"Just a dream," Anya murmured over and over against his shirt.
"What happened?" Trajan strode into the room, his coat and hair still wet from being outside. Anya let Yvan go with a jerk, running to Trajan's arms for comfort. Yvan carefully schooled his face as the sharp spike of jealousy pierced his guts.
"We saw the flames coming out of the window when we drove in. We thought the whole place was burning," Cerise said, her face white with worry.
"No, just me," Anya replied, her voice muffled by Trajan's overcoat.
"How about we go downstairs and get you something warm to drink?" Trajan said, kissing her gently and driving the spike into Yvan a little further. "Why do you taste like blackberries?"
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
Sitting with Trajan's arm around her and a cup of hot tea in her hands, Anya finally relaxed enough to tell them about her dream and what Yanka had done to her. She couldn't remember what the vision was about that had forced into her mind, but she still felt the horror and pain of it deep inside of her.
Dream Yanka was enough to scare the shit out of her. Anya could only imagine what she would have been like when she had been alive.
Will I become like that when I learn my magic?
"Just how much paprika did you put in that borsch you made tonight?" Izrayl teased Katya, who sat beside him. They were both bandaged up and recovering from the fight, but it didn't stop their bickering.
Katya rolled her eyes. "Very funny. More likely something you put in it when I wasn't looking."
"I don't know much about magic, but how do we know your dream was real?" Cerise asked.
"She tasted of blackberries when I kissed her. Dreams can be powerful but not enough to cause fruit in one's mouth," Trajan pointed out.
"It was real enough to Anya to cause her body and her magic to react. Whether or not she found her way to the Land of Dreaming or the Land of the Dead like Yanka argued is irrelevant," Yvan added. He had a dark look in his eyes that Anya hadn't seen before. They flashed from red and back to blue, the firebird wanting to make his presence known.
"If it weren't for Yvan, I'd still be burning." Anya smiled at him, and his glare softened a little. "You scared me when I woke up. I thought I had set you on fire."
"The firebird and I have begun working on me being able to control its magic. You couldn't set me on fire if you tried," Yvan said as he got to his feet and started to pace.
"Getting back to whether you made it to the Land of the Dead or the Dreaming," Katya said to Anya. "I have shaman friends who can walk those paths. They need preparation first. Usually, they put themselves into a trance, but it's possible you did it without it. I'll ring them and see if they can help. I was going to get in contact with them anyway. They would be good teachers for you."
Anya drank her tea, her head still aching and full of fire and pain. Whatever Yanka had done to her hadn't affected her physically, but mentally she was a mess from the horror of the future. Maybe Yanka had wanted to warn her, not scare her, but Anya doubted it.
"We need to think about whether or not you're going to set yourself on fire every time you have a bad dream, Anya," Izrayl said, an uneasy look in his golden eyes. "Yvan, and you might be fireproof, but I'm not."
Katya elbowed him. "Shut up. You don't need to scare her more."
"No, he's right," Anya said, her panic rising. "I have no idea what this means from now on. I could wake up with the house in ashes with all of you… Excuse me, I can't?—"
Anya hurried back to her room, flames, and blood flashing in her mind's eye and salt filling her mouth. She went into the small bathroom and climbed into the dry bathtub. She swallowed down her tears and tried to steady her breathing. At least there was nothing she could burn in there.
Every day she learned something new about her magic, and every day she was starting to feel like a stranger in her own body.You have to learn how to control it. If you could use it to beat off bullies when you were twelve, surely you can do it now.She didn't know how to stop being afraid of it.
"Anya? Are you hiding in here?" Trajan tapped on the bathroom door.
She pressed herself down as flat as she could. His curly head and dark purple shirt appeared above her.
"I'm not hiding. I'm trying to think," Anya replied.
"You don't want to do that in comfort?"
Anya sat up and admitted, "I'm worried if I get upset, I'll light up again."
"Okay, then scoot forward." Trajan kicked off his shoes and climbed in behind her. His legs came down around either side of her, and he pulled her back against his chest. Warmth flooded her, and she relaxed back into him.
"You know Izrayl didn't mean to upset you," he said.