SAM

  “Think we can do it, Sam? Walk in people’s dreams? Do we reach everyone all at once? Countless sleeping minds?” Cora murmured against my neck in the dark of our hotel room.

  I chuckled into her hair, “And go mad? No thanks!"

  I ran my fingers lightly down her bare back, “Maybe... could we tell ourselves to try comforting one person? Like Ree helped me on Discord, you know? She nudged me towards safety.”

  I went on, “Maybe there’s someone out there whose life is a waking nightmare. But while they’re asleep, we can give them peace? Like that dream you had.‘I was the song, and the song was the world, and nothing could stop such beauty from existing.’” I quoted her journal, whispering into her hair.

  Her lips traced the curve of my neck.

  “If we can connect someone desperate to that kind of peace while they’re sleeping, maybe they can find their way out of the dark,” I whispered, breathless.

  “Hmm,” she hummed against my skin, no longer thinking about dreams. She kissed her way up my neck, covering my mouth with hers.

  I got lost in Cora. Bliss.

  In time, I remembered to care about the unnamed masses of the 9 Galaxies, drifting towards oblivion.

  In the seconds before sleep pulled me under, words spun round my mind. I see my hand and know I'm dreaming. Then I find the mind who needs me, joining them to the peaceful dream.

  The memory of a ruby light and golden feathers filled me, and I knew no more.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  I was pulled forward. I could not stop it. Suddenly, I saw an avalanche. Looking at it hurt everything inside of me so bad, but I could do nothing. I saw a dark hand reaching towards me through the snow.

  I stretched out my left hand, and a serpent shot forward in a streak of ruby light. Just before it struck the brown hand, it turned into golden feathers and wrapped around the hand.

  Drip. Drip. Drip. Water kept falling. Freezing cold. Water everywhere. It hurt so bad looking at it. Then pale fingers broke the surface of the black pool, reaching towards me.

  I reached back with my left hand, and a golden snake slithered under the water, evaporating it into ruby light.

  Piercing white light shattered everything in pain, and I’d collapse under the strain if I didn’t get away from it. But I was trapped. There was nowhere to go, only a world of suffering. And I couldn’t breathe.

  Something stirred, aching, longing, trying for all it was worth to break free. I grabbed hold. Parachuting down, we held onto each other and slowly lowered to a soft, feather bed.

  Love. Then heartbreak. Grief. Always and only grief. There would never be anything else.

  I know, I said, but it wasn’t words. It was a feeling that was like a thought.

  I know. Because I did.

  All-consuming grief had been my closest friend for years and years. A constant companion who never left me.

  I know, I repeated.

  And peace was the response.

  Morning light woke me from the deepest, calmest sleep of my life. I reached for my journal, and Cora’s pen scritched her notebook. Then we swapped, my eyes welling when I read her dreams.

  The sound hurt. Grating. Worse than nails on a chalkboard, and all I wanted in the world was to get away. But it pulled me in, and I couldn’t stop it. There was a child inside the sound, and I wrapped around her.

  But I wasn’t me. I was furry and soft, and the child’s tears wet my pelt in relief as she clung to me.

  Blistering heat seared the world, but there was no flame. I was the inferno and nothing could put me out. Cool water drenched me, and my mind cleared. I heard an echo of something familiar. Two words: “Go home.”

  Love was a poison in my veins that I could never stop. I had to have him. Again. I’d never stop. Not until. . . Stillness. Calm. Peace. Love was peace. Just like this. “Remember.”

  “Woah, Cora.”

  “Woah yourself, Dream Walker.”

  We grinned at each other and closed our notebooks.

  Time to head to the train station and home.