Mistfall(Book One of the Mistfall Series)

11. More Mental Hijacking





I barely slept over the next few days. Every time I drifted off, horrifying images would jolt me awake screaming. I knew I would eventually have to succumb, but I intended to fight it as long as possible.

Staving off sleep for the fear of my dreams wasn’t my most brilliant idea. A few more of Abel’s thugs had come to play Winner and Loser’s with me. Exhaustion had slowed my reaction time. I almost had my first and final loss when a troll had swung at my head with its club. The club came so close I could feel my hair move from the force of the swing. It was a sheer miracle that my brains weren’t splattered on the walls, in a gooey, bloody mess.

Do you know what you get when you mix sleep deprivation with horrifying visions and the dreams I’ve been having of the guy I’ve probably been in love with for the past five years? One very po’d jinn.





I had to blink a few times as everything came into focus. Looking around the room, I recognized the familiar table I was sitting at. I was in the middle of John’s kitchen. I stood up from my seat and took a look around.

The Spartan feel of the place was gone. He had moved in ahead of schedule due to Willa’s death and didn’t have time to furnish the place when I was here. A mocha sofa set now lay in his living room. Potted plants of lavender, thyme, mugwort, etc., lined the window sills, each vying for the golden sunlight streaming through the crystal panes of glass.

Picture frames graced the mantle of the fireplace. I looked at each photo. One was of his mother holding him as a baby. Another was of Jack and John, stacking red rust bricks on top of mortar, building the chimney to the fireplace I was standing in front of. The one that grabbed my attention was the one of me. Me? Why would he have a picture of me on his mantle after all these years?


I remember the day he took the picture. We were having a rare day off from combative training. Per usual we remained in the forest.

John owned quite a bit of land he had built his house on and we were walking through a part he hadn’t been through in some time. His lack of interest in cultivating his property allowed a pixie garden to flourish. Pixie gardens were rare to find and beautiful to walk through, if you were invited.

The caretaker of the garden, a man named Parson Persimmon, welcomed us to his pride and joy. He invited the two of us to stay the day as well as the mid-summer feast that night.

I know what you’re thinking. Parson Persimmon? It sounds ridiculous, I know, but pixies love alliteration. I have met: Rueful Rose, Cackling Carrot, Waning Wisteria, and Libertine Lilly, just to name a few.

Parson Persimmon, or Perse as he liked to be called, showed us to the main garden. He left us on our own to explore for a short while to make sure there was no one underfoot, as they were all of four inches tall.

I say garden because, for pixies, that’s what it is. In terms of relative size though, it was a large farm. The ornamental gardens, like the one John and I were in, were varied with a myriad of plants. Creeping ivy snaked its way towards the sky on any trellis or vertical support it could find. Creeping phlox in pink and white covered the ground on either side of the velvety moss covered path we were walking on. Flowers grew up from the ground and hung down from planters in every imaginable hue.

Outside of the gardens laid fields of singular plants. An acre to the right of us was nothing but rosemary interspersed between trees and other naturally occurring flora. Its aroma perfumed the air upon the breezes that carried it with its evergreen spiciness. Above us, in the trees, grew canopies of orchids in virgin white, lavender, and cotton candy pink. It was a spectacular sight.

Perse returned and showed us around the different display gardens. Pixies were unaccustomed to visitors so Perce was chuffed as chips and relishing in his role of tour guide.

Did you ever wonder how the Hanging Gardens of Babylon were possible in a desert? It was because of these guys. Pixies created and maintained them for just under a millennia. They would still be there today too if a king hadn’t insulted the garden’s pixie caretaker.

The prankster in Perse came out when he sent us into a maze. Tall, green hedges formed the corridors. It was simple enough at first; just follow it to the center. Things became a bit more difficult when the hedges decided to walk off and rearrange themselves.

John and I became separated when a new wall grew up in between us like a shot. I could hear the tinkling chime of pixie laughter when John swore and kicked at the hedges. Between John’s frustration and the hilarity of the situation, I couldn’t help but join in with the pixies.

Knowing that the pixies could keep their sabotage going for days, I cheated. Only a little though. I magicked up a variety of shiny objects for them. Gold and silver for the boys and colorful sea glass for the girls. The pixies’ magic was relegated to the plant world, so any mineral based bauble was highly coveted among them.

