Page 13 of Precipitous Nightmare's Valentine Dream

“You’ll bring him a dream about her, then,” said Precipitous, balancing lightly on a thick branch that should not have been capable of supporting his weight. He spread his arms out and Lumi paused to admire the definition of his muscles and the overall shape of him silhouetted in the ambient nighttime illumination. “Some continuation of the daydreams you’ve been feeding them all day.”

Luminous shrank down to the size of a house cat and let her wings emerge. Behind her, Precipitous hummed, and when she turned, his eyes were locked on those delicate slips of swirling color. He reached out as though to touch, then stuffed the errant hand in his pocket instead.

“They’re lovely.” He peered down, taking in the entirety of her most delicate form. “You’re lovely.”

His smile shifted from mildly astonished to wicked. “I’m tempted to eat you up.”

Luminous flushed from her moonlight-haired head to her pink-painted toenails.

“Oh, yes, Horny Boi,” she murmured, lifting one finger. “Hold that thought. I will be right back.”

His chuckle followed her as she entered Gary’s house to find the mortal man in fitful sleep on his expensive leather sofa, History Channel reruns playing unattended on his TV.

Luminous quickly wove a dream of revelation, the kind where dreamers discovered some answer to a real-world problem that eluded them during waking hours. In this case, Gary solved a catering coordination issue for Melanie by calling in a favor from an old college classmate. Upon waking, he should recognize the truth of his dream and give the guy a call. The couple would bond in excitement over putting the final piece into place for the salon grand opening, and he’d invite Melanie to be his date to the Valentine’s Day charity ball he’d arranged for another client.

Their past would come full circle, and he wouldn’t stand up Melanie this time. Easy peasy, dream time becomes real time.

Luminous sang to herself as she put the final touches on Gary’s dreams of his one true love.

“Amish love, lady don’t hurt me…”

A low chuckle startled her out of her Dreamcrafting.

“I don’t think those are the actual words of the song,” said Precipitous. He stood in Gary’s living room, peering at a row of framed photographs on a shelf.

“What are you doing in here?“ Luminous hissed, waving frantically at him to leave. “I told you to stay outside. What if Gary wakes and sees you? What if he senses you and shifts into a bad dream? You could undo all my work.”

“Do you actually think the words are Amish love? Or do you do that to disarm people?”

Luminous huffed at his obvious underappreciation for good song lyrics and stubborn inability to follow simple instructions.

“You have to get out of here.” She approached as silently as she could, her wings whirring softly as she hovered just above the carpeted floor. Precipitous seemed completely unconcerned about what his presence might do to the sleeping man on the couch.

“I got hungry,” he said, as though that explained everything. Something in his voice caught her attention, and her eyes locked with his. She could see him changing form, stretching out past the faux mortal skin he wore, letting his claws emerge, his razor-sharp teeth elongate. His horns curled up from beneath his thick dark hair, and Luminous’ wings fluttered faster. The slow, wicked smile he gave her sent shivers down her spine.

“You want a taste?” Luminous flashed him a grin of her own, putting a veneer of confidence over her racing heartbeat. She spun quickly, laughing over her shoulder as she turned. “You’ll have to catch me first.”

And with those parting words, she dove into Gary’s dream and raced down the shadow paths connecting all dreamers.

The startled look on her Night Terror’s face was worth whatever he might do to her once he caught up.

Chapter 11

A Hunt in the Forest

Precipitous Nightmare

The paths through Dreaming wound across surreal landscapes of vibrant color, through monochrome rain-swept worlds, over endless stretches of sand, of fog, of burnished highways rolling ever forward.

Through it all, Precipitous kept his eye on the little DayDream tumbling her way between the minds of sleeping mortals. With each backward glance, her golden eyes glowed ever brighter.

Every time their gazes collided, Precipitous shifted between shadows to jump ahead just a tiny bit more. He did not wish this game to last too long, after all. Merely long enough.

They slowed at the edge of the Forbidden Forest, a creation often utilized in dream scenarios involving a terror of the natural world or the denizens dwelling within it. Somewhere deep among the trees, dreamers screamed, cried, and fled from things that looked like wolves with too many teeth.

“You cannot hide from me here, Dream girl.” Precipitous whispered as he trailed her to the edge of those dread woods, his voice a low, deadly promise. “Not in a domain that belongs securely to Nightmare.”

Still in that state halfway between monster and mortal man, Precipitous ducked beneath a low-hanging limb and stalked his prey. His hands trailed along the rough bark of trees both ancient and aware, a silent message that he was here, that he watched over them, that he asked their help in keeping the tiny Dream creature from ever leaving their embrace.

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