Page 57 of Bane Bloom

Another movement draws my eye. A creature whiter than the fog grows larger as it approaches the shore. Water trickles and plashes.

“You again,” I say as he emerges.

Phantom nickers a greeting. Water streams from his fine, gleaming coat. I hold out my hand and he comes, muzzle soft and warm against my fingers.

He turns and wades again into the water, bending his great neck to look back at me. He tosses his head and seems to beckon, and I set my candlestick on the beach and follow. When the water has risen as high as his muscular shoulders, he stops to wait, and somehow I understand what he wants. I clamber onto his back—though I’ve never ridden and am frightened—and slip my fingers into his frothy mane, gripping it tightly.

“Phantom,” I say anxiously, “I can’t swim.”

His answering nicker seems to say, But I can.

He is powerful, his movements surprisingly steady. Before long I can no longer see the shoreline. I grip his sides with my legs.

We move quietly through the fog for a while before he begins to slow, though there is no shore in sight. I feel his body begin to angle beneath me, and a moment later his head dives into the lake, nearly unseating me.

Water rises to my hips and waist, and as it reaches my chest, I let out a cry. At last my head goes under, too.

His legs continue to churn as he plunges down, down, down, while I cling to fistfuls of mane. My eyes see as clearly as above the water, and I can make out other creatures around us. Murky light rises from the depths.

Panicking, I let go of him so I might return to the surface. My arms flail, but I am sinking. An enormous fish appears—it has the head, shoulders, breasts, and streaming water-weed hair of a woman. I glimpse another creature swishing below me, scales flashing in the green light. Then I feel fingers gripping both of my ankles, and I’m tugged sharply down.

I claw at the water and open my mouth to scream.

The scream left my waking lips more like a whimper. I bolted up, nightdress clinging to my clammy body. Scarcely awake yet, I padded across the floorboards, opened my door, and hurried through the open door of the other bedroom.

“Catherine?” Thomas sat up in bed, candle still burning on the table beside him. His gaze was sharp with fear. The coverlet fell to his waist, baring his broad, warm, sun-bronzed chest.

I rushed to the bedside, and he caught me in his arms and pulled me exactly where I wished to go. An hour ago, no one could have convinced me I could ever feel safer than I had when he’d caught and held me in the bluebell glade. But in this moment—cheek against his chest, firelight flickering over his skin, a tracing of soft russet hair tickling my face—I did.

His thumb brushed my other cheek, and I realized my face was wet with tears.

“What’s happened, lass?” he asked, voice low and urgent, warm breath in my hair.

The dream had left me with a vague sense of terror, but as my breaths began to slow, the details came back to me. I’d run to him over nothing more than a nightmare!

And yet, melting there against him, feeling the rumble of his voice through his chest while his hand stroked my hair, I had not a single regret.

“I am well,” I finally managed. “It was only a nightmare. Very like one I used to have as a child.” Inspired by Nancy’s old stories and my encounter with Phantom, no doubt.

His chest rose as he drew a deep breath. “Tell me.”

I recounted the dream for him, though the longer I talked, the more foolish I felt. Why could a dream never properly be described? How could something that terrified you one moment seem so ridiculous when you put words to it?

When I finished, he was silent for a long time. The casement stood partway open, and the night had gone quiet. No wind, no rain, no creatures stirring at the shoreline.

Regret did creep in now. Finally I sat up, avoiding his gaze. “I’m so sorry to have burst in on you like this.” I wiped the last bit of moisture from my cheeks with the back of my hand. “I wasn’t fully awake.”

I was rising, but he gently took hold of my wrist.

Our eyes met.

“I’ll not have you apologize for being afraid,” he said. “You’ve been given many reasons to be.”

My heart beat like the wings of a bird startled from a hedgerow. My gaze shifted to his hand around my wrist, and he abruptly let go. Which wasn’t at all what I’d intended. I raised my hand, fingers trembling as I lightly touched the side of his face. The scruff of his beard.

There was astonishment in his gaze. Also fear, and something I couldn’t quite name. A kind of eagerness that caused a quaking heat inside me.

Lowering my hand, I said, “I don’t understand what is happening to me, Thomas.” I was sitting on the bed of a half-naked man, taking comfort from his voice and the feel of his skin. There was no place left to hide, so I didn’t try. “I know that I’ve been a thorn in your side since I arrived, yet I feel very differently about you. I suppose it’s something you’ve done to me. Perhaps a trick you’ve learned from the fairies.”