Chapter 12: Waking World Whispers
The last thing Kael remembered was the warmth of Talia's head on his shoulder and the chilling whisper of stone against his palm. The world dissolved not into light, but into a dizzying, nauseating pull—like being yanked backwards through a deep, dark river.
He gasped, his eyes flying open.
Sunlight.
Not the eerie, magical glow of the Dream Continent, but the plain, dusty morning sun filtering through his cracked bedroom blinds. The familiar hum of early traffic from the street below. The smell of old wood and leftover takeout.
He was lying in his own bed, still wearing the jeans and t-shirt he'd had on the day before. His heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drumbeat out of place in the quiet room.
It was a dream? The thought was a desperate, fleeting hope, instantly crushed. The ache in his muscles was too real. The phantom sensation of Astral Flow sparked at his fingertips. And the memory of Talia's voice, soft and raw in the darkness—"I like you, Kael."—was branded into his mind.
He sat up, running a hand through his messy hair. It felt too quiet. Too normal. The sheer mundanity of it was more jarring than any monster.
Across the city, in a bedroom that looked more like a museum exhibit, Talia's eyes snapped open.
She lay perfectly still for a long moment, staring at the pristine white ceiling of her canopy bed. The silence here was absolute, broken only by the distant, rhythmic ticking of an antique clock. The soft, expensive linen felt alien against her skin, which still thrummed with the echo of adrenaline and pain.
She slowly pushed herself up, a sharp twinge in her side making her wince. She pulled up her silk nightshirt, half-expecting to see a vicious wound. But there was nothing. Only smooth, unmarked skin. The healing had held, even across realms. But the memory of the injury, of Kael's frantic Astral Flow staunching the bleeding, of his fear for her—it remained, a ghost pain far deeper than the physical.
Her phone buzzed on the nightstand. A notification from her stylist. Another from her father's secretary about a charity gala.
She ignored them all, her mind replaying the feeling of leaning against Kael in the dark. The way her own carefully constructed walls had crumbled in the face of his stubborn, genuine self. A faint, unfamiliar heat rose to her cheeks.
This is a problem, she thought, her usual cool composure settling over her like a familiar, heavy coat. But the coat didn't fit quite right anymore.
---
Juno woke up with a mouthful of pillow and a headache that felt like a tiny goblin was trying to mine its way out of her skull with a pickaxe.
"Ugh… five more minutes, Mom…" she mumbled, swatting blindly at her alarm clock.
Her hand connected with something solid. And warm.
Her eyes flew open.
Calyx was sitting in her desk chair, calmly examining a ridiculously sparkly snow globe she'd won at a fair last year. He turned it over, shook it, and watched the glitter storm with an expression of profound disinterest.
Juno shot upright, her head screaming in protest. "WHAT THE—HOW DID YOU—GET OUT OF MY ROOM!"
Calyx didn't even flinch. He set the snow globe down. "You drooled on my shoulder. I think that grants me certain visitation rights." He glanced around at the band posters, the cluttered desk, the clothes piled on a chair. "It's… louder than I expected."
"My room is none of your business!" Juno hissed, pulling her blanket up to her chin. "How are you even here? This is the real world!"
"Astral Flow has its pathways," he said with a shrug, as if explaining a bus route. "Your psychic signature was fading fast. Someone had to make sure you didn't accidentally dream yourself into a coma." He finally looked at her, a faint smirk playing on his lips. "Also, you talk in your sleep. Something about… glowing noodles being 'worth the internal explosion'?"
Juno's face turned the color of a fire hydrant. "I—You—Shut up!" She scrambled out of bed, pointing a trembling finger at her door. "Out! Now! Before my mom finds a strange boy in here and we have to explain interdimensional healing!"
Calyx stood, stretching languidly. "Fine, fine. I'll be the mysterious stranger who lurks in your backyard. Try not to get yourself whisper-attacked before first period." He gave her a lazy salute and, to her utter astonishment, seemed to simply step sideways into the shadow of her closet, vanishing from sight.
Juno stood frozen, staring at the empty space. "Okay," she whispered to herself. "So that happened. Totally normal. Absolutely fine."
---
The walk to school was surreal. Kael felt like he was moving through a world made of glass, fragile and slightly unreal. Every sound was too sharp, every color too bright. He kept flexing his hand, half-expecting Astral Flow to flicker around his fingers.
He saw Juno first, waiting by the gate. She looked… frazzled. Her hair was even more chaotic than usual, and she was scanning the shadows of the schoolyard with paranoid intensity.
"He's here," she blurted out as Kael approached, her eyes wide.
"Who's here?"
"The healer guy! Calyx! He was in my room! He said he came through an 'Astral Pathway' or whatever and then he just—poof—vanished into my closet!"
Kael blinked. "He… what?"
Before Juno could launch into a more detailed—and likely louder—explanation, a hush fell over the students milling around the gate.
Talia had arrived.
She stepped out of a sleek, black car, her posture ramrod straight, her expression a mask of icy neutrality. She didn't look at anyone, her gaze fixed on some distant point ahead. The whispers started instantly. "It's her." "Did you see her new watch?" "She looks so bored."
Kael's breath caught. This was the Talia everyone knew. The untouchable heiress. The celebrity who never spoke.
Her eyes scanned the crowd, and for a single, heart-stopping second, they locked with his.
The mask didn't crack. Not exactly. But something flickered in her gaze—a flash of shared memory, of vulnerability, of a dungeon dark and a confession whispered. Her step faltered, just barely. A almost imperceptible stumble on the perfectly paved sidewalk.
Then she looked away, smoothing her blazer, and walked past them without a word, leaving a wake of perfume and awe.
Juno let out a low whistle. "Wow. Okay. So we're just pretending we didn't almost die together last night. Cool. Cool, cool, cool." She nudged Kael, who was still staring after Talia. "You okay there, champ? You look like you just saw a ghost. A really, really pretty, emotionally constipated ghost."
Kael swallowed, the familiar weight of his school bag suddenly feeling alien on his shoulder. "Yeah," he muttered, tearing his gaze away. "Let's just… get to class."
The normalcy of it all was the weirdest battle they'd faced yet.
---
Far away, in the deepest, most lightless trench of the corrupted Dream Realm, the Lady stood before a pulsing, sickly heart of darkness—the core she served.
But her mind was not on her master.
She was thinking of the boy. The one with fire and water in his fists, and the girl who stood by his side.
She remembered a different sun. A different life. A time before the whispers, before the glorious, painful power that now coursed through her veins.
A name, forgotten by everyone but her, echoed in the silence of her soul.
Anya.
The corruption around her writhed, sensing her momentary distraction. It demanded focus. It demanded obedience.
The Lady—Anya—closed her crimson eyes. When she opened them again, the moment of weakness was gone, burned away by a colder, harder resolve.
But the seed was planted. The memory of what she had been, before the darkness, had begun to stir.