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But what was he seeking to gain by entering her world like this?
More important, how was he doing it?
Pinfeathers blinked, his black eyes remaining downcast. Tilting his head to the side and knitting his brow, he seemed to contemplate the question. He didn’t answer, though. He only looked the other way, toward the Christmas tree, so that with the next flicker from the television, Isobel caught a glimpse of the jagged hole in his cheek.
It made her wonder—if he could reconstruct his arm and side, what kept him from doing as much for his face?
But there was something in his demeanor, in the heavy way he sat, that warned her against asking and launching the opening bid for a match of verbal tag-you’re-it with the Noc.
Instead she shifted her weight from foot to foot and kept her eyes trained on him, waiting for him to speak or move again. When neither of those things happened, Isobel’s anxiety began to build, its intensity magnified by the ticking of the clock on the mantel.
The clock.
Isobel shot a glance in its direction long enough to see that the second hand moved at its normal pace.
That time remained steady helped to solidify the notion that she had to be awake. And why was he just sitting there anyway? Was he waiting for her to offer him leftover Christmas cookies and a glass of milk?
Finally his sullen silence became too much.
Raising the trophy, she took a quick step toward him, feigning the intent to strike, as though he were a snake she could scare off.
His eyes alone flicked up. He shot her a withering glare.
“Mature,” he said.
Isobel felt her face burn. His response, so infuriatingly snide, left her wishing she’d gone ahead and taken a crack at his jaw instead of pretending. Now she’d given him the upper hand, the knowledge that she wouldn’t attack unless she had to. Something even she hadn’t known until that very moment.
“You’re—You’re not supposed to be here,” she said, stammering in her effort to remain calm.
“We could also argue that I’m not supposed to be,” he replied. “But one thing you and I seem to have in common, cheerleader, is our knack for existence. Though it would appear I’m not quite as adept at evading destruction as you. For there you are.” He pointed at her with one curved claw. “Yet . . . here am I. And if you look carefully in between, you can see everything we knew would happen. Or wouldn’t,” he added with a flippant wave.
His gaze returned to the floor.
Isobel shifted uncomfortably where she stood.
While she was used to his speaking in riddles, she didn’t know what to make of his uncharacteristically dour mood. Was it just a show? Another game?
“Look,” she said, raising the trophy again and aiming it at him as though it were a gun she could blast him into bits with. “I already know this isn’t a dream. So tell me how you’re doing it. How are you entering the real world again?”
He laughed, a low, deep sound that sent a cold shiver running through her.
“Still so convinced that everything revolves around you,” he said, at last drawing himself to a standing position, his spindly frame towering over a foot above her own.
Despite the sudden rush of adrenaline that gushed through her veins, Isobel refused to allow her body the backward step it so desperately wanted to take. Instead she remained rooted, determined not to do or say anything else that would betray her escalating fear. Even though she knew Pinfeathers held no power to harm her physically, everything about him, from his caustic voice to the twitchy birdlike way he sometimes moved, terrified her.
“Dreaming aside,” he went on, “how can you be so sure your world is the real one?”
Without waiting for an answer, he began to take slow and cautious steps toward her, as though she were the cornered animal poised to either strike or bolt.
It was certainly how she felt.
Widening her stance, Isobel clutched the trophy close to her, wishing it were an ax instead of a flimsy piece of plastic affixed to a tiny block of granite.
“I swear, if you so much as try to touch me . . . ,” she warned him, the threat trailing off as she began to consider her options.
Now that she was face-to-face again with the nightmare creature in all his gruesome glory, he appeared less vulnerable than she remembered. Not only that, but Isobel couldn’t seem to recall why she had thought the trophy would have done her any good as a weapon. Why did she seem to have a knack for trying to defend herself with stupid objects anyway? Why hadn’t she done herself a favor, feigned an interest in baseball, and asked her parents for a Louisville Slugger for Christmas?
Unable to hide her fear any longer, she began quivering all over, her stomach clutching at the memory of the monster’s thin, pale lips fastened to hers. She couldn’t take that kind of torment anymore. Worse, she didn’t know what she would do if he dared assume Varen’s form in front of her even one more time.
