Total pages in book: 125
Estimated words: 122030 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 610(@200wpm)___ 488(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122030 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 610(@200wpm)___ 488(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
The minutes stretch on and just as I’m starting to fidget with impatience, Lucia yanks my arm to get my attention and then points into the murky teal water on the other side of the rock.
I squint, seeing movement, but unable to differentiate the inky purple from the marine green until it pokes a head out.
A horse.
I internally roll my eyes. The aquis equī—obviously, since that’s what Lucia said before she shifted me into the dream—swim.
My life, I swear. It’s stupid.
But the horse… now that is interesting. The head is huge, but refined at the same time. Like an Arabian with a dish-shaped nose bridge, pronounced chin, and flaring nostrils. Its forelock floats across its forehead, long and colored teal, just like its body.
It snorts, blowing out a stream of bubbles that doesn’t come off as fun or magical, but rather… threatening and evil. Then its eyes glow a golden orange-yellow. And even though we’re under water, I see flames in there.
Evil in there.
Then it looks right at us and before I can even think, it charges. And I am frozen in fear with eyes wide when I see that it doesn’t have any legs. Or… it does. Dozens of them, but they are not the legs of a horse, but the tentacles of an octopus. It is part octopus.
Teeth are snapping at me as the long tendrils of sucker-covered appendages reach out to grab me—and then it floats right through me.
In the next moment, I’m somewhere else. A long, great sheet of ice. Blowing wind and snow hit my face like tiny pebbles, stinging and making me cower.
Lucia yanks my arm again, forcing me to look up. I shield my eyes from biting snow, focus on what she’s pointing at, and see a… tribe? Of people, obviously, since they are walking upright and wearing thick white furs.
They are formed up in a circle holding torches and the air smells like fire and burning oil. Lucia takes us closer. But we’re not walking, we’re floating. We pass right through them, just like the water horse passed through us. And then I see that the center of attention is a black hole in the ice.
The aquis equī comes up from the water and the sound it makes—it’s horrifying. Like the scream of a dying rabbit. A lamb being slaughtered. An elk in rut. I want to cover my ears but I can’t take my eyes off this demonic thing. Then a movement to my right forces me to look away. And there I see a girl, no more than twelve or thirteen. Her arms and legs are bare even though this is subzero weather and she’s only wearing enough white fur to cover her chest and hips. Her hair is long and black, her skin fair, but weathered tan from the sun. She is walking to the beast still protruding from the hole in the ice and I scream. Loud. Because it’s going to eat her.
Lucia covers my mouth, even though no sound came out, and points. Turning my head with her other hand, making me watch.
The demon thing from the sea opens its mouth and I’m sure this is it—I’m going to watch a little girl be eaten by a monster—but then… then it bows its head low, lining its massive nose up onto the ice like a ramp. And the half-naked girl walks right up its face and sits behind its great ears as it leaps from the water and disappears into the white sky—just a teal streak on the horizon.
I come out of the purple chilled to the bone and sopping wet. Of course, this is just my spirit body. My real body is still unconscious on the bed, being bled out to feed my boyfriend.
My life. I swear.
“What the fuck!” I turn to Lucia, who is smirking at me. “What the fuck!”
“Sorry.” She doesn’t sound sorry. “I know it was a fright. But it would take too many words to explain it. And why bother, when we can simply dreamwalk our way into the exact moment when it all started?”
“Exact moment when what all started?”
“The Ice Maiden, Syrsee. The exact moment when Coyrah, the Ice Maiden, tamed the aquis equī and turned into…” She shrugs. “The night mare.”
I just blink at her, so confused.
“These people we saw, they disappeared about fifteen hundred years ago. Just… poof. Vanished. One day, they were ruling the entire Arctic. They had magnificent cities, Syrsee. I will show them to you. One day when we have time after all this is over. Gorgeous cities. And then, as I said, poof. Gone.
“Except they weren’t gone at all. Coyrah gave herself to the aquis equī and that was how they got the power of the purple.” Lucia pauses to smile here, like this is the end of the story and whatever knowledge or understanding I was supposed to glean from showing it to me is obvious.