Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 101147 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 506(@200wpm)___ 405(@250wpm)___ 337(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101147 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 506(@200wpm)___ 405(@250wpm)___ 337(@300wpm)
The dreams stopped when you died.
So much stopped when I took that final breath and died in my brother’s arms. I shake off the terrible memory. I died, but Gillian’s magic brought me back. Unseelie magic that will undoubtedly cost Gillian her life if Torin the Pretender ever catches us.
With a sigh, I get up from my perch. The sun is going down. It will be time to go to bed in a couple of hours. It will be time to dream again.
The dreams only came back in the last few years, and when they did they took on a distinctly adult tone.
Four hands caressing me. Two mouths vying for my attention. I don’t know their names, but I know how they feel when they move against me. I know what it feels like to be between two hard bodies. Beloved. Wanted. Whole.
I smooth out my dress. Sheer fancy. I’m alone, and I’ll remain that way. I’m untouched. A virgin at twenty-seven. It’s pathetic, but true. My only real experience is an attempted rape that my brother Cian halted. I know only violence. Nothing can change that.
The Dark Ones are merely a figment of my imagination. I latched on to my childhood fantasies in order to have a relationship—even one that only happens in my dreams.
But I left dreams behind long ago. I stopped believing the day Torin slaughtered my family.
The Dark Ones aren’t coming for me. No one is. I’m alone. If Beckett and Cian are alive, I pray they found a safe place to live and some modicum of happiness.
I go to the chest where I keep my meager possessions. I open it and move aside my second-best dress. I move my hand under the fabric to wrap around the cold metal hilt of a knife.
It’s the knife that was used to kill me.
It’s the knife I intend to kill Torin with.
I let the knife be, content that it’s there. I close the drawer, a weary feeling stealing over me.
It’s hours until I can slide into sleep and see them again. They’re figments, but they’re mine.
My Dark Ones. My loves.
If you’re out there—come for me. Please come for me.
Tears blurring my eyes, I start down the stairs.