The Changeling (Book One of The Síofra Chronicles) (6 page)

"Have you heard from your McHottie yet?" Becca's voice broke through my wandering thoughts. 

"What was that?" I blushed, feeling bad that I had been caught not paying attention to Miguel's tale of romance found on the dance floor.

"Are you talking about that guy you were dancing with last night?" Miguel asked, his dark eyes pinning mine with curiosity as he turned to face me. He grinned excitedly. "Girl, he was sexy as hell.  Please tell me you gave him your number."

"Um, yeah I did. He texted me this morning and we grabbed a cup of coffee before work," I said, avoiding their gazes.   I knew what was coming.  I could see Becca puff up with excitement and I groaned internally. 

Damn.  Here comes the inquisition.

"And you haven't mentioned it until now?" Becca shrilled, bouncing as she tried to unsuccessfully to give me a reprimanding glare. 

I rolled my eyes at her. "No?  It was only a cup of coffee and we're just friends. Coffee with friends is not exactly BFF-alert material," I laughed, pulling my feet up on the couch and tucking them underneath me.  "Besides, we're not talking about me. We're talking about Miguel and his new love interest."

"Not anymore we're not," he argued.  "I meet guys all the time. You don't.  So when you do it, it's big news.  Stop playing coy and indulge me here. I want to hear all about this man candy of yours."

My face grew warm.

"He is
not
my man candy," I insisted.  "He's a guy I had coffee with."

"And danced with," Becca interjected.

"And danced with.  Seriously, it's not a big deal.  He came into the bookstore yesterday looking for something. He asked for my number, but Sharon ran him off before I had a chance to give it to him. I ran into him again last night at the club. He bought me a soda, and we danced for a little bit. No need to start planning a June wedding."

I shrugged as if it hadn't been as thrilling for me to experience as it clearly was for them to hear about, even though it had been. If I hadn't been so damned distracted by random thoughts of clear green eyes and wavy summer-colored hair during our coffee, I would have enjoyed it even more. Only
I would get distracted by someone I’d had a dream about when talking to a very real and very hot guy. No wonder my dating history was so damned bleak.

“June is played out anyway and all the good venues will already be booked.  April’s a better month,” Becca grinned.  “Now stop stalling and tell me about this coffee date.”

I sighed dramatically, knowing that, for all her pretense, she was enjoying dragging it out of me. Becca liked to make a production of things, and since I loved her, I indulged her.

"It wasn't a coffee date. It was just coffee," I corrected her. "We had coffee and talked, and he stole my bear claw. He reached onto my plate and snatched it out from under me. Who does that?"

"Talked about...?" prodded Miguel. "
Dios Mio
, it's like pulling teeth with this one. Come on, Cassie. Use your adjectives. Descriptive words are our friends."

I grinned at him.

"Tattoos. We talked about tattoos and piercings and mutants."

The memory of the feel of Dom's tattoo under my fingers made heat pool in my cheeks.  Becca didn't miss a thing and smirked at my blush. 

"So are you going to see him again?" Becca asked, her grin so wide I wondered if her cheeks were aching. 

"I don't know," I told her honestly.  "I hope so.  I had to leave and go to work.  I told him I would text him later."

"So text him!" Miguel demanded, looking around for my purse.  "Where's your phone? You should text him now."

"Oh, no. Not right now," I protested as he found my purse and dug out my phone.  "I just got off work and it's late.  I saw him this morning. I don't want him to think I'm clingy or desperate or something."

Miguel considered my words before agreeing and stuffing my phone back in my bag. "I guess you're right, Cass.  Give him a couple days and then text him.  It'll drive him crazy. Maybe a forty-eight-hour texting embargo.  Oh, Becca! Our little girl is growing up!"  He pretended to sniff back tears, and Becca and I laughed at him. 

"Seriously though, Cassie, I'm glad you met someone.  It's about time.  I don't think I've ever even seen you look twice at someone.  I'm not saying you should fall in love every second Tuesday like Becca here...” He cast a sidelong glance at Becca.

"Hey!" Becca laughed, throwing a throw pillow at his head. "I don't fall in love that often!  Lust maybe. Okay, definitely lust."

I snorted with laughter.

"Definitely lust," Miguel agreed. "But what I mean is that it’s nice to see you opening up to someone besides us.  You are a knockout, honey, and if this guy upsets you at all, I'm totally down to make him cry like a little girl."

