“Em? Is that really you?”
A broken sob escaped Emory’s lips. She ran to Romie, and Romie to her, and here in the space between waking and sleeping, they hugged each other close.
“I found you,” Emory cried.
Romie was here, in the sleepscape. She was real—and yet still not real enough, she realized. It was as if a watery film were separating them. They could touch each other, sure enough, but it felt almost like an illusion about to shatter.
They pulled apart, and when Romie spoke, it sounded like Emory was hearing her from underwater, the sound distorted and far yet near enough to touch.
“How are you here?” Romie asked. Horror struck her, and her fingers tightened painfully around Emory’s wrists. “How are you here, Em? Did you go through the door?”
“No, Ro, we’re in the sleepscape. This is just a dream.”
Her grip eased. “You didn’t go through the Hourglass?”
“I’m calling you through the sleepscape, just like you did.”
With a frown, Romie searched the darkness around them. “Did a Dreamer bring you?”
“Sort of? I’m… Well, I can use Dreamer magic.”
“How—”
“It’s a long story. I’m not sure how much time we have.”
Her eyes narrowed. “But you’re alive?”
“Yes, Ro, I’m alive. You’re the one who had me thinking you were dead.”
Romie swore, wiping furiously at her tear-stained face. “Well, I’m not.”
She drew Emory in for another hug, biting down a sob, and Emory didn’t care that the weight and feel of her felt off, only that she was here.
And then Romie pulled back, shoving at her.
“Ow,” Emory bit out.
“You stupid asshole. Why did you have to follow me that night? What the fuck were you thinking, going to Dovermere like that?”
“Me? What about you? Risking your life to join the Selenic Order just so you could get a taste for other magics?”
Romie flinched. “You know about that?”
“Yes, I know about that.” Emory showed her the glowing mark on her wrist. “I’m one of them now.”
Romie lifted her arm in mirror to Emory’s. Her own mark glowed silver—not black, thankfully.
“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me.” Emory pushed her sleeve down. She couldn’t quite keep the anger from her voice. “We’re supposed to tell each other everything, Ro.”
Color rose in Romie’s cheeks. She crossed her arms defensively. “I couldn’t say anything, could I? It’s called a secret society for a reason.”
“Yeah, well, it sucked. All this time, you had me thinking you didn’t want to be friends anymore. That you’d finally had enough of me.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“How am I being ridiculous? This is what you do, Romie. You get bored of things and people and leave them behind to chase after more exciting prospects.”
“I would never do that to you.”
“You did, though.” Her voice broke. “You did. And look where it got you.”
She expected Romie to counter with more defiance, but was taken aback when she deflated, looking contrite. “You’re right. I’m sorry, Em. I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt. I just…” Romie cast a look around the sleepscape. Unshed tears glistened like stars in her eyes. “Did the others make it?” she asked quietly. “Serena, Dania, Harlow, Daphné?”
Four broken bodies on the sand.
“I’m sorry,” Emory said. “They’re dead.”
Romie only nodded, swallowed. As if she had expected this.
“What happened to you, Ro?”
Romie blew out a breath. “When the tide rushed in… I had my eyes open through the whole thing. The waves were spinning us around the Hourglass, and it opened, Em. It really opened, and before I knew it, I was through.”
“The door to the Deep.”
Romie pursed her lips. “I’d been dreaming of it, you know. There was this song in my sleep, always calling me to Dovermere. Just like in Song of the Drowned Gods.” She laughed harshly. “I became obsessed with finding the epilogue because I was so sure it was the key to lead me to the next world. I thought having access to the kind of magic the Order has might help me find it. Instead that fucking ritual brought me to the Tides-damned sleepscape.”
Emory frowned. “The sleepscape? You mean all this time, you’ve been asleep?”
“No, that’s why it doesn’t make any sense, because I’m awake.” Romie glanced around them with a frown. “It’s as if I’m in the sleepscape but not. Like it’s some sort of… in-between, and I’m stuck here whether I’m sleeping or waking. I’ve tried reaching for dreams, but it feels off. I only managed it with you, and even then, it was hard to do. Like trying to call out to you from too far a distance.”
Emory repressed a shiver. “We think… We think you might be in some kind of liminal space between our world and the Deep.”
Romie gave a harsh laugh. “Purgatory, huh? Figures.”
“Is Jordyn with you?”
“He is.” A hesitancy in her eyes, her voice. “An umbra got to him early on. I’ve been tending to him, making sure he doesn’t succumb to the umbrae’s pull, but he hasn’t been the same since.”
Romie hugged her arms. “I wanted to keep looking for the epilogue because I can feel it, Em. It’s here somewhere, and it’s the key to everything. It still calls out to me, that fucking song I can’t shake. We tried going after it together, the four of us, but the others… They didn’t acclimate well, not like I did. The farther down the path we went, the worse it got. They’d start bleeding from their noses and ears and would find it hard to breathe. So we had to turn back and stay here. I watched over them, fighting the urge to follow the song, because without me, I don’t know… I don’t think this place is meant for those who aren’t Dreamers.” She frowned at Emory. “However it is you got here, you need to be careful.”
“I’ll be fine. But what happened to Travers and Lia?” Emory asked, hoping Romie could provide an explanation for their washing up onshore. Wondering if she even knew of the horrible fate they had suffered.
“First it was Travers,” Romie said grimly. “He kept hearing a voice. But not like my voice, not like the music in my dream. He said this voice was calling him home. I thought it was the sleepscape taking its toll on him, but… One day, he was there one minute and gone the next. Vanished in what I can only describe as a wave of darkness. Like a riptide.
“We couldn’t make sense of it. And then the same thing happened to Lia. I saw her running and crying to the voice she said was calling her home, and she vanished, taken by this strange tide just like Travers. I tried to follow her through that darkness, but it only took her. Only her.”
Romie’s voice came out thick with emotion. “A part of me hoped they did go home. That whatever purgatory this must be, it’d finally come to pass for them.”
“They did come back,” Emory said painfully. “But not… Romie, you can’t let Jordyn follow that voice. You can’t follow that voice.”