Page 15 of Trials of Dusk and Dreams
He almost lets me tug his hands from his bleeding ears, but then his eyes roll, and he resists. “Too loud. Too bright.” He starts rocking again. “Too hot. Too cold. The hive is too small for everyone. The walls are breaking. They have nowhere to go without combs holding the honey.Too loud!”
He no longer hits his ears but tears at his hair.
Although he says nothing, I feel the weight of Bodin’s judgmental gaze on my back.
Calamity, I imagine him thinking. Every time I try to fix things, I make them worse.
No.
I’m not going back to that dark place of doubt and insecurity. Fox showed me I am deserving. Tinger showed me I am valued. My parents trusted me enough to let me go and figure things out by myself.
Nothing grows in the shadows,my mother said the night before I left.
I can do this.
I just need to think of what worked in the past—what helped me calm down when I was irrational with fear and pain? My Aunt Rory used to tell me to look at five things around me and name them. But that won’t work here. That’s for someone still in the realm of sanity.
The answer comes to me from an unexpected place.
When I was little, my advanced shifter hearing made thunderstorms much worse. Once, a storm battered branches onto my father’s wooden cabin roof in the mountains. The wind howled louder than a wolf. Everything felt big. My emotions were big. The danger was big. I scrambled into a corner but could still see the shadows flickering. The gap beneath the door screeched like a banshee. The sprites in the fireplace squeaked and hid beneath their log.
I felt small, insignificant, and powerless to stop the fear growing in my belly.
“Come on, squirt,” my father said, thumping the bed he sat on. “Hop on the bed.”
“No!” I screamed, blocking my ears.
He was the strongest male I knew, a monster hunter, but there were still so many things he couldn’t protect me from.
“Why not?” His growly frown only made me want to shrink.
I can’t remember my answer. Probably more childish screaming, but what I do remember is that his frown went away, and his eyes lit up with an idea. Somehow, he pulled me onto thebed and said, “If the cabin feels too big, squirt, then we’ll make it smaller.”
He slung a sheet over our heads and made a cocoon. It muffled some of the sounds, but what completely drowned them out was the rowdy tavern song he sang as I burrowed into his embrace.
“Varen,” I raise my voice to get his attention. “Come with me, and I’ll take you somewhere the loud swarming won’t reach you.”
I’m unsure exactly what it is, but something buzzes loudly in his head. It started when I pushed him away.
He tries to ignore me, but I take his hands and order, “Your queen bee needs you to cluster around her. Clustering stops the wings from buzzing.”
He gives me another inch, so I tug him to his feet, careful not to let him hurt himself further. We climb onto his messy bed together, and I toss the sheet over our heads. The barrier makes the world seem smaller.
I’m acutely aware of Bodin’s presence just outside our cocoon. His concern is almost tangible, but he remains silent, allowing me to try.
“It’s just you and me here,” I murmur. “No buzzing wings. No swarming. Just you and me.”
I hug him close, tightening my embrace as my father once did for me. If we make the world smaller, if we drown out the storm with our own voices, we can take control of reality.
Sweet relief pours through me as Varen doesn’t pull away. But he doesn’t relax. His muscles are rock hard and frozen, locked in terror against whatever horror rattles his mind. I cup his head and desperately try to remember the lyrics to a song, any song, as he clings to me.
But I don’t sing. There’s no need. Tension suddenly eases from Varen’s posture. He presses his ear to my chest and exhales. Another song has captured his attention—my heart.
I catch Bodin’s eye through a gap in the sheet. His expression is a mix of approval and something else—a longing quickly masked. I’ve inadvertently demonstrated a strength Bodin didn’t expect. It’s a small step, but perhaps it’s the beginning of earning his trust, of proving that I can be more than just a source of destruction in their lives.
Chapter 7
Willow