I climbed off the couch and sat next to him on the floor, resting my head on his shoulder.  He wrapped his arm around my side and hugged me.

"Thanks," I smiled at them.  "I couldn't ask for better friends."

"Damned right," Becca grinned, snuggling up on Miguel's other side. 

As hard as it was being away from my family, having friends like them made it bearable.

I was content to let them continue the conversation while I thought about my morning with Dom. Without realizing it, my thoughts shifted instead to Aleksander.  There was something about him that drew my attention.  Part of me was sad that he was only a figment of my imagination.  I imagined what it would feel like to run my fingers through his hair.
What a waste to dream of someone so vividly that the memory clung to the corners of my mind.  

Miguel stayed for another hour or so and cooked us dinner.  Becca was good at staples, but her restrictive diet wasn't my style, and my cooking skills were limited to boxes of cereal and packets of noodle soup.  Miguel lived in the dorms and didn't have a full kitchen, so we allowed him to take full advantage of ours as often as he liked.  With the three of us sitting around the living room watching television and eating his delicious food, I was perfectly content in that moment.  Life couldn't get better than this.

After my stomach was comfortably full, the conversation reaching a lull, I could feel my eyelids growing heavy.  It had been a long day, and I hadn't woken up feeling refreshed. I bid them a good night and escaped to my room.

I changed into my pajamas and brushed my teeth before returning to my room and climbing into my bed.  I looked at the book of mythology that I had put on my nightstand longingly but realized I was too tired to read it tonight.  I resolved to examine it in more detail in the morning and pulled the covers up to my chin, hoping for a deep dreamless sleep. 

Chapter Seven

I was asleep before my head hit the pillow. Or maybe I wasn't asleep after all.  The tang of salt filled my nostrils, and I jerked my eyes open and sat up so fast it was like a spring had vaulted me back up. 

I was on the damned beach.

"You have got to be freaking kidding me," I growled, flinging myself back onto the ground and shutting my eyes tightly.  If I ignored it, the dream would change. It would go away.

"That doesn't look comfortable." Aleksander's voice carried on the breeze, and I opened one eye and turned my head toward the sound. 

He was sitting on a large rock a couple of feet away, the corners of his mouth lifting in amusement. 

"It's not. The sand is damp, but I'm hoping that, if I ignore you, you'll go away."

"No such luck," he said with a smirk.  "I'm not going anywhere.  I'm your Caomhnóir so I have nowhere else to be. You are the sole recipient of my attentions."

I glared at him, ignoring the way my heartbeat sped up at his words.

"So do you believe me now?"

"No,” I said stubbornly, dragging myself up to a seated position.  "I don't want to believe you."

"Desire doesn't alter reality, Cassie.  Whether you want to believe me or not, this is real, so I suggest you cancel the pity party and we can move on to something productive."

"I'm not throwing a pity party." I glared at him. 

"Aren't you?" he asked, standing up and reaching out a hand. “I’m hoping that there will at least be cake.  A party isn’t really a party unless there’s cake.”

I ignored his hand and climbed to my feet by myself, brushing damp sand off my arms and legs and grimacing as it chafed my skin.  Aleksander reached out and stilled my hands with his, pulling them down to my side as he gently wiped the sand from my skin, soothing rather than irritating it. I inhaled deeply, trying to suppress the tremble beginning in my limbs.   

"So what happens next?" I asked grudgingly.  I focused my gaze on the moons rising in the distance and refused to look at him.  I wanted to be mad but the look in his eyes was quickly diffusing my anger.  It wasn't his fault I was dreaming of this place again.  

"Next we talk about what happened last night.  It’s important to discuss what happened with your friends’ dreams and your negative reaction."

"What is there to talk about? You basically invaded my friends’ privacy and dragged me along for the ride.  It was creepy and wrong and I want no part in it."  Just thinking about watching their dreams made me feel dirty. I swung my eyes back his way, my brows knitting together in a frown.

He pulled a hand through his unruly hair and let out a frustrated sigh. "Cassie, it's not what you think.  I tried to explain this to you last night but you didn't want to hear anything I had to say.  If you’re ready to listen, perhaps I can explain why we watch the dreams.  Maybe if you understood why, you would feel better about it and know that we mean no harm.  We are there to protect mortals.  There's no entertainment value in it."

He held his hand out to me. I ignored the shiver that ran through my body as my fingertips made contact with his.  He let out a breath and closed his eyes for a moment, his face screwed up like he was concentrating on something.  Opening them, he led me into the forest, never relinquishing my hand.

