In The Dark Of Dreams Part 34

Perrin grunted. "I knew. There were enough outside rituals involved that I would have had to be dead not to know there was something living on the back of my head."

"How old were you?"

"The previous host died when I was . . . thirteen of your human years. I was young, either way. Very young for the responsibility. Many were concerned that I would not be strong enough to bear the isolation." He hesitated. "You and I hadn't been inside each other's dreams for long."

She tried to imagine the boy she had known, alone and shouldering the weight of keeping a sea monster asleep. Made her ill. "We met off the coast of Maine. But the Kraken nests in these waters?"

"I was born and trained in the part of the ocean that the humans call the Atlantic. Near . . . Greenland, I think. But I was sent here. None of the local candidates were strong enough for the kra'a." Perrin paused. "I never knew it was Maine."

He said that very quietly. Broke her heart a little. Perrin, lost in the world. Jenny ached at the idea. She couldn't even fathom what he had gone through, just to survive. Alone. Abandoned. Cut off from everything he had known.

Eight years ago. Jenny thought she should have felt something, but nothing stood out. Nothing at all. Eight years ago she had been in San Diego, exploiting family contacts in the United States Navy in order to work with, and learn from, the military's dolphin trainers. Wondering, sometimes stupidly, if any of those animals would be willing to chat with her grandfather about the existence of mermen.

You never did ask, she thought, watching Rik and Eddie play cards in the shade of the bridge. Clearly not eavesdropping.

"How did they know you would be strong enough for the kra'a?" she asked. "Was there a test?"

"A Kraken nests in the waters between Iceland and Greenland. Children of a certain age are presented to the local Guardian, as I was. The kra'a told its host what I was, and so I was selected for training. When the Guardian here began dying, its kra'a somehow knew about me. And asked for my life."

"Is that normal?"

"It happens," he said, but there was something in his voice that made her think that it wasn't common at all.

Rare, whispered the kra'a inside her head. But there are times when rarity is necessary. We wanted his mind.

Jenny winced, touching her head. Perrin said, "What is it?"

"It spoke to me," she said, and only because she was looking at him did she see the split-second devastation that filled his face. Devastation and grief, and terrible aching loss.

Then, gone.

But she felt those emotions like a slow ache inside her mind, on the other side of the wall, and wondered what would happen if she tore down the barrier between them. If she let him flood her mind. If he would feel the kra'a again.

"Perrin," she began, hesitantly. But before she could say more, the phone in her lap rang.

Jenny flinched, and tossed the oversized cell to Eddie. He answered quickly, was silent for several long moments, then settled that dark, old-man gaze on her. "Ma'am. It's Roland. He'd like to speak with you."

"Remind me," she said. "Is that old b.a.s.t.a.r.d still clairvoyant?"

"Um, yes."

She flipped the phone the middle finger. "So I guess he can see this, right now?"

Eddie wasn't standing all that close, but she very clearly heard the answering growl that came out of the phone. The young man bit back a smile. "Yes, ma'am. I believe that's the case."

Jenny smiled, though it felt crooked. "Okay. I'll talk with him."

Perrin cleared his throat. "I met Roland. His sense of humor seems limited."

"Sounds about right," she said, and frowned. "How did you get mixed up with this crowd?"

"A friend," he said, then Eddie was there with the phone, and Jenny took it carefully, suddenly feeling like it was a live snake.

"h.e.l.lo, Roland," she said quietly.

There was a moment of long silence, filled with heavy breathing. Until, finally, she heard a gruff voice say, "You look like s.h.i.+t warmed over, sweetheart."

"That would be an improvement over you, I think."

"Funny," he rasped. "Been a while. I heard what happened at the old place."

"Whatever," she said tersely. "You folk keep to your side of the fence, we stay on ours, and it works out fine."

"Like h.e.l.l it does. Everything changed that day. If we're going to fight the Consortium, your side has to learn to trust us."

"f.u.c.k that," she told him, not caring that it was coa.r.s.e, and he was her elder. "I'm done trusting family. And it's not like you're diving into the arms of A Priori."

"Guess not," he said softly. "Priorities. Expectations."

"Too many secrets," she replied, keenly aware of everyone listening. "Did you speak to my grandparents?"

"Nancy did it herself. But they already knew something was wrong. Maurice called them."

Jenny hesitated, uncomfortable. "So why did you want to talk to me?"

"Because I'm your uncle," he said. "And I'm sorry I can't kill my brother for what he did to you and yours."

She had to escape, after that. Talking to Roland had been a mistake. His voice was too familiar, too close to his brother's. She told him about the island, and hearing her uncle on the radio-but that was all she could do. She had to give the phone back to Eddie and run.

Of course, the problem with running on a boat was that a girl could only go so far. Finding a place to lick all her wounds, almost impossible.

Jenny ended up in the cabin with its weak-legged cot and garlic scents. Sitting on the edge of the sagging mattress, staring at her feet. Feeling rather small and afraid, and useless.

The kra'a rested in her mind with all the presence of a nagging thought, and so she closed her eyes and nagged back, just a little.

Why did you choose me?

You were needed, said the kra'a. You were of us. You were of him.

And you missed him, she replied.

We were emptier without him. Emptier without you, through him. Taken before death. Dreams torn. Dreams should never be torn.

Jenny sensed a terrible aching emptiness inside the kra'a-there and gone-but that glimpse of its pain made her feel strange.

I understand emptiness, she told it. I understand.

