Lucy’s house creaked and settled around us. It was the dead of night. I should’ve been sleeping, but every time I closed my eyes, I dreamt of the vision Sabella had shared with us. For the past few days, it was all I could think about. All I worried about, despite what Mori said. She said we’d fight to the end, and by the gods, we would.
But as the days dragged on, and we were no closer to the answers we needed in order to stop Baladon, my anxiety grew as my denial waned. My denial that we might be ending this fight with our deaths after all.
I reached across the bed, but Mori wasn’t here. The sheet was cold as if she’d never been there at all, after promising to rest at least for an hour or two. She should’ve been here sleeping. The damned woman was walking around this house half asleep because she refused to admit she was different here. That she was changing in ways none of us anticipated. I never imagined what being in the human realm, away from the base of her existence, would do to Mori.
Losing her power little by little was what I considered a worst-case scenario. She was tired, and I was pretty sure she was refusing to admit that she was hungry. Not like she ate hardly anything, though I told her she should. Muttering under my breath about stubborn women, I climbed out of bed, padding barefoot through the room and into the hall.
Everyone else was sleeping—like normal mortals—but not Mori. I expected to find her at the dining table, staring intently at that damned cracked orb again, but the room was empty. So were the kitchen and the rest of the house. My pulse raced as panic had me running back through the house, fearing we didn’t have as much time as we all assumed, and Baladon was already here.
As soon as I was in the backyard, I slid to a stop in the wet grass, growling in annoyance.
Mori was in the greenhouse, her back toward the house. I started to go to her, but then she shook out her hair, and I watched as more stars tumbled down to the floor at her feet. They’d been appearing every now and then, as if her power was trying to recharge, but each time they fell out just as fast as they appeared. Soon I had a feeling there would be no more stars at all. I hadn’t seen them in her eyes since the night we arrived. Her shoulders hunched, and she laid her hands on the table before her. I thought of giving her some time to herself, but instinct dragged me into the greenhouse.
The door creaked as I opened it.
She turned around. “Forrest? What are you doing awake at this hour?”
“I should be asking you the same question,” I said, taking in the bags under her eyes, worse than before I went to sleep. She had stress lines on her face, and she was pale, not her usual pale, but a sickly pale. “Come back inside with me. Sleep. Please.”
“Gods don’t sleep, I’ve told you this,” she argued as I went to her.
“And I would leave it alone if you did not look ready to fall over on your face, love. You need to rest, at least.”
“I have work to do out here.”
“And the work will still be here in a few hours.” I held her hands and then pulled her into an embrace. She rested her cheek against my bare chest, and I felt her relax with me. “You are not in the realms anymore. You’ve left your world behind, and you have to accept it. You’re changing.”
She sighed heavily, and I waited for her to finally give in and agree with me, but instead, she planted a kiss on my cheek, then slipped from my arms. “I need to keep working. Go back to bed.”
“No, if you’re up, I’m up.” I crossed my arms, resting my hip against the counter.
“Fine, suit yourself.” She turned back to the row of herbs in front of her.
I was no herbalist and certainly no witch, so they meant nothing to me, but she whispered under her breath as she plucked small, blue flowers and dropped them in a mortar close by. Then she picked some green stems from another plant and dropped them in next.
“What are you doing?” I asked, enjoying how delicately her hands moved as she worked.
“Searching for a way to fix the orb,” she said quietly, studying another plant through narrowed eyes. “Nothing seems to be working yet, but Lucy has quite the collection of plants here, some I have not seen in many years.”
I thought of Lucy, and a pang of sadness had me rubbing my chest.
“You think you can mend it with plants?” I was skeptical and not really in the mood to discuss Lucy and how devastated we all were at her loss. Kate, the most.
“There is magic in this realm; you just have to know where to look for it. And yes, I might be able to fix it with plants, if I find the right combination,” she added, sounding aggravated.
She plucked and picked for another few minutes, then picked up the pestle, added something that came out like green sludge from a vial, then started mashing it all together.
The smell was intense, and I fought back a gag as she smirked at me, pounding away.
“You can always leave,” she reminded me as I covered my face with my hand, trying not to breathe.
“Not leaving unless you’re coming with me.”
She shook her head and turned the mortar as she kept mashing. Her smirk fell, and she reached for another vial, this one with a clear liquid in it that was smoking. She let three drops fall into the mortar, and I heard her suck in a breath. I waited with her, unsure of what she was expecting to happen. There was a bright flash of light and puff of smoke, but as she waved it away, we both leaned over the mortar and stared into what was now in the bowl.
“Damn it,” she yelled, slamming her fist down on the table.
