Page 26 of Wanted: A Roommate Who Isn't Evil

It kept ringing.

Dranian found a voice he didn’t recognize coming through the phone telling him to leave a voice message for Shayne to listen to at a later time. The thing beeped too fast, and Dranian gasped ashe realized he hadn’t a thing prepared to say. He blurted, “Call me!” and then he smashed his finger into the red button six times to ensure the device was no longer waiting for him to speak.

He inhaled a few times and placed a hand over his thudding heart. Then he glanced back at the stars asking all their questions.

“Hush, I’m tired,” he finally told the snoopy lights in the heavens. He tossed his phone aside and laid back against his pillow. He did not fall asleep right away, but when he did, he heard a voice.

“Dranian,”she said, entering his thoughts of melting colours and windy echoes.“Don’t kick me out. I need to see you. It’s important.”

The being who had never even told him her name. That was the first sign she could not be trusted.

There was never a body, just whispers and the occasional reaching arm that found its way in as though she was asking him to take her hand.

Dranian’s dream morphed into darker tones. Smoke, wind, and red fire. A strange sensation crawled over him; he heard shouts and screaming. He spun around over and over, but he could not seem to find where the noises came from. He curled his fists, ready to muster his energy and throw this beingfrom his mind.

“Dranian!”She shouted this time—the loudest she’d ever spoken.“I need to speak with you! Let me in!”And then,“I can chase this nightmare away if you let me.”

Not once had he replied to the voice attacking his dreams. Most souls would have answered by now, but once, a long time ago, Dranian had learned toneveranswer the call of a voice in his dreams.

He fought the impulse to shout at this being for invading in the first place. How dare she? How had she even found his mind to dreamslip into? She was probably causing the nightmare herself. It would only get worse if he said something back to her, giving her the key to enter his dreams at will.

“I’ve been searching every mind across the realm looking for you,”she said, her volume switching from loud to almost too quiet to hear—like her connection to him was growing thin on her end.

Dranian began to push her back out as he always did. He tried, but this time, he could not seem to kick her from his thoughts. Perhaps it was because, despite his best efforts, he continued to fail to remove every being invading his faeborn life at the moment.

“Dranian, you know my voice! Don’t you remember me?!”she said again quickly, and this time her words seemed to ring in Dranian’s ears. He halted his efforts to send her on her way.

Remember? Had he met this mysterious voice before?

“You promised you would come back for me.”This time the voice carried a blend of timidness and accusation. It was a tone that twisted something deep in Dranian’s soul. A familiarity thathe had tucked away forever.“Where are you, Dranian? What happened to you?”

The first time he’d heard the voice, he thought he recognized it. It was certainly a trick of the dreamslipper. He was sure every time the female entered someone’s dream, she made the owner feel like they knew her from somewhere. It was what dreamslippers did—persuade a being to let them in, then torment them forever with nightmares. A wicked sort of pleasure for the maddest puppet masters.

But…

But. Though it was a hazy memory from long ago, something he had forgotten about until now, Dranian did recall telling someone such a thing. Just once. In a village he had left behind. One he had never returned to.

But it couldn’t be her.

This was a trap. It was also the longest he hadeverallowed her to speak to him in his dreams.

Dranian prepared to thrust her away; his will pooled in around him as he focused.

“Dranian!”she warned, this time with no pleading or timidness. It was a clear-cut warning. Angry.“I have no name to tell you to make you trust me—”He launched her from him, and she was swept backward with one limb of sound reaching back in the shape of an arm.“You were the only one who gave me anything. Your will for me to live. A spear. Your smiles…”

Dranian reached out and caught her arm. Hervoice had almost vanished. He held her—held on as his thoughts scattered and then rushed back together again. As this faceless, bodiless being before him hung there by the thread he gripped. As his rhythms sped faster, then slower, then faster again.

As a very distinct, clear memory swept in.

“Ashi-Calla Village…” he whispered. The words came from his mouth before he realized he was saying them. He didn’t mean to say them toher…

Suddenly a presence lunged into his dream, filling it up, blotting out all the colours as she entered, stepping out of a bright light.

Dranian gasped when he realized. He dropped her arm, he tried to reel back, but it was already too late.

She marched into his dream with a full body, coming right for him with intimidating ferocity. Dranian tried to wake himself, to escape the dream, but she grabbed his collar before he could leave.

He stared at her. At her face.

---