Page 33 of Cursed By the Dawn

Our movements became languid. Lazy, almost. Taking time to enjoy the sensations we evoked with every touch and taste, but never moving further than what our clothes contained. And when we dried off in soft robes and tucked into our canopied bed, I felt as if we could, perhaps, conquer these next few days. That we could be the Shadow Weavers we were summoned to be.

That we weredestinedto be.

Together.

Two dreamers had died.

Sorren and Ceveon reported the grim news: The two dreamers who had perished under the Weavers’ demonic “gift” had not, as expected, woken up in their beds earlier that morning. They had not risen with groggy memories of being flung into a tree or cut down the middle, insides spilling into shadows. They had not attended breakfast, had not arrived with the other dreamers at our makeshift training grounds. No, they had not done any of those things.

Because they were gone.

Dead.

“Are you sure?” I asked roughly, resisting the urge to palm my throat. “Isn’t that…”

“Impossible?” Erebus offered darkly. He stormed back and forth, shadows trailing the edges of his cape. I could tell his control was slipping; his thin mask of decorum was ready to fall. “Death in the Dream Realm is convoluted; ‘death’ is meant to result in waking—either waking up in a physical plane, in Noctis, or waking up in an assigned domain.” Rage simmered like cold fire beneath his skin, eager to bereleased. “But these dreamers werecutfrom our domain. Uprooted and discarded like weeds.”

And it was true.

There were two fewer threads in our domain. I could feel their absence from our web, along with other threads seeking to close the gap. Erebus and I were connected to all the dreamers across our domain. Their souls were like little pricks of light, tiny silver stars that formed a webbed constellation within our minds. Their threads vibrated in fear. They were uncertain about their futures and distrustful of Erebus and me as their leaders.

But there were also threads ofwant, too.

Want for power, revenge, and knowledge. They craved what we had to offer them, even if they didn’t fully revere us. They wanted to know how to fight. How to survive. And we could teach them.

“There are concerns about where the dreamers’ souls went,” Ceveon said, glancing at the crowd of dreamers who were beginning to gather around us in the courtyard, waiting for instruction. His green eyes, typically so vibrant, were heavy with exhaustion. “Some believe their souls did not ascend to be with the Maker.”

My brow tensed. “But where else would they go? Our dreamers are no longer…” I trailed off, unexpectedly choked up on that one little word.Alive.Our dreamers were already dead; they had all passed away in a number of cruel ways, succumbing to Corruption and inhabiting their demons’ bodies until we cleansed them. Perhaps Eden, Mother, and Father were still in the Dream Realm somewhere, suffocating under the flesh of the demons that claimed them. Unable to find their way to our domain as the other dreamers had. “Alive,” I finished quickly, feeling ill.

“No, we aren’t,” Sorren said, thin lips pursed in irritation. As though he wanted to move past this and talk about something else. “Beyond the Dream Realm, we’re all just piles of rot and bones.”

Erebus visibly darkened, shadows falling heavily upon his shoulders. He’d always feel anger and guilt for their entrapment. For not freeing Ceveon and Sorren sooner, even if it wasn’t his sin to repent for. “Where do the dreamers believe the souls went, Ceveon?”

“There are theories that the two souls descended,” Ceveon answered.

“To the Beyond, then,” I noted, recalling what I knew of that hellish place. It was the equivalent to spending an eternity amid chaos, darkness, and demons. In truth, it didn’t sound that far off from Erebus’s castle before he was freed. “Where demons originate. And where Raelion claims he rules.”

Ceveon nodded, expression grim. “They believe the demon was able to drag the dreamers’ souls away from the Dream Realm, away from the Maker—and straight to the Beyond.”

“Thankfully,” Sorren began, twisting one of the many silver rings on his fingers, “it doesn’t appear that anything other than a demon can fully remove a dreamer’s soul from this domain. There was a brawl a few days ago—a dreamer had his neck snapped. But he woke up the next day right as rain.”

Ouch.

I shuddered, trying to distract myself from the visceral horror of a snapping neck. “If a dreamer is taken to the Beyond, can they ever return?”

The three men shared an intense look.

“No,” Erebus finally answered. “No, they cannot.”

Our conversation unraveled as the seven Weavers returned, descending from the sky in an orderly fashion. Lelantos, Weaver of Air, and Ceres, Weaver of Earth, would lead the day’s training. Lelantos, his tawny wings spreading behind him in a dramatic sweep, immediately dove into the basics: how to envision wings, and how to move them efficiently.

“Wings,” he declared, “are the most essential form of advanced movement in the Realm. Wings are instinctive to use, provide a grounding sensation to the act of flight itself, and require little mental effort to maintain.”

Ceres supplemented his instruction, explaining how dreamers could manipulate their own minds—and, in turn, their self-imposed limits—to run and jump higher. The Weavers reminded our dreamers that theyweren’t breathing; their hearts, joints, and physical limitations had no effect on their capabilities in the Dream Realm.

For the most part, the dreamers seemed somewhat capable with their shadow-hewn wings, if a little awkward. Only a few truly floundered, unable to properly reach the new limits of their imaginations. These dreamers struggled to walk with their wings on; they wobbled around or stumbled to the dirt as if a horse were straddling their backs.

As if a horse were straddling their backs andkickingthem.