Chapter 16

Shared Dreams

After the nightmare incident, Kael started avoiding sleep.

Evelynn realized this because every single time she woke during the night, she could feel him.

Not physically.

That would have been less disturbing somehow.

No, the bond had apparently decided privacy was now illegal. Sometimes she sensed restless irritation drifting through the connection like smoke. Other times it was exhaustion so heavy it made her chest ache too. Once around dawn she even felt a sharp pulse of anger strong enough to wake her completely from sleep.

Ten seconds later, something exploded somewhere in the western side of the palace.

Dragonfire-related property damage had officially become part of her daily routine.

By the third day, Evelynn was starting to lose patience.

She found Kael standing alone on one of the upper balconies overlooking the cliffs while snow drifted slowly through pale morning light. He hadn’t noticed her immediately, which probably meant he was too tired to function properly.

Good.

“You look terrible,” she announced.

Kael glanced sideways at her without much enthusiasm. “Good morning to you as well.”

“You haven’t slept.”

“Neither have you.”

Fair.

Evelynn wrapped her arms tighter against the cold wind and leaned against the stone railing beside him. “This thing between us is getting worse.”

Kael looked back toward the mountains. “Yes.”

“You say that like someone announcing bad weather.”

“It behaves like bad weather.”

Also fair.

For a while neither of them spoke. Below the cliffs, Black Citadel slowly woke beneath drifting snow and golden dragonfire lanterns. Dragons occasionally crossed the sky above the city, dark shapes disappearing through clouds.

Then Evelynn asked quietly:

“What happens if we keep sharing dreams?”

Kael went very still.

Not subtle stillness either.

Dangerous stillness.

Evelynn immediately noticed.

“…that was not the reaction I wanted.”

Kael exhaled slowly through his nose. “The bond deepens through emotional exposure.”

“That sounds medically fake.”

“It is older than medicine.”

Unfortunately true.

Kael finally looked toward her properly. “Dream-sharing usually happens in advanced resonance.”

“And we are?”

His gaze lingered on her a second too long.

“Yes.”

Well.

That felt concerning.

Evelynn rubbed at her temple tiredly. “Can we stop it?”

“No.”

“Can we slow it down?”

Another pause.

“Maybe.”

That “maybe” sounded aggressively unreliable.

Before Evelynn could continue interrogating him, a dragon horn echoed somewhere below the palace. Kael’s attention shifted immediately toward the lower city.

Duty.

Responsibility.

Whatever terrifying king things dragons did all day.

He straightened slightly. “I have council matters.”

“Sounds miserable.”

“It will be.”

At least he was self-aware.

Kael turned to leave before pausing unexpectedly beside her.

Then quietly said:

“If the dreams happen again… wake me.”

Evelynn frowned. “You literally appear every time I’m emotionally unstable anyway.”

“That is different.”

“How?”

Kael’s expression darkened slightly.

“In dreams, the bond becomes harder to separate.”

Cryptic dragon nonsense again.

Wonderful.

That night, the storm returned.

Wind rattled the enormous palace windows while snow swallowed Black Citadel beneath darkness and silver moonlight. Evelynn tried reading before bed, then tried tea, then tried aggressively pretending she wasn’t nervous about sleeping.

None of it worked.

Eventually exhaustion dragged her under anyway.

And immediately—

fire.

Again.

But this time she wasn’t alone.

Evelynn stood in the middle of a battlefield beneath a blood-red sky while golden dragonfire burned across the horizon. Broken weapons littered blackened ground around her. Smoke filled the air thick enough to choke on.

Somewhere nearby, dragons screamed.

Not roars.

Screams.

Pain.

Death.

The sound twisted through her chest horribly.

Evelynn turned slowly.

Bodies covered the battlefield.

Humans.

Dragons.

Both.

A massive dragon corpse lay collapsed across shattered stone nearby, black scales split open by enormous wounds. Beyond it, entire cities burned beneath the sky.

The Burning War.

This had to be the war.

Then suddenly she felt him.

Before she even saw him.

Kael stood several yards away dressed in black armor streaked with blood and ash. Younger again. Less controlled. Dragonfire curled violently around him while black wings stretched behind his back.

But this time—

he saw her too.

Immediately.

No confusion.

No distance.

The moment his gold eyes landed on her, the dream shifted sharply.

The battlefield trembled.

Evelynn stumbled as another wave of pain slammed through the bond between them.

Not hers.

His.

Kael moved toward her quickly. “You shouldn’t be here.”

“That’s comforting considering I don’t know where ‘here’ is.”

His expression tightened impatiently. “This is memory.”

The air around them warped suddenly.

The battlefield vanished.

Now they stood inside a ruined palace hallway lit by burning dragonfire. Stone columns had collapsed across bloodstained floors while smoke drifted through shattered ceilings overhead.

The transition happened too smoothly.

Dream logic.

Evelynn hated dream logic.

Kael looked around sharply like he didn’t fully control where the memory pulled them.

Then both of them froze.

Someone stood at the far end of the hallway.

A woman.

Human.

Dark hair.

Silver necklace glinting beneath firelight.

Evelynn’s breath caught.

The woman from the murals.

Lyriana.

She turned toward them slowly, though something about her looked strange. Blurred almost. Like the dream struggled holding her shape together.

But her eyes—

Her eyes locked directly onto Kael.

And suddenly every emotion in the room changed.

The rage surrounding him disappeared instantly.

The dragonfire softened.

Even the crushing grief beneath the bond shifted into something painfully human.

Love.

Raw enough to ache.

Evelynn felt it slam through the connection so hard she nearly lost breath.

Kael went completely still beside her.

“Lyriana,” he said softly.

The woman smiled faintly.

Then blood appeared across the front of her dress.

Evelynn’s stomach dropped.

The dream shattered violently.

Suddenly screams echoed through the palace around them. Fire exploded across the walls while dragonfire burst through collapsing ceilings overhead.

Kael moved immediately toward the woman.

Too late.

A spear suddenly tore through the smoke behind her.

The memory distorted sharply after that. Images flickered too quickly to follow. Blood. Fire. Kael roaring something in a language Evelynn didn’t understand. Dragons falling from the sky.

Then—

pain.

Unbearable pain exploded through the bond hard enough to rip a scream from Evelynn’s throat.

She woke violently.

The room around her spun.

Darkness.

Storm.

Fireplace.

Reality crashed back all at once.

Evelynn sat upright gasping hard while tears she didn’t remember crying burned down her face.

The chamber doors slammed open immediately.

Kael entered breathing hard like he’d run.

Then stopped the moment he saw her.

Both of them stared at each other across the room.

And neither needed to ask.

They had shared all of it.