“I’m going back to bed,” Charming says.
“No, you’re not,” Gwyneth snaps, shooting him a look that makes him pause. She drops her hands and fixes me with the expression that once meant she was about to drag me by the ear out of a very poor life decision. “Nightmare. Now.”
That sobers me completely, but doesn’t stop me from trembling like a leaf as I think about everything that happened during my dream. Nash notices and drags me backward until my spine presses against his chest. One arm wraps around my waist, steadying me without pinning me. Grounding me. The others settle around us in a rough circle, every pair of eyes on me.
“I dreamed of ruin,” I begin. “Not old, but fresh, violent ruin. The kind that happens because something powerful has decided the world should crack in half.”
The room stills further.
“The sky was wrong,” I continue. “Low, split open, gold burning through it like a wound. There was a battlefield with bodies everywhere. Some dead, some moving.” I swallow. “All of it was familiar.”
Malachi’s brow furrows. “Familiar how?”
“Like I knew it. Not because I’ve seen it before, but because some part of me remembers it.”
Gwyneth says nothing, but her gaze flicks to mine. “Anything else?”
“There were banners. A black one with a gold crown split in two. A green serpent eating its own tail. A tower crumbling in a storm. They meant something.”
Genie’s expression shifts into one of recognition with a hint of fear. And that bothers me more than the dream.
I keep going before anyone can interrupt. “The bodies rose, and one of them looked at me. I think I knew him. His face was wrong, burned and shadowed, but I knew him anyway.” I drag in a breath. “He called me Harbinger.”
Hart’s jaw tightens. Malachi swears under his breath, and most worrisome is the way Charming stops lounging and sits forward.
“And then?” Gwyneth asks.
“And then they all started saying it. Over and over. Harbinger, harbinger, harbinger, like I was supposed to know what it meant.” I shake my head. “He said I ended them.”
“That you ended them?” Nash repeats, voice low against my ear.
“Yes. I told him I would remember if I’d done something that dramatic, because I’m chaotic, not forgetful.”
Malachi’s lips twitch despite the tension. “Fair.”
I lean into Nash for a tempo before continuing, “Then the sky split. Something huge was behind it. Ancient. Watching. There was a voice.” I close my eyes because even now I can hear it. “‘You were not meant to wake.’”
My fingers curl around Nash’s arm. “Then the man touched my wrist, and the world shattered. I woke up choking on smoke that wasn’t there.”
No one speaks. The fire crackles. A capon clucks softly from beneath the chair.
Genie breaks the silence first. “That was no ordinary nightmare.”
“What gave it away?” I deadpan.
He glares. “There are degrees of not ordinary. This was a very high one.”
Gwyneth moves to stand. “I’ve seen pieces of it before in my dreams.”
All heads turn to her as she squares her shoulders. “Not the exact same, but enough. The battlefield. The symbols. The sense of aftermath.”
“You’ve never mentioned it,” Hart says.
“I wasn’t certain what it meant, and I’m still not.”
“But enough to know this is bad,” Charming says.
“Yes.”