“Not what you were hoping for?” I asked, my nostrils flaring at the disgusting stench wafting through the greenhouse.
She picked up the mortar and walked outside to dump it out. When she returned, she was muttering under her breath and was right back at it.
“Mori.”
“Hmm?”
“Will you stop for five seconds and look at me?”
“I have to make this work,” she insisted, still not stopping. “There’s a way. I know there is.”
“And we’ll find it after you’ve slept.”
“I told you I don’t sleep. If all you’re going to do is stand there and pester me, just go away,” she said with a definite angry tone. “I have to do this.”
“Why?”
“Because I do. Now leave me alone.”
“No.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“You’re not mad at me so don’t even try to pretend you are. What’s this about, truly? Talk to me. Why are you punishing yourself like this?”
She sagged against the table. “Because I have to do something.”
“We’re all trying to do something to fight against Baladon,” I reminded her.
“No, you don’t get it. I have no real power here, no magic. For gods’ sakes, I’m using herbs to try to come up with something, anything to get that orb to work,” she rambled as her voice got louder. “And Lucy died, Greyson probably, too. And Hank and Danielle. Truly, we have no idea if any of them survived. It’s eating them alive, I know it is, and it’s killing me that I couldn’t save them.”
I wrapped my arms around her and drew her back against me. “None of us could, you know that’s the truth. We had to leave if the realms and everyone in them would have any hope of surviving.”
“But I don’t know how to fix the orb,” she admitted. “Or kill Baladon.”
“No one ever said you did. We’ll find a way.”
“How can you be so positive about all this? After everything you’ve lost, how?”
“You’ve lost those you care for, too. Your family,” I said softly as she spun around to face me. “And I’m merely doing what you told me to do. Hold onto hope that we’ll make it through this. One way or another, the war against the darkness will come to an end.”
She glanced over her shoulder at the table scattered with herbs and blew out an aggravated breath. “Alright, I give in.”
“About?”
“About getting some rest tonight, but,” she said, poking me in the chest, “that does not mean I’m ready to admit I need actual sleep. Or food. I’m not mortal.”
I stopped myself short from saying, ‘not yet’ and took the small victory. Sooner or later she’d have to admit she was no longer the powerful goddess who crossed over into the human realm. I took her hand and together, we left the greenhouse and headed back upstairs to the bedroom we’d taken over.
I paused when we passed Craig and Kate’s door, sensing the sorrow pouring out of her. She missed Lucy, we all did. But for Kate it was different, the witch was like her mother. I sent soothing thoughts her way, hoping they would help ease her back to sleep. In the silence of the house, I heard Craig whispering to her, too. She’d been leaving her room, but each day was a visible struggle for her to not fall apart.
Not that I could blame her. We were in Lucy’s home, and she was surrounded by memories everywhere she looked.
Mori and I entered our room. She tumbled into bed, and I followed her, lying down, so we faced each other. I waited for her to pass out and get a few hours rest at least, but those brown eyes seemed wide awake.
“What if we can’t make this work because we haven’t fulfilled the prophecy Sabella spoke of?” she whispered in the darkness.
I frowned and shut my eyes. “Go to sleep. We’ll talk about it in the morning.”
“No, we need to talk about it now.”
“There’s nothing to talk about,” I growled and rolled over. “Sleep, Mori.”
“Oh no, you don’t get to just roll over and pretend like you’re not avoiding the situation.” She tried to roll me back over.
But I was twice her size and barely budged. I smirked as she cursed and finally gave up. Only to hop over me and land right on the edge of the bed. She nearly fell off, so I reached out to catch her, and she grinned in triumph.
“You know exactly what I’m talking about. What if that’s the key?”
I shut my eyes and shook my head. “I’m not talking about this with you again.”
“You don’t have a choice. We have to talk about it eventually.”
“Yes, eventually, when there’s no other option remaining. Sleep, Mori,” I whispered and kissed her softly. “You need it.”
“You’re not getting out of this talk,” she warned, even as she yawned and snuggled closer.
“Hmm, is that so?”
“Damned straight, stubborn ass dragon,” she mumbled.
I waited for a few beats as her breathing evened out and then she snored softly. I cracked open an eye and smiled when I saw she was sound asleep. But my smile didn’t last long.
She was right to believe she should not need sleep. It wasn’t that I wanted to be right, telling her she was turning mortal. The notion worried me about what would happen to her if and when we returned to the realms. Would her power come back to her? Or would she become mortal forever? My mind drifted, and eventually, I gave in and fell asleep, too, holding her close to me until dawn broke over the house.