Hypnos strengthened his hold over her subconscious, anchoring her to his dreamscape but letting her guide what she saw. He could control her dreams, keep her safe in sleep, but the moment he wasn’t touching her was when her curse would strike.
Rather than ruminating about Pasithea’s visit, Hypnos let himself fall into Iliana’s mind.
He found himself in the same sun-warmed meadow he’d taken her to when she was dying. His memory. Iliana lay on her back in the grass, her face turned toward the sky, amber light softening her features. She looked ethereal. Alive in every way that mocked her proximity to death and the curse hovering right outside.
Hypnos could feel the undertones in her dream; the emotions she’d only recently voiced. There was grief in the corner of the meadow, shadows that didn’t belong in the sunlight. Longing that made the breeze taste bittersweet. Loss in each blade of grass she touched.
He joined her on that grass. “Why here?”
Iliana turned to him, smiling as brilliantly as she had before falling asleep. She shrugged, rolling onto her side to prop her head on her hand. “I’m not sure. It just feels right.”
Hypnos could sense what she meant, even if she didn’t fully understand it.
This meadow was the first place he’d truly protected her. The first place she felt safe since the curse took hold. But it was more than that. He could feel the memory leaking through her subconscious. A different field from a different time. Her father’s voice explaining cloud formations. Her mother’s hand in hers.
The last time she felt absolutely safe.
She’d taken his memory, the peace he’d offered, and woven her own into it, creating a place to remember. This was how she grieved, carrying their memory forward and finding safety in it without forgetting what she’d lost.
Hypnos studied her, memorizing how her lashes outlined her hazel eyes and how the wind toyed with her auburn hair. He reached out and brushed a loose strand from her cheek with his fingers.
“Do you enjoy helping people fall asleep?” she asked.
Her simple question pulled Hypnos from the trance she’d put him in. “It’s satisfying. Sleep heals and gives peace.”
Iliana traced his jaw with a featherlight touch, sending longing through him. “I wish I didn’t have this curse so I could find comfort in your power.”
Something in him cracked. “You aren’t at peace?”
She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Once I’m asleep, it feels amazing. When I’m in your dreams, in the meadow, I feel protected.” Her hand fell onto his chest, over his heart. “But when I’m awake, when I’m trying not to fall asleep…”
She trailed off, and he waited.
“I don’t trust myself,” she finally said. “The curse uses sleep against me, making me hurt myself. So even though I know,” she tapped her temple, “I know you’re protecting me. Even though I want to trust you, there’s this part of me that panics when I drift off.”
Her eyes met his, apologetic. “It’s not that I don’t trust you, Hypnos. I don’t trust what happens when I’m not conscious to control it. Does that make sense?”
Hypnos swallowed roughly. It made perfect sense. She trusted him with her sleep, to keep her safe once she was under. But the act of falling asleep, of surrendering when her own mind had been weaponized against her? That was different.
“I don’t want you to feel that way,” he said. “I know I was an ass when you came to me, but I feel like we’re moving past that.”
“We are,” she told him. “This is about the curse, not about you.” Her hopeful eyes searched his face, then she put her hand on his chest once again. “So…you don’t hate me?”
Hypnos jerked. “I—I don’t.”
Iliana rolled onto her back, staring into the endless dream sky. “Good. I don’t hate you either.”
She said it as if it had never been in question.
“I’ve seen pain,” she breathed. “I’ve lived it, and so have you.”
The dream darkened in his periphery. Her grief was pressing against his consciousness. But there was something else there.
Guilt.
She turned to him again, and he could see it in her eyes. “Am I grieving wrong? Should I hate the world? Should I hate you?”
He could sense the confusion roiling through her, and he could relate. There’d been days when he could barely breathe through the anger, and then days when he felt nothing at all. Laughter, followed by immediate self-hatred for the light emotion.