I wanted to pretend like I didn't enjoy the feel of his hand around mine, but it was difficult to ignore the butterflies dancing in my stomach at his touch.  His hand was warm, and the firm pressure was comforting.  He wasn't the reason for my frustration, and it was time I stopped punishing him for it and gave him the chance to earn my anger instead of giving it to him for free.  

I took a deep breath and forced the irritation out, following quietly behind him through the trees until we broke through the greenery surrounding the Pool of Dreams.  He walked directly to the large boulder hanging low over the water and tugged my hand, pulling me up onto the smooth stone surface alongside him.  The water, still as glass below us, lit from within and continued its constant projection of dreams.  It was a beautiful light show that mesmerized me, and I longed to look into its depths again.  

I stretched out on my stomach on the rock and peered over its edge, telling myself I didn't notice the warmth of him as his body stretched next to mine on the narrow stone, that I wasn’t aware of his eyes on me. Instead, I forced my eyes on the water below, caught in the images dancing on the surface.

"What did you mean when you said you protected the mortals?" I asked after a few moments, curiously watching the scenes in front of me.

As wrong as it felt to watch my friends, I didn't feel the same hesitation about watching other people. I should have felt embarrassed, but I wasn't. I was a hypocrite, and I wished it would bother me more than it did. Instead I felt detached and curious as the images danced before me.  Aleksander had said that the dreams didn't hold any entertainment value for him, but I couldn't claim the same. I was too curious.

"We watch their souls while they wander.  Being outside their bodies makes them vulnerable, and it’s our task to safeguard them while they journey through the Dreaming," he explained soothingly, so close that I could feel his breath tickling my ear. 

I closed my eyes, ignoring the warmth flooding through my stomach, and forced my focus back on his words. "So you said yesterday that people
can misuse the Dreaming.  Is that what we're watching for?"

"Among other things.  Consider a nightmare.  They can be terrifying, overwhelming even, for the dreamer.  The harder you try to run, the slower you move. It’s a vortex of fear that humans create and then find they can't escape from.  This is one of the things we watch for.  If a soul is too consumed in their fear, they may never return to their body and fail to awaken.  Worse still are those who struggle so strongly against the constraints they create that, when they do free enough to run, they run in the wrong direction and sever their mortal tether."

I felt the blood drain from my face. 
Sever their tether?  

"What happens then?" I
asked, not wanting to hear the answer.

"They die,” he said sadly.  "It doesn't happen often.  The mortal tether is strong, but the older the body becomes, the weaker that link is.  The mortal simply dies in their sleep, so terrified of their dreams that they lose themselves in the fright."

I stared at him, horror flooding my thoughts and bile climbing my throat. A hazy half memory of dark, empty eyes, ice-cold hands, and mocking laughter caught me for a moment, sending a tremor of fear through my body.  Sometimes my dreams were so dark I was convinced I was going to die.  It was scary to realize that the danger had been real after all and worse to think that I had done it to myself, creating the perfect storm of fear all on my own.

Aleksander's eyes were sympathetic and full of compassion as he stretched his arms around me and pulled me into his chest.  I lay in the circle of his arms, resting my forehead against his chest. I refused to think about the paralyzing cold of my nightmares and forced my thoughts instead to how pleasant he smelled, like musk and amber, or the warmth of his chest against my cheek. I listened to his heart beating and let the rhythm calm me. My anxiety eased, replaced by a sense of wholeness and peace that had not existed the moment before.

“I’m sorry, Cassie.  I didn’t mean to upset you.  I find myself doing that more often than I would like," he said thickly.

Part of me wanted to stay there in his arms, feeling safe from my own fears.  I was so good at avoiding things that upset me, and I wanted to do just that—bury my face in his chest and pretend that I wasn't as scared as I was—but that wasn't why I was here.  That wasn't why he was showing these things to me. I couldn’t always hide myself away from things that scared me.

"No. No worries," I said as I untangled myself from his arms.  "It's not you.  It caught me off guard.”  I rolled back to my place on the stone, wiping my eyes surreptitiously and willing myself to stop being such a needy coward.  

"Fae are empathetic creatures, Cassie," he said soothingly. "It is only natural that you feel sorrow for such a loss.  It’s why we were entrusted with the duty of watching over the souls in the first place."

