CH194

CH194
My fingers grazed the air above it, and Reese’s eyes snapped up. He looked straight at me, eyes wide with surprise and alarm.
“How are you here?"
The words tore through the clearing, cutting over the chants, over the fire’s roar. I stumbled back. He moved closer, fast, his expression twisting into something cruel.
“You always meddle, don’t you? Always trying to rewrite what’s already been written. Is that your game? You will not win Freydis.” His eyes narrowed and he grabbed my arm. "You should have been mine when I first gave you the chance."
My chest seized. “You can see me?”
“Oh, I can see you,” he said, his voice warped and echoing. “You’ve been a thorn for lifetimes. Who are you in this life?" He smirked, yanking me closer. "You certainly are more… plump in this one."
The words made me want to hurl and punch him. So I did. He reared back with a cry of pain. The air warped again. The torches flared blue. Celeste turned her head, eyes blazing white, and the woman’s voice joined his in a single, terrible harmony, but all I could do was leap for the token.
"Stop!"
I grabbed hold of it, and the world gave out beneath me. I plunged into darkness, tumbling through a rush of color and sound. The echo of laughter, of ice under skates, of a voice whispering my name in the dark and so many other names. The token burned in my hand, but it hadn't stopped pulsing. I whirled through place and time, hearing them chanting. It was nearing its end. I had to stop them somehow.
I pulled at the crystal and a sharp sound cut through the darkness. Then, there was nothing but silence.

I jolted upright in my bed, breath ragged, heart slamming against my ribs. The room was dark. The clock on my nightstand glowed 3:07 a.m.
For a moment, I couldn’t tell if I was still dreaming. I could still feel the token pulsing in my hand. The air in my room felt charged. I swore it was humming faintly. My hands were shaking. When I threw back the blanket, I half expected to see dirt on my skin, ash on my palms, or catch the scent of that forest on my clothes, but there was nothing but sweat and goosebumps.
The memory of Reese’s expression burned behind my eyelids. The greed in his eyes was unnerving. What did that vision even mean? I swung my legs out of bed and padded to the window. Outside, the street was sleeping under a thin veil of fog, the streetlamps glowing like halos. Somewhere in the distance, a siren wailed. In the reflection of the glass, I saw the flicker of light that turned to a faint gold pulse beating out the same rhythm as the token in my dream. It flashed once, twice, and was gone. I pressed my hand against the cold glass. My reflection stared back, wide-eyed and uncertain. The images of the ritual echoed in my head, but the shape and form of the token grew fuzzier.
Shit!
Adrenaline shot through my veins. There was no chance I'd remember enough to explain or describe it if I didn't move fast. My heart was still racing. Then, I shivered. Suddenly, the room was cold enough that my breath fogged faintly as I crossed to the door. I headed into the hall. The townhouse was silent except for the low hum of the fridge downstairs. Lukas’s door was cracked open and a sliver of warm light bled through the gap. I hesitated, then knocked softly.
There was a pause, and then his voice, quiet but awake. “Come in.”
I pushed the door open.
Lukas sat on the floor, leaning against the bed; the lamp on the bedside table cast shadows down his face. He was shirtless and damp. Water still dripped down his chest from his hair, curling and sticking to his skin. I followed the slide of it, feeling my whole body heat up. He was beautiful, sculpted and defined. My hands twitched, itching to touch and embarrassed by the sight. He wore pajama bottoms in plain black, and his books were arranged around him.
His eyes were bright in the low light and too awake for this hour.
“Couldn’t sleep either?” I asked.
He gave a hollow laugh. “Sleep isn’t the problem. Waking up is.”
My stomach twisted. “You’re flickering again?”
"No. Not any more tonight. I simply…" He shook his head, drawing his knee up and running a hand through his hair. “The quiet is unnerving now. I keep wondering if it's just my hearing going out or if I'll fall asleep and wake—” He gestured vaguely toward the air. “Somewhere else or nowhere else. Sleeping during the day is easier for me these days."
I closed the door behind me and crossed the room. His bed was messy. The sheets were tangled, the blanket half-bunched up to one side. A notebook lay open beside him, filled with uneven handwriting and half-drawn diagrams that looked like runes.
“What are you working on?”
“Trying to capture a vision,” he said. “It's slipping away pretty quickly."
"You… wouldn't happen to have a pencil?"
He cocked an eyebrow and offered me one. I laughed, surprised at the wooden pencil.
"You don't like mechanical pencils?"
He flushed a little. "I… broke one. Wooden pencils make more sense to me."
I chuckled and took the pencil, dropping down.
"Have you noticed anything about the flickering? Like a pattern? A feeling?"
He shook his head. "There’s no pattern. Sometimes when I’m calm, sometimes when I’m dreaming, I feel… weightless, I guess. Once when I blinked too long, I felt too heavy.” His voice faltered. “It’s like time is testing how much it can take before I notice, but I can't say if that's exhaustion or actually flickering all the time.”
The ache that bloomed in my chest was sharp and immediate. I scooted closer to him until I was close enough that our knees brushed.
“You’re still here,” I said quietly. “That’s what matters.”
He looked at me then, and something raw flickered across his face. “For now.”
The silence stretched. The words I wanted to say felt heavy in my throat. I reached for the notebook.