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My trembling lips press together, and tears burn my eyes as I fight to keep them from rolling down my cheeks.
Have I imagined them? Was I really here, in this room the entire time?I’ve never had a nightmare or dream where I’ve created people out of thin air, let alone six. It’s always been people I know, like Asmo, Gael, my father, the dungeon guards.
No… I couldn’t have imagined them.Loric and his friends had faces. But in my good dreams, the few I've had over the years, the people in them usually did… It’s only been my night terrors where the others look like figurines, just round, shiny heads. No eyes. No mouths. No noses.
The last thing I can remember is Loric urging me to go to sleep, and dreaming… dreaming of sitting around one of those wooden tables in the cavern, cards in hand. I remember laughing at stupid jokes, drinking faerie wine. It was nice, like I had friends… It felt real, like a fleeting glimpse of a life that could have been mine.
But that dream had twisted, the cavern had melted away and contorted into the white room. The others disintegrated before my eyes and the stone walls morphed into shimmering colorless scales. My father moved about, his back to me as I lay helpless on the altar. The leather straps around my waist, my ankles and wrists are clamped so tight I fear they’ll tear into my flesh like it’s nothing.
The only way I’ll be able to tell if this is in my head is to see his face—or rather, the lack of it. My dreams are too vivid, too realistic to distinguish from reality otherwise.
The scratching of glass and the creaking of wood fill the air, the cold stone leeching the warmth from my skin. Desperation claws at my chest as I pull against the restraints, the leather biting into my skin without mercy. My vision blurs with tears and I let my head thud against the altar, knowing it’s useless to fight it. There’s no way to break free, dream or not.
This can't be real…It can't be.
"What are you doing?" My voice, barely a whisper, trembles and I shake my head.Weak… Weak innocent princess.
My father continues his work, swirling beakers, mixing things together, unflinching, as if deaf to my pleas. How could I have believed I stood a chance at getting out of this place… of finding freedom? Of killing the king? If this isn’t a dream, if I’ve been here, on this altar the entire time, sedated, dreaming of life outside this fucking room… then I’ve officially lost it. He’s broken me beyond repair. He’s won.
“What are you doing?” I ask again, my voice a little louder, but there’s nothing I can do to keep the tremble out of it. “Why am I here? It's not my birthday. It hasn't been a year.”
“Quiet.” His tone is devoid of emotion. That's all I get. One word.
I let out a breath, my body shaking, whether it’s from adrenaline or fear of what’s to come, I don’t know. My lungs clench, as if they’ve been taken in a fist and squeezed, my heart fluttering at a lethal pace.
“Look at me!” This time, I yell. The sheer intensity of it has my ears ringing as my voice echoes off the walls. Slowly, he turns in place, his head hung low, a needle glinting in hand. His shoulder-length blond hair obscures most of his face, and it’s only once he’s mere steps away that I glimpse where his features should have been. The dim torch lights cast an ominous amber glow of that smooth, round head of his.
Never, in my life, have I been happy for that. But as relief washes over me, the world shifts again. The room spins, the altar beneath me seeming to fall away into an abyss. My heart races, my breath coming in gasps. And I wake.
I’m in my bed, in the cave room, the one Vik showed me to. The place I fell asleep in. I’m drenched in sweat, my chest heaving with ragged breaths. My mouth is open on a silent scream, but no sound comes, only a strangled gasp escaping my lips. The darkness of my room presses in on me, suffocating, as if the nightmare clung to the edges of my reality, refusing to let go.
Frantically searching the walls, I look for the paintings from the stories Meg told me, the things that have calmed me for years, but they’re not here. They’re in the cell, back in the dungeon. I push off the blankets, the layers becoming all too suffocating as I quickly untie the cloak, wrenching it off my shoulders. Only then can I breathe.
“Fuck, keep it down, would ya?”
Hyde… She’s still here.
“Yeah, I’m still here. Where did you expect me to go?”
“Are you in my dreams too? Do you experience them?” I breathe, resting my elbows on my knees, feet slung over the side of the bed.
“Fortunately, that’s a no. But I know you have them.”
“Do you know what they’re about?”
“I mean, I’m not dumb. I can guess. But he’s not here, Calamity. If what Asmo did worked, then the king doesn’t even know we’re alive.”
I hold my breath, counting to three before exhaling through my nose. “Easy for you to say. You don’t see him every time you close your eyes.”
“Well no… but that’s mostly because I don’t have eyes about ninety percent of the time. You have them.”
“It’s not a joke,” I grit as the cold begins to settle in again, turning my sweat into crystals on my skin.
“No, but it seems to be helping, taking your mind off it.”
I lower my head into my hands, staring down at my legs.
“Would you look at that… Our skin is turning back to normal. We’re not so damn pale anymore. A little less ghostly, not that it’s your fault, dungeon and all.”
