Can’t argue with what is, I thought, tossing my handful of dirt and needles off into the abyss, feeling the tickle of the falling earth against the bare skin of my dangling foot. My other foot was tucked up and hooked under the knee of the leg that hung over the edge.
It didn’t feel like I was doing anything very dangerous. It felt like I was dangling my foot off the branch of a very tall tree I’d climbed. Just enough frightening to make my stomach tingle a bit. I twisted around until the abyss was to one side of me instead of in front of me, though I left one leg hanging off the edge.
Spread out on the ground in front of me was a white linen tablecloth set with an elegant tea service, the kind with porcelain so fine you can see your fingers through the sides. There was a plate with those little creamy sandwich cookies I associated with France but could now buy at Costco. There was also a plate of brownies, but those looked a little unreal, as if whoever had made up the plate couldn’t quite remember what they looked like.
A warm breeze rose from the abyss and caressed my bare foot, leaving sharp prickles behind. It wasn’t really painful, more like I’d gotten too close to a Fourth of July sparkler, the ones they give little kids. I was connected to the abyss in some way that made me uneasy. I started to pull my foot up, but Stefan spoke.
“Mercy.”
I hadn’t realized he was there, sitting cross-legged on the other side of the tablecloth. He wasn’t looking at me; he was frowning at the brownies.
I looked up at the sky, which was that bright cerulean blue that artists are so fond of. But I couldn’t locate the sun.
“Is this a dream?” I asked slowly. “Or are you doing this so you can talk to me?”
“I wouldn’t do that,” Stefan said absently. “That would be too dangerous. Someone would notice. But everyone dreams.”
His words seemed important. I tried to make sure I’d remember them exactly. Marsilia’s words had been important, too, but I had only remembered the gist of what she had said. Hopefully I would do better with these.
“Dangerous for you?” I asked.
He laughed. And it was wrong. Stefan had a warm laugh, and this was full of broken things like dreams and hope.
“No,” he said, wiping his face as if there might have been tears on his cheeks. “Not for me. Marsilia and I, we are survivors. We are powerful enough to be useful, but not so powerful that we are threats. It’s our friends and allies that we have to sell out so we can survive.”
He looked up at me then and I sucked in a breath. Someone had gouged out his eyes.
I made as if to get up, to go to him, but he put up a hand. “No.”
There was such command in his voice that my body stopped moving without my volition. Suddenly my heart pounded, my hands and face felt numb, and I couldn’t breathe as one of those stupid panic attacks gripped me. I hadn’t had a panic attack in . . . maybe a whole week. The last one had been spurred by a dream, too. I’d dreamed of Tim and the drink from a fairy goblet that had stolen my will.
Just as Stefan had stolen my will.
If Stefan told me I was happy, I’d feel that way. It was the nature of the vampiric bond. If he told me to kill Adam . . .
“I don’t think that would work,” Stefan told me in a detached voice. “I don’t think anyone could make you kill Adam.” He paused. “Except maybe Adam himself, if he got you mad enough.”
I stared at him. There was nothing wrong with his eyes. They were the same rich brown as always, a couple of shades lighter than Adam’s. My panic attack had stopped. Just stopped. And I wondered if he’d told me not to be afraid. And not to remember that he’d told me so.
He turned his head to the abyss as if he were ashamed.
“I am sorry,” he told me. “I can’t— I’m not . . . Anyway. Marsilia and I have given you a game to play.” His fingers worried at the edge of the tablecloth that dangled over the ledge. “If you lose, you die. If you don’t play the game, you die. And even if you win . . .” He wiped his cheeks again. In a whisper he said, “I am so tired of the people I love dying while I go on and on.” He bowed his head and, still very quietly, asked, “Do you know the prayer? ‘If I should die before I wake . . .’ But the Lord doesn’t keep the souls of vampires safe, Mercy. Vampires don’t have souls.”
“Stefan,” I said.
“Don’t worry about me. Don’t worry about Marsilia,” he said forcefully.
“Are you all right?” I asked. “Are you safe?”
He laughed that terrible laugh again. “No. And no. But I’ll survive. That’s what I do. Tell me what happened when you went to my house.”
I frowned at him. “How do you know I went to your house?”
“I was informed. Please?”
I told him what had happened in more detail than I would normally. I didn’t know if that was an effect of this place or not-place, or something Stefan wanted from me.
“Is this a dream?” I asked again when I was finished.
“Have a brownie,” he said, instead of answering my question. “You like brownies.”
I gazed doubtfully at them. “I’ll take a macaroon instead, please. I don’t like the look of your brownies.”
He laughed, and this time it sounded like his laugh—if a little tired. “Macaron,” he told me. “Macaroons are the stodgy ones with all the coconut.”
“I’m sorry about the piano,” I offered without taking a cookie. “And, really, most of the living room furniture. The stairway. Some of the books got pretty wet, too, when the frost all melted.”
“I don’t care about the piano,” he said. “Things can be replaced. Even books.” He was frowning at me. He leaned sideways, getting a better look at my dangling foot. “What’s wrong with your foot? Your feet? Why are you keeping that one way out there?”
I looked at my foot, too. “It’s the one that got a bit of spider spine stuck in it.” Hadn’t both of them been hurt? “I’d forgotten. It doesn’t hurt.”
“Show me,” said Stefan.
I raised my dangling foot and lost my balance, as if it were a lot heavier than I’d expected. Stefan swept forward like a striking snake and grabbed my ankle, sending the teapot spiraling off the edge and into the darkness.
He kept his grip until I regained my seat.
“Don’t fall off the cliff, please,” he said, sounding a little shaken. He gave the abyss a wary look. “Literally or figuratively. I don’t know what it is or why it’s here.”
“Okay,” I agreed.
I knew I hadn’t been in any danger. I trusted Stefan to keep me safe.
I examined that last thought as Stefan looked at my foot. I knew that the only person I trusted to keep me safe with such bone-deep certainty was . . . no one. Not even me.
I frowned suspiciously at Stefan. What else had he said to stop my panic attack?
“Give me the other one.”
I managed that without overbalancing myself.
“You should get them looked at,” he said, releasing the foot he held. “Show them to Zee, I think. And soon.”
He released me and began folding up the tablecloth with quick, almost angry movements.
“Are you afraid?” I asked abruptly.
He stopped moving, then his hands tightened on the tablecloth before he flung the whole thing—half-formed brownies and all—into the darkness, which swallowed them up.
“I’m always afraid, Mercy,” he said, looking into the endless black. “Always.”
I don’t remember anything after that.
The next time I woke up, it was to the sound of my bedroom door opening and the smell of the good hot chocolate. This was accompanied by the scents of bacon, cheese, and all sorts of breakfasty foods.