AllFreeNovel
Share Us
That sounds like such a load of bullshit to me, but everyone else seems to take it at face value, and Lily looks absolutely stunned.
“I am Sharina,” she says to Lily as she pats her on the cheek. “I am a dream walker. Will you come with me and show me your dreams?”
If I wasn’t so wide awake, I’d swear I was the one dreaming. What the fuck is she talking about? Did I mishear or am I going nuts? Kinda feels like it.
“Yes,” Lily says in a near whisper and lets the woman lead her away.
I can’t allow that. I can’t let us be separated. I have to go with her.
But Lily raises her palm when I try to follow, and whispers, “It's fine. Stay.”
And there’s nothing else I can do.
“Sharina is a healer and a spirit leader of our tribe,” Miriam explains. “Lily is safe with her.”
I’m not all that sure I believe her. Though I can’t sense any real danger from these people, not if I’m being completely honest with myself. Somehow the walk today heightened my awareness of everything and everyone around me. Or maybe that’s happened in the last week that we’ve been here in the middle of nowhere.
But I’m tired and hungry and a lot of weird shit has happened tonight, so I don’t know how much I can still trust my intuition.
The one thing that it’s telling me loud and clear is that I should call Cross and get him to send some reinforcements. And I’m gonna listen to that.
* * *
LILY
Sharina leads me away from the fire and towards the river, her hand that’s still holding onto mine burning my skin like fire. I’m relieved when she finally lets it go and sits on the wooden bench by the water. How did she know this was here? It’s a little lover’s seat type of thing hidden from camp and the rest of the world by tall reeds and grass. You have to know where it is to find it. But that’s secondary in my mind. Primary is the way her glowing dark eyes seem to see directly into my mind whenever she fixes them on me.
She brushes a few strands of hair off my forehead and her touch is like the kiss of the sun on a cold day. Then she presses her thumb to a spot in the middle of my forehead and it’s like I’ve been pierced by a sword of flame.
I recoil from her, breathing hard, not knowing what to say, unsure if I can even still speak.
She smiles at me. “Don’t be afraid. I know what I’m doing.”
Your touch hurts, I could say. But that would sound childish.
“What are you doing?” I ask instead, glad to realize that the firmness in my voice is still there and intact.
“Looking. Seeing,” she says serenely. “And knowing. Relax.”
She reaches out with her hand again and it takes all my will power not to flinch away from her touch.
She cups my check, the sensation hot yet not unpleasant. More unpleasant is her gaze, fixed directly on my eyes, burning. I try to breathe calmly but it’s impossible. And even the cold mists rising from the river aren’t cooling me anymore.
“I see headlights staring at you,” she says. “A car that you’re very afraid of.”
“We saw it tonight, out on the grassland, in the middle of nowhere,” I say. “I think it was following us.”
She nods. “I think it’s been following you for a long time. Since you were a young girl.”
The nightmare is vivid in front of my eyes now, more vivid even than when I actually dream it. She’s called it up, I’m sure of it.
“I have this recurring nightmare—“
“I see it,” she interrupts making my heart race in fright. How can she?
“It’s not something that ever happened,” I say. “I just dream it.”
She nods again and brushes her fingers across my forehead again, the touch not as burning as before.
