The Dream Crafter(34)

“Why not? Telling me that magic doesn’t do anything to you, even if I spoke it to everyone, it seems like that would be a plus for people to know you’re invulnerable.”

“No one’s invulnerable to magic – not completely. Telling people where your strengths lay can sometimes make it easier to figure out your weaknesses.”

She’d have to take him at his word. Magic was something she kept far away from, the same feeling in her gut that kept her away from anything that had to do with dreams. She didn’t want to know. So she’d be safe. The little kid on the bed, keeping her feet under the comforter, because the moment an ankle slipped free, the monster could reach up and grab.

Yeah, worked out well.

“Speaking of abilities…” Merc trailed off, his voice going quiet at the end. He chanced a quick glance at her, but in this dark there was no telling what he saw, and that was if he was looking for something physical. “I want to hear about your brother. You said everything you’re doing is for him, so I’m curious.”

His voice had a slight edge of hesitation, but it also held a warm curiosity, the way he would have spoken their first meeting on the beach. It was wanting information because of interest in who you were talking to, not information to use against someone.

Which was stupid to believe, given the circumstances. He was a mercenary and taking the Spellbook from him had marked her an enemy – or if not that, someone who could not be trusted. The way he kept her awake told of how that hadn’t changed.

But…but but but…

Behind her eyelids all day had been the memory of his hand reaching for her sleeping form, the way his fingers shook as they stroked over her cheek and roamed downwards to feel the pulse at her neck. The way he had hesitated before he laid a finger on her, as if in fear of what he might discover.

The way his fingers curled into his palm, tightening down, as though pushing any remembered sensation deep.

Sharing couldn’t hurt her, could it? Just a little sharing. Only a bit, to not be alone in this anymore, even if only for a moment. Nothing that could be used against her, or Nakoa. A few memories wouldn’t harm anything.

The dark made speaking easier. The dark meant she could pretend his attention wasn’t on her, or that she was dredging up words and scenes she had buried deep as she could, buried so she could survive every day.

It was the dark, and it was more than the dark. It was she was alone with a man who for one brief moment cared for her, someone who against all odds her heart and soul wrapped around, embraced, in a dream world that with him – only with him – she didn’t despise. She didn’t fear. For one moment, there had been peace. “He’s imprisoned. He’s alone, and if I don’t free him, he’ll never be free.”

“Where is he?”

She shook her head in instinctive negation. He wouldn’t understand why Nakoa was there, not without the whole story, and she wasn’t giving him that.

But Merc seemed to understand, because the semi-friendly atmosphere remained, and he didn’t push her answer. “Tell me about him,” was what he said instead.

A smile flitted over her lips, unbidden but so welcome, as her mind started at the beginning, when it was the two of them, small and sure, wandering the island together in adventures they couldn’t conceive of ever ending. “He’s two-and-a-half years younger than me. He was always curious, always getting into everything. He was one of those kids who takes apart clocks and toasters because they want to know how they work, but it’s not enough for other people to tell them. They have to know for themselves. He loved being outdoors more than anything, and being in the water even more than that. He hated reading, but he loved being read to. He was always polite, too. Not in a forced way, but because he was a natural caretaker. He wanted everyone always happy. And he smiled, no matter what. He always smiled.”

“You sound more like a mother hen than an older sister.”

“Maybe I am.” Her pride shown through on that answer, because she had loved being a big sister. She loved holding his hand, and wiping his face, and making sure he was fed, and most of all, she loved the smile he would give her as he looked up at her, as though she were the best thing in the world, better than cookies or cartoons or the chance to go into the waves. He had been her world, and she loved every moment of it, even when those around her told her she should call him a burden or resent him. She never had. Not for one moment.

She hadn’t been a saint. She got mad and she got frustrated. She stomped her foot and occasionally pouted. But resentment? Never.

“And your parents?”