Before I Wake (11 page)

“What would you know of my ‘job’?”

“I know that one of your creatures is hurting people.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because I was one of them.”

And in that second, his expression went from mulish to anguish, then to something murderous that, I admit, had me shaking a little.

“Explain.”

I did—and fast. I told him about Karatos—what It had done to Noah, and some of what It had done to me. I just couldn’t bring myself to admit to him that I had been so totally helpless. I told him that It was suspected of killing people, but I didn’t tell him about Antwoine. If Morpheus really did hate the old guy, I didn’t want that to stop him from stopping this thing from hurting any more people.

Morpheus seemed more concerned about what this thing had done to me and about the fact that It had been outside the gate when I arrived. “If It thinks to anger me through you, It is right.” The lines of his face were harsh and unforgiving. I wouldn’t want to be Karatos when the God of Dreams caught up to him. “I will find It and destroy It.”

My shoulders sagged. “Thank you.”

“On one condition.”

My gaze jerked to his. WTF? “This thing of yours ra…beat me”—my mother winced at my raised voice—“and you have a condition?”

He stood tall and straight, and the gaze that met mine had no mercy in it. This was the King of Dreams. He was timeless, a god, and that side of him bowed to nothing, not even his own child.

“Karatos is not my thing,” he informed me, as if that mattered. As though all the hurt it had inflicted, was negligible. “He belongs to your uncle Icelus.” If I remembered my mythology—and my family history—correctly, Icelus was in charge of bad dreams and all things terrifying.

“He is still part of this world,” I stupidly reminded him. “And this world is yours.”

He moved closer. My mother inched between us, as though she might protect me with her tiny, delicate self. I didn’t need her protection. My mother was an ordinary human.

I wasn’t. I was as much a part of this world as Morpheus, even though I had chosen to leave it. I faced him with my shoulders back even though he scared the crap out of me. This mess was his to clean up, not mine.

“You are a Nightmare.” Morpheus’s voice had dropped at least an octave. “You are a guardian of this Realm, born to protect those who traverse it from things such as Karatos.”

“Don’t blame me for this. I haven’t been part of this Realm for years.”

“Whose fault is that?” I was shocked by the naked pain on his face. I had hurt him by turning my back on this world, and being a stupid kid I hadn’t thought of how that would feel to a father. And later, when my mother went into her sleep and abandoned her family, I turned from him even more.

I opened my mouth to speak, and he cut me off. “You should have been able to protect yourself when he came for you, but you never learned how because you ran away.”

“I…”

“And I let you.” Darkness fell across his features. “I should have made you come back. At least then you might have been able to defend yourself.”

My mother left me to go to him, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder. She would always leave me for him. And not just me—everything. It still hurt.

I didn’t want to be here any longer. I wanted to go home, to my bed. Go back to the world I knew, because in this one…

In this one I remembered good things, and I felt guilty for them. I felt too much a part of that very thing that had destroyed my family—was still destroying them.

“You said you had a condition,” I reminded the quiet couple coldly. “What is it?”

Morpheus raised his head, pinning me with those glacial eyes. “That you learn what it is to be a Nightmare. That you accept what you are.”

Accept it? Not freaking likely. But I could learn about what I was if it would keep me—and Noah—safe.

“It’s what you are to all of us.” Who was “us”?

“All right,” I agreed.

He watched me, suspicion in his gaze. He knew me too well, and my capitulation had been far too quick. “That means spending time in this world. With us.”

I looked from him to her, anger overwhelming me. “That’s a better deal than your other kids get, huh?”

She turned white and looked as though I’d hit her. I wasn’t the least bit satisfied, and the doctor in me was dying to shout out why. I told the doctor to shut up. I was going to be a child abandoned by her mother for just a little while longer.

Morpheus put his arm around her, held her close, but when he looked at me it was with sympathy. “Do we have an agreement, Dawn Marie?”

I nodded. Stiffly. “Yes.” I would learn. I would do my time in their presence, but if he expected me to cave like some love-starved child and forgive them, he was in desperate need of some therapy himself.

He actually smiled. My mother did as well, though she couldn’t meet my gaze. “When would you like to get started?”

