“But you found each other,” Aris says.
“This time. But what about the next cycle? His dreams of our past were taken from him. Absinthe will no longer work on him—the dreams they took are gone. At first, I tried to remind him of the past, but it only confused him. It got so bad he would get angry whenever I talked about it. Eventually he refused. So I settled into making a new life with him. Bodie was not the same after the Dreamcatcher. A part of him was missing.”
Aris knows what Seraphina means. A part of Benja was missing too. Hope. The Dreamcatcher had taken hope away from him and replaced it with emptiness.
“He would never remember me the same way I’ll remember him,” Seraphina says.
“But suicide?” Metis asks.
“You think it was my idea? It was his. Death is the only way out of Tabula Rasa’s grip. He was the freest man you’d ever find. Everyone else here—they wanted the same thing. You don’t hear about it, because nobody talks about it. But they’re there, waiting for the right opportunity to break free. Isn’t that what Benja did?”
Aris feels tears rolling down her chin. “This can’t be the only way out. There has to be another way.”
“There isn’t,” Seraphina says.
She notices that next to Seraphina is a glass filled with clear liquid.
“No, don’t,” Aris whispers. “We can help.”
“There’s nothing you can do.”
“We have a machine that can project dreams. That’s why we came here—to try and help Bodie get his dreams back.”
Something flashes in Seraphina’s eyes. She looks down at Bodie and sighs.
“It’s too late for us. You need to leave. Once the police find us, they’ll want answers. You two cannot be associated with this.”
Seraphina eases a ring off her finger and does the same to Bodie. She beckons Aris over.
“Here, take these and go. Use the back door.”
Seraphina hands Aris the silver objects. Aris looks at them in her palm and realizes that they have the same design as her and Metis’s rings.
“Why do you have these?” Aris asks.
“I don’t know. All of us here have them. We all came across them somehow. Please put them in the Gift Market the next time you’re there. Someone else may be able to use them.”
Aris feels like crying.
“Please go. I need to follow Bodie,” Seraphina says. “Being without him is unbearable. But I can’t do that until you two leave. Please.”
Metis places his arm around Aris and pulls her toward the back of the house. As they walk slowly away, she looks over her shoulder at the scene.
The floor of the yellow room is carpeted with the men and woman who, just moments earlier, were alive. Their bodies cover the floor like a field of white flowers. A vision from a nightmare.
Seraphina is the only figure sitting. She is cradling her lover in her arms, rocking back and forth as if singing him a lullaby. In another time and another place, could Aris be her? She shoves the rings into her jacket pocket and feels warm tears streaming down her face.
There are fewer people in Elara than the other cities. Thane fears being seen, so he hides behind a building across the way from the house Aris and Metis disappeared into. He hopes he does not end up in Elara next cycle. He doesn’t like this place. Everything looks old and battered, reminding him of sun-faded photographs of ghost towns in Old California. He prefers the brightness and noise of Callisto. It’s where he belongs.
The cold wind blows, and he crosses his arms over his chest. Too many nights he is out in the cold, stalking suspects. He cannot wait for Tabula Rasa to come and take him out of this situation.
He looks across the way at the only lit house on the empty street. There is a party going on in there. He heard laughter and screams, and something like breaking glass coming from it. Aris never mentioned having friends in Elara. Perhaps the friends belong to Metis.
They are lovers. But it does not make sense. The Aris he knows would not suddenly commit to someone with only a month left.
Why now? Why this man?
The house is now quiet. Too quiet. Thane decides to look inside. He will be careful not to get caught. Maybe everyone in there is drunk. Then it would not matter. He treads carefully across the graveled road.
One of the front windows has curtains that are partially open. He goes toward it and peeks through. The room is empty.
That’s strange. Where are they?
His eyes catch something odd on the floor. Flowers. Desert flowers surrounded by brown earth. He strains his eyes. The silky texture does not look like dirt. More like hair.
What is someone’s head doing on the floor?
He thinks of Aris, and his heart drops to his stomach. He runs to the front door and pounds against it. No answer. He turns the knob and pushes.
The scene before him is out of a surreal painting. On the floors are limp bodies strewn about. Everyone is dressed in white. Next to them are empty shot glasses.
His mind immediately goes to the drug the Interpreter Center is hunting down with his help.
Does it make people immediately fall asleep and dream?
He walks to the woman with flowers in her hair, being careful to tread lightly. The floorboards creak with each step. When he gets to the woman, he kneels next to her. She has a smile on the corner of her lips. Her face looks peaceful.
“Excuse me.”
Nothing.
He touches her, intending to shake her awake. Her skin is still warm, but her body is too still. He moves his fingers up her slender neck.
No pulse!
Next to her is a familiar face. A man with deep-tan skin and blond hair. The one whose dreams the Interpreter Center erased almost
