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Alia awoke slowly, her body warm with sleep and pleasantly heavy as it sunk into the soft mattress. She runs her fingers across the sheets, the fabric impossibly soft beneath her calloused hands, allowing her mind a slow moment to catch up to her surroundings. Outside the birds chirped a melody, the sound too similar to a lullaby to feel at home in the glow of early morning. She sat up, becoming more confused as she fully woke, the uncanny energy washing over her in a rush.
The air was sickly sweet, and the strong smell of Spring clung to her despite her certainty that she had fallen asleep to autumn. She worried about the ends of her hair between her fingers, before catching herself in the habit and sweeping it all to one side instead. As a child her teachers had hated the idle action, and the small comfort was something that she never could shake, try as she might.
The room, and the energy within it, was familiar, but she couldn’t quite place it. It felt like an amalgamation, a cluster of memories fused together to make a single moment, and something about it felt off. It was as if everything, from the too warm sun kissing her cheeks to the soft cotton draped across her body, was crafted just for her. It wasn’t exactly unpleasant, but Alia was not one to blindly give into illusion, and the wrongness had her instantly set on edge.
She felt a sudden shift in the energy surrounding her, and at once she understood how and why the world simultaneously felt so familiar and strange. She clenched her jaw, the faint nerves turning to outright dread and discomfort.
“Lillith,” she said, speaking without sound, the words filling Lillith’s mind as if they had been whispered directly into her ear
“Clever girl,” Lillith cooed, her mocking words curling through the air like smoke as she materialized, “most take much longer to realize they’re dreaming. Although, I don’t know if I’ve ever attempted this exact trick on someone as powerful as you.”
“Your flattery will not aid you,” she said, “I will not tell you where the stone is.”
“Oh, come now, you assume the worst of me so quickly?” Lillith asked, “how do you know that I’m not paying you a visit for pleasure. Maybe I just want to be friends.”
Lillith shuffled through Alia’s mind like a pack of playing cards, sifting through the details of her life for something that she could use to gain leverage. Her life appeared to be one nightmare after the next, and she was not hard pressed to find something tragic to use against her. Lillith wasn’t eager to jump straight into torturing the woman, of course, but it helped to be prepared for anything.
“Do you take me for a fool?” Alia asked, “your feigned pleasantries and this false sense of security are as transparent as a guilty child’s attempt at deception. I will not be manipulated so easily.”
Lillith laughed, the distorted sound eerie against the warmth of the room. Alia’s boldness charmed her, in a way, her courage reminiscent of an especially brave kitten. She bit her tongue, knowing the comparison would only infuriate Alia more. Instead, she quieted, picking through Alia’s memories for the exact piece of history that would dig beneath her skin perfectly.
She shifted through appearances, mimicking faces from Alia’s past while she searched for the right one. Lillith paused, halfway between one of Alia’s aunts and a nearly forgotten childhood friend. It dawned on her that she didn’t know if any part of Alia was aware of her appearance, or whether the effort used to find a face was a waste of her precious time.
“Only if you touch me,” Alia said, simply.
“How did–”
“I can feel the change in the air,” Alia said, smirking as if she’d won a round of a game, “I might not be able to see you, exactly, but I know how it feels to be in the same room as my mother. I also know how it feels when something is imitating her. You cannot fool me, Lillith, I can feel your face beneath hers.”
“Is that so?” she asked, borrowing another old friend’s voice, the memory of the girl bright and easy to pluck from Alia’s mind. She holds the sound over her, dangling the borrowed voice like a cruel child taunting an animal with a cut of meat, waiting for her to pounce so she could snatch it away.
“You are not her,” she said, her voice even, “you satiate yourself on weak-willed men and those who already stand on the brink, but I am not like them. You will not use my heart against me so easily.”
Lillith frowned, the words taking her off guard. She had expected Alia to be stronger than most of the dreamers she had dealt with, but the indifference was entirely new to her. Even the strongest souls would falter at memory as powerful as the one Lillith had chosen, and yet, here was Alia resisting without hesitation.
