“It wouldn’t be if someone else had the dream. But you’re a cassandra sangue.”
“I didn’t make a cut, and my skin didn’t split because of weather or anything, so it wasn’t prophecy; it was just a dream.”
He nodded as if she’d convinced him, but he presented the one thought that troubled him, the thought that had brought him to the Liaison’s Office. “It’s just odd, don’t you think, that three significant things happened at the same time of day? You had a bad dream, something compelled Hope to make a drawing that frightened her, and bison in Joe’s territory were killed. All at daybreak.”
“But daybreak in the Northeast Region is two hours ahead of daybreak where Hope lives.”
“Two hours ahead of daybreak in Joe’s territory as well. But you don’t remember your dream, so we don’t know if you had some kind of vision about the bison.”
The sorting room filled with an awkward silence until a truck pulled into the delivery area.
“I have to get that,” Meg said.
“And I have to get to work.” He walked out the back door of the Liaison’s Office, then stopped. He didn’t want to go to Howling Good Reads yet, didn’t want to talk to Simon.
Meg had lied to him about not remembering the dream. It wasn’t that he’d thought she couldn’t lie. She was human after all. But he’d never thought she would lie to any of the terra indigene who had befriended her.
Was their friendship less valued now that there were more humans around? Or was he making too much out of things that weren’t important?
Too agitated to work, he headed for the Market Square to sit and think.
? ? ?
The moment the deliveryman walked out the front door, Meg rushed to the back room and peeked out the door to make sure no one was around. Then she opened the door all the way and leaned against the doorjamb.
She had lied to Vlad—and had lied to Simon and Henry and Tess earlier that morning when they asked her if she remembered the dream. She remembered enough. More than enough.
She’d dreamed about making a cut, had dreamed so vividly she could still feel the razor slicing her skin. Prior to the cut, she had run her hands down her arms, down her legs. But the buzz hadn’t been in her arms or legs; it hadn’t been on her back or her belly. In the end, she laid the razor along the right side of her jaw and pressed the blade against skin. Then her dreamself had endured the agony that came before a cassandra sangue began speaking prophecy, had continued to endure the agony by staying silent. And that dreamself had seen something so terrible that Meg had flung herself on Simon to protect him, to save him.
She had bled in a dream and seen prophecy. Something bad was going to happen to the Wolves. Unfortunately, she hadn’t seen the prophecy, so she couldn’t tell anyone what was coming, couldn’t give a warning.
Were any of the other cassandra sangue who were living outside the compounds having similar experiences of seeing visions without making an actual cut? Hope was making drawings that, until that morning, had been a different way to reach the visions without cutting. What about Jean, who was living with a Simple Life family on Great Island? Was she sensing things now without cutting?
The visions the three of them saw seemed to intertwine, but were they seeing the same things? She and Jean and Hope had come from the same compound, had been taught the same images, so they had that much in common when they described their visions. But now their lives were so different. Jean lived on a farm. Hope lived in a terra indigene settlement in the Northwest. And she lived in the Lakeside Courtyard. Each of them was absorbing new images every day, but not the same images. That was true of all the girls who had been freed from benevolent ownership. Would the younger girls, growing up without that rigid training, be able to communicate at all when they saw the visions of prophecy? Would it matter?
Meg clenched her teeth as the skin over her entire head suddenly filled with that pins-and-needles feeling.
It would matter. Maybe not here, maybe not right now, but it would matter.
So how could girls living outside the compounds achieve the same kind of image consistency in order to communicate with one another?
She needed to find another, already available, source for images. Wasn’t that part of her job as the Trailblazer, to help the other blood prophets find the tools they needed to survive?
The prickling beneath her skin faded. Going to the doorway between the back room and sorting room, she hollered, “Nathan? I’m going to the Three Ps. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
“Arroo?”
Yes, it was unusual for her to leave the office during her work hours, but if another delivery arrived, Nathan—and Jake Crowgard, who was perched on the wall between Henry’s yard and the delivery area—would let her know.
She hurried out the back door and across the access way. She’d been inside the Three Ps only once and had been overwhelmed by the amount of paper products Lorne Kates managed to carry in the small shop. She kept her eyes focused on the counter and rushed toward it as Lorne came out from behind the chest-high wall panels that separated the computers and printers from the retail part of the shop.
“Morning, Meg.”
“Good morning.” She braced her hands on the counter.
“You all right?”
Meg nodded. “I’d like some postcards.”
“Do you want to take a look at what I have in the spin rack?” Lorne asked.
“No. I need sets of pictures, images. If I see Talulah Falls in a vision and need to convey that I’m seeing that particular waterfall, I want another cassandra sangue to pick up the same image so she knows exactly what I mean.”
“Haven’t you been creating a binder of images to help identify things in your visions?”
“The binders are too big.” As soon as she said it, she knew it was true. Binders would be useful for collecting images that appealed to each girl, but the blood prophets needed something else for the consistent images, something about the size of a postcard.
Why was she so certain of that? Had she seen something during a cut, or heard about something that she couldn’t recall?
They both turned toward the door when they heard the howl.
“Someone is looking for you,” Lorne said. “I’ll pull one of each postcard and drop them off at the Liaison’s Office. After you look them over, you keep the ones you want and give back the rest. All right?”
“Yes. Thanks, Lorne.” Huffing out an annoyed breath when Nathan howled again, Meg rushed across the access way but stuttered to a stop when she saw Blair Wolfgard leaning against the office’s back door, waiting for her.
Blair was the dominant enforcer in the Courtyard and didn’t have much use for humans. To be fair, she was pretty sure she’d caused him a considerable amount of trouble since she started working, and living, among the terra indigene. So there was always the possibility that Blair would forget—or ignore—the “don’t bite Meg” rule.
“You caused a commotion at your place this morning,” he said.
“I had a bad dream, and I sort of fell on top of Simon.” How many times did she have to say it?
“What was the dream?”
“I don’t remember.”
Blair’s amber Wolf eyes studied her. “You would tell me if I needed to keep watch for something, wouldn’t you?”
“I would. And I will. But there’s nothing to tell you now.”
He opened the back door and stepped aside to let her enter.
“Meg!” Lorne hurried over to her, casting a nervous glance at Blair. “Take a look at these. And here’s a catalog from the place that prints the postcards. Keep it awhile. You can make up a list of the images you want me to order for you.”
Meg took the postcards and catalog. “Thanks.”
With another glance at Blair, Lorne bolted across the access way and back to the safety of his own shop.
“I’m going back to work now,” Meg said.