Page 10 of The Dark Mirror

‘Nick. We met up in Copenhagen in June, and he asked me to put my contacts on the case. He was planning to return to Sweden, but he had managed to visit London, back in April.’ She accelerated out of the fuel station. ‘How long were you in Poland?’

‘I don’t remember.’ My eyelids drooped. ‘I don’t … remember anything. Not since March.’

‘Wait. The whole time you’ve been missing?’

I couldn’t answer. My strange new dreamscape was calling me back.

Something made me stir. I tried to rise from my slumber, but the world felt so heavy. When I did manage to crack my eyes open, I realised I was in a bed.

Maria paced in the gloom with a phone. Even though she was close, her voice sounded distant, unintelligible. I lifted my head an inch off the pillow, drawing a tiny sound of exertion.

‘Paige.’ Maria was there at once. ‘Paige, it’s Maria. You’re in Prague.’ She brushed my hair off my clammy forehead. ‘Did someone give you white aster?’

‘Cordier.’

‘Who?’

That was the last I heard. My dreamscape closed like a flytrap around me. I sank into the shadows of my dreamscape, where I lay among the blooms until voices woke me again.

‘… waterboarded in London. I don’t know how to get her to wake up, let alone drink.’

‘You should have called sooner.’ A new voice. ‘She must have taken a great deal.’

‘Paige has never touched drugs, to my knowledge.’

‘Sometimes it only takes a bad day. Unless you think it was given to her by force?’

‘That is exactly what I think, and when I find out who—’

‘Shh.’ The bed sank to my right. ‘Paige.’ My lashes fluttered, but everything was too blurred to see. ‘Paige, my name is Verca, and I’m here to help. Can you hear me?’

‘Mm.’

‘Listen to me carefully. Do you remember when your birthday is?’ It was a long time before I could think of it. ‘January,’ I murmured. ‘January … the fourteenth.’ A music box, a whistling bird. ‘Very good.’ The new voice grew louder. ‘Paige, I really need you to stay awake, okay?’

‘I hate seeing her like this,’ Maria muttered. ‘What is happening, Verca?’

‘It’s a whiteout. A severe overdose,’ came the quiet reply. ‘I have only seen this once before. We have to act quickly. If she slips any deeper into this state, she could lose all her memories.’

‘You mean she’d forget who she is?’

‘Yes, but she’s fighting. We have time to stop it.’ A warm hand touched my arm. ‘The blue aster in my case. Bring it here.’

My awareness returned in small bursts. A rustle, and then the coarse snap of a lighter. I opened my eyes to see a swirl of bluish smoke, smelling of violets.

‘Breathe in, Paige.’

Out of nowhere, a memory flashed, a shard of a mirror catching the sun: someone else, another woman, forcing white flowers up to my face. The scent of them, sickly sweet, on a cloth.

‘No.’ I tried to twist away. ‘No—’

‘Paige, it’s all right.’ Maria grasped my good wrist. ‘You can trust us. You can trust Verca.’

I did trust that voice. Surely I could. But then Eléonore Cordier loomed, a shadow on the snow, promising me it was all for the good. She had lied. Still, I could hold out no more.

I breathed in.

By the time I woke, the world was golden. I blinked a few times, trying to remember where I was. An ache lingered in my temples. I lay on a low bed, my hair greasy, throat dry as sawdust.

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