I shrugged. “How about now?” The sooner I started learning, the sooner he’d bring Karatos down, and I could get back to my real world.

And who knows? Maybe I’d learn something useful.

Something that might force my mother to wake up and face the family she’d left behind.

He kicked my ass.

Not literally, of course, though I’m sure the temptation was there. It was a simple game—one we used to play when I was younger. Morpheus would create something from dream matter, and it was up to me to change it into something else. My father put the “morph” into “metamorphosis.”

It was easy, and I got cocky—until he actually started throwing things at me. Nothing crazy, just snowballs. When I was little, he used foam balls. I guess he wanted to toughen me up a bit. I did okay, except for the times when I tried to be creative. I should have just morphed the damn things rather than wasting time thinking of what to turn them into. Did it really matter if I thought

“bird” five times instead of something else each time? Hence the bruises.

Most of them were on my arms and shoulders. It wasn’t very many, only three or four, but they were large. I wasn’t ticked off that he’d given them to me, I could have prevented them easily enough. I felt foolish that he’d nailed me, because it just proved how out of shape I was. No, what bothered me was that the little black dress I had planned to wear to Noah’s show was no longer an option.

I had no idea what to wear.

I’ve never been to a gallery before. I mean, I’ve been to museums, but never to a real art show where people express opinions and sip champagne like they do at these things on TV.

It was a cool night, so I finally went with black pants and a cowl-neck chocolate brown jersey top. For jewelry I added a necklace my aunt created that was lengths of gold chain, peridot, garnet, and aquamarine. I looped it around my neck so that one strand was like a choker while the rest fell below the neckline of my sweater. Then I added the matching dangly earrings. Brown leather boots, purse, and matching jacket completed my ensemble. I fluffed out my hair and applied an extra coat of Clinique Black Honey gloss before checking myself out in the full-length mirror.

“Not bad,” I muttered. There was no concealing that I was a good-sized girl, but I was a put-together good-sized girl. I wouldn’t be too underdressed in a more formal setting, and I wouldn’t be too overdressed if the gallery proved more casual. Yayee me.

The gallery was in Chelsea. I took a cab. The ride gave me time to think about things I hadn’t allowed myself to think about while getting ready.

What was I going to tell Noah? About his dreams, I mean. About this Karatos thing? He had believed that I had been in his dream readily enough, but how much truth could he handle before he started doubting my humanity? On top of that, how much was I allowed to tell him about the Dreamkin? We weren’t supposed to be real.

I was definitely not going to mention the fact that I shouldn’t even exist. One of a kind, that was me. A being straddling two worlds, able to live in both and belonging to neither.

Nope. Definitely not going to share that with Noah unless I had to.

But at least I could tell him that he didn’t have to be afraid to go to sleep anymore. I’d just have to be careful about the details.

Morpheus would make good on his promise, and if Karatos hadn’t been unmade by now, he would be soon. Creatures such as Karatos, who dealt in all things disturbing and scary—might belong to my uncle Icelus, but Morpheus was head honcho in The Dreaming. He’d take care of the Terror, not just because it was the right thing to do but because doing so meant I’d be spending more time at the castle with him and my mother.

The agreement left a sour taste in my mouth, but I had given my word. And maybe a tiny part of me—microscopic really—wanted to be a part of that world. The few minutes I had spent in it the other night had left me feeling a kind of peace I hadn’t felt in a long time.

By the time I stepped out of the cab in front of the gallery on West Twenty-fifth, I had pretty much settled on what to tell Noah so that it sounded reasonable. I checked my hair and makeup in my compact and straightened my sweater, so that it didn’t cling in an unflattering manner.

Inside the heavy black wood and glass door a European-looking man welcomed me, took my coat, and pointed me in the direction of the bar. Free booze. I was glad I wore cashmere—this was obviously a classier affair than I had first assumed.

The realization made me feel a little guilty. This gallery was far from the funky, urban setting I had expected. There was a good-sized crowd gathered. The air was thick with conversation, the clicking of heels on the stone-tiled floor, faint music overhead. I ordered a glass of white wine and moved toward the art rather than the people.

