“Wren,” he murmured.
She looked at his hand and cocked her head to the side. She wasn’t herself, he realized. Her hands were holding onto the delicate fabric of her dress. Her head swiveled constantly to look around her, and her eyes were large with fright.
Was she worried something was coming after her? If he remembered anything from her nightmares, it was possible. But E had said that the other souls were not stressed in the depths of its mind. Why would she be?
He took one step towards her and froze when she poised to run.
“Wren.” He was quiet with his words and movements. Burke had the distinct feeling that if he lost her now, she was gone forever. “It’s me.”
Her head cocked to the side, and she looked at him for the first time since entering the clearing. Those storm grey eyes danced over his features, and her lips parted. A jolt of joy nearly made him run forward to hold her in his arms.
She took one step towards him. “Cricket?”
His brows furrowed instantly. Cricket? What was she talking about?
Was this situation more dire than he had realized?
She shook her head too many times to count as her eyes moved to stare down at her open hands. Her fingers opened and clenched in a pattern. “No, no, no, not cricket. That’s a person not a cricket.”
She was whispering to herself, he realized. Without E constantly in her mind Wren had grasped at the edges of her mind and wrapped them around herself. Insanity was a tightrope she was currently walking without any guidance.
“Man. Cricket. Bug? No, not bug.” She muttered as her arms wrapped around herself. “Think. Think!”
He wanted to help her. But she was so wrapped firmly in her own mind that he did not know the effects of him talking. She had to figure this out for herself. It was killing him to not assist her.
“Jiminy Cricket?” Her eyes looked up at him with a hopeful light in them before her brow furrowed instantly. She stared at him as though he was the problem in this moment. “No, not character, you’re too big.”
Burke waited patiently and prayed to every God that she would figure it out. She had to go through this moment by herself.
“Jiminy.” She whispered then. Her eyes widened again as she stared at him. This time, he saw recognition in that gaze. The fog had lifted from her mind. “Jiminy.”
“Hello.”
He wanted her to step forward. He wanted so desperately to hold her in his arms. To get this entire ordeal over with and to save her once more. But she took a step away from him instead.
“Wren-” Burke followed her for each step he lost.
“I’m not right, Jiminy.” She shook her head and held out a hand as a barrier against him. “I’m not right.”
“I know. I know, sweetheart. I’m here to fix you.”
“You can’t.”
His hand checked that the vial around his throat was still there. He could fix her. She just had to give him a chance. “Why do you think I’m here, Wren?”
She tapped hard against her head. Jabbing the solid skull underneath her wild hair, she shook her head at him. “I’m in pieces, Jiminy. Not whole. Not the same. Shattered and broken, I’m -” she swallowed hard, “I’m not myself.”
His hands clenched at his sides. “Malachi did that to you. He pushed you too hard, but we found a way to piece you back together.”
“Silly.” The smile on her face didn’t look right. “You can’t put together a puzzle that has pieces missing.”
She turned and plunged into the darkness around the trap he had set. Burke didn’t hesitate. He followed her instantly.
He didn’t know what the depths of E’s mind would feel like the further he got from the point he had been dropped at. Strangely, it felt as though something was constantly pulling him backwards. The only way he could describe it was as though he was attempting to run through waves. Something was always pushing him back.
Sight was nonexistent in this place. His hand might have been in front of him, but he did not know. His body was no longer attached, and his mind was spiraling as he tried to find her.
Burke could see how this place drove people insane.
“Wren!” he shouted. “Wren!”
A giggle from his right cause him to swerve. He wasn’t interested in playing this game. He wasn’t chasing her through a labyrinth.
“I’m here to save you!”
She laughed again.
“Damnit, Wren!”
This wasn’t her. This wasn’t the woman he had fallen in love with. It was only pieces of her, and some pieces he didn’t particularly like. Insanity made her words seem meaningless and her actions less.
He broke free into another dream. Silvery light nearly blinded him as he brushed off the black spiderwebs that tried to pull him back into the abyss. He wasn’t letting go. He was going to find her.
Before him were fields of roses. They were a blanket that covered the ground and filled the air with a cloying scent. So sweet, it clung to his clothing, and Burke could taste the bitter stems. Red roses that put his own image to shame.
Perhaps she was showing him what she truly wanted. If he were going to tempt her, he was going to have to do a lot better.
“Wren?” he asked one more time. He was going to change form soon if that was what it required. As a bird, he might be able to find her in this dream that was her own creation.
An image shimmered before him as the roses parted to reveal a stone ruin. The crag glittered as the silver light caught on veins of ore that threaded through its rough stones. A carved stairwell ringed its great height.
The roses shuddered again before they started to swallow the stairwell whole.
“I hope you’re giving me a hint,” he muttered before sprinting towards the stairs.
The roses bit at his legs. They were beautiful flowers, but their thorns tore into his flesh. He
