Page 57 of The Right to Bear Claws
Finally, slowly, Tobias reached out and touched her fingers with his own.
"Show me," he said, his voice breaking with centuries of suppressed longing. "Show me what I've forgotten."
Kaia's eyes closed, her dreamwalker abilities reaching out to embrace memories that had been locked away in shadow for longer than most civilizations had existed. And Elias, anchored to her through their bond, prepared to witness the birth of a nightmare and, hopefully, its transformation back into something resembling hope.
28
KAIA
The moment Kaia's consciousness touched Tobias's memories, she was drowning in centuries of accumulated pain.
The visions came in waves, crashing over her with the force of lived experience rather than simple observation. She wasn't just seeing his past, she was experiencing it, feeling every emotion as if it were her own.
The first memory was almost beautiful. A young man, perhaps twenty-five, standing in a moonlit garden with hands that glowed with gentle silver light. He was healing a woman's broken arm, the bones knitting together under his touch while she watched with wonder and gratitude.
"You're a miracle, Tobias," the woman breathed. "A gift from the gods themselves."
But even in that moment of triumph, Kaia could feel the weight of his isolation. The way he smiled and accepted her thanks while inside, a voice whispered that she would fear him if she truly understood what he was capable of in the realm of dreams.
"I help people," young Tobias said to the empty garden after the woman left. "I heal, I protect, I use my gifts for good. So why do I still feel like a monster?"
The scene shifted, flowing like water into the next memory. Now he was older, perhaps thirty, standing before a gathering of village elders who watched him with expressions ranging from awe to barely concealed terror.
"The dreams of our children have been peaceful since you arrived," one elder said carefully. "No more nightmares, no more night terrors. We are... grateful."
"But?" Tobias prompted, reading their fear as clearly as Kaia could feel it.
"But there are rumors. Stories from other villages about dreamwalkers who lost control, who became corrupted by the very nightmares they sought to banish." The elder's voice shook slightly. "How do we know you won't become such a creature?"
"Because I choose not to," Tobias replied, but Kaia could feel the doubt creeping into his heart. "Every day, I choose to help rather than harm, to heal rather than hurt."
"And what happens when choosing becomes too difficult? When the nightmares you absorb begin to change you from within?"
The question hung in the air like a poison, and Kaia watched as it took root in Tobias's mind, growing into a fear that would eventually consume him.
Years passed in rapid succession, each memory showing her how the isolation built layer by layer. Communities that welcomed his healing but kept him at arm's length. People who sought his help in desperate times but avoided his company during celebrations. The gradual realization that he would always be useful but never truly accepted.
"I could make them love me," she heard him whisper to himself one night, alone in yet another temporary dwelling. "Indreams, I could craft visions that would make them see me as worthy of their affection."
The temptation was there, real and powerful, but young Tobias had pushed it away with horror.
"No. That wouldn't be love. That would be slavery disguised as affection."
But the thought had been planted, and Kaia could feel how it would grow in the fertile soil of his loneliness.
Then came Elara.
Beautiful, intelligent Elara with her dark hair and laughing eyes, who appeared in his life like sunlight after years of shadow. The memory of their first meeting was so vivid that Kaia could smell the jasmine in the garden where they'd spoken, could feel the warm summer air on her skin.
"You're the dreamwalker," Elara said, not with fear but with curiosity. "I've heard stories about your abilities."
"And what do the stories say?" Tobias asked, already half-prepared for rejection.
"That you walk between worlds, that you can heal minds as easily as bodies, that you carry the power to banish nightmares with a touch." She smiled, and it was genuine, unafraid. "They say you're the most gifted healer our land has seen in centuries."
"And that doesn't frighten you?"
"You've used your gifts to help people, haven't you? To ease suffering and bring peace to troubled minds?"