One of the pixies who went by the name of Joyous Jasmine, Jaz for short, appeared from the sanctuary of the hedge at my offering. Her hands were clasped over her mouth, mid-giggle. She wore a lovely purple velvet dress, which upon further inspection, was made out of flower petals. What I had mistaken for velvet were really the very fine hairs of violet petals.

She perched atop my shoulder, pleased with the opaque aquamarine shard of sea glass, and showed me to the center of the maze. On my entrance to its center, a dozen pixies surrounded me, waiting to claim the prizes I had offered. I handed them out freely, both as a bribe and a token of my appreciation for being allowed to walk amongst their heavenly abode.

John must’ve given some of the pixies trouble as Jaz and I waited on him for over twenty minutes. He finally joined us when he gave up on trying to figure out the maze and split the earth of the maze in half.

After he repaired the fissure and subsequently calmed the pixies down, Perse brought us tea into the clearing. He didn’t stay, but Jaz and some of her friends did.

Pixie tea is something I recommend you try if you ever get the chance. It is made up of the nectar of a plant. We were drinking the tea of the rare Chocolate Cosmos. The tea tasted nothing of chocolate, the term only referring to the rich, dark cocoa color of the plant’s petals. What did it taste like? In one word: sin. It smelled of vanilla and tasted like cake frosting. It was the most indulgent and delicious thing I had ever tasted.

While we were having tea, a few of the pixies insisted on doing my hair. They wove ivy throughout the waves of my raven hair, accenting it with blue and purple flowers.

One of the male pixies fluttered up to John’s eye level and shook a fist at him. The pixie told John to not even think about getting his hair done or the only thing of color on him would be black and blue. John reassured the pixie he wasn’t interested in being prettied up.

I hadn’t been without my contacts for too long at that point and time, so I was a bit apprehensive when the pixie girls told me the colors they used brought out the purple in my eyes. My fear was assuaged when they assured me that I had nothing to fear because they had known about me for some time. Trees happen to be huge gossips. The hamadryads and the pixies, thankfully, were the only ones that spoke the language of the trees. Both were excellent secret keepers.

Jaz finished me up by shaking some pollen on me. When the sun’s rays lit upon my head, the pollen shimmered, reflecting the light like a prism. John told me I looked like the embodiment of Mother Earth. That’s when he took the photo that now sat on his mantle.





Sighing, I turned away from the fireplace and continued my tour. I was perusing through a book left on the coffee table when I saw something move out of the corner of my eye. I turned to the picture window to see what it was. The forest was on fire! Trees and bushes were engulfed in the hellish flames. The thick, shadowy tendrils of smoke rose to the air like spirits from their graves. Papery white particles snowed down, covering what wasn’t burning in a haunting blanket of ash.

A hand touched my shoulder and I turned to see John standing behind me.

“Everything okay Violet?” he asked, worried.

Looking back at the picture window I was greeted with the forest’s usual tableau of greenery and birdsong. I tilted my head. What was it that had distracted me in the first place?

“Everything’s fine. I just thought I saw…” I wasn’t sure what I saw, come to think of it. My face scrunched up in contemplation, trying to remember.

“Saw what?” he inquired dropping his hand from my shoulder to the small of my back.

The thought slipped my mind completely. “I don’t remember,” I laughed, shaking off the foreboding feeling. “Guess it wasn’t that important.”

“Sweet Violet, always on guard,” he said, admiringly. He turned me to him and embraced me in a long, slow kiss. The feel of his lips against mine almost ran that nagging feeling in the back of my head off. Almost.

I pushed John off of me and slapped him hard across the face.

“What the f*ck was that for?” he yelled, his left hand held against his cheek.

I ignored him and walked back to the window. What I needed was some time to think. Fragments were forming in my mind. Everything was on fire, scenes changing, and Melissa and John at the kitchen table. The very same table I was just sitting at not too long ago.


John’s face was betraying him. He paled. The only ounce of color left was the hand shaped welt that had formed on one side of his face. I knew he was connected to all of this, but I was still figuring out how.

I was still connecting the dots when he took two long strides and grabbed me by the shoulders, shaking me. “What is wrong with you Violet?” he demanded.

I put my hands out, at the ready, in warning. “Get away from me John.”

I guess I was talking to a wall. He grabbed me by my arm and flipped me, head over heels, onto the floor. I felt little pain, though I should have felt much more hitting the ground so hard. That should have tipped me off, but I was only seeing red.

