‘What did you mean,’ he asked, ‘when you said that dream wasn’t yours?’
‘I meant what I said.’ Noon pushed her hair back from her forehead. Her heart was still beating too fast. She half expected thousands of skittering beetles to come surging out from behind the screens, or for the ceiling to shake apart to reveal the fat belly of a Behemoth. ‘I don’t know where it came from. All my bad dreams, they’ve always involved what happened to me when I was a kid. I’ve never even thought about the Behemoths, they’ve all been gone for so long. They’re just a story Mother Fast told us when she wanted to scare us.’
Tor made a pained face at that. ‘What you dreamed was so similar to what Ainsel dreamed, I can’t ignore it. What if—’ he grunted and pressed his fingers to his forehead – ‘it’s still trying to push its way in. Maintaining this dreamscape is hard.’ He looked up at her sharply. ‘Stop it. Stop thinking about it.’
‘Oh, that’s great advice, thanks. I’ll just stop thinking about it. Piece of piss.’
Tor stood up and stalked over to a low cabinet where a bottle of wine rested. Noon was sure it hadn’t been there a moment ago. He picked up the bottle and poured himself a glass, draining it off in one go.
‘Dream wine.’ He put the glass down. ‘Dream wine should be excellent, don’t you think? But it’s not. It’s a ghost of the thing.’ He took a breath. ‘Don’t you see, witch? What if these dreams mean something? What if they’re a premonition?’
Noon looked at him. He was at ease here. There was an archway in the wall behind him, leading to another, equally beautiful room, and beyond that she could see glass doors leading out into a garden. She thought for a moment she could see figures out there, children running through the grass . . .
‘You are pushing at the edges, Noon,’ he said. ‘Please desist.’
‘When I escaped the Winnowry, it was because I fully believed the Jure’lia were coming,’ she said. She paused, pressing her thumb to her lips before continuing. ‘I didn’t doubt it at all. And then I left, and all these other things happened. I’ve barely had time to think.’ She took a breath. ‘But if I think about it again, if I allow myself – yes, I think they’re coming. I think the dreams are true.’
Tor picked up the bottle, and put it back down again. He laughed, a short, bitter sound. ‘If that’s true, witch, then we are all—’
There was a hand on her shoulder, shaking her. Noon turned to see who it was, and sat up in the narrow bed, nearly falling out of it.
‘My darling,’ said Vintage, ‘look at the state of you both.’
33
Vintage wasn’t in a great state herself, a fact of which she was well aware. Even so, she was gratified to see the girl’s eyes widen in shock. She stumbled back as Noon jumped out of the bed and threw her arms around her, nearly knocking her into the wall.
‘Vintage!’ The girl broke the embrace and held her at arm’s length, staring at her as though she’d never seen her before. For a moment her eyes brimmed with tears, and Vintage saw her struggle to control it: the sight broke Vintage’s heart, a little. ‘Fire and blood, Vintage, I thought you’d died, I thought you were dead, I would never have left you—’
‘Take a breath, child, before you pass out.’ Vintage patted Noon’s face. She was gaunter than when Vintage had seen her last, her shining olive skin now washed out and pale. Her hair stuck up on end and her eyes were lost in shadows. ‘It looks like you’ve had enough to deal with.’ Before Noon could move away, she took hold of Noon’s arms. They were crisscrossed with cuts, most of them looking painfully fresh. ‘What have you been doing to yourself, my dear?’
Noon looked down at the cuts. She didn’t seem ashamed or alarmed. ‘Tormalin. He was nearly dead. It was all I could think to do.’
Vintage sighed. ‘You probably saved his life, although I’m not sure he’ll thank you for it, vain creature that he is.’ Detaching herself from the fell-witch, Vintage approached the bed. Again, she felt her heart fracture. These children, how broken they were, and she had made it worse. The left-hand side of his beautiful face was a rippled mask of scar tissue, his hair seared away from his scalp. His left arm, which lay above the covers, was in a similar state. He appeared to be sleeping peacefully enough, at least.
‘I don’t know about you, my dear, but I could do with a hot dinner inside me.’
They bustled around the kitchens together, stoking up the oven and opening cupboards, searching through the cold larder. There was little planning to it, and Vintage suspected the girl wasn’t capable of doing so; she seemed easily distracted, her hands trembling now and then. She would stop, as though listening to something only she could hear, before shaking her head and chopping the warty eyes off a potato. Vintage wondered how much blood she had given Tor in the time she had been gone. Too much could be dangerous, but having looked at the Eboran’s terrible ravaged face, Vintage could well imagine making the same decision herself.
When finally they sat down at the table, it was to a hotchpotch meal of boiled potatoes with butter, thick slices of cured ham, pears poached in nutty ale, baked apples, and jars and jars of Esiah’s best preserves. Vintage’s stomach rumbled audibly at the sight of it. She caught Noon’s eye and they both laughed.
‘Vintage,’ Noon said round a mouthful of potato, ‘where have you been? What happened?’
‘If I recall correctly, my dear, what happened was that everything erupted in a giant ball of winnowfire.’ Seeing the expression on Noon’s face, Vintage swiftly continued. ‘I’m not at all sure, but I believe I was blown free somehow. I awoke some distance from the wreckage of the Behemoth, with this delightful scorching on my face.’ She dabbed her fingers lightly to her cheeks, which were still red and sore. ‘And my clothes torn and burned. I had landed in a big puddle, luckily, and I believe that may have put any fires out. I don’t know how long I was unconscious for, but the fire was down to its embers. Everything hurt.’
She paused, taking sips of the apple juice they had found in the larder. It was sweet and tart. ‘I couldn’t move for that first day, or the first night. I lay still and tried to figure out whether I’d broken anything. And I hoped that the parasite spirits didn’t come across me.’
‘I should have gone back.’ Noon had stopped with a forkful of ham halfway to her mouth. ‘I should have come looking for you.’
‘The fact that you got Tor back here in that state is a feat in itself, Noon, my dear. Please do not be distressed. When finally I felt I could stand and walk, I started to make my way to the gate. I did not get far. I lay for another night in the hollow of a tree. It took me a long time to wake the following morning, and I knew I had to get some food.’ She raised her eyebrows at Noon. ‘Food heals, Noon, just as blood heals Eborans. More efficiently, in fact. I hope you have been eating?’