Alia slid off of the tall bed, her bare feet padding across the stone floor as she moved toward Lillith. She watched with intrigue as Alia stood in front of her, her chin tilted up defiantly. The softness of her appearance was juxtaposed against her cold demeanor, and Lillith had a peculiar passing urge to kiss the smugness off of her lips. She shook away the feeling, disgusted by her own sudden humanism.
“I will not be so readily drawn into your nightmares, Lillith,” Alia said, the words sharp in Lillith’s head, “try your worst, but do not assume for even a moment that I will be going down without a fight. You will not find the information you seek in my mind, I can promise you that.”
“I–,” Lillith began, snapping her jaw shut as she frantically tore through Alia’s mind for something she could use. She came up short as Alia dulled her memories, everything the same shade of indecipherable grey. Alia diluted her feelings, equalizing everything so Lillith could not distinguish between the mundane and the exceptional.
Alia raised her eyebrow, even more emboldened as she felt Lillith’s frustration deepen. She was determined to stand her ground, and no manner of creature, however powerful Lillith may be, would get the best of her.
“Clever,” Lillith murmured, “I may have underestimated you, witch. Very well, I’ll leave you to your dream, for now. But rest assured, my love, this will not last forever.”
“I’m counting on that.”
Lillith snapped herself out of the dream with a loud woosh, leaving Alia’s sleeping form crumpled on the floor. She reappeared back into reality, standing around a dying fire on the outskirts of a forest. Around her the party slept, entirely unaware of her presence. She eyed Antoine, his twitching body curled uncomfortably on the bedroll strewn across the dirt, his face set in a deep frown. The illness had already started to take hold of him, and the itch of his skin was worsening with each passing moment. Even in sleep he seemed to feel it, his fingers occasionally scraping his heaving chest.
She watched him for a moment before deciding to leave him alone for now. He was a loyal thing, and she needed him weaker if she had any hopes of learning anything of importance from him. There was a strength in him that was easy to overlook and underestimate, but she was well aware that his dedication to servitude would not crumble so easily. It would be a waste of time to scratch at his thoughts before he was ready, and so she would have to wait.
Across the fire Arthur laid on his back, his left hand pressed to his chest almost possessively as the other wrapped around his wrist, fingers sprawled against the back of his hand. The image was disproportionately comfortable for their circumstance, and it showed her that Arthur was much too far from breaking now. Vale had shaken him, of course, but there was a definite will that had grown stronger since the last time she entered his dreams. She would have to be patient if she had any hope of getting what she wanted from him.
Finally, her eyes fell on Alia. She too slept near the fire, her long hair sprawled across the ground, her hands neatly laid on either side of her. Her face was expressionness, and it gave Lillith little insight into where she had ended up in her memories.
Arthur stirred, catching her attention as he shifted slightly and murmured in his sleep. The faint sound of the voice in his head broke the silence, his voice comforting Arthur’s restlessness with an ease that struck her. She found herself wondering about them, how it might have felt to be so intertwined with another. The thought was quite unpleasant to her, and she sneered at the thought of being stuck with someone for any period of time, let alone every waking moment.
Even so, something about them did pluck at what little humanity she had. There was a familiarity and understanding there that Lillith struggled to comprehend. It was clear the two saw each other, cared for each other, in ways she could not grasp and likely never would. She had certainly never experienced anything like, least of all with a human.
Her existence was ruled by independence, and the closest she had ever come to care was the cruel tricks her father had passed off as lessons. At most, she had felt the affection of those who worshipped her, but that was more akin to fear and obsession than it was genuine understanding. She had never felt love, not truly, and she sure as hell had never felt an all-consuming love like theirs, nor did she want to. It was their weakness, a string to pluck to extract the note the enemy wanted, and she would never allow herself to hold such a stupid defect.
