Dreamfire (49 page)

“Thanks.” She turned the lighter over in her hand, feeling the metal warm from her touch. “Is he still hanging around?”

“He died,” Haley said without sadness. “He's gone.”

That ache in her chest—oh, she would have thought it would be gone now, but it throbbed the same as ever. Maybe it always would.

“You get to just be you now, huh?” she said.

“Yeah.” Haley smiled, but he put his hand over hers as if he knew how much she was hurting.

Her eyes were wet. She'd come so close to getting Ian back. For a moment, she'd looked into his eyes and—just like before—hadn't realized it was her last chance to say good-bye. Voice breaking, she asked, “Will he be all right?”

Haley tilted his head as if the answer were obvious. “Of course.”

*   *   *

Josh went home two days later, woozy with pain meds and anti-seizure meds and anti-inflammatories. Deloise made her hot chocolate, and they sat around the kitchen table with Haley and Whim; Will—who was probably on a similar drug regimen—was taking a nap. In response to the multiple tragedies that the Weaver-Avish family had experienced, dream-walker communities around the world had sent flowers and, more locally, food. The kitchen reeked of pollen and casserole.

“You are never allowed to scare me like that again,” Deloise informed Josh. “I was nearly out of my mind.”

“She was,” Whim agreed. “I had to make out with her for half an hour to calm her down.”

“Whim!” Deloise cried, and she turned and smacked him with a kitchen towel. “That never happened,” she told Josh, but she had flushed bright pink.

It totally happened,
Whim mouthed to Josh.

If it did,
Josh mouthed back,
I'm going to kick your ass.

It never happened,
Whim agreed.

Deloise wasn't the only one upset with her. Haley had somewhat understated the situation when he'd said Josh's father was mad at her.

“I am sick to death of visiting people in hospitals!” he'd told her. “Especially you! Do you know how serious a depressed skull fracture is? It's a miracle you can still walk and talk!”

He'd put her on maximum-security grounding for two months, and this time she thought he might stick with it for at least a couple of weeks.

She didn't mind. Now that the adrenaline and panic were gone, she could see just how foolish and shortsighted she had been. Besides, she was having surgery on her elbow in a week and was expecting to log a lot of hours on the couch.

“Is Young Ben out of jail?” she asked her sister.

“Yeah. Peregrine dropped the charges after he heard Feodor was dead. It's not like anybody in their right mind would believe Young Ben had anything to do with him. Ben sent the tulips.”

“I thought Ben sent the poppies.”

“No,” Deloise said slowly, “the poppies are from … well, you'd better read the card.”

She carried over to the table a stunning arrangement of several dozen red poppies in a white porcelain vase. “Bet this cost a pretty penny,” she said.

“I thought it was illegal to send people poppies,” Whim remarked, “because you can extract opium from them.”

“I don't think they came from a flower shop,” Deloise said as Josh opened the card.

Dear Miss Weavaros, Mr. Micharainosa, and Mr. Kansas:

You are hereby formally invited to a banquet celebrating the life and accomplishments of the recently departed Feodorik Kaja
ż
kołskiocsi. As honored guests, you will be seated at the head table and invited to share your recollections of this brilliant, visionary man.

Yours sincerely,

The Grey Circle

The invitation was embossed in gold leaf on heavy card stock—very expensive.

“What the hell is the Grey Circle,” Josh asked, “and why are they celebrating Feodor's life?”

“And why did they invite
us
?” Haley added.

“The Grey Circle is a group of people who basically worship Feodor,” Whim explained. “They think he's a genius, and they meet to talk about his ideas and try to take them to the next level. They probably want to pick your brain about what his universe was like and what sorts of things he was building.”

“But we more or less killed him,” Josh said.

Whim shrugged. “They're nuts. They'll twist whatever you say to make it sound like he had a glorious death.”

