“The Chosen One utters treason, declaring the criminal our sovereign!” someone whispered, outraged.
Scandalized murmurs rose between the dinner guests.
“Short kingis just a phrase from my land,” I said quickly, before they could get any ideas about trying out any of those torture devices on me. “Let’s put aside the fact that you guys really mailed it in when it came to the fitment of a fairly important door for a second. Why would someone even want to take Winston?”
“To use for evil, of course.” This groundbreaking revelation was delivered very proudly by the king himself. “Perhaps the Evil One took a hostage as a threat to the rest of us, or perhaps they’re carrying out diabolical horrors on the poor soul, testing their vile spells and torture techniques. Poor Winston was already shackled and vulnerable. He would have been an easy target.”
The hair rose on the back of my neck. I was out of my depth here.
“Please,” a wobbly voice said from the crowd, which parted to let its speaker through. “You must help my son.” An older womanemerged, clutching a damp handkerchief. “For all his crimes against chickens, Winston is a good boy. I fear what will become of him in the Evil One’s lair.”
This must be Winston’s mom. I swallowed hard. I’d never had the type of mother who would insist her child was a perfect angel even when everyone else suspected the kid was possessed by a demon. Somehow part of me was a little jealous of Winston. My mother was acutely aware of all my faults. She wouldn’t stand up for me like this if I so much as shoplifted. The love of Winston’s mom felt realer than any “love” I’d experienced back home in the “real” world, and suddenly the whole saving-the-world thing felt a little too grave.
It had been easy not to take it seriously before, when the looming evil felt like hearsay. But no matter how silly some of the citizens acted, they were real people with dreams and fears and families, and their lives were in danger. Who knew what the Evil One would do next or if they would kidnap someone else’s loved one.
Amy seemed so certain Bryce or I were the Chosen One, but I wasn’t sure how that was possible. I had no idea how to help these people, and the pressure of responsibility made it hard to breathe. Part of me wanted to run away and find the portal home, but I wasn’t ready to admit defeat in front of Bryce. Plus, it wasn’t like there were any other heroes stepping up to take the job. Well, except for Bryce, which was unacceptable because, no matter how clueless I was, Mr. Flip-Flops-Cause-Plantar-Fasciitis leading an attack against an evil force was ludicrous. All I could do was keep pretending I knew what I was doing.
“Keep the guards searching for more clues,” said Amy. “If we can find Winston’s whereabouts, perhaps we can arrange a rescue mission. There is nothing more we can do tonight. The Chosen One must complete their training and grow stronger. Only after then will it be time for them to launch their defense against the Evil One.”
The dinner party was somber now. I looked from one face to the next. The guard said Winston’s kidnapping had happened two hours ago. That would have been after we arrived at the castle, but before we all gathered for dinner. Anyone here might have been involved. Of course, the suspect could have been an outsider, but the castle inhabitants would have easier access to the dungeons and might not be questioned sneaking around the passages.
There was only one person among the dinner party small enough to fit under the truly half-assed specimen of carpentry that was the door to the key room: the visiting princess.
CHAPTER 9INWHICHWEHAVETWOFUNCTIONINGBEDSBUTSHAREONEANYWAY
BRYCE
It was the longest, most detailed, most vibrant dream I’d ever had.
After our visit to the dungeons, servants had escorted us back to our beds, instructing us to try to get some sleep so we would be fit for training in the morning.
Now, I shifted in my huge bed, which had to be the Chosen One’s bed and not the sidekick bed. The room was large and empty. And silent. So silent.
I couldn’t hear Courtney.
Most nights I heard her through the thin duplex walls. She’d sing loudly and off-key in the shower. She’d rehearse excuses for why she couldn’t come into work—no two the same, never getting her wires crossed. And yes, sometimes, she’d make sex noises after I’d shipped her adult toys. I hadn’t been able to decide that day if I’d made the biggest mistake or the best choice of my life. I’d eventually decided never to speak of it, no matter how often I thought of it.
Reminding Dream Courtney of that day was fair game, though, as was sending her suggestive texts at dinner. I wouldn’t have dared to do those things with real-life Courtney, but theywere exactly the thing I needed to throw Dream Courtney off her game. And there had been something somewhat… exciting about it.
Shadows crept across the wall, reminding me of the creepy turn my dream had taken with the kidnapping thing, and my skin prickled and crawled.
Iobviouslywasn’t scared of the dark. But Courtney probably was.
Then again, Dream Courtney across the hall wasn’t making a peep.
Usually, I didn’t notice being alone. It was the in-between times when it sneaked up on me. When I’d finished work, but it wasn’t bedtime yet, and I didn’t know what to do with myself. When my growling stomach reminded me to eat, and I cooked alone in a cold, dim kitchen. When I lay in empty sheets at night, repressed memories the only thing keeping me company.
During those times, having a warm body shuffling on the other side of the wall gave me something to fall asleep to. I’d close my eyes and pretend I was back at my grandparents’ house, and they were down the hall, watching TV.
I rolled onto my side, the bed suddenly feeling absurdly large for one person.
Furrowing my brow, I thought hard, willing a book to materialize on the nightstand—my usual method of keeping my mind from drifting. I apparently sucked at lucid dreaming, because the nightstand remained bare.
Everything was too dark. The flickering fire cast ghoulish shadows across the wall.
I decided Courtney was for sure scared of the dark. She was probably lying there in terror, expecting a cold hand to close around her ankle and pull her under the bed.
Then I realized I was thinking about Courtney in bed, and something about that felt dirty. Not in a sexy way. Definitely not in the way that made my heartbeat quicken and my thoughtsstray to the way that dress hugged Courtney’s curves. Dirty in the way that made me feel like I’d contracted a mental plague just from thinking about her.
