend despite revealing a chain of events that hadn’t always reflected well on her—the history of intrigue, betrayal, compromise, and fierce commitment from the day Brian somehow appeared in old Salem to their reunion in the hills of present-day Nebraska. Apparently the whole overcame one or two regrettable parts.
“I loved the storybook beginning,” Agatha said.
A moment Rebecca would cherish forever. She closed her eyes and flipped through the photo album of her mind, pausing at an image she once sketched for her poetry book—Brian leaning into her Salem cabin window on the day he changed her life. She’d torn it out before their far more recent evening in Nebraska. Otherwise, his skin would have crawled had he found his perfect likeness sketched in a book drawn by someone who supposedly never met him before. He might have thought her a stalker, like crazy Abigail. “I think Brian fell into Salem during a dream he hasn’t had yet. Otherwise, he would have recognized me in Nebraska.”
Agatha left the table and rummaged in a cabinet. “But you were a real, waking person in this dream of his? Living in the colonies?”
“It’s complicated.”
“That word is the story of your life.” Agatha returned with a silver decanter and two crystal goblets. She uncorked the bottle and poured for both of them, then settled back into her chair.
Rebecca studied the amber liquid inside her goblet. The fragrance hinted at vanilla, raisins, and caramel. “What is this?”
“Brandy.”
“No, not for me.” She shied away from spirits as a rule, even in the World of Mortal Dreams.
“A nip won’t kill you.”
In no hurry to find out, Rebecca ignored the drink and motioned to the window over the sink. A covered wagon lumbered by, scattering a swarm of monarch butterflies from a grassy field dotted with dandelions. The wagon rambled over a rise and continued into the forest beyond. “Look outside, Agatha. You’ve dreamed yourself into the past.”
Agatha hurried from the table to peer out the window. “Early America? I’d have no reason to come here.”
“Perhaps this is somebody else’s fantasy, and you’ve been drawn into it. Such happenings are common here.”
Agatha sighed. “If only I could share one of Shakespeare’s dreams, instead.”
“You can up to a point, if you think about him before falling asleep. But someone like Brian would be able to step into the bard’s waking world.”
“Can you?”
“No.” In fact, she wasn’t entirely sure how anyone managed to jump off the carousel of shared fantasy. The illusions Brian brought with him in his travels rivaled the conjuring ability of the most powerful witches. He’d come to Salem wearing clothes. She’d felt his hand when he touched her. “I didn’t realize he was dream-walking at first. His image was as sharp as a knife.”
Rebecca lifted her goblet. She sloshed the brandy in a circle, then brought the drink to her lips and gulped some down. A rich, fruity, liquid flame burned her throat and watered her eyes. She gasped.
“You’re supposed to sip it.”
“Will brandy help me feel more in control?”
Agatha giggled. “You should have asked before you drank it.”
Rebecca pondered another sip of the horrid drink but went for her teacup instead. The smooth blend helped chase the aftertaste away. “Later, I met others like Brian. They can’t pick their destinations very well, but they’ll follow my suggestion if the place is one they wouldn’t mind visiting.”
Such as the service attendant, Hal, in Sidney. But thinking of her 1940s friend dampened her mood. Stoddard’s comment about not doing enough still rankled. She’d done plenty when she asked Hal to steer Brian north toward her cabin in August rather than letting events play out on their own. Perhaps the prophecy had anticipated a different series of events entirely. What if she broke a predestined chain?
Agatha sipped her brandy with such a show of relish one might almost imagine the drink a pleasant one. She paused to fit a cigarette into a holder, struck a match, lit up, and soon sent smoke rings drifting toward the ceiling. “Why are you so cagey with your young man? You must be bursting to tell him everything.” She set her cigarette onto a crystal ashtray.
Wisps of smoke began finding their way across the table. Rebecca slid her goblet in their path hoping the flavoring might do the drink some good. “Pure witches celebrate evasiveness when courting.”
“And you say the prophesied Rebecca is a pure witch?”
“Yes. So the chosen one can only be me if I am pure, you see? Besides, I promised my mother on her dying day everything would be done a witch’s way.”
Agatha stood. “Did I mention we have a visitor? She’s been waiting in the sunroom.”
Rebecca nearly choked on the smoke. A visitor had been here all this time? And since when did Agatha’s tree house have a sunroom? Stoddard had warned she might lose control, but she never imagined her powers of observation would jump ship, too. Had she somehow become a pawn in somebody else’s game?
She suspected whose game it might be.
Abigail’s.
She followed the writer through a doorway into a bright, flowery room furnished by two wicker chairs and… “What in the world is my couch doing here?”
Agatha trailed her fingertips across its threadbare arm. “She arrived just before you. Didn’t you send her?”
“No, and my furnishings don’t usually follow me around like lonesome puppies.”
The cushion on the right side compressed.
Rebecca couldn’t make sense of the vague message. “You’re getting saggy.”
The couch didn’t respond.
