Page 43 of Sleep No More

“Anyway, this is our room and no one can get into it but us; there’s two beds, so you can rest while one of us keeps watch and the other reports in.” Arden smiled at Nolan. “I’ll take first watch.”

“You are the worst of all possible sisters,” grumbled Nolan.

“Believe me, I’m well aware.” She walked over to one of the two beds and all but threw herself onto it. “I’m also the sister who needs to be a little indolent for a while, due to all the iron poisoning.”

For the first time, Nolan looked concerned. “Are you actually injured?”

“I’ll be fine,” she said, waving him off. “October needs her rest, and I’ll rest with her, and then we’ll all be ready for the chaos. Please go let people know that we’ve returned—and unless you’re given a royal order by an authority we both recognize, don’t bring anyone back here.”

“But—”

“Yes, I know you’re going to get pressured, but ask yourself: is the pressure as bad as what I, personally, will do to you if you disrupt my napping? Come back in an hour and we’ll swap off. You’ll get the nice warm bed, I’ll get the angry purebloods who want their pound of flesh. We’ll let October sleep off the iron hangover.”

Nolan still looked unsure. Arden threw a pillow at him.

“Get!” she ordered. “I’ll see you when you’re back.”

“I’m telling Madden,” he said, and sketched a circle in the air, stepping through it before she could reply.

Arden laughed, sinking down into the remaining pillows. “He can tell Madden as much as he wants. It’s not like Madden’s getting in here without help.”

“Madden?” I asked, as I sat down on the other bed. It was perfectly soft, and smelled of blackberries. I lay down, settling my head in the pillows.

“Best friend,” she said. “Nice guy. You’ll probably meet him later, he’s sort of inescapable when I’m around and not up a tree somewhere. Been with me since Nolan and I were fleeing the Mists, and at this point, I’m not sure either one of us would know what to do without the other. I hope you’ll like him.”

“M’sure I will.” It was getting progressively harder to keep my eyes open. I yawned, the taste of oysters still clinging to my back molars, and wished idly for something else to drink.

Arden was talking again, explaining some convoluted relationship between her brother and her best friend and several people whose names I didn’t quite catch, but I wasn’t really listening. I was already half-asleep, and increasingly unable to focus on what she was saying.

Then I realized she was talking pure nonsense, reciting what sounded like a piece of human poetry as she lulled me down into sleep.

And curse her for understanding the exhaustion that comes after iron exposure so ridiculously well, because it worked.

THIRTEEN

I WASN’T SURE HOW MUCH of the last day I’d spent asleep or unconscious, but I was sure it was more than I was happy about. In my defense, it had all been part of an effort to recover from some horrible experience or other, beginning with “losing too much blood” and ending in “iron poisoning,” and I never intended to do any of those things again. My eyelids felt like they’d been glued shut with something strong and sticky, and as I struggled to open them, I considered the virtues of just going back to sleep, since it was starting to feel inevitable. No one stabbed me when I was asleep.

They did take my knives and throw me into cells full of iron. Iron could cause hallucinations when enough of it built up in the bloodstream, and which was more believable? That I’d somehow been yanked out of the Queen’s dungeon by a pair of Tuatha in fool’s motley and dropped in a pumpkin field, or that I’d already absorbed so much iron that my brain was spinning any story it could come up with to convince me that things were going to be okay?

Things were not going to be okay. I did, however, need to pee, and going back to sleep wasn’t going to fix that. I finally forced my eyes open and sat up, my whole body feeling heavy and slightly disconnected, like my veins had been stuffed with cotton wool. I looked around the circular room.

One of the Tuatha was in the other bed, apparently sound asleep, body turned so I couldn’t see how long their hair was and know whether I was looking at Arden or Nolan. Not that it seemed to make all that much of a difference. I stood, wobbly-legged, and began shuffling around the room, looking for something resembling a chamber pot or garderobe. There were no doors, but there were a few pieces of furniture that could have been wardrobes, and sometimes those served a dual purpose.

My search came up empty. I was contemplating the logistics of trying to hang my rear end out the window, and whether I’d even be able to pee while I was dangling a hundred feet off the ground with no belt or rope, when a circle opened in the air and Nolan stepped through, answering the question of which Windermere was in the bed.

I squeaked, startled, and he shot me an amused look before stalking toward his sleeping sister, one hand firmly held behind his back. I recognized that stalk. It was the one August used on me when she thought I wasn’t looking and was about to do something entirely uncivilized that would never have been allowed if I hadn’t been her sister.

Indeed, when he reached Arden’s bedside, he pulled his hand out from behind his back, revealing a large green bullfrog. “Sister dear,” he said sweetly.

Arden made a grumbling noise.

“Sister dear, the queen wants to see us.”

I tensed. The queen? Oh, but we were on the Golden Shore, not in the Mists. He was referring to Queen Chrysanthe, who hadn’t thrown me in a dungeon any time recently. I forced myself to relax again, and just watched as Arden failed to respond, even when Nolan put a hand on her shoulder and rolled her onto her back.

Then he dropped the frog on her face.

Arden woke with a shriek that was less horror and more indignation as the frog, frightened and confused, launched itself out of the bed with one massive kick of its hind legs. Nolan was laughing like this was the funniest thing he had ever seen, bending over almost double as he clutched his stomach and howled.