When they are gone, he breathes out, which makes me instinctively follow. “It’s just you and me,” he speaks softly. “Stare . . .” he points into his eyes, “right here.”

After only a few moments, my arms begin to feel light, my chest rises. The black rim around his eyes seems to pulse, which makes me lose concentration. Soon my mind is free—detached from both the gravity of the world and a familiar internal conflict. This is something I’ve never experienced.

I find myself floating in a world of black. The hairs on the back of my neck lift as cold surrounds me in the dark. Nerves vibrate down to my fingertips as I notice my hands bending and stretching beyond what is humanly possible. There’s pressure against my head and shoulders as if I’m on a roller coaster and my neck unnaturally elongates. Through the vast black, small specks of white begin to slow and then pick up speed.

Or maybe it is me. Yes . . . it is me. I am now racing through the speckled black, while sounds whiz by—possibly voices, possibly nothing. There is no way to tell. The darkness seems to last longer than expected, until everything speeds up, pulling my skin away from my bones. My head jerks forward with a sudden stop. I open my eyes.

I’m in a bedroom with stone walls and thick, large furniture. Under my feet is a mosaic floor made of tiny square tiles. There is no one else there.

Giggles are heard from somewhere ahead. I peek out the doorway of this medieval place and I see myself as a child running through the halls. It isn’t Willow—it is Remy. She runs around Briston’s legs, laughing.

This vision lasts only a second before my body thrusts forward into the darkness again. The sounds that had once whizzed by unrecognizable, are now voices—all inflections and tones, men and women, yet still muffled. Again, my body stretches and pulls from all angles until the stretching ends abruptly.

Now, I stand in a thick forest alive with whistling birds, chirping crickets, and occasionally the breeze scraping branches together, while the sun shifts through the trees leaving hot designs on my skin. Just as my skin begins to pull once again, a dark-haired woman appears from behind some trees. She smiles sweetly.

“Welcome back, Remy,” she whispers.

“You’re his mother?” I know this . . . somehow, I know this.

“Please tell Arek hello,” she says, but she and the forest disappear before she can continue.

Repeatedly, I straddle reality and memory, never landing, until finally it is black again; the white specks appear more as diamonds. They disappear suddenly and my feet land on gray carpet. I wiggle my toes to grab it, then look up to find myself in a home with gray carpet and white couch and chairs.

Yet something is off. I am there, but just fifteen feet ahead of me, Remy is there too—a second version of myself. My hair is a bit shorter than it is now, but I am still recognizable. Remy holds her shaking hand out to the side as blood drips down her skin and a knife lays at her feet. Inches from the silver weapon are someone else’s fingertips, lifeless on the carpet. I follow the hand to the body. My mother’s hair is strewn about the carpet, the space beneath her head pools with blood.

“What did you do?!” Someone rushes in—the light in the room is so blinding that I can only make out a face contorted in panic. “What have you done?”

My heart beats out of my chest as I watch.

“I don’t know,” the whisper is barely audible from Remy.

Elizabeth falls to her knees, crying over her sister. “Lyneva!” I try to block the light from the wall of windows.

The darkness sweeps over me again, leaving only bits of bright light and passing figures. Could be people? Could be objects? They pass so fast it is impossible to tell. Then everything stops.

Arek sits in front of me and we are back in the cabin, yet the room is spinning. “Close your eyes until the spinning stops,” he suggests.

“How long was I gone?”

“A few minutes,” Arek says.

The truth is heavy on my chest, so I rub my sternum with a strong palm. “I did it.” My voice is quiet, but what I say is loud.

“How do you know?” he asks.

“I saw everything.”

“Describe it.”

“A room with gray carpet and white furniture . . .” I can see it in his eyes, “You know the room I’m talking about?”

“Yeah, Lyneva’s home.”

“There is a lot of light in the house from all of the windows so when Elizabeth runs in, I can’t see her at first.”

“Light?” he asks.

“Yeah. The entire wall behind me is windows and I have to cover my eyes to see anything.”

He shakes his head. “Dreams change things . . . memories don’t. Lyneva died at night.”

Geo appears from around the corner of the room. “If I can jump in here . . .”

“Are all of you in the hall listening?” I ask.

One by one everyone sticks their head in the room and comes forward with a sheepish grin.

Geo continues, “He did something.”

“Navin?” Arek asks.

“Possibly . . . but more than likely Japha. Gyre taught me the ability to change one’s memories and I’m not sure that Navin would have that ability yet. You must try again if things continue to change. It’ll take some time to sift through the layers,” Geo explains.

“How will I know if it’s real?” I ask quickly.

“You’ll know. It’s the same with any dream, Willow. You must force it to tell you the truth. Question everything as you go through the memory. You ultimately know what truly happened. Force your brain to let you in.” Geo crosses his arms.

In just moments we are back again. Arek sends me faster and more aggressively into the recesses and the speed through the darkness is a bit easier now. The gray carpet with the white furniture appears. The sun burns my neck until I turn around and stare at the window even though it forces me to squint.

“No sun . . .” I whisper. “There is no sun.”

Suddenly a large rumble like a roar from the belly of the earth begins outside, and an instant steady rain drums the roof. The sky unnaturally rolls into darkness like I’ve never seen before, like the lights to the world are turned off. Flashes of lightning rip across the charcoal sky followed by the grumbling thunder. The living room is lit by a silver lamp in the corner of the room.

“Gray carpet . . . white furniture . . .” I pay attention to everything. This time I hold a blood-covered knife. I shake my head. “It hasn’t happened yet.” I shut my eyes. “It hasn’t happened yet.” Before I open them, I hear the quiet sound of talking—two feminine voices not far away. I am adjacent to Elizabeth and Lyneva, who glare at each other. Their standoff confuses me.

“Lyneva, the council trusted you to make those decisions and you led them into a slaughter.” For the first time, Elizabeth’s elegant body looks sinewy and stiff as she yells.

“Please tell her you didn’t do it,” I urge my mother.

“Trying to find the compromise between the Rebellion and the Powers is not betrayal, Elizabeth,” Lyneva retorts.

“Children died,” Elizabeth cries out. “People lost their lives because you told Japha and Navin everything.”

Lyneva turns to me. “None of this is true. Those people died because of their stupidity.”

“I have proof.” Elizabeth pulls papers from a bag.

“What are those?” Lyneva asks with concern.