Josh thought about that. Feodor hadn't had a glorious death, but he had died believing he was living a glorious life. As much as she hated Feodor and as relieved as she was that he was dead, she couldn't help feeling a little glad that, in a way, he'd gotten what he always wanted. She'd been in his head, she knew what torment he'd lived in, and she couldn't bring herself to begrudge him his victory. She couldn't even resent his idyllic death, because he'd had a supremely miserable life. Josh probably knew that better than anyone.

But she doubted the Grey Circle would understand.

“Who sent that?” she asked, pointing to a potted plant she couldn't name. “It's beautiful.”

“Davita, and it's an orchid.” Deloise stood up and plucked a card from between the flower stems. “It's addressed to you.”

“I had to stop her from opening it,” Whim added.

Josh tore the envelope open.

Dear Josh,

I'm terribly busy, but I'll be by to see you soon. In the meantime, know that I'm furious with you, very proud, quite amazed, and in deep trouble with your grandfather. Say hello to Will for me,

Davita

 

PS: The royal family sends their regards.

“Wow,” Deloise said. She sighed happily. “Let's dismantle the junta and restore the monarchy.”

Josh thought that royalty would probably just be another group trying to control her, but she didn't say anything. Let Deloise have her dreams the way everyone did.

“Royal family,” Whim scoffed. “There's no one left but a few distant cousins.” He took the card from Josh and put it back in its envelope. “What did you end up telling the Gendarmerie?”

“More or less the truth,” Josh said. “Minus the whole True Dream Walker part.”

She'd admitted her new secret identity to her sister and Whim. It just felt easier.

“Was Peregrine suspicious?” Whim asked.

“Oh yeah. I don't know how he knows, but he does. I'm going to have to watch out for him.”

Haley reached out and put his hand over hers. “
We're
going to have to watch out.”

And he smiled at her.

It seems like it's been a lot longer than a week since the last time I wrote. It will probably be a lot longer than a week before I write again, too, because it's killing my elbow, but I want to record this.

It's past midnight now, and I'm still awake. I guess I should be resting, but I've been flat on my back for days and tonight I just can't sleep. Too much on my mind.

I am really, really going to miss Grandma. I wish so much that I could say good-bye. Good-bye, and that I'm sorry. My disobedience did contribute to her death, and there's no use in pretending. It contributed to Kerstel's injuries and Winsor's coma. As usual, my family thinks I'm a hero and not guilty of anything, but the truth is I'm seventeen, I'm an adult in the world of dream walkers, and I've done what I've done. All I can say is that I think I've atoned. I've lost, too.

This whole stepping-up-to-adulthood thing includes being honest about my abilities, too. I am the True Dream Walker, I have that power, and I have an obligation to the Dream to keep it balanced. No more being afraid of responsibility. No more being small. No more telling myself that

“God, you look terrible,” Will said.

Josh stopped writing and looked up. Her pen bit into the diary's page and made a large black blot.

She was sitting in the living room in her family's apartment, curled up on the couch under a down comforter. The television was on, but she'd turned the sound down. Except for the bluish light of the screen, the room was dark.

But not dark enough that she couldn't see Will standing at the end of the couch. He wore a pair of his old sweatpants and a loose black T-shirt. Stitches crossed his left eyebrow, a magenta bruise ran down half his face, his right hand was bandaged, and lumps of medical gauze and bandages under his shirt made him look like a hunchback. Josh knew she looked just as bad, but the sight of him all battered upset her.

“Is there an inch of you that isn't black and blue?” he asked.

“I haven't found one yet.” She had no idea what else to say. “I just got home. You'd already gone to bed.”

“Yeah, these meds knock me out. I've been sleeping weird hours since I got back.”

Since you got home
. She wanted to correct him, but didn't.

They were both quiet, and the television emitted a dim laugh track. “Do you mind if I sit down?” Will asked.

“No,” she said quickly.