“I need to dust you.”
Still no answer.
“Someone is sitting on you?”
The couch rocked back on its legs, then returned to its proper position.
Why had events careened so far from a predictable course? “What else?”
The left cushion compressed in sympathy with the one on the right.
“Somebody is lying on you?”
The couch rocked back again.
“Who is this someone?”
Nothing.
Rebecca had to know more. A bandit might have strayed across her cabin and broken in! “A ragged, old love seat has so little to tell. Why didn’t you bring my chatty mirror with you?”
The foolish couch turned its back on her.
“I think you hurt the poor thing’s feelings,” Agatha said.
“She’s moodier than I am.” Rebecca stroked a cushion. “I’m sorry.”
The couch held firm.
“Don’t make me beg, couch.” Most likely, Abigail broke in. Who else co
uld her visitor be? Not Brian. He’d never be able to find the cabin on his own. Besides, she hadn’t sensed his arrival.
On the other hand, she hadn’t sensed anyone’s arrival! “Agatha, you’ve been such a wonderful hostess and good listener, but I need to—”
“Run along,” her friend said. “I have a party to attend.”
Chapter 28
Tick, tock, tick, tock. The steady beat of a pendulum clock welcomed him to wherever he’d landed. He’d been sleeping too deeply. Lost his bearings.
Crreeeccchh. A floorboard squeaked.
Bdrbdrbdrbdrd. An electric razor low on its battery?
A small, soft paw tapped his right temple. Once. And again. Oh. A purring cat.
Claws snagged his hair. He shot his arm up and glimpsed a sleek blur of black fur leaping away.
He closed his eyes again. Tried to remember…
His name—Brian.
The cat—Simon.
Where he was.
No clue.
Something new touched the side of his head. Not a cat. Fingers combed through his hair.
He opened his eyes. Rebecca. No bonnet. No Puritan dress. The Rebecca.
But before he could reach out and touch her to be sure, two images from a truly sick adventure stomped through his memory—Abigail and her cousin lurking in the woods, and a sorcerer pretending to be a merchant.
Brian’s pulse shot into overdrive. “I need to get you out of there.”
“Shh. Wake up.” Rebecca’s words came soft and easy, a near whisper so close to his ear that the warmth of her breath puffed every bad thought out of his head.
He shifted up and glanced around. Candlelight flickered against the upright mirror in the center of the room, lighting the bookshelf and the overstuffed chair and sending shadows dancing across the cozy walls of a Nebraskan cabin nowhere near Salem, whether measured by distance or time. He took a slow breath of sweet, non-colonial air. Leaned into the cushions of a familiar old couch.
One stubborn little worry still throbbed in his head, though. What happened to the younger Rebecca he’d left behind? “You didn’t end up marrying a sorcerer, did you?”
She opened her mouth to speak. Stopped. Studied him. Weighing something. “This was no ordinary dream, was it?”
“Not even close.”
A slow smile spread from Rebecca’s lips to her eyes. “Then this will wake you up.” She pushed a cup and saucer at him. “I made herbal tea for you.”
Tea wasn’t his thing, especially with a fruity aroma, but she’d made it for him. He risked a sip.
Gagggg. His throat burned. Steam nearly blew out of his ears. “Did you spike this?”
“I added a dash of brandy. Do you like it?” Judging by the gleam in her eye, she sure wanted him to.
“It’s…it’s…good?”
Rebecca exploded into laughter. She took the cup and set it on an end table, sloshing some of the awful stuff into the saucer from her shoulder-shaking chortles. “I wasn’t nearly as gallant as you when I tried some earlier.”
“Very funny. Maybe you should give it another try and—”
The mirror caught his eye. He needed to stay on point, save the humor for later, talk through everything he’d experienced.
But Rebecca leaned forward, coming so nose-to-nose close she threw him off point by a billion miles. “Welcome back.”
He gave in to the soft, warm magic of her lips. He touched her face. Closed his eyes. Oh, to get lost in the moment, freeze time, freeze the world—she could do that—but he had so many…questions.
Eyes wide open now, he stared into hers. The kiss ended.
Rebecca settled onto the couch beside him.
He fished the Saint Brigit coin out of his pocket. Cold silver, for what it was worth. “So I’m awake?”
“Mm-hmmm.” She rested her head on his shoulder.
“What day is it?”
“Friday night.”
“Yesterday was Thanksgiving?”
“And you came looking for my cabin.” She took his hand and threaded her fingers into his.
Bong, bong, bong, bong, bong, bong, bong. The little pendulum clock pounded the hour from its new home on top of the bookcase. The gift he’d given her back in Madison now held the left side of her romance collection steady. But the chime stopped way too soon. “It can’t be only seven, Rebecca. I was in Salem for hours.”
“Salem, you say?” She flashed a smile as wide as a kid’s on Christmas day. “I wondered when you’d go there.”
Good. Now they could get at it. He opened his palm. “This coin didn’t know whether I was asleep or awake. What’s your theory?”