Still, her eyes flicked back to Alia. She was beautiful, even in sleep, and for the first time Lillith understood why humans were so determined to capture a moment. The image was striking, and the purpose of paint and photographs was never more clear to her as it was in that moment. She wanted to hold onto it as long as she could, to find a way to preserve such a sight. She cringed at her own sentimentality, cursing herself for having such an embarrassing thought.
She hardly knew Alia, but already she felt seen by her in a way she never had before. There was no fear when she faced her, and her defiance held an underlying amusement. The dream felt more like a game than a means to an end, an equality that was absent in every other nightmare she crafted. She was drawn to her, and she couldn’t understand why.
With a huff she dove back into Alia’s mind, impulsively materializing inside of her memory in a rush. Lillith usually preferred to take her time when she entered dreams, allowing herself to unfurl slowly as a means of overwhelming her victim, the slow release a display of power that showed them they were prey to her predator. She was much too impatient for that now, too eager to get the answers she sought, and though she would never admit it aloud, she knew that those questions extended far past the desire to obtain the blackstone.
She was curious about Alia, and that curiosity was not something Lillith was used to. Of all the dreamers she had in her grasp, none were quite like Alia. For one, most were terrified to confront their past, desperate to avoid the sharp edge of memory and the pain that accompanied its cut. Even Arthur, determined as he was, eventually succumbed to her bidding, as she hoped he might again. The nightmares she built were full of the exact demons those under her influence refused to face, the darkest parts of themselves exposed and displayed in ways that made them willing to do anything to conceal it once again.
But Alia had already made peace with herself. There was more darkness in her life than anyone Lillith had ever met, and still, she was able to face memory with an ease that should not have been possible. Her defiance was not arrogant or defensive, it was fact, and that made Lillith all the more determined to make sense of her.
She materialized in a meadow, the culminating memory encompassing dozens of afternoons spent enjoying the sun. At a distance she could make out the outline of the castle, and she easily placed the memory in time. Alia had not been in the castle that long, and these memories were newer and more concrete. The colours surrounding her reflected this, the grass a vivid green, speckled with vibrant yellow and white flowers that dotted the clearing. The grass was overgrown and uncorrupted by human intervention, the peaceful space used only by Alia when she was able to steal some time for herself.
At its centre was a large swath of fabric where Alia slept. She sprawled across the blanket, her cheek gently rested against her hand as she napped beneath the sun. Her skin was illuminated by a warm, golden glow, the setting sunlight caught in the hair strewn across her face. She stirred, knitting her eyebrows together as she became aware of Lillith’s presence and swam toward consciousness.
She awoke with a yawn, rolling onto her back and stretching her body out as she let the dream wash over her. Her back arched slightly, her body stretching out before she pressed her palms to the ground and pushed herself into a seated position. She rolled her shoulders back, her body adjusting to the movement as if it were in the waking world, her bones cracking with each stretch. Though she knew that Lillith was impatiently observing, she took her time adjusting herself, making herself comfortable before she would allow Lillith to confront her.
“Back again?” She asked, finally acknowledging Lillith’s presence. She startled at the sound of her voice, gently touching her fingertips to her throat the second she heard it. Disconcerted, she immediately reached around the blanket, instinctively searching for her ever present slate.
“What?” Lillith asked, genuinely confused by her reaction, “I gave you your voice back, are you not grateful for my gift?”
Alia shook her head again, setting her mouth in a frown as she remembered that she was without her usual means of communication. A look of unease passed her face, but it was quickly replaced by her usual neutrality.
“Have it your way,” Lillith said, robbing her, once again, of her vocal chords.
She summoned a slate, and Alia breathed a sigh of relief as she ran her fingers over it.
“That was not my voice,” she said, embedding the words directly into Lillith’s mind. The feeling was odd, to say the least, but she couldn’t exactly call out the discomfort of having another person influencing her mind.
“I estimated,” Lillith said, “you had a voice, at one point, so I built from that. But I guess my attempt at kindness was misguided.”
“I…appreciate the thought,” Alia said, her shoulders relaxing as she settled back into familiar silence, “but I have not spoken in so long. The sound is foreign to me, and I do not wish to appear as anything other than what I am.”