He sat down sideways, facing her and with one leg folded in front of him. “I can't lean my back against the couch,” he explained, pressing his side against the cushions instead, “or I might mess up the skin graft.”

“How bad is it?”

“The meds help with the pain, but nothing seems to stop the itching. I heard you fractured your skull.”

Josh shrugged. “My elbow hurts more.”

“Lauren says it's going to need surgery. That's no fun.”

“Yeah.”

They ran out of conversation. Josh finally capped her pen and closed her journal, then set them on the coffee table, which she discovered was worse because she no longer had anything to do with her hands.

“So,” Will said, with forced casualness.

“So,” she agreed.

He glanced at the television, glanced away.

“Look,” Josh said, unable to deal with the tension any longer, “I don't care whether you're in my scroll or not. You're here and … you're
my
apprentice and I'm keeping you.”

Will lifted his eyebrows and almost smiled. “You're keeping me?”

She laughed at herself. “I guess I'm asking you to stay.”

The seriousness crept back into his face. “I don't want you to ask me out of pity. Or a misplaced sense of obligation. Or because you'll feel like a jerk if you don't.”

“I'm asking because I want you to stay,” she told him. “Because I like having you in-Dream with me, and because I need someone like you around, someone who won't cut me any slack.”

The light of the television made his auburn hair seem more brown than usual. Josh had a nice view of it when he lowered his head.

She heard the same resigned, sad tone in his voice that she'd heard in the limo just after they'd seen the junta. “You're asking because you need me.”

Don't, Josh. This time, don't screw it up.

Just say it.

“And because I'm in love with you,” she blurted out, and Will's head snapped up.

They stared at each other for a moment, and then Josh felt herself go pink and tried to cover her face with her good hand. “I can't believe I just said that.”

“No, it's—”

“Completely inappropriate—”

“It's not—”

“Because you're my apprentice, and I think you might legally be my brother now and—”

“Josh, stop,” he finally said, and dragged her hand away from her face.

She was afraid to look at him. She didn't want to look. She squinted at him so hard she could only see part of his face. But the part she could see showed that he was smiling at her, and all the defeat and fear and exhaustion had vanished from his expression.

“After all we've been through,” he said gently, “I think that was the bravest thing I've seen you do yet.”

He kept hold of her wrist to stop her from covering her face again and, careful of her bruises, leaned forward and kissed her. One perfect, lingering kiss, after which he asked in a whisper, “Do you think I don't feel exactly the same way about you? Because I swear I do.”

Josh released a small laugh, but she was crying a little too, and all she could think of to say was, “Come here,” whereupon she tried to climb into his lap before realizing how painful that would be for both of them. They spent a moment figuring out how to get closer without further injuring one another, and then Will pulled the comforter around them while dropping kisses onto Josh's forehead.

She used the remote to turn off the television. In the silence afterward she heard his heart beating under her palm and remembered the moment in the ambulance when his pulse had slowed and she'd feared it would stop. Now she was shaky with relief that he was still here, that she had said the right thing to tell him how she felt, that he wanted as much from her as she wanted from him.

“So,” he said, “I guess this means I get to stay your apprentice.”

Josh smiled to herself, closing her eyes. “Actually, I was thinking maybe you could become my partner.”

“Really? That would be cool.” He kissed the top edge of her bruised ear, so lightly, and she remembered one other thing she had to tell him.

“Will?”

“Yeah?”

“My full name is Joshlyn Dustine Hazel Weavaros.”

He kissed her forehead again, and she lifted her face for more.

 

Epilogue

They fell asleep
on the couch that night, and despite the shelter of Will's arms, Josh dreamt of Warsaw.

She dreamt that she stood on the rooftop of a building staring out over the glory of the city before the war. Only the arms wrapped around her were not Will's but Feodor's, and he stood behind her and whispered of the destruction to come. As he spoke, bombs began to fall, buildings caught fire like oil-headed torches, screams from far below drifted up to them on the wafting smoke.