I’m not a big art aficionado. I’m that cliché who knows what she likes but couldn’t tell you anything about it. I like color. I like beauty and maybe a little sadness. I’m not interested in anything aggressive.

Fortunately for my delicate sensibilities, Noah’s work fell into my “like” category. He used bold, rich colors that were somehow subdued. Much of his work made me want to look inside myself. Looking at these gorgeous canvases on the stark white wall gave me more of an insight into Noah than a month of therapy.

Maybe it was all bullshit, but I admit, I was sucked in. There was vulnerability in his work, the subjects. There was a sense of melancholy, and yet strength and beauty as well.

I was glad I’d dressed as I had. Some of the men wore suits, the women cocktail dresses, but the general feel of the evening seemed to be dressy casual. Of course, casual for a lot of these people seemed to mean DKNY and Armani. I admit to being a little cowed, but having money meant that these people could afford to buy Noah’s work, and Noah could use the money.

Or at least I thought he could. That thought expired the moment I saw him.

He stood in the center of the floor, partially surrounded by a group of men and women who seemed to be hanging on his every word. He was dressed in black trousers and jacket, a gleaming white shirt underneath, opened at the collar. His belt was as black and shiny as his shoes. He looked comfortable and relaxed; his shirt alone probably cost more than my entire outfit.

He had shaved for the event, his jaw smooth and golden. His black hair was brushed back from his face, but a bit fell over his forehead as he smiled at something one of the women had said to him. Skanky cow. Jealous? Yeah, I was.

I couldn’t move. For the first time in our acquaintance, I was afraid to approach Noah. This was his world, not mine. Seeing him like this, I was now painfully aware that my assumption of his being a starving artist was waaaay off the mark. I had gone from being vaguely superior in my footing to inferior just by walking through the gallery door, and I felt really, really stupid and out of my league.

I could leave. I could tell him I had been there but didn’t see him. Or better yet, I could tell him something had come up, and I hadn’t been there at all.

All hopes for escape were dashed when he looked up—and caught me staring.

He smiled. A slow, eye-crinkling, lazy curving of his lips that had me tingling from the toes all the way up to my earlobes. I managed a smile in return—or at least I hoped I had managed one. Idiot that I am, I even raised my hand in a little wave.

Noah said something to the group, then walked away from them. A couple of the women watched him go, and I knew they’d look at me and wonder why he had left them to come see me. A part of me wondered, too, even though my heart was doing the lambada in my chest at his approach.

“Doc,” he said in that mellow voice of his as he stopped but a foot away from me. He had a drink in one hand, the other was stuffed in his pants pocket. “You came.”

He actually sounded surprised. Maybe he wasn’t as sure of himself as I thought. I smiled. “How could I pass up the opportunity to see your work?”

He scanned me with a frank gaze. “You look great. See anything you like?”

Other than him? “I just got here.”

I knew from the amusement on his face that he had been fishing for a compliment. He jerked his head toward the back of the gallery. “C’mon. I want to show you something.”

The last time a boy had told me that, I’d seen more of Jason Lewis than I’d ever wanted to see, but I followed Noah regardless.

But he didn’t let me follow for more than a few steps before falling back to walk beside me, his hand on the small of my back as he steered me where he wanted me to go.

People watched as we walked past. Were they wondering who I was? What I was to the star of the evening?

As Noah guided me past several paintings, I stopped to look at one. He stopped as well, never taking his hand off of me.

The canvas was large—at least six feet across. The colors were all a mix of blue, green, and gray, blended into moody swirls. A woman in a nightgown lay on the floor, her arms covering her head as though protecting herself. Looking at it, I felt so anxious for her, so afraid and sad. I looked at the little plaque on the wall beside the painting. It was titled Mother.

Startled, I turned to Noah. The image was provoking enough, but to give it such a title was almost creepy. His face was totally blank as his gaze left the painting to meet mine. This was one of those times when he didn’t want me to look beyond the painting. I knew it because that was the same expression he wore during so many of our therapy sessions. I was beginning to realize that it was all about self-protection.