“Very well,” Lillith said.
“A concept, I’m sure, is one you will struggle to wrap your head around,” she said, smiling.
It took Lillith a moment longer than it should have to realize that Alia was making a joke, albeit a friendly one, at her expense.
“Do you know who I am?” Lillith said, an edge to her even voice, “what I am? Your insolence implies a misunderstanding of the power I hold. I could crush your mind to dust as easily as one could a clump of mud. I could ruin you, if I so desired. You speak as if–”
“I’m not afraid of you,” Alia said, rising to her feet. She smoothed out her dress as she stood, regaining balance before moving toward Lillith with an easy grace, “you boast such power, and hold such anger and disdain, but you forget that I am no ordinary woman.”
“Your power is nothing compared to mine,” she said, “you have no idea what I’m capable of.”
“Don’t I?” Alia said, “The great Lillith, architect of nightmares, a great old one with power beyond human comprehension. Daughter of the crawling chaos. A creature with immeasurable power and magic. Well, I have seen power before, make no mistake. I have been a victim of it since my girlhood, and there is little anyone, even you, could ever do to break the resolve I spent a lifetime crafting. If you wish to use my own mind against me you’re going to have to do much better than my old friend’s face and a warm bed.”
“Your ignorance would be endearing if it wasn’t so fucking infuriating.”
“My ignorance? You can see inside my mind, Lillith, you can pick through my thoughts and memories at will. My whole lifetime unraveled in an instant in your hands, and yet, you speak as if you have no awareness of my power. I am not going to fight you, it is a waste of my energy, but do not underestimate what I am capable of.”
“Is that so?”
“They say that I can see into the hearts of man, but that’s reductive. You are no man, and still, I can see inside your heart just as easily. You think me ignorant but I can read you like a book.”
“You see what I allow you to see.”
“I see the truth,” she said, “one that you are willfully blind to.”
“And what truth is that?”
“That you are not as ruthless as you claim to be.”
Lillith laughs, the sound harsh and clipped, “I assure you, sweetheart, I am much more ruthless than you could ever imagine. I have reduced men to ash on a whim. Melted powerful minds beneath my hand until they cower, whimpering as they give me anything I desire. I have killed, tortured, devoured souls because I felt like it, so do not think for a moment that I will not do the same to you.”
“We have not known each other for long,” she said, crossing her arms, “but our short time together has proven that you do not take as much pleasure in suffering as you claim. I see you for what you are, even if you refuse to see yourself.”
“You should be grateful,” Lillith said, “I have chosen to spare you, unlike the rest of your little party, and your audacity is making me reconsider that choice.”
“Why spare me, then? You deal in nightmares and manipulations, and speak of cruelty, but my history is rife with pain. I have experienced the kind of darkness that would drive weaker minds mad. Surely it would take little effort to find what is needed to torment me. Failing that, you could easily harm me physically. So, why the hesitation?”
Lillith knew her words to be true. Alia’s life was made up of nothing but tragedy and torment. She had been bred and raised to be a tool, constantly exploited to benefit others from the time she first opened her eyes. If she were anyone else she would have been the perfect victim, a life of strife that would normally have Lillith eager to indulge in.
With the life Alia led Lillith should have had no problem bringing her to her knees. It would take nothing more than a passing thought to have her reliving the worst of her experiences, the physical and emotional pain she endured flooding her over and over again. Even the rare comfort Alia had felt was tainted by imminent destruction and hurt, nothing about her life was easy or kind. Breaking her should be easy.
But that strange affection gave her pause. As easy as hurting her would be, she didn’t want to. She was enraptured by this strange creature, and the desire to know more overpowered her desire to get what she wanted. Deep down, she knew that Alia would not break so readily, but even if she had been susceptible to her tricks, the thought of hurting Alia soured something inside of her.
