The Paragon

Chapter Eighteen

It was like I was watching a strange, very wobbly film. Everything seemed like it was underwater, wavy and unclear. I was looking at someone, a dark shape, someone cloaked in shadows...then my vision cleared and that shadowy figure was revealed to be Phoenix.

He frowned at me, looking sorrowful, as he held up his right hand with its palm facing towards me. Confused, I mirrored his movement, and placed my left palm on his right one—but when I put it there, I couldn't feel myself touching him. Even so, the contact seemed to mean something, as his face broke out in a small smile. He leaned in closer to me, his lips coming closer and closer to mine until we met in a kiss, one I could almost feel. It was like kissing a ghost.

Then, everything changed.

There was a burst of color—red, orange, yellow. Fire? It was hot. Phoenix was ripped away from me, as suddenly as he was there, he was gone. I tried to scream for him, but he was gone. I felt a strange feeling in my stomach, and placed my hand over it. When I looked down and pulled my hand away, I saw it covered in red. Blood?

My vision went wobbly again as I stared at my hands covered in my own blood. Screams—mine and unfamiliar ones—were echoing in my ears as the whole scene seemed to fade away. And then, suddenly, my eyes snapped open and I was awake. I gasped for breath, as though I'd been holding it in my sleep and sat up, immediately pulling the blanket away from my stomach to see that it was whole and unharmed. It was just a dream; I was okay.

It was wrong of me to be dreaming of Phoenix and I together—however briefly—when I'd only just essentially rejected him. Was my subconscious tell me I should be with him? Or was it telling me that us being together was a doomed goal? He'd been torn away from just when we'd gotten close, my worst fear for anyone I cared about.

Shaking my head, I tried to control my breathing and my thoughts. Dreams didn't mean anything. They were made up of our thoughts and fears and nothing made sense in them no matter how hard you might try to make them. Still, this dream—nightmare—hadn't felt normal.

I swung my legs out of bed and onto the vibrating metal floor, unable to stomach the thought of going back to sleep and perhaps bringing that dream back, or another like it. It really wasn't like me to be so affected by a dream. Dreams should fade away quickly after waking, but this one was choosing to linger in perfect clarity in my mind. I closed my eyes to try and banish the images from my head; instead they just swirled sickeningly behind my eyelids. My whole body felt shaky and odd.

It was, perhaps, my first sign that this trip wasn't going to be quite as seamless as imagined.

***

"The group that we're meeting with in Aelvine is known as the Association," Phoenix explained. "They're a rebel alliance, based in Kennett, formed when the Empire first began its invasion of the country."

"Isn't it a territory now?" I asked, staring up at the ceiling as I leaned back in my chair. After avoiding each other for most of the day, Phoenix had insisted he and I go over the situation before our arrival tomorrow, and we were now closed in the conference room together.

"If the belief is that the Empire is wrong, one of the strongest things we can do is deny their authority," Phoenix said. His face suddenly appeared above me in my line of sight, looking strange upside-down as it was. "Imogen, can you focus?"

"Trust me, I'm focused," I murmured, but sat back up anyway. I was as focused as I could be anyway. The nightmare was still fresh in my mind, and being around Phoenix wasn't helping me forget about it—quite the opposite.

"So what does the Association do to oppose the Empire?" I asked, trying to cast my mind to other thoughts and focus fully on what I needed to know.