Page 36 of Synodic

“Over and over again? Keira, you’re scaring me. I think I should call your parents,” she said, lifting her phone.

I cursed the day I invited her out for dinner with my family. My parents had taken to Natalie instantly. She learned all about them, what they did, their practice together. She’d been fascinated, asking question after question all night long.

By the time dinner ended, she and my mother had exchanged numbers, acting like long-lost friends. “Call me if you ever need anything,” I remembered her telling Natalie. It was always so much easier for her to talk to total strangers than it was to her own daughter. I thought bringing her would be a nice buffer between mine and my parents’ skirted conversations, not something she could use against me later.

“No, I’ll be alright,” I said frantically as I shook off the memory. “Natalie. I’m honestly fine. Actually, I haven’t felt this good in a really long time.” I hoped she could hear the sincerity in my voice because I wasn’t losing Luneth. Not again. “Please don’t say anything to them.”

She dropped her phone to her side reluctantly. “Fine, but if this happens again, Iwillcall them.”

Her intrusion into my personal affairs was not her place, and she was beginning to feel like a glorified guard, but if she called my parents, I would be committed. With a press of a button, Natalie could take it all away from me.

“It won’t,” I said, hoping I convinced her.

“What is going on with you?”

“Please. Can you just trust me?”

“One more scream, Keira, one more and I’m calling them,” she said in warning as she retreated from my bedroom, and I knew she meant it. “Make sure you at least wrap that arm.”

I’d been holding my breath, and I collapsed to the floor as soon as she was out of sight. Everything was crashing down on me, and I was trying to process whether I felt scared or relieved. Maybe a little bit of both.

I needed to see Rowen again.

The problem was, I wasn’t even remotely tired, and there was no way I was going to wait around until I fell asleep, to stand by helplessly and see where my traveling deemed to plop me next.

I would have to force the hand, take control, and choose where I wanted to go. No more waking up lost and confused. I’d had enough of that.

There were instances my body had been active on Earth while some part of me existed on Luneth like an astral projection, which accounted for my blackouts in time. But there were others where I’d been entirely present on Luneth’s plane, both in body and soul, hence the muddied slippers and bruised arm.

Perhaps if I was intentional with the crossing, my body would follow suit.

It was an interesting theory, one I planned on testing, but before I went anywhere, I needed a shower—to wash the disgusting feel and smell of Graem off me. His simple mind had struggled to comprehend that I was a woman. He’d been so sure I was the man he’d been expecting. But what did I have in connection with this mysterious male prophecy everyone was talking about? It seemed no one knew.

I quietly tiptoed down the hall, not wanting to draw Natalie’s attention. The last thing I needed was her bombarding me with more questions I could scarcely answer myself.

I finally reached the bathroom, closed the door behind me, and turned the lock. Flipping around, I rested my head against the sturdy surface of the door and tried to breathe. I looked down at my hands; they were shaking. I must be in shock.

I couldn’t believe how close I’d come to dying: just now with Graem, back at Weir Falls, and who knew how many other countless times when I’d been trapped in the darkness. I’d been blissfully unaware that my body could indeed suffer physical consequences when in my dream-like state, and my stomach turned at the thought. I dashed to the toilet and retched, heaving painfully until there was nothing left in my stomach.

Trembling and exhausted, I stripped out of my shorts, bra, and underwear, and threw them in the trash bin.

I entered the shower and sat under the deluge of scalding water, waiting for my shaking to subside. This was it, my time to reconsider. To turn away from Luneth forever and go back to the life I knew, as empty and hollow as it was. Or, I could return and help fight the impending darkness that closed in around the Wyn people.

The choice was finally mine to make.

But I felt Rowen, the land, and the village all over me,withinme. I could never deny Luneth. Not again.

I had made my choice long ago.

* * *

Stepping out of the tub, I left trailing wet footprints along the patterned tile as I grabbed a towel and wrapped it securely around my body.

Standing in front of the foggy mirror, I swiped my hand across the steamy surface, revealing the band of my brow.

My eyes!

Harlan had mentioned something about them looking different, but I hadn’t really noticed it until now. They used to be dark and cloudy. My dad would joke that my eyes hid my secrets, and who knew what mysterious creature swam just below the opaque surface.

---