Somewhere deeper in the house, a faucet dripped.
Muted voices dipped–one in warning, one in fear.
Glass clinked. Ice shifted in a tumbler that didn’t exist. And it came. Like it always did. A woman’s soft scream, so faint it might’ve been imagined.
Daphne cried, silent and red-eyed in the deceptive safety of her too-thin blanket, and Hunter stayed. Anchored himself deeper in the dream. He didn’t flinch at the scream and didn’t look away from the soundless tears.
Hewasnightmare. Made to guide, to reinforce. To push the dreamer until they woke up gasping or cracked open enough to let something new in.
Hewasher mind, her emotions. Felt her terror as his. The blinding rage.
The words she mouthed, over and over, didn’t make sounds, but they thundered all the same. Hatred recited like scripture, her lips chanted curses with the steadiness of prayer.
Small. She felt so small. Insignificant.
But Hunter didn’t stop, no matter how overwhelming it was, because he felt something else in her. Courage. And he would use every shade of fear, every nuance of pressure, and every shadow of danger to help the woman who still carried the girl inside of her.
From the other side of the door, Hunter conjured the voice gently. Carefully. Her mother’s voice, her intonation. Every syllable heavy with what wanted to be a promise of safety but delivered surrender. He pushed it through the door, soft but weary. “Daphne, baby, just stay in bed.” He summoned that careful myrmur meant to soothe not Daphne, but her father. “It’s better if we don’t make it worse. If we stay quiet, he’ll calm down. He always does.”
She hated that line, and Hunter knew it.
Sure enough, Daphne flinched. Not visibly, but he felt it inside her, where everything was remembered. Her fingers curled in the blanket as rage spiked and was buried under obedience. She knew this. Not the words, but the pattern. That practiced calm meant for survival. The hush that begged the storm to pass over without noticing them. “Be a good girl. Just stay in bed.”
Hunter felt the shift in her as the memory-fed nightmare rose like bile, pushing a tremor just under her skin. The wild, shakingnoclawed its way up her throat but stayed there.
Good girl. Obedient. Silent.
Hunter felt the weight of a childhood spent beinggoodand how that it had bought hernothing. He cheered when the question she’d never dared ask out loud bloomed in the darkness behind her eyes:Why didn’t you stop him? Why didn’t you save me?
But years of conditioning pulled her back, and she tried to pretend it wasn’t happening, just like always.
So, Hunter pressed again. “It’s not that bad. He’s just tired. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
That one landed.
Hard.
Daphne didn’t move, but he felt her screaming inside.
Because it had always been tomorrow.
Tomorrow, they’d leave. Tomorrow, it would stop. Tomorrow, they’d fix it. Tomorrow, the bruises would fade.
Tomorrow never came.
Her fists clenched under the blankets.
Hunter let the voice out once more, delivering a challenge he hoped she’d take. “Just stay quiet in your room, and this will all go away.”
And that was it.
Daphne sat up.
Slow. Stiff. Trembling. Not with fear but with fury. Because the comfort her mother offered was betrayal. Because obeying was agreeing.
He recognized the fire in her and smiled. She was ready now. And he’d burn in any mask he had to wear if it meant she’d take that first step.
Her feet hit the floor. The room creaked. The air pulled, like the dream itself sensed the change and prepared.
