"Okay." I walked over to him, my bare feet making a whispering sound with every step across the cool grass. When he held my hand, the warmth and strength I felt from his touch seemed every bit as real as if I'd been awake.
He smiled down at me, his eyes like mysterious emeralds in the silver light. He led me deeper into the forest, and I realized neither of us seemed to feel any pain, despite the fact that we were both barefoot. Shouldn't we have stepped on sticker burrs or pinecones by now? I looked down. A thick bed of soft moss covered the entire forest floor and halfway up the trees like a green snowbank. It felt spongy beneath my feet, like walking on a cool, thick towel.
We continued in silence for a while until we came to a clearing with a waterfall and a stream. On the bank, someone had spread a blanket and left a picnic basket. The moonlight shone in slanting rays through the trees here, making me yearn to dance and spin among them like a little kid. It all felt so familiar, too, as if I'd been here before.
"Come sit with me," he said, and I was only too happy to follow him to the blanket.
"This is where I wish I could have taken you for our first date. Somewhere as beautiful as you."
"Me, beautiful? Now I know this is a dream."
"What if I told you this wasn't a normal dream? That our minds really are connected right now?"
"Uh-huh. So you're saying you're not just a figment of my imagination?"
"Basically, yeah." He traced a finger over the back of my hand, then he looked at me, and I loved the fact that I could safely stare directly into his eyes.
"So then you've done this a lot before? Connected with other people's minds while they're asleep?"
"No, just yours. You're the only descendant I've ever wanted to dream connect with. It takes two descendants to dream connect. Otherwise I could see you but you wouldn't be able to see or hear me."
"Weird."
He grinned. "But fun, too. We used to dream connect all the time when we were kids. Do you remember?"
And in a rush, all those dreams came back to me. I had been here before...in our dreams. This was our place, our clearing where I'd dreamed that we'd played together count less times. "You ate all my pretend cupcakes when I asked you to, and you helped me decorate our tree house. Oh, and you also showed me how to dig really good tunnels for toy cars! Though I preferred Barbie cars and scooters instead." I laughed. "My mom used to ask me why I kept chewing off my nails. I told her it was to keep the mud from getting under them. She never understood, since I didn't play in the dirt in real life."
He chuckled.
"But why did we stop?"
He frowned, thinking about it for a moment. "Well, it hasn't been for my lack of trying lately. I thought at first that it was because my parents stuck some charms or a spell on my room. But I managed to get around that. Connecting has still been hit or miss, though." He tilted his head, studying me. "Something's different about you tonight." He kept staring at me for a long moment, then snapped his fingers. "That's it. Your necklace. You always wear that gold locket."
I instinctively reached for my necklace, then remembered. "Oh, yeah, I had to take it off tonight. It was tangled in my hair. And then I couldn't get it back on, so I just left it off."
"When did you get it? Did someone in your family give it to you?"
I nodded. "My grandmother gave it to me...in the fourth grade."
We stared at each other in understanding.
"That's gotta be it," he said. "The locket must have a charm on it that keeps you from connecting to me. Otherwise we'd have no problem. Everyone's parents in the Clann can dream connect. My parents joke about it all the time."
And obviously my vampire genes hadn't prevented it before.
"Okay. But how do I know what you're saying is true, that we're really connecting and my subconscious isn't just making all this up?"
"Easy. Tell me something now that I wouldn't know in real life, and I'll repeat it to you Monday morning."
"Okay." I had to think for a minute, then it came to me. "Tonight, my father tried to talk me into moving in with him and switching schools."
Tristan stared at me, his smile fading. "Are you making that up?"
I shook my head.
"What was your answer?"
"I told him no way. I barely know him. And he's..." I almost said he was a vampire and a council spy. "He definitely cares more about his job than me." I told him how my father had left my dance recital early last spring without seeing my jazz routine.
"Ouch, that must've hurt. Did he say why?"
I pulled up a section of moss at the edge of the blanket, choosing my answer carefully. "His family doesn't approve of my dancing. That was the night he asked me to totally quit dancing."
"But you tried out for the Charmers anyways, right?"
I nodded. "His family pulled some strings and made sure I didn't make the team, though."
He muttered a curse almost too quiet for me to hear. "I'm sorry your dad and his family suck. But at least you tried to fight for what you wanted."
My eyes stung. I shrugged and stared down at the hunk of moss in my hands, tearing off the little fuzzy pieces from its surface. After a while, I swallowed. "Maybe we could talk about something else."
"Okay." He reached out and tucked my hair behind my ear so I couldn't hide behind it anymore. "Have I told you how brave I think you are?"
That made my cheeks burn. "Yeah, right." I wasn't brave at all. Just one secret date with Tristan had made me shake in my shoes with guilt and fear that we'd end up getting caught.
"No, you really are," he murmured, his voice dropping even lower. "It's one of the things I kind of admire about you."
"Tristan, if I was so brave, I would be dancing with the Charmers now anyways."
"What about all the stuff you do for the Charmers?"
I frowned in confusion. "Like what?"
"Like how you're not afraid to be alone on campus early in the mornings and late at night after practice. Or when you go to the school alone during a home game just to get another hat for one of the dancers."
Part of me wanted to hold on to those words like they were treasured bits of gold. He seemed almost proud of me, or at the very least impressed. But I had to shrug off his words. He just didn't know what I really was. Why would I be afraid of being on campus alone? I was the scariest thing that would ever walk those grounds, what with my monstrous mixed blood. Not that I could ever hope to explain any of that without totally repulsing him.