Although hearty flames still merrily danced in the fireplace across the room, goose pimples and small beads of sweat covered the sleeping woman’s skin. Fever-damp sheets clung to her chilly flesh as she woke suddenly. Jolting upright, as if physically ejected from the nightmare she had escaped, she frantically surveyed the familiar landscape and let out a staccato breath. The dream broke and like a popped bubble containing smoke, the memory of it immediately began to dissipate; leaving Genny grasping at vague tendrils despite the visceral experience impressed upon her.
Minor recollections formed and she looked to her hands which were unconsciously clenched into tight, white-knuckled fists. Fingers unfurled and revealed the root Gloria had given her, thoroughly crushed, in one and on the other something akin to a bruise turned blue. Memories trickled back, an encounter in the familiar library construct and Gloria, of ballgowns and broken glass, of a shower of blood in the tavern turned upside down. Most of the impossible, imagined events, returned to her and even though they were ridiculous the reality was undeniable. But there was something more, it wasn’t a distinct memory so much as a feeling. She had trusted Elliot with, with something. Something, but what?
In a flash of frustrated anger, fists formed anew slammed into the mattress on either side of where she sat.
After a moment she closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and recalled a vision of the beast of many teeth, the older Elliot whose hands wrapped over hers and the hilt of her sword. And then… and then? Her mind reached, it pulled at the dark corners and frayed edges where half remembered things dwelled, the monsters of peripheral vision, and faces without names. Something bit her hand and in the shadows, she just barely saw the disturbed surface of the water and the fractured reflection of Elliot. Blurry, blue bokeh accompanied by dull sounds, words heard underwater, and puzzle piece images as if captured upon shattered glass that became increasingly fragmented. The rest seemed lost.
Gloria had felt something, thought something just before this, something that matched the mushy sound. “Soodsy,” she said aloud, her tone uncertain and her eyes opening to find only the empty room before her.