Loki's Daughter Book 2

Nightmares

I leave my room in the early morning and make my way silently down to the library. I walk up and down the bookshelves fingertips dragging over the spines trying to find a book to read.

'Isn't too early to read?'

I barely even acknowledge my father as I finally find a book and sit down on one of the chairs.

'Raven you do need to let yourself sleep.'

'You know I can't.'

He stands over me and reads over my shoulder. At the tenth page he takes the book off me.

'Why can't you be a normal person?'

'I already answered that. We and especially I can't be normal.' I reach out for the book but he throws it away and I watch as it floats back onto its shelf. Father moves in front of me, kneels down so he look into my eyes.

'Come with me Raven,' he whispers. I shrug and follow him out of the library. He takes me into his living room and turns the tv on. I flop down onto the couch and he sits next to me. I watch the tv in silence and after a while move around so I'm lying on the couch, feet propped up on father's lap while my head rests at the bottom of the armrest. More time pasts and I finally start falling asleep.

I wake up and sit up, eyes darting around the room. The door opens and my father strolls in holding a plate of food.

'Your cousin visited and brought me dinner,' he sits on the edge of the bed laughing to himself. He offers me the plate but I shake my head and he takes it back. I keep looking around the bedroom. It's not mine.

'You're in my bedroom. You fell asleep on the couch and I moved you in here. Figured it would be more comfortable than a couch.'

'Why would you care? Its not like you left me on shitty earth where I spent most of my life sleeping on hard tiled floors or wherever I was last thrown at,' I snap still scared and angry from the nightmare that woke me up. Loki looks up and frowns. The plate disappears as I slide out from under the covers and pace over to the window. Different view out here.

'Raven what's going on? Why is it that you can never sleep?' the questions just burst out from him. I climb up onto the window sill and jump out on to the edge of the balcony.

'Fucken hell Raven. Talk to me instead of always running off,' my father snaps from where he hovers next to me.

I wince at his wording and teleport into my room. I slam the bedroom door shut and lock it behind me. I pace around me room. I just need to hit something. Preferably not a person. I remember back to the rundown town I stayed at before I was tricked into coming back. I feel something in my mind and recoil away from it. A moment later my father stands in front of me his face pale.

'Please Raven...talk to me. Help me understand what's going on.'

I hit the marble column next to me. I feel something break and swear. 'Okay fine. You want to know what's going on,' I turn around and face him. 'I keep having nightmares. The moment I shut my eyes I have nightmares or memories. And I can't deal with it okay?' I struggle to keep the tears away. I can't cry. Not now. Not ever. I'm not allowed. He grabs hold of my shoulders and gently shakes me.

'That's for not telling me before and also for ever thinking like that,' he tells me as he release me.

I turn my back to him as my throat dries out and I can't find myself able to speak.

'So, what woke you up this time?'

I lower my head and cast the spell and show him. It was seeing the dog dying again for the fifth time after it died and then it went to where I ended up lying every time when I was in foster care. At the bottom of walls, on cold floors, on straws, rocks, benches, rarely beds and more than often outside during a lightning storm. The spell ends and I watch as my father takes one look at me and turns away.