I Fell In Love With A Girl Who Died Before I Was Even Born

I blinked at the three of them.

Arclose. Edin. Nightmage.

Speed Nuts and the Automotive Studs?

What the hell was I supposed to say to that?

I think I opened my mouth half a dozen times before anything actually came out.

"You're in a band," I said, acknowledging the truth. "That's… great. But I don't need a guitarist. I need a doctor."

Edin laughed so hard he fell over.

"Oi, lad, you've got a sense o'humor," he said between laughs.

Shion gave him a look, and he stood up trying to stifle himself.

"Do you need a drink of water?" she asked darkly.

Edin shook his head.

"Not water, lass," he said. "I'll be back in a minute."

I adjusted my position on the couch, and a moment later, I felt Shion's cold hand squeeze my arm gently, reminding me that she was here for me.

The living room still smelled like weed and warm electronics. A lava lamp sputtered in the corner, and I could swear the couch cushions were comfortable enough to be a curse. I chose not to investigate.

Shion looked at Arclose.

"He's not wrong," she said. "That's why I brought Ryu here. He needs help, and I know you've got something."

I winced as I shifted on the couch. The pain hadn't gone anywhere, but now it had company, namely, three dudes with wizard vibes and zero medical degrees.

"Gracious," Yuki said from the corner. "How can these three help?"

Nightmage threw his hands up, agitated.

"I knew it," he said. "I get to say it, so don't even stop me, Arclose! I told you so! I said from the beginning that bringing her with us to the Nightlands was a mistake, vampire or not."

Arclose sighed.

"Calm down, dude. You're too tense. Nothing's messed up, okay? First, Shion's saved our asses—"

"Twice," she interrupted.

Arclose sighed.

"She's saved our asses twice, so I don't think she's wrong to come to us when she needs a favor. You know what that shows?" he asked.

Nightmage crossed his arms.

"Mooching?"

I could tell Arclose was getting agitated, but then Nightmage held up his hands defensively.

"Okay, fine, I get it. You're right," Nightmage said.

He turned to Shion.

"Yeah, I suppose if you're going to continue to help us out, and if you're going to be part of our crew, then we need to treat you like you're part of the crew."

Then he looked at me, judgmentally, of course.

"And your boyfriend who's completely not your boyfriend."

Yuki sniffed.

"How do you know he's not mine?" she asked. "Oh, never mind. You probably can't even see me. That's okay."

She grinned at me.

"The person who can see me is the one who matters."

Shion rolled her eyes but otherwise ignored Yuki.

I, on the other hand, couldn't help but blush, something Yuki noticed and grinned about.

"So, what've you got?" Shion asked.

I raised my hand.

"Wait," I said. "Slow down. You've got to. My ankle hurts like hell, but I need to know what's happening. Shion, who are these people?"

Nightmage and Arclose wandered off into the back room, promising they'd return with something that would apparently "help" me more than, an actual doctor.

She took a breath so she could explain.

"They already told you, duh," she said, sarcastically. "They're a band."

I narrowed my eyes at her.

"Don't give me that," I said.

Then, to my utter amazement, she grinned at me and she hugged me.

"Promise you won't be mad," she said in a tone that I'd never heard from her that sounded like she was trying to be sweet.

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That wasn't her voice. Not really. It was like someone had swapped out her usual dry sarcasm for something... softer. Warmer. Like she'd borrowed someone else's tone just long enough to stab me with it.

"Shion," I said slowly. "What did you do?"

She bit her lip. Actually bit it. Not in the flirty, fang-showy way she normally does when she's toying with me,but like someone who knows she's about to be the bad guy in someone else's story.

"I've been going," she said. "To the Nightlands with them."

My mouth went dry, and she didn't wait for me to respond.

"I didn't tell you because you'd worry. Or, even worse, that you'd try to come with me. And I couldn't risk that."

My heart did this weird, slow twist. Like it wasn't breaking, just folding in on itself.

"You've been going into the Nightlands," I repeated. "Alone?"

"I wasn't alone," she said quickly. "I had them."

She nodded vaguely toward the back of the lodge, where Arclose, Edin, and Nightmage were supposedly finding their very trustworthy non-medical remedies.

I looked down at my ankle. Still throbbing. Still real and swelling like hell.

"You still need to explain what's going on and who those guys are. Just… start from the beginning."

Yuki floated a little closer.

"Ohhhh, this ought to be good," she said.

Shion shot her a look and took another breath.

"I didn't lie," she said. "I just didn't say anything, okay? So, don't accuse me of lying."

I didn't say anything.

"That's the same thing, though," Yuki said flatly.

I tensed, expecting an angry retort.

"I know," Shion said.

Then, unbelievably, she put her dry, cold hand over mine.

"It started the first night, okay? Everyone else was in their dorm rooms, but what was I supposed to do, Blondie? Huh? Curl up and grab forty winks?"

She looked away, her eyes landing on the corner of the coffee table. Then, I felt her thumb as it began to softly caress my hand.

Shion, what the hell are you doing?

"So, I left my dorm and, wouldn't you know it? Those bastards enchanted the gate!"

Shion suddenly grabbed my hand and anger flashed in her eyes.

"Goodness!" Yuki said. "They wouldn't let you leave the campus?"

For the first time since we'd entered the lodge, Shion answered her.

"Nope," she said. "Apparently, it makes the people in Shin'yume feel safe. Oh, we can go into the woods, but that's it."