We know, it whispered. We know, and we will not allow ourselves -we will not- -allow- -we will not allow ourselves to be- -emptied again.

"Never," Jenny breathed, pressing a fist to her stomach.

"Never," said Perrin, from the door.

She flinched and felt absurdly ashamed, as though she had been caught doing something bad. But Perrin leaned into the cabin, his body almost too wide for the door, his eyes closed as though listening to something very quiet. He wore a haunted look, and in the shadows his pale skin and silver hair made him resemble some apparition.

A warrior from the shadow lands, she thought, never mind that was the kind of thing some romantic teenager would write in her diary.

"Did you hear what the kra'a said to me?" she asked him.

"I heard," he said, his eyes still closed. "Right now you're thinking something warm about me."

"You can tell that?"

"Our bond," he said.

"The longer we're together," she replied. "Inside each other's heads."

"Maybe." Perrin smiled, a little sadly. "So what was your warm thought?"

Jenny studied the sharp lines of his face, marveling that he was real, that she was real, that this was not a dream. "White knight. My knight. In s.h.i.+ning armor."

His smile gathered warmth, and he opened his eyes. "I've heard the term. But I don't understand it."

Jenny also smiled. "It comes from human medieval literature. Knight-errant. A warrior who would wander, sometimes in the service of others, sometimes on a quest. n.o.ble. Righteous. Often performing deeds in the name of his lady."

Perrin slid into the room, closing the door behind him with a soft click. He turned the lock, too, and that gave her the same reaction as a physical touch: a sharp, intimate throb hit her low, between the legs.

It got worse the longer she watched him. He was a beautiful, unearthly man, but the attraction she felt went deeper than that. Perrin filled the cabin with heat and some subtle power that soothed the heartache and loneliness inside her-a pain that had never left her. Pushed aside, maybe. Ignored. Forgotten, at times. But ever-living, ever-present, ever-burning: some coal still carrying a spark.

"Are you my lady?" he asked.

"How many good deeds have you done lately?"

"None." Perrin knelt in front of her. "But I promise to try very hard to change that."

Jenny touched his face. He turned his cheek into her palm and kissed her wrist. She closed her eyes, drifting. Warm. Safe.

His arms were so strong, sliding around her, gathering her close against his broad, scarred chest. Jenny clung to him, burying her face in the crook of his neck. Breathing in his scent of salt and ocean. Listening to their heartbeats mingle.

"You ran up there," he murmured. "What scared you?"

"Everything," she said, pus.h.i.+ng closer. "I remember things I don't want to remember, and it breaks my heart a little, each time."

His hands tightened. "Yes."

Jenny closed her eyes and felt the wall inside her head, Perrin warm on the other side.

Let him in, she told herself. Let him in.

But she was afraid of that, too. She was afraid of what he would see.

"I'm sorry," she murmured.

Perrin flinched, and she realized that his hand had been resting in her hair, against the parasite. She sensed his embarra.s.sment at being caught touching it-as though her apology to him was some remark of pity-instead of her own remorse for being a coward.

He began to move his hand. Jenny reached back and held it in place.

"This is yours," she said.

He began to shake his head, then stopped, going very still. "When I hear its voice inside me, I feel good for a short time. But then I remember what I lost. Like you remember."

"I remember," she echoed. "I remember a boy on a beach. I always wondered why that boy didn't come back. Why he-you-came to land in the first place." Jenny pulled away, searching his eyes. "I recognized the man on the boat. The one who kept hitting you."

"My father," Perrin said.

Jenny was unsurprised. Something in their faces, the way they were together. How carefully Perrin did not strike back. "He hurt you, when you were a kid."

He still hurts you, she thought, memorizing the bruises on his face, and body. Bitterness twisted his mouth. "I had just discovered that I would be sent away as host for the kra'a. My family was given permission to join me, but that didn't make it easier. I had always . . . wanted to touch land. I was afraid that was my last chance."

"You were miserable when I found you."

"Terrified. Everything was so bright and heavy, and large. Like the sky. It was one thing to push my head above water to see the sky, but exposed on a beach, surrounded by nothing but air . . . I thought I would die." Perrin's lips brushed the top of her head. "Until you came."

"I never forgave myself for running away and not helping you."

"I told you. You would have died if you'd stayed. You couldn't have saved me."

"I was a stupid kid."

"No. Not like me. I never stopped being stupid."

She touched the old bullet scar in his shoulder. He tensed.

"Yes," he said quietly. "That was my fault."

The scar was large, deep. Bone had been broken. She was certain of it, given the placement. It would have taken a long time to heal.

"Who shot you?" she asked.

"A man I tried to rob." Perrin smiled, grim, at the surprise that must have been on her face. "I wish I could give you a more n.o.ble reason, but I was starving, I was a mess, and desperate. I took food from a gas station, tried to run-and the owner pulled a gun. I kept running, right at him. He was scared and shot me. I don't blame him. It was a lesson I needed to learn."

"Not to run at men with guns?"

"Or, you know, that stealing is bad."

"I was going to get to that."

He looked away, and his smile faded. "Prison followed. I almost died there. From the other inmates, the captivity, the chemicals used in cleaning. But especially from my inability to access seawater. I need to drink it to stay alive. Freshwater sustains me for only so long. There are minerals my body requires to keep functioning. So I . . . made deals . . . to have sea salt smuggled in. A poor subst.i.tute. I had to hurt people to get what I wanted. I had to be . . . frightening." His voice roughened with each word. "You don't know what I've done. I don't want you to."