I shot back on to my feet and opened my hands and attempted to shoot off a few fireballs at him. Nothing came. No fizzle, spark, or smoke. That’s when it hit me. All the dreams I had of John recently had been manipulated. I had been manipulated. I flashed to the dream of John, Melissa, and the robed people. The Dreamweaver! He wore the same robes.

I lunged at John, knocking him to the ground. I may not have magic, but I could still beat the crap out of him. I straddled him while I hit. I pulled no punches, every hit being targeted to inflict the maximum amount of pain. He didn’t fight back, but blocked what punches he could.

“You a*shole!” I shouted. “What did you do to me?”

“I’m trying to find you,” he replied bluntly while moving his head to avoid a punch to the face.

I stopped hitting him. “That makes no sense. You’ve been hacking into my dreams for the last few weeks. What gives?”

“Get off of me first,” he urged me.

I moved to sit in front of him, digging one of my knees into his thigh for good measure. He pulled his knees to his chest, giving me a cocky grin.

“You still hit like a girl you know,” he taunted.

I kicked my leg out swiftly, aiming for his shins. He had expected my retaliation and moved out of the way.

John held his hands up in concession. “I know you’re upset. Just calm down and give me a chance to explain. Please.”

I crossed my arms in a huff. “You have five minutes,” I told him.

“First, you have to drop the glamour of the dream. I can only manipulate what you see. Its power is in what you believe to be real,” he informed me.

“How do I do that?” I asked.

“You’ve done it before. You just didn’t know what it was that you were doing.” He scooted across the floor to my side. “Close your eyes,” he instructed. “Try clearing your mind and then subtract everything you see, including me, little by little,” John instructed soothingly.

My eyes popped open at that. “Wait,” I said, putting my hand up. “That sounds awfully similar to what the Dreamweaver told me to do when he shanghaied me to his realm days ago.”

My eyes weren’t the only ones as big as saucers now. I’m not sure if his surprise was because I knew about the Dreamweavers or that they went behind his back.

“A Dreamweaver met with you in your dreams?”

“Um, not exactly. Hijacked my consciousness was more like it,” I said.

“Why? What did he talk to you about?” he inquired hungrily.

Ha! Even with someone I know is trustworthy, I wouldn’t give up that information. That little nugget of life altering info was mine to keep until I figured a way out of it.

I shook my head. “Nuh-uh. That’s between me and him.” I raised an eyebrow in question. “How did you know it was a he?”

“There are only three of them left. They’re all he’s.”

So that’s why they wanted me to join them. They needed a breeder. Fantastic, I’m cattle now. Relegated to a vision of a four way with the beaked bastards of doom and a dairy cow, I quickly focused back to the matter at hand.

“Alright, let me drop this glamour and then we can talk,” I told John.

My hostility had abated, but the anger was still there. I was willing to listen to his story and wait until after he was done to resume the unabashed violence.

I closed my eyes. In my mind I slowly drew down the darkness. I started with John, subtracting him from the equation, limb by limb, until only a torso was left. That too I made disappear. I probably could have made him disappear in one go, but my aggression was still playing itself out, childishly at that. Little by little everything dissolved around me as the light ebbed away until there was nothing left.

Just as I had darkened the vision, I allowed the light to wax full. The scenery was the same as I had just left it. Clever ass, I thought. He knew I was breaking through the magical dreams. John made this dream so similar to the reality that, if I broke through, I wouldn’t know the difference.

There was a difference though. Aside from John and the Dreamweavers, Melissa was there.

“Melissa!” I exclaimed as I ran the distance between us. “I thought you were dead.” I tried to hug the honey-haired Witch, but walked right through her like a ghost.”

John saw the puzzled look on my face and addressed my confusion. “Sorry Violet. This is all real,” he pointed out gesturing to the house and its occupants, “but you’re just a mental projection here.”

I would later find out the true power of the Dreamweavers. They were masters of telepathy and out of body experiences. They could enter anyone’s mind, willing or not. That knowledge scared me a little.

“Luca told me that he offered you his place to stay. I thought, because he betrayed me, you were dead,” I directed to Melissa.

Violence flashed in John’s eyes, turning them light, like the first greens of the spring. (Yup, another Otherworlder trait. Extreme emotion causes our eyes to light up like Christmas lights) I didn’t understand his reaction. Yeah, a bad guy had played me like a fiddle, but John and I had been in worse situations.