“Saint Brigit becomes confused when dreams and reality converge.”
“So I was asleep and you were awake, like in your poem.” He left the couch and went up to a mirror shrouded by over three hundred years of mystery. He tapped the glass. Solid. Slid a hand along the wooden frame. Real wood. “I thought this was a portal.”
Rebecca came up beside him. “Did my looking glass make you sleepy?” Her eyes sparkled.
“Or you did, somehow.”
She shrugged. Intertwined her fingers with his again.
“Forget how I got there. What were you doing in Salem, Rebecca?”
“Barely existing until I met you.”
He tried not to get lost in her awesome eyes. He had too much more to learn. “Soooo, you were existing in colonial Salem when I popped into your life, and now you’re over here, where you can tell me all about it.”
Rebecca leaned into him and whispered in his ear. Her warm, intoxicating breath snuffed ordinary sound out of the world, leaving only a faint echo that had to be listened for twice. “Study my poetry, Brian. Find every clue.”
“Clues?” He’d been down that road, but he kept wiping out at the blind curves. “You mean like your aversion to appliances? Did you honestly think I’d be smart enough to guess you lived in Salem over three hundred years ago based on the fact you don’t own a toaster?”
“You were clever enough to find my cabin today, and that’s no simple task.”
Simon bounded out of a corner, meowing for all he was worth. Rebecca headed into the kitchen with him.
“Finding it was no big deal,” Brian called. “I saw the chimney smoke.” Actually, the deal had been a lot bigger than that, starting with a poetry reading from his mom, followed by a sorcerer in the driveway, an endless drive, a nearly hopeless search for the cabin…
Brian’s trip down memory lane veered east to Chicago, where he’d promised his mom he’d stay in contact. He grabbed the phone out of his pocket.
She’d texted him, and the message managed to sift through the local dead-signal zone. Good-bye, Kia, hello, bicycle.
Wait, he typed, I’m with Rebecca and everything’s cool. I’ll call when I head back.
The cat’s cries grew louder. Rebecca clattered around in the kitchen. Sounded like she opened a can and scooped food into a dish. “You couldn’t have seen any smoke,” she called. “I lit the fire after you were already here.”
“No way. It was already going strong. And why are you surprised I found the cabin? Weren’t you expecting me?”
She returned to the doorway, wiping her hands in a towel. “What are you talking about?”
“You left food and a note on the table.”
“No I didn’t.” Rebecca’s wide-eyed bewilderment sent Brian’s stomach into a roller-coaster dive. She was supposed to be the one with a handle on all the mystery.
But this particular riddle had a simple solution—the same stalker who’d been dogging them for months. “Don’t tell me we’re dealing with Abigail again.”
Rebecca settled onto the couch. “No, I don’t think this fits her scheme. She’s bent on defeating the prophecy, not feeding visitors.”
He sat beside her. “Can you at least tell me what this prophecy’s about?”
She didn’t. Not right away. She stared into the mirror instead, no doubt try
ing to figure out whether her code would allow the tiniest sliver of information to be shared. Maybe he’d need to find a prophecy poem.
He nudged her with his elbow. “Come on. Throw me a bone.”
Rebecca turned to him and focused her gray-green eyes into his soul.
He stared her down, cracked a smile.
She did, too. “Very well. A witch named Aislinn made a prediction a thousand years before Nostradamus. Her followers carved her words into stones scattered across Ireland. Aislinn foretold brief shadows like Salem, and much greater darkness later—plagues, famines, wars—all leading to the collapse of the World of Mortal Dreams right about now.”
“That’s bad, huh?”
Rebecca sighed. “I had trouble finding my mum’s dreams recently. I can’t tell you how much that hurt, Brian.”
“Oh. Your mom is—”
“Long dead. But dreams are supposed to last forever.” Rebecca’s sad expression rallied into steely resolve, from pressed lips to laser-sharp eyes. “I found hers, finally, but do you see how selfish I was to think only of her? Mankind won’t survive if the void sweeps all the dreams away. Without the refuge of our dreams, we’d be zombies.”
“What void?”
She shrugged. “I can’t say.”
“The black fog I saw that night behind Club Intrigue?”
Zipped lips.
Great. Back to square one. “Which is it? You know the answers and aren’t telling me or you don’t know?”
Rebecca found a loose thread on the sleeve of her dress and began twisting away on it. “The prophecy is scant on details, Brian, other than saying I will court you the witches’ way, you will learn my secrets, and together we’ll defeat the darkness.”
“This secret-learning is coming real slow, Rebecca.”
She grinned. “You’ve been to Salem. Perhaps you’ll go back to learn more.”
His first instinct was to grab a fistful of couch cushion and hang on for dear life.
“Not yet, Brian. Don’t you know by now we witches love to drag out the mystery?” She leapt off the couch and went to the window. Stared into the darkness. “You asked me something when you awakened just now.”
