Mister Impossible (Dreamer Trilogy #2)(91)

“I can,” Bryde said softly. “Because I know when you dreamt me.”





What is real?

You make reality.

Just like that, Ronan was in the worst dream again. The dam was gone. The lake was gone. The warmth and clarity of Bryde’s dream was gone, replaced with Ronan’s old nightmare. He was standing in the bathroom of the Barns and there was a Ronan in the mirror. Behind him, Ronan could see the reflection of Bryde standing in the doorway.

“No,” he said.

Bryde said, “I only came because you asked me.”

“No.”

“Don’t say no. You know. You knew.”

“I didn’t know.”

“You knew,” Bryde insisted. “Deep down, you had to know. You had to ask for it, or it wouldn’t have happened.”

The dream changed. It was Lindenmere now. They were surrounded by Ronan’s massive trees, standing in the clearing where he had heard Bryde’s voice with Hennessy that day. The dream was impossible to separate from reality. The details were perfect. Every lacy fern. Every growing patch of lichen. Every mote of dust and insect gleaming in the air.

“No,” Ronan said again. “They knew your name. They knew the rumors.”

“You dreamt the rumors.”

“No. I can’t do that. Only you can do that sort of stuff. The orbs—”

“You dreamt it into me.”

The forest was alive with sound. Distant wings. Claws. Talons. Mandibles. Even after all these lessons, Ronan was no less likely to corrupt a dream than when he’d brought the murder crabs out at Adam’s dorm, when push came to shove. “Why are you doing this?”

“Why did you keep Adam out of your dreams?” Bryde asked. “You were sure he would know. You wanted to pretend.”

He frowned, just a little, and Ronan could feel that he was mentally driving the encroaching claws and talons out of the dream. Effortless. Controlled where Ronan was not.

“I didn’t want anything,” Ronan said. That was a lie. The dream threw it back at him. He thought he might throw up. “You knew about Hennessy. I didn’t know about Hennessy.”

“I know what Lindenmere knows,” Bryde said quietly. “I am both of you.”

Oh, God. Now Ronan was playing it all back in his head. He was going over everything Bryde had taught him. He was trying to recall the first time he’d seen Bryde. The first time he’d heard Bryde. He was trying to remember how he’d decided the game of finding him was worth playing. The promise of another dreamer had been so tantalizing. The promise of another dreamer who’d actually known what he was doing had been even more tantalizing. He could have generated that in a dream, just like those talons and claws. He’d wanted a teacher. He got a teacher.

No.

Ronan tried to think if Bryde had ever told him anything that Ronan himself didn’t already know, that Lindenmere, as a forest situated on the ley line, able to see other events along the ley line, wouldn’t have known.

Oh, God. Bryde getting his information from the trees. Bryde often knowing what Ronan was thinking before he spoke. Ronan looking at Bryde and thinking he looked familiar, or something, and shying away from what he actually already knew. The rabbit hole kept leading down. He couldn’t find bottom. He was still falling.

The dream was now an Irish shoreline. An ancient hawk flew over the black ocean. Ronan could taste the salt in his mouth. Cold shot through him, a damp cold that made it all the way to his bones. It didn’t feel like a dream. It felt like reality. It felt exactly like reality. Ronan could no longer tell the difference between them.

Bryde said, “You wanted me.”

“I wanted someone real.”

Reality doesn’t mean anything to someone like you. Bryde didn’t have to say it. Ronan already knew it. He knew everything Bryde knew, deep down.

“It’s harder than I thought,” Bryde said. “Being out here. I thought it would be simpler. I thought I knew what I wanted. But it’s so much louder. It’s so, so much louder. I get … confused.”

Ronan’s heart was breaking.

“Your quest,” Ronan said.

“Your quest,” said Bryde.

Ronan closed his eyes. “You’re just a dream.”

Bryde shook his head. “We already know what you think about that, because I told you. What do you feel, Ronan Lynch?”

Betrayed. Alone. Furious. He felt like he had nightwash even though he didn’t. He felt like he couldn’t stand to look at Bryde for one more second. He felt like he couldn’t stand to be in his own head one more second. He felt like he couldn’t tell if he had ever woken up from that worst dream.

The black ocean boiled and then burned. Ronan’s mind boiled and then burned. Everything could burn if you hit it hard enough.

“Nothing,” Ronan said. “I can’t feel anything.”

The grass was also burning now. The flaming waves had lapped the pebbly shore, which caught fire, and then the ascending cliff face had caught fire, and then the strange flames had wicked over the edge and caught the dirt and then the grass. The fire whispered to itself as it did its work. Its language was secret, but Ronan got the gist. It was starving.

Bryde said, “Right now, Hennessy is trying to dream something to shut down the ley line for good. Can you feel her? We can go stop her, or I can go stop her, or you can try to stop me and let the ley line be shut down and kill all of this. Either way. You have to make a decision. Is this my quest, is it your quest, or is it nothing? For once in your life, stop lying. Stop hiding behind me. Ronan Lynch, what do you want?”