Page 199 of Flirting with Darkness

It wasn’t there. When I tried to speak, the memory slipped between my fingers and my tongue felt thick and heavy.

I pitied Granny, stuck here in a house that sent terrors in the night and stopped your tongue and stole away shards of memory, leaving fractured moments that made no sense. We were only trapped for a month, but she said she’d been here a long time. Even if she’d never faced danger in her dreams, the things House showed were terrifying in their own right.

I wondered how long ago the different events we’d witnessed had happened. The sapphire-eyed woman appeared in many of the dream-memories, but she and her guests never seemed to age, so it was impossible to calculate a timeline. Faolán had commented that their clothing looked old, but was that two centuries old or a thousand years?

One lunchtime a few days after the painting incident, I asked Granny about the sapphire-eyed woman and whether she’d been at the house when Granny had arrived for her punishment.

“I never saw the woman you mention performing rituals or holding parties in these walls.” She went to take a sip of peppermint tea, but paused with the rim an inch from her lips. “Though they sound fun.”

I must’ve made a sound, because her eyes widened and she chuckled, shaking her head. “The dancing. It’s been a long time since I danced.” Her expression pinched as she exhaled, then took a sip from the steaming cup.

Biting my lip, I scratched my bandaged arm. Faolán said the itching meant it was healing, thanks to his salve, but at this moment my frustration at not being able to train paled against the sorrow on Granny’s face. I’d taken my body and its fitness and youth for granted. I was lucky this was only a temporary stop to my exercise.

“Still”—Granny lifted her shoulders—“mustn’t complain. These old bones should be dust by now.” Her eyes sparkled as she chuckled.

I couldn’t help but smile back. Her cheer brightened her eyes, making them seem less rheumy, almost blue.

Faolán grunted and hid a yawn behind his hand.

I went to swat him for being rude, but the way the afternoon light set darkness under his eyes and carved a hollowness into his cheeks made me stop.

Admittedly,myeyes were gritty most days since we’d arrived, especially when our dreams were especially strenuous, but great blue-purple shadows haunted his like he hadn’t slept in weeks. And his cheekbones hadn’t been that sharp when we arrived. He insisted he was fine, but the stress of this place was clearly weighing upon him.

I couldn’t save him in a fight the way he’d saved me from the kelpie, but I could give some small help with this.

Instead of swatting his arm, I soothed my hand over it and gave his fingers a little squeeze.

Although we’d stolen plenty of kisses since the night with the kelpie, they were always when we were alone, never in front of Granny. An unspoken lie stood between us: if we didn’t have to explain it to anyone else, that meant it wasn’t real.

And, I told myself, that also meant it wasn’t anything I had to worry about. Even if my heart thudded whenever he touched me and now clenched for how exhausted he looked.

Even if I avoided letting things between us go any further than kisses because of the truth behind our unspoken lie.

It was real.

It was messy. It was complicated. And if I gave in to all I wanted from him, it would only get worse. What would I do once our month was over? I couldn’t stay with him in Elfhame, even if that seemed like a nice idea. Not that he’d asked me to.

Even if he did, I couldn’t stay with him to see the year and a day we’d stated in our marriage vows. I didn’t have time. I had to get back to my family. I had to help them.

Sure, they’d managed without me, so Ari said, but…

They needed me.

And being needed wasn’t the love I’d seen between Ari and Ly, but it was as close as I could get.

Movement out the corner of my eye tore my mind back from the tangled mess of my feelings and tore my gaze from Faolán’s gauntness.

Granny watched us with a small smile, slender hands cradling her cup. The arthritic swelling of her knuckles had gone down, no longer bending the joints out of shape.

Maybe having guests made House spare her from its dreams. We hadn’t seen her there, after all. Most of the time I asked her about them, she only said there were certain things the house didn’t let her speak of. With how pleased she’d been to have guests, it made sense that we gave her a break from the nightmares. I didn’t begrudge her that.

I reminded myself that over the following week as we had still more dreams. Knowing the risks, we were much more careful now, not giving in to curiosity to follow sounds, sticking together at all times. Our plan to simply survive seemed to be working. No matter what we tried, we couldn’t avoid the memory-dreams, though—they came for us eventually.

Twice, we woke in the part of the house we’d been dreaming about, looking around in confusion, but usually we found ourselves in bed with the sun rising.

I still had a few normal dreams—of home, of Ari, of spending time with Faolán. A couple of times I dreamt that I woke and he was gone from our bed. Maybe that was fear of what might’ve happened if I hadn’t saved him in the painting.

Maybe, part of me whispered, it was that I feared losing his companionship, his solid presence, the way he made me feel with his kisses. The way he looked at me like he wanted me—not my help, not what I could do for him, butme.

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