Without thinking, I stepped forward and grabbed his arm. The muscles of his forearm bunched under my touch, and he froze, looking over at me.
I swallowed, overwhelmed by our proximity. “I’m sorry. I’m not explaining this well at all.”
Dropping my hand from his arm, I shifted back a half-step. He frowned at the distance.
“I’m a dream walker, and I wouldn’t be able to enter your dream unless you were in my realm. That’s how I know you’re in Faerie.”
Zane looked around again, his eyes widening. “You’ve somehow entered my dream?”
“Yes,” I said, relieved that he seemed to finally be catching on. “And I reached out to you because I need your help.”
At those words, Zane turned toward me, closing the space I’d put between us. Grabbing both of my arms firmly but gently, he held me in place.
“You’re in trouble? What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”
His gaze traveled up and down my body, searching for injuries he wouldn’t even be able to see if they were there. I could appear however I wanted in dreams, so I knew I looked perfectly healthy and unharmed to him right now—which was mostly true. The pain Queen Liliana had inflicted on me so far hadn’t left visible marks. But I’d already tasted some of her cruelty, and I didn’t doubt she’d inflict more harm if she thought it would suit her ultimate purpose.
“I’m okay,” I told him, worried that if I confessed I was injured,he wouldn’t be able to focus on anything else. “But I do need your help. Queen Liliana has kidnapped me. She wants to try—”
A sudden, familiar tugging sensation pulled at my gut, and I gasped. I was waking up.
“What? What’s wrong?” Zane asked, his gaze wild.
“I have to go. I’m waking up,” I said, ripping myself from his grasp. The dreamscape wasn’t dissolving around us like it had with my sister, but I had to get back to my void before I fully woke.
Turning from him, I rushed back through the door, cursing myself for wasting so much time watching him interact with his brothers instead of getting to the point. I had to hope he’d be asleep again tomorrow so I could tell him everything.
“Wait,” I heard him call just as I fled from his dream.
Even as I started to blink my eyes open, I could still hear the echoes of his shouted plea for me to stay.
Chapter Five
Zane
Iawoke with a start, panting and covered in a thin sheen of sweat, as I frantically scanned the space to get my bearings. I wasn’t sliding down a mountain of oil, nor was I in my study in the Western Kingdom. I was in Faerie, in the cottage at Orange Hills, with a sleeping redheaded child beside me.
Releasing a shaky breath, I glanced outside to see that it wasn’t yet light. Then again, Nellie had told me it never got very bright here, so I had no clue what time of day it might be.
That dream … it felt so real. Lorelei’s presence, her telling me she was in trouble, and then her sudden departure—it had turned the dream into a nightmare.
But was it real? Did she really need my help, or was I just imagining things out of some savior complex?
Already, the details of the dream were hazy. She’d referred to herself as something … a dream maker? A night visitor? I shook my head, trying to dredge up the memory from the depths of mymind. But as I grasped for the details, they slipped through my fingers like fine grains of sand.
It didn’t help that after she left, the dream had morphed into something nonsensical. I was on a quest with a talking raccoon and bear, searching for marshmallow snowballs, when suddenly, the black oil from the Harvest Mountains swept us away. I was certainthatwasn’t real, so did that mean I’d simply conjured Lorelei as well?
She’d been on my mind constantly, so it made sense that she would appear in my dreams. I’d never heard of anyone having the power to visit someone in their dreams. The most logical explanation was that the dream was just that: a figment of my unconscious imagination.
But what if it wasn’t?
I rubbed my forehead, the knot in my gut tightening with worry for Lorelei. My instincts told me she needed me right now. Then again, my instincts had been screaming at me to protect her since the moment I first laid eyes on her. That didn’t necessarily mean she was in any more danger now than she had been before. Right?
A rustling beside me broke through my spiraling thoughts. Nellie stirred awake and peered up at me with sleepy eyes, pulling my attention.
“Hey, good morning,” I whispered softly.
“Mmm,” she grunted, still groggy.