I flicked my gaze back up to meet his, oddly comforted by the sympathy I found there.  I felt some of the pressure in my chest slacken and nodded, feeling less alone in my sorrow. 

"Isn't there anything we can do for them?" I asked.  The thought of helplessly standing by while others were slowly suffocating themselves in their fears was repulsive. 

"Yes there is," he explained, appearing pleased with my desire to help.  "When we see nightmares like this occurring, we can intervene.  We can shock the mortals back into their bodies or use the Dreaming to alter their nightmares so that we can nudge their souls back to their bodies." 

He gestured toward the Pool, and I watched as it flashed and the color shifted, bringing with it a new dream and a new dreamer.

"Can you show me?"  I wanted to help the dreamers, wanted to spare them their darkest moments. I didn’t want anyone to feel the paralyzing fear that had been my dreams lately.

"Better than that, Cassie," he responded, his lips turning up into a smile. "Nightmares aren’t as common as you would think, and it can be dangerous even for a seasoned Fae, let alone a Síofra. I will teach you how to nudge the souls in pleasant dreams first."

He reached down toward the Pool, slowly putting his hand up to his forearm into the still water. The water did not ripple or shift at all where his hand disturbed it. It accepted it, swallowing his arm.

Aleksander focused his eyes on the still liquid, and I could see a small ball of light forming in his hand under the surface.  He closed his eyes and his face contorted with concentration.  As he did, the ball of light in his hand grew brighter and larger. He grunted with the effort, and the light flared brightly, filling the entire Pool in a flash. 

The ball of light faded and nothing was left of the dream's image. He slowly withdrew his hand, his arm still dry. 

"What happened?" I asked excitedly.  "What was that light?"  I had seen that it before, luminous and bright and shocking.  I struggled to recall where I remembered it from, but the image danced at the edges of my memory, teasing me.

"That light," he smiled as he rolled onto his side and looked at me, “was a manifestation of love.  When you learn to control your power, you can draw on it to create.  When the light grows too bright, it surrounds the dreamer and startles them, pushing their soul back toward their body.  It can be draining, but it’s worth it to keep the souls safe from themselves."

I watched the water shift and show me a girl who looked near my age. Her dark hair reminded me of Becca.  In the image, she was dancing in a dance studio, her willowy frame turning and spinning in front of a wall of mirrors in a room full of sunlight. It was beautiful to watch.

"Show me how?" I asked, mesmerized with the dancing girl. 

Aleksander rolled back and leaned into my side again, whispering instructions, his breath warm and pleasant as it tickled my face. "Put your hand into the water.  It will resist. Ignore it and push through.  The resistance is the barrier between Otherworld and the Dreaming. You must have your hand firmly in the Dreaming for it to work."

I leaned over the edge of the stone, reaching down and letting my fingertips skim over the smooth surface.  It was warm to the touch and felt odd.   Aleksander nodded in approval, and I took that as my cue to push through. 

He was right. The surface resisted. It felt like one of my mom’s gelatin molds—neither a solid nor a liquid but somewhere in between.  Pushing harder, I felt my hand free from the gelatinous water into nothingness.  I was in.

"What next?"

"Okay, now this is the difficult part," he said, leaning closer and watching my hand.  "You need to think of someone you love.  It doesn’t matter who it is, but you need to do it now.  A happy memory usually works best."

As the graceful dream dancer turned and spun, her glossy dark hair whipping out in a fan around her, I thought of Becca.  She was my best friend, closer than my sister, and I would have died for her.  I focused on those powerful feelings and felt my palm tingle with heat. 

There in my palm rested a small ball of white light the size of a golf ball.

"You are doing well, Cassie," Aleksander encouraged.  "Now, concentrate harder. Focus all your warm feelings, all of the love you have in your heart, on this little ball and help it grow. Feed it your love."

I thought of my parents, of my brother and sister, even Miguel. Those I loved the most.  The ball of light grew slowly and then wavered, as if changing its mind and shrinking again. 

"Concentrate, Cassie." He put his hand on my back and started rubbing a small methodical circle with his thumb. 

It sent a surge of heat through me, settling low in my stomach.  I turned to look at him and found his face so close to mine that our lips almost touched. My breathing hitched as I stared into his eyes, neither of us speaking.  I ignored the heat growing in my hand and felt only the wild beating of my heart as I saw the longing in his eyes.

A growing glare in my peripheral vision distracted us both and Aleksander's head snapped back toward the water.