She wanted to ration that it was too easy, that such a life brought no challenge and she would be bored with such a simple task, but she could not lie to herself, not truly. There was something different in Alia, something special. Beyond the gifts that were bestowed on her, the gifts earned through a lifetime of bloodshed and strife, she had a spirit that was so unlike any other human Lillith had met.
Humanity was poison, of that Lillith was sure, but that bitterness and contempt did not seem to extend to Alia, and she couldn’t quite pinpoint why.
Alia faced her, her shoulders set back as she awaited Lillith’s response. Why was she sparing her? In the time that she had been asleep Lillith had shown her only pleasant dreams and crafted kindness. Sure, it was a trick she had pulled before, but it never lasted long. A part of her knew that what she truly wanted was to keep Alia like this, content and safe, but she did not know why. That dream was a far cry from what she had planned for Antoine, for Arthur and the fucking voice he carried, so why was she any different? She had torn so many people to pieces without a second thought, and somehow, she wanted nothing more than to care for the woman standing in front of her.
“I am…unsure,” she said, honestly, “perhaps, I think you deserve a break after leading such a gruesome life.”
“The men I share this journey with have suffered as much as I. They have faced more than their fair share of atrocity, and still, you don’t spare them. I do not know exactly what it is you have planned for them, but I can feel that vitriol beneath your skin. I know what manner of horror you plan to inflict, and that is so far from what you have shown me. What is it about me that differs?”
“Are you not known for your ability to see into the hearts of others, as you claim?” Lillith asked, with a scoff, “surely you must see their true nature. Those so-called men you travel with are nothing more than animals crawling in the dirt. They take what they need, what they want, without sparing a single thought as to how their actions might reverberate. They are selfish, vile creatures, and I need not show them even a fragment of the grace I’ve extended to you.”
“I see,” Alia said, turning her mouth down as if she made a breakthrough in a case, a look of understanding passing over her.
“Surely you are not as blind to them as you are to the physical world. Clever girl, I know you’re capable of seeing them for what they are, and despite this, you are so keen to pretend that they are something they are not.”
“Of course I am not blind to their shortcomings,” she said, softening, her tight posture slipping away as she lets her guard down, “but, hearing this, I understand now what you see in me that you cannot see in them. You see only the surface, and while I appear to you nothing more than a victim of the world I was born into, you see them as nothing more than perpetrators of violence. There is good in them, Lillith, I can feel it in their hearts, and if you want to understand humanity you must look deeper than you are.”
“I do not wish to understand humanity,” Lillith said, huffing in disbelief.
“But you wish to understand me?” Alia asked, carefully.
Lillith gaped, unable to do anything but stare at the woman in front of her as the words hit her like a truck. She could not deny the intrigue, not to someone as perceptive as Alia, and the truth infuriated her as much as it scared her. She wanted to know more about Alia, not as a means of manipulation or because she wanted something from her, but because of a genuine interest in her.
“Even so, you are not going to free me,” Alia said, lightly, “I see that now, and I will not fight in a losing battle. If this is the end for me, then so be it.”
She took a single step back, tilting her head toward the sun and basking in it for a moment before she continued. She kept her head tilted as she sent her words sailing through Lillith’s mind, each one moving like bright music inside of her head as they floated on, “if that is the case, and if I am correct in assuming that time moves differently here—”
“You are correct, a lifetime can pass in an hour if I so wish. Where are you going with this?”
“If we are not beholden to the passage of time,” Alia said, smiling sweetly, “then will you join me?”
“Join you?”
“Join…you?”
“Yes, if time matters not, then it is no waste of it to sit in the sun,” she said, gesturing toward the blanket, “even if that sun is fabricated.”
“Why?” Lillith sputtered, looking around as if her surroundings might give her a hint.
“Because,” Alia said with a soft laugh, “I believe that there is good in you, deep down. And because I don’t believe that anyone has ever asked you to spend an afternoon listening to the songbirds and letting the hours pass without pressure. Perhaps, this is what it will take for you to let yourself soften.”
