“I… This is hard.”
“It is not,” I coax her, caressing the tops of her cheeks with my thumbs. “It’s so much harder to keep this wall up. Letting it crumble will be a relief, love.”
“Stop calling me that.” Her whisper is defeated and soft, and I sigh in despondence.
“Of course.”
I don’t complain about her taking away one of the few ways I have for pretending that she’s mine.
“And… All right. I’ll just… Let it fall.”
She shakes, then the skin around her eyes softens, and I surge in, out of the cold and into her. We both gasp, her fingers twitching around my face, my body pressing closer, until we’re tangled together, nose to nose, her breasts rising against my chest with her every rapid inhale.
Inside, Jaga is a complex landscape, dark red, hard-edged, with shocking pockets of softness and deep pools I could drown in. Trees grow here, tall and naked, heavy with moss. Things chitter and scuttle in the dark, among the blades and spears that are like thick undergrowth, weapons growing right out of the ground. A shadow circles above, a carrion bird or a dragon.
If I go any deeper, I might be lost.
Like her soul, this is a mess, twisted and unnatural, and so beautiful, I forget how to breathe.
I sense her innermost being, and it’s confused, desperate, and hungry. This is her, raw and uncovered, and it shocks me to see how much uncertainty and despair hides behind her confident exterior. Jaga has always seemed so resolute, from the very beginning. Even in completely new situations, she found her way fast, and her ‘no’ was always clear and certain.
“What now?” she asks through a gasp that might be a sob.
“Just a moment,” I comfort her, stroking her face with both hands, her soft cheeks so at odds with all those sharp edges in her mind.
I wonder how many times she’s cut herself on them. My sweet poppy girl.
“How long?”
“Not much longer. We’re letting the bond grow strong so it stays there when we pull apart. Is it very uncomfortable? Because I love it here, Jaga. You are beautiful everywhere.”
She sobs now, pitiful and angry. “You have no right to say that to me.”
“You’re the first woman I let in my head. I have a right to pay you a compliment.”
She shivers, but her eyes remain open, vulnerable and sweet. I feel the bond now, a glittering, hot pathway leading from my mind to hers.
“I don’t like it here. Inyou,” she chokes out, and it could be the truth or a lie. “You… You are confusing. There is suchvastness.And shadows. So much is here, but it’s distant and strange. Then there are… things… slithering… With hooves… Oh, gods.”
I push further into her mind, letting her jagged edges slice me, bleeding my pain into her thoughts. Jaga moans, and I hiss with triumph, seeing a flash of slimy scales behind a strange thing, seven long braids of hair hung out to dry on a line like washing. Then, a clawed hand wrapping around a desolate, naked tree. Something glitters in the hollow, a treasure.
“You have them, too. Monsters. Mine are out in the open, that’s why you see them. But yours hide. You keep them secret, even from yourself.”
“I do not!”
“Every fear you fail to acknowledge, every bit of hurt you’d rather not feel, every drop of shame and guilt. They are all here, hiding. And other things, more sinister. Do you believe you should have died back then, Jaga? When you were twelve? Do you think you deserved it?”
Her landscape shakes, slimy, wet leaves falling off trees, the red glow of the ground beneath my phantom feet growing hotter. Her monsters hiss and skulk, slick, long bodies churning in their hiding spots. I catch a glimpse of a lolling tongue, a thing with horns, red eyes filled with menace.
“You said you wouldn’t do anything!”
“I’m not. It’s you doing it. No matter, it’s ready. I’ll pull out now.”
I blink, and I am back in the real world, Jaga’s eyes, terrified and frantic, boring into me with accusation. I smile, not letting go of her lovely face.
“Why did you ask me that?” she whispers with bloodless lips, not stepping away.
Her body shifts and brushes mine, hot and needy, and my gaze strays to her mouth. I am so thirsty for just a taste, it’s madness.
