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ChapterThirty-Five
SUNDAY
Iknew I was dreaming the second the taste of ash hit my tongue. It was all around me, like swirling gray snowflakes that burned when they got in my eyes. This was my mother’s handiwork. She hadn’t come to me in a dream since the night she held my unborn daughter in her arms. I’d thought I was finally rid of her. I should have known better.
I glanced around the barren wasteland, looking for her. She had to be here. She’d never pass up an opportunity to take credit for terrorizing me. Dread sat thick in the air, so palpable it seemed to have a life of its own.
Whatever my mother wanted me to find wasn’t going to be pretty. Death walked here. But who had she come to claim?
With no landscape to guide me, I picked a direction and started walking. There was little change in the cracked, gray dirt and not so much as a mountainscape in the distance. But on the horizon, I saw a gnarled tree, its empty branches reaching for the heavens as though desperate to be saved.
Unease skittered down my spine, but there was no escaping it. This is what I was here for, and the only way out was to get it over with.
I rushed to the tree, an invisible breeze sending a dark piece of fabric floating backward on the other side of the thick trunk. I squinted but couldn’t make out anything more than that from this distance. Quicker than should’ve been possible, I was in front of the massive elm, my chest fluttering as everything in me screamed something was wrong.
As I rounded the trunk, my gaze locked on the reason for my anxiety. Confirmation.
“Oh, Caleb,” I whispered, horrified at the sight of my confessor.
He hung limply, a noose around his neck, eyes open and glassy, mouth slack. Dark bruises colored his throat, and there was no denying he was dead.
“You can’t be dead. You’re a vampire.”
I had no way to get him down, and from the glow in the distance, the sun was rising. If I didn’t get him out of here, he’d burn. I staggered forward, grasping his legs and trying in vain to pull him down from the branch. Pleas fell mindlessly from my lips as I struggled with his weight.
“Wake up. Wake up.” My voice was barely a whisper stolen by the now howling wind.
Persistent shaking and an urgent male voice pulled me from the dream.
“Wake up, dove. You’re dreaming.”
“Noah?”
“I’m right here. You’re safe.”
I bolted up. “Caleb’s not. Something’s wrong.”
Noah stopped me with a palm on the shoulder as I swung my legs over the side of his bed in his old flat in Blackthorne Hall.
“Sunday, it was just a dream. I’m sure he’s fine.”
“No,” I insisted. “You weren’t there. You know my dreams always mean something.”
He frowned, looking torn. “What happened?”
“Caleb was hanged, and the sun was about to rise. I think it was a warning. I need to get to him.”
“I’ll come with you.” He was already grabbing one of the hoodies I stole from Alek, tossing the fabric at me.
I slipped the soft sweatshirt over my head, then pulled on a pair of leggings. “No. You have to get the others. Bring them to Caleb’s place. If there’s something seriously wrong, he’ll need all of us.” He wanted to argue with me. I could see it in his eyes. “Please, Noah. Trust me.”
“Fine. I’ll meet up with you as soon as I sound the alarm.”
Rising to my tiptoes, I brushed a chaste kiss on his lips, inhaling his spicy scent on reflex. “I’m probably wrong, and he’s fine. I just... this is something I can’t shake.”
The journey to Caleb’s room was a blur as I sprinted toward his door. Heart hammering, limbs trembling with the onslaught of adrenaline, I pounded on it. When he didn’t answer, I tried the knob, but it was locked.
I slammed my flattened palm on the wood, letting out a frustrated growl. The overwhelming grief I’d felt since waking up hadn’t lessened. Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath in an effort to calm down, focus, think.