“I cannot be softened,” Lillith said, pushing past her as she stomped toward the picnic blanket, trying to exude a resistance even as she complied, “but…I will allow you this one indulgence.”
“You think I cannot hear the smile in your voice?” Alia asked, trailing after her and sitting down on the blanket with crossed legs.
Lillith took a seat beside her, flopping down with much less grace than her companion. She ignored Alia’s question, instead asking one of her own, “what is the point of this? What are we meant to be doing?”
“Why must everything have motivation,” Alia asked, “can we not simply enjoy each other’s company? Converse, or listen to the birds. There needn’t be a point to everything.”
“I don’t understand.”
“The point,” Alia said, “is to enjoy the world around us. To take pleasure where we can find it, even if it's nonsensical.”
“Hm.”
“And, I suppose, if this were not a dream I might say the point of an afternoon like this is to eat, to satisfy one’s body and mind simultaneously.”
Lillith poured through Alia’s mind, glad to have the semblance of a goal. She flickered through until she conjured a particularly bright feast, one hosted at Castle Kerringford not long after her arrival. Lillith held onto the thought as she summoned the meal, the space in front of them filling with dishes piled with decadent food, the smell warm and inviting. Alia brightened as the memory turned tangible around her, delighted by the food appearing before her.
“And what’s the point of this?” Alia asked, teasing.
“The point?”
“Yes,” she said, taking a bite out of a strawberry, the red juice dribbling down her chin as she continued to project her words into Lillith’s mind, her tone as sweet as the fruit, “you seem to be preoccupied with the purpose of things, so what is the purpose of this?”
“Did you not just say the purpose of this was pleasure?” Lillith asked, speaking with an uncontained fondness, “beyond that, I thought. Well, I thought it might make you happy.”
“You want to make me happy?”
Lillith paused, taken aback by the truth in her words. A part of her recoiled, uncomfortable within the desire, but she could not deny that, against all rationality, she wanted to make Alia happy. The admittance made her want to bolt, to snatch away the warmth in defence and refuse the chance of rejection or mockery. There was an unwelcome vulnerability within the affection, and she feared that she was not built for such a feeling.
“I suppose so,” she said, instead.
“See?” Alia said, “I knew there was good in your heart.”
“Or this is another trick,” Lillith said, “and I’m just waiting until your guard is down to strike.”
“oh, hush,” she said, shoving Lillith’s shoulder playfully, “if this is a trick then it is a beautiful one, and I am not so pessimistic as to throw away kindness when it’s offered.”
“I suppose that’s a wise choice.”
Alia shook her head, pushing the bowl of strawberries toward her in invitation. Lillith eyed it suspiciously, slowly extending her hand to pick one up. She held it in between two fingers, the bright red even more saturated against her unnaturally white skin. Lillith inspected the fruit as if it might change in her hand, unsure of if she wanted to eat it or not.
“Just eat it,” Alia said, “it will only bite if you decide it should, this world is your making after all.”
Lillith rolled her eyes, but brought the berry to her lips anyways. Carefully, she sunk her teeth into it, feeling the sweet juice burst in her mouth. It was a strange feeling, but not an unpleasant one, and she found herself smiling at the taste and the strangeness of swallowing.
“It’s good,”she said, searching for the words as she wiped away the juice from her lips, “I have never had the need to eat. It has always seemed so animal to me but, I…I think I am enjoying it.”
“Well, I’m glad,” Alia said, “and really, there is nothing wrong with a little bit of animalism, now and again, don’t you think?”
Lillith nodded, popping the rest of the strawberry into her mouth. She was much less fond of this bite, the leaves strange against her tongue, but the sweetness was just as enjoyable as the first bite.
“In any case,” Alia continued, picking up a warm piece of bread and tearing off a chunk that she handed to Lillith, “you should just enjoy it. As you said, this cannot last forever. Eventually one of us will have to wake up.”
“Right,” Lillith said, trailing off as she took the bread from Alia’s hand. She felt a pang of unease, knowing both were ignoring the fact that there was a chance that Alia may never leave that dream.