(Samarra – point of view)
I fall asleep the way I always do. Exhausted. Wired. Half-expecting something to go wrong.
The house creaks around me, old wood settling, rain tapping softly against the window like it's asking permission to come in. I curl onto my side and tuck my hands under my pillow, grounding myself in the familiar fabric, counting breaths to slow heartbeat.
For a few minutes, it works.
Then the dreams start.
I'm standing in the forest.
Not a forest. The forest. The one behind the house, thick and endless, trees packed so close together the sky is nothing but thin slashes of grey above me. The ground beneath my feet is slick with mud and something darker.
Blood.
I know that without looking.
The air feels wrong. Too heavy. Like breathing through soaked fabric. Every sound echoes. My footsteps, my breathing, the slow, wet drag of something moving just out of sight.
"Hello?" I call.
My voice comes back to me warped, stretched, like it travelled too far before returning.
Something laughs.
Not loud or cruel.
Amused.
I turn and see the house. Only it's not the house.
The windows are dark and hollow. The front door hangs open, splintered, streaked with old rust-coloured stains. I step closer despite every instinct screaming at me not to.
Inside, the floor is smeared with handprints. Like someone had been dragged from the hallway out the door.
"Josephine," a voice whispers.
I freeze.
It's not Derrick.
Not Catherine.
It's a woman's voice, soft, breaking, familiar in a way that makes my chest ache.
I follow it down the hallway.
"Hello?" My shaky voice betrays me.
Past rooms that feel wrong. Too long and narrow. Walls breathing in and out like lungs.
At the end of the hall, there's a tree growing through the floor.
Its trunk is split open.
Hollow.
Something inside it moves.
I step closer.
Closer.
"Come home daughter" the voice whispers again making me jump.
Green eyes open in the dark. Bright and glowing.
I try to scream but it's soundless
Something grab my ankles and I hit the floor with a crack. Hands, cold and desperate, pulling me backward toward the forest, toward the roots, toward the dark that smells like smoke and flowers and rain.
***
I wake up gasping.
My sheets are soaked through. My heart slams so hard it hurts, my whole body shaking as the voice echoes again inside my skull.
Come home, daughter.
My feet hit the floor before I've fully woken. Autopilot taking over. I move down the dark hallway, quiet as a mouse, floorboards creaking softly beneath my weight.
The living room is dim but he's there.
Derrick is sprawled on the couch, half-upright, head tilted toward the doorway like he fell asleep watching it. He looks almost peaceful.
I pause.
You're not a kid anymore.
You shouldn't need him like this.
The voice slithers back in.
Come home, daughter.
My throat tightens, tears pricking my eyes.
"Derrick?" My voice barely makes it out. A squeak.
His eyes snap open instantly, alert, searching. Then they soften when they find me.
"Mouse?" He sits up, scrubbing a hand over his face. "What are you doing up? What's wrong?"
I don't answer. I cross the room and collapse against him.
His arms come around me automatically, warm and solid, familiar. Safe. I'm shaking so hard my teeth chatter, words breaking through tears and shallow breaths.
"I—I had a nightmare," I whisper. "One of the really bad ones."
He tightens his hold, one hand cupping the back of my head, the other pressing firm and steady between my shoulder blades.
"Shhh," he murmurs into my hair. "I've got you. You're okay."
My fingers clutch his shirt like they used to when I was little. Night terrors have followed me for as long as I can remember. Sometimes I used to wake up with scratches along my arms and legs.
Self-inflicted, the doctor had said.
Catherine's disappointed gaze.
Derrick's worried eyes, scanning me like I was something fragile. Breakable.
A mouse that needed hiding.
I bury my face in his chest. His scent, clean, familiar, grounding fills my lungs.
But the shaking doesn't stop.
"It felt so real," I whisper. "There was this… voice. It said, 'Come home, daughter.' It was calling a Josephine."
Derrick goes utterly still. Every muscle locks. His gaze flicks to the shadows, the corners of the room, the windows.
When he speaks, his voice is low. Even.
"It can't take you," he says. "Not while I'm here."
His hand rubs slow circles against my back.
It feels too good.
My pulse stutters for a different reason entirely. I become painfully aware of how close we are. How big he is. How safe I feel. The way his thumb brushes gently along my spine sends shivers racing through me.
My stomach flips.
I pull back just enough to look at him.
His eyes search my face, full of worry. Full of light.
I'm close enough to see golden flecks in his icy blue irises.
My breath catches.
His gaze drops to my lips for the briefest second.
My heart stumbles.
What is this?
"Derrick…" I whisper.
He blinks hard. His jaw tightens. He lifts a hand and tucks my hair behind my ear, fingers lingering like he's fighting himself.
"This was the first nightmare in a while," he says quietly. "You're probably just stressed. Shaken from your first day and that story from the hardware store"
My forehead drops to his.
"Must be," I breathe.
He exhales shakily. "I'm here. I'm always here. I swear to you. I won't let anything happen to you."
We sit there like that, breathing each other in, until my sobs fade into soft sighs and my body finally goes slack against him.
He lifts me easily and carries me back to bed.
Tucks me in like he used to.
My hand reaches out weakly, catching his.
"Sit with me?"
He settles beside the bed, back against the old wooden headboard, one hand threading through my hair until sleep finally pulls me under.
This time, there is no forest. No voice.
Just the steady weight of him beside me.
----------------------------------------------------------
Derrick p.o.v
Her breathing evens out before mine does.
I stay where I am, back against the headboard, one hand still in her hair like if I let go too soon the world might remember she exists.
She sleeps now.
Peaceful.
Too peaceful for someone who heard his voice.
My jaw tightens.
Come home, daughter.
Lucian's words crawl across my mind like ash.
That wasn't a dream.
Dreams don't carry signatures. They don't tear through wards, don't bend space, don't echo across realms.
This did.
Which means he's found her.
And if he's found her…
My gaze drifts to her face. Soft in sleep. Unaware of the war that just brushed past her soul like a hand reaching through a veil.
I should have felt it sooner.
That failure sits heavy in my chest.
I lower my forehead until it rests lightly against the wall above her pillow and close my eyes.
I remember another girl in another lifetime, dark hair against blood-soaked cloth, her breath shallow in my arms, whispering that same name before the light left her.
Josephine.
Aleira.
Different names.
Same soul.
The realization doesn't frighten me anymore.
It devastates me.
Because fate does not return what it intends to take back gently.
I glance at the door, every shadow now a threat, every sound a possible breach.
They will come for her.
Not because of what she is becoming.
But because of what she already is.
I straighten slowly, careful not to wake her, and ease my hand from her hair.
For a moment, my fingers linger in the space above her head. Close enough to feel the warmth, far enough not to touch.
"I failed you once," I whisper to the dark. "I won't do it again."
I step into the hallway and close the door softly behind me.
The house feels smaller now.
The wards hum, faint, strained, like a heartbeat growing tired.
Catherine is awake when I find her at the kitchen table, hands folded, eyes sharp.
"You felt it," she says.
I nod.
"He called to her."
Her breath stutters. "Then the truce is broken."
"Yes."
Silence settles between us, heavy and final.
I turn toward the window where the forest waits, patient and hungry.
Let them come.
They will not take her.
Not while I still draw breath.
Not while I remember how to burn.