Melissa smiled and quickly diverted my attention from John. “I’m alive and well. When Luca came back to check on me, something didn’t quite feel right about him. After living with you for the past five years, I’ve learned to trust my gut.” She laughed and attempted to lightly punch me in the shoulder but drew her hand back after remembering I was non-corporeal.

“Anyway,” she continued, “instead of going to Luca’s I came straight to John and told him what happened.

“We would have found you too, but your boyfriend got to you before we did,” John added, putting heavy sarcasm on the word boyfriend.

“He’s not my boyfriend John,” I chided him.

“From what I hear, you two were getting rather cozy with each other,” he accused.

I sat on the floor, afraid I’d fall through anything else I tried to sit on. “What Luca and I did or did not have was over the minute he knocked me out. What business of it is yours anyway John?”

He lowered his gaze from mine, his cheeks slightly tinted pink. “You’re right. It isn’t any of my business.”

“Great, now that your done being a jerk would one of the two of you mind telling me what’s going on?” I asked the both of them.

John began the story. “Before Willa was murdered she suggested I search out the Dreamweavers. Willa thought the idea of a psychic lojacking was a good one, just in case you needed to be found.”

Melissa jumped in. “It’s a good thing too. Locating spells haven’t worked. Even the Dreamweavers are having a hard time finding you. We need you to tell us where you’re at.”


I leaned back on my hands and stared at the wooden beams that formed the ceiling of John’s house. Each of them had been hand hewn from trees in this very forest. “I’m safe and sound, for the time being,” I advised them. “Finish the story first. Then maybe I’ll be a bit more forgiving to you dream terrorists and tell you where I’m at.”

Melissa glared at John. “I told you she wouldn’t like the subconscious thievery of her mind,” Melissa scolded him.

“Not my brightest moment, but I was pressed for time and my options were limited,” he claimed. “Now can I continue?” he asked the two of us.

Melissa and I nodded our heads in silent assent.

John went on. “It took me until last year to find them. The Dreamweavers are ancient, older than some of the gods even.” He gestured to the three brown hooded men. “Their numbers, once in the millions, are now reduced to these last three.”

“So they just flit through anyone’s psyche with ease?” I asked.

“Except for you,” Melissa chimed in.

John nodded in agreement with Melissa. “That is true. I will get to that soon.”

He put his hand to his chin, trying to remember where he had left off in his story. “Where was I? Oh yes. The Dreamweavers can move through a mind with ease. In the subconscious they manipulate dreamscapes. In the conscious mind they cause daydreams. All in all, they troll through our minds for information.”

I was both awed and outraged by that statement. They were acting as Big Brother, overreaching with their power.

“You’re wearing your thoughts on your face again Violet,” John informed me.

Mental note: never take up poker.

“It’s nothing like what you’re thinking,” he went on. “They use the information only to create dreamscapes, hence their name. They have never once, in their entire existence used the information they gather to wield power over others.”

My lips rounded and formed a silent oh. “I guess that makes sense,” I said warily, still not convinced their actions were benevolent.

John explained further. “They agreed to help, training me for the day I might have to search you out. I was told by one of the Dreamweavers that I would regret my decision to find you.” He sat on the ground next to me and spoke quietly, his next comment only for my ears. “They wouldn’t tell me why, but I know I could never regret rescuing you.” He tried to caress my face but I felt nothing and he was only greeted by the empty air.

He smiled at me and I returned it. Inside, I knew what the hooded harbingers of doom meant. John’s belief in me solidified my determination to find an option that didn’t end in doom or gloom.

The story wasn’t over. John still had much more to tell me. “When Melissa found me-.”

I interrupted him. “I was wondering about that. How do you and Melissa know each other?”

“Willa,” the two of them replied in unison.

I swear to all that’s holy, Willa was ten steps ahead of us, even now, after all this time. She had planned ahead for my entire life, not just the time she occupied a spot in it.

John’s voice retracted me from my thoughts, a tad of annoyance in it. “If you two don’t mind, I’d like to finish the story.”

John was faced towards me, so he didn’t see Melissa stick her tongue out at him, rolling her blue eyes towards the ceiling, while making a rude gesture at him. I fell to my side in giggles, unable to hold it in.

“Gah!” John threw his hands in the air. “It’s no wonder Willa paired you two together. As a team, you’d frustrate a man to death before you had the chance to kill him.”