She looked pissed.

"The woods," Shion spat. "Like, what the hell would I want to find in there? Venison? Squirrel? Do they think I'm going to find, like, a non-yokai tanuki and eat it?"

I was beginning to put things together.

"Okay," I said. "So you came upon Obie's lodge, right?"

Shion grinned at me.

"Getting smarter, Blondie," she said, caressing my hand again.

Then, both of us looked down at her hand over mine, and I felt her tense.

"Oh," she said, embarrassed. "Sorry."

She went to move it away, but I stopped her.

"It's okay," I said.

The tension remained, but she didn't move her hand.

"They're… they call themselves 'interlopers'," she said. "Not sure how helpful that is, but basically, they, er, me and them… we go into the Nightlands and bring back whatever we can."

I tried to follow along.

"You enter the Nightlands?" I asked.

A brief nod.

"Yeah. It's where people go when they dream," she said.

Then, we heard Arclose and his friends return.

Edin held a cardboard box.

"'ey," he said, plopping the box on the coffee table. "We got some stuff that'll 'elp."

I sat up as Edin opened the lid.

Inside was an assortment of weird looking odds and ends. I'm not talking about magic items, like wands, scrolls, or glowing orbs.

I mean, this stuff looked like Cthulhu's tool box, and it gave off a soft, eerie glow.

Arclose quickly walked to the window and made sure the curtains were closed all the way.

"Hey, watch it, Paul," he said. "Do you want all our hard work to get flushed down the toilet because of a stray sunbeam?"

Edin looked mortified.

"Ey, tha's a good point. Sorry."

I looked confused.

"Please," I said, turning to Shion. "Tell me more."

She grinned and drew a breath.

"Okay. David Arclose," Shion began, but Arclose interrupted her.

"Just Arclose, please. None of this David stuff," he said. "It's cooler that way."

Shion rolled her eyes.

"Fine. Arclose and his friends—"

"Call me Steve. I don't care," interrupted Nightmage.

Shion looked ready to kill him, so he just grinned and shrugged.

"They go to the Nightlands and they bring stuff back here, to the real world," Shion said quickly, before anyone else could butt in.

Yuki floated over and peeked in the box.

"This stuff is from the Nightlands?" she asked.

Arclose reached inside and pulled out what looked like a wine bottle, but a bottle made from shimmering stained glass, and the bottom was round, like a bowling ball.

"Check it out," he said, carefully lifting the bottle.

"What is it?" I asked.

He shrugged.

"Merlin's brew," he said. "Ambrosia, mana. Nectar of the gods. I mean, really, who knows what it is. It's a drink that we swiped from the dream world. Maybe this'll fix your foot."

There was no way I was drinking that stuff without knowing what it did.

"Yeah, right, Arclose. Put that away before you turn him into a mutant turtle or something," Shion said.

Suddenly, I came upon a horrifying conclusion to Shion's plan.

"Shion," I said, trying to keep my voice steady. "Let me see if I have this straight. You brought me here, to Obie's lodge, to meet with three guys you've been hanging out with at night. The four of you go to the Nightlands, where people go when they dream, right?"

Edin nodded.

"Yeah, that's right," Shion said cooly.

"Okay, so, your plan, then, was to bring me here, instead of the John St. John Long Wellness Center to see if there was something that the four of you stole from someone's dream that could fix my foot? Like, instead of a doctor?"

Shion seemed uncharacteristically tense.

"You did promise you wouldn't be mad," she said.

Then Arclose reached into the box and pulled out a red glass spiderweb.

"A-ha!" he said, triumphantly. "This'll do! Hippocratic Brace!"

Yuki's jaw dropped open.

"You just made that up," she said.

Arclose handed it to me, and I grabbed it carefully. It was impossibly thin, like a spiderweb, but it looked slightly thicker that the ones I was used to seeing. And it was red. It felt like holding glass thread in my hands, and as I held it, the color shifted subtlety but never stopped being a dark red hue.

"You've got to be careful with that," Arclose said. "And whatever you do, keep it the hell away from sunlight. If so much as a reflected beam of sunlight hits that, the dream is over, and you'll be limping your way home."

Yuki floated to my side to examine the spiderweb.

"What did you call it, and, uh, how does it work?" I asked, holding it in front of me so Yuki could see.

Nightmage walked to the side of the couch and crouched beside me.

"Here, kid," he said.

I wanted to tell him that I was twice his age, but I decided to just hand him the glass spiderweb.

"It's called a Hippocratic Brace. At least, that what I call it. Who knows what you call stuff that's pulled out of a dream and shouldn't exist in the first place. Now, roll up your pants leg, stud, and we'll get to work."

I looked back at Shion.

She gave me a half-hearted shrug.

"Slowly, Blondie. Don't jostle your ankle too much," she said.

Yuki scoffed at her.

"Oh, a lot of help you are."

I managed to get my pants rolled up to my knee without screaming. Nightmage leaned over and pressed the Hippocratic Brace against my ankle where it was dark red and swollen.

Instantly, the webbing began to wrap around my ankle. Then, to my horror, the webbing wormed its way through my skin and into the flesh beneath my ankle. I could feel it under my skin, wrapping around the bone in my leg and foot.

And a second later, all the pain in my foot vanished.

Nightmage grinned.

"How's that? You feel like you can walk?"

Walk? Hell, I felt like I could sprint.