Focusing on the door, I rose and opened it.
I stepped into Elle’s dream.
Elle is in the market of Hereswith, accompanied by two of her sisters and her father. Things feel normal but the light is gray, and distress ripples at the edges of the dream, like the pounding of a distant drum. The mountains are dark shadows in the distance, but fires burn along their slopes, marking the fortress in the clouds. Night falls, sudden and nonsensical, and the crowd in the market vanishes in a blink. Elle is alone, searching for her father, her sisters. A cold mountain wind blows, rattling shop signs and scattering loose papers on the street as Elle runs from door to door, knocking, begging to be let in. They are all locked, the windows darkened, shuttered. And then comes a different noise. One that pierces Elle’s heart with fear.
Heavy footsteps. They meet the cobblestones slowly, deliberately, clinking like strange music.
At once, Elle’s thoughts race.
Hide, hide. Whatever it is, don’t let it find you. Hide . . .
She runs through the streets but there is nowhere to hide, and the heavy footsteps faithfully follow her. They grow louder—closing the distance between them—and Elle whimpers as she tumbles back into the market green. She crawls toward a wagon and cowers beneath its bed, crying, although no matter how hard she tries to scream for her father, no sound emerges from her mouth.
She finally sees a glimpse of the one who is hounding her, whose tread makes that strange music.
A knight is walking to her, as if he knows exactly where she hides. She sees him from the knees down as he approaches the wagon in those measured, heavy steps. His armored legs and feet gleam silver in the darkness. Plated steel and rusted with blood.
He unsheathes a sword, but he lets the tip of it drag along the cobblestones at his side, as if he wants to hear the tempered steel screech and spark against the rock.
He comes to a stop, directly before the wagon. Elle trembles, stares at his steel boots, the edge of his sword. And then she hears the creak of his armor as he begins to bend, to crouch, reaching for her . . .
I jolted.
The dream had broken, spitting me back into reality, and I drew in a deep breath.
I was sitting in the Fieldings’ cottage. The afternoon was warm, the light golden as the family gazed at me, and yet I felt the chill of Elle’s nightmare. I could still hear the echo of those strange, armored feet that had followed her. The ring of the sword dragging on the stones.
Who was he? I wondered, glancing at Elle.
But I couldn’t ask the girl. Not now, with the dream lingering like smoke in the air, choking us both with fear.
I took up my quill and ink and recorded the nightmare swiftly in the book. My hand trembled; my penmanship was slanted and riddled with blots. Papa would no doubt notice later when he read it and asked me why this nightmare bothered me so badly.
“Well?” Spruce Fielding prodded when I had finished the recording, shutting the tome.
I looked up. “Well what?”
“What was the dream? Why won’t she speak? Was it truly so frightening?”
I didn’t reply. I began to gather my things, shrinking them back into my pocket until I remembered the remedies. I had brought five, and I withdrew the glass vials as I stood from the couch.
A swallowed remedy kept dreams at bay for an entire day. The good ones as well as the frightening ones. If drunk before bed, a person would experience a tranquil sleep. An inner fog, culled of dreams. Like my sleep, every single night.
I handed the first one to Elle. Then I moved to Elizabeth and gave her a vial. Next, the oldest sister in the kitchen. And lastly, I enchanted the remaining two remedies to float up to the loft, where the roosted sisters continued to observe. They reached out in awe when the vials hovered before them.
“I didn’t ask for any remedies,” Spruce said, wringing his hat again. “I can’t pay for them. Why did you—”
“I know you didn’t ask for them,” I cut him off, weary. I smiled one last time at Elle and Jane Fielding before turning to leave. “I give them to your daughters freely, but I would like a word with you, sir.”
Spruce followed me outside into the yard. The sun had already set behind the mountains and the shadows were long and cool. Dusk was coming, and I felt the urge to get home as quickly as I could.
“I know what you’re going to say, Miss Clem,” he said.
I arched a brow. “Oh? And what is that, Mr. Fielding?”
He raked his hands through his thin hair. “My daughters shouldn’t be playing Seven Wraiths. I know your father disapproves of the game. I know it makes his work that much harder, with nightmares sprouting up like weeds, thanks to the cards being dealt. But I can’t keep my daughters from playing it. They’re of Seren ancestry; both my and Jane’s families hail from the mountains. And so my daughters will continue to play the game, even with the threat of nightmares, just as Jane and I once did. Because we long for home, even as it lies in ruins, doomed. Even as we have never seen it with our own eyes. Only in dreams do we behold it.”
Silent, I listened to his every word. I knew the Fieldings were of mountain descent, just as Imonie was. I knew they would not be able to return to the home of their ancestors until the new moon curse was ended. But I didn’t think such a spell could be broken by playing a game of enchanted cards, which had ironically been inspired by the same curse. In particular, by the seven members of the mountain court who had each played a hand in the Duke of Seren’s assassination.
“It’s not my place to tell you whether or not your daughters should play the game,” I said. “All I wanted to do is to remind you that the new moon comes tonight. Ensure your shutters are bolted, your doors are locked, your family and livestock are all safe inside tonight, Mr. Fielding.”
“As I do every new moon, Miss Clem,” he said, somewhat indignant. But then he seemed to realize what I was implying, because his scowl and voice mellowed. “You don’t think . . . that my little Elle’s nightmare will manifest tonight?”
I didn’t know. But it inspired a tremor in me when I imagined coming face-to-face with the armored knight who reeked of violence, who had threatened a little girl. I had to confess that Elle’s nightmare had felt alarmingly tangible. It had fooled me for a span of terrifying moments, when I had been her, believing everything was real and unfolding, as if I could have reached out and touched the cold glint of the knight’s bloodied armor. And perhaps it was only due to my inexperience with divination, and perhaps it was only due to the fact that this nightmare had been spawned by a sinister card game. But it felt heavier than the others I had encountered.
I glanced at the mountains. If the new moon chose to spin Elle’s nightmare when the stars began to burn . . . the knight wouldn’t be a wisp in a dream. He would be flesh and blood encased in steel, and his sword would be ready to cut.
I wanted to know who he was, what he wanted. If he was inspired by someone.
I bade Spruce Fielding farewell and began to walk home, my gaze on the sunset. But I feared I wouldn’t be able to find the answers I sought. Not until I challenged the knight in the streets of Hereswith.
4
“Miss Clem!”
I was just coming upon the market, which had become vacant as shops closed early for the evening, when I was intercepted by a frantic Lilac Westin, the revered baker in Hereswith. Flour dusted her face as she all but collided with me.