My giggle turned to full on laughter at his outburst. Melissa lost control and joined me on the floor, unable to stand, she was laughing so hard. John, knowing a losing battle when he saw one, left us to our fit and went to converse with the Dreamweavers.

“Ow,” I said holding my side. “That hurts.”

“I couldn’t help it,” Melissa said, still laughing. “It’s been morbidly serious around here since the Dreamweavers showed up,” she confessed.

I managed to get to my feet and repeated John’s tantrum while loping around like an ape. Melissa screamed in a fit of giggles at my mimicry while I held on to a recliner for support.

Once our hysterics abated, promises were made not to even breathe heavy until John finished his story. For good measure, he threatened to have Melissa hogtied with one of his plants. Physical threats were useless against me, but I didn’t want to see my best friend tied up. Besides, the green of the plants wouldn’t match the orange jumper she was wearing.

John, satisfied that he could continue without any further interruption picked up from where he left off. “Melissa found me and told me about the werewolf attack and the subsequent fallout. When she told me her suspicions about Luca, we both agreed it was urgent to find you. I called upon the Dreamweavers to help. Their magic maintained your dream state while I manipulated it, or tried to. You were able to break through the dream. The Dreamweavers said it was you and not my lack of skill that caused it.”

John gestured to me with both hands. “You’re different Violet. I don’t know how, but you are. You may walk, talk, and act like a duck, but you’re all platypus.”

I tilted my head at that. Platypus? What on Earth did that mean? I wanted to ask, but I had made a promise to keep quiet until he was finished.

“With the help of the Dreamweavers, we were able to locate you in the Wildwood,” John informed me. “By the time we got there though, Luca had already kidnapped you. We’ve been trying to find you ever since, but you’re somewhere the Dreamweavers can’t locate. Do you know where you are?”

I took my cue to speak again. “I’m in an oubliette under Abel’s castle. I won’t be here when you come for me though,” I informed them.

I proceeded to give the two of them Hailz’s and my escape plan. The three of us agreed it would be better if I waited twenty-four hours to implement it. That would give them time to travel to Ireland and for me to summon Hailz and bring her up to speed.

The Dreamweavers, who had made nary a sound until now, became agitated as we made our plans. We couldn’t understand their native tongue. Melissa was in the process of asking them what was wrong when the front door slammed open, revealing John’s best friend, Jack.

“They’re ten minutes out. We have to go now,” Jack updated the room.

The Dreamweavers vanished into thin air at the warning. Melissa sprang into action, scurrying around the room grabbing full backpacks for each of them and weapons.

“Hi Mags. Sorry to have to cut things short,” Jack apologized. “It is good to see you again,” he offered in consolation.

“John was in front of me.”You have to let go and wake up now,” he told me. “The Dreamweavers are gone and I have to go. I’ll see you again real soon though.”

I understood and made my goodbyes short. The darkness had already started breaching the edges of my vision since the Dreamweavers had left. I hastened its work and dimmed the light until just the faintest glow was left. That’s when an explosion rang through my ears. I tried to go back, but to no avail. Without the magic to open a dreamscape, I was cut off from them.

Light rapidly suffused its way back into my vision, dissipating the darkness. When I opened my eyes, I found myself in bed, back in the oubliette. Hailz was leaning over the bed, poking me with a stick.


“What in the Otherworld are you doing?’ I exclaimed, grabbing the stick out of her hands.

Hailz put both hands on her tiny waist. “I’ve been trying to wake you up for fifteen minutes. You didn’t respond, so I figured you were dead. I didn’t know how dead though. In case you were rotting, I poked you with the stick.” She pointed one finger straight down at her red-soled shoes. “I didn’t need your corpse exploding and ruining my brand new Louboutin’s.”

“You’re all heart Hailz,” I replied caustically while I sat up in bed. I brought her up to speed on the additional help for my escape, assuming they weren’t killed in the explosion.

“It would help to have a few extra bodies when the Aelfadl come hunting for us,” she told me.

Hailz had met with her friend who ran the nearby Fae village. They were ready and willing to offer me sanctuary and return me home. That was a relief. Otherwise, I would have to swim all the way back to America.

After she left I showered and packed. I spent some time checking and rechecking my supplies. I would have to reallocate a few dwarf-made weapons along the way. Anything I created would be as useless as a Nerf bat.

Once I was sure I was ready, I laid my trap. It was time to go.