“We feed, for lack of a better word, on Mortals to replenish our strength.”
The room started to sway. Or maybe Macon was swaying.
“Ethan, sit down. You look absolutely pallid.” Macon strode over and guided me to the edge of the bed. “As I said, I use the word ‘feed’ for lack of a better term. Only a Blood Incubus feeds on Mortal blood, and I am not a Blood Incubus. Although we are both Lilum—those who dwell in the Absolute Darkness—I am something entirely more evolved. I take something you Mortals have in abundance, something you don’t even need.”
“What?”
“Dreams. Fragmented bits and pieces. Ideas, desires, fears, memories—nothing you miss.” The words came rolling out of his mouth as if he was speaking a charm. I found myself struggling to process them, trying to understand what he was saying. My mind felt like it was wrapped in thick wool.
But then, I understood. I could feel the pieces clicking together like a puzzle in my mind. “The dreams—you’ve been taking part of them? Sucking them out of my head? That’s the reason I can’t remember the whole dream?”
He smiled and stubbed his cigar out on an empty Coke can on my desk. “Guilty as charged. Except for the ‘sucking.’ Not the most polite phraseology.”
“If you’re the one sucking—stealing my dreams, then you know the rest. You know what happens, in the end. You can tell us, so we can stop it.”
“I’m afraid not. I selected the bits and pieces I took rather intentionally.”
“Why don’t you want us to know what happens? If we know the rest of the dream, maybe we can stop it from happening.”
“It seems you know too much already, not that I understand it completely myself.”
“Stop talking in riddles for once. You keep saying I can protect Lena, that I have power. Why don’t you tell me what the hell is really going on, Mr. Ravenwood, because I’m tired, and I’m sick of being jerked around.”
“I can’t tell you what I don’t know, son. You’re a bit of a mystery.”
“I’m not your son.”
“Melchizedek Ravenwood!” Amma’s voice rang out like a bell.
Macon started losing his composure.
“How dare you come into this house without my permission!” She was standing in her bathrobe holding a long rope of beads. If I didn’t know better I’d have thought it was a necklace. Amma shook the beaded charm angrily in her fist. “We have an agreement. This house is off-limits. You find somewhere else to do your dirty business.”
“It’s not that simple, Amarie. The boy is seeing things in his dreams, things that are dangerous for both of them.”
Amma’s eyes were wild. “Are you feedin’ offa my boy? Is that what you’re sayin’? Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
“Calm down. Don’t be so literal. I am merely doing what is necessary to protect them both.”
“I know what you do and what you are, Melchizedek, and you will deal with the Devil in due time. Don’t you bring that evil into my house.”
“I made a choice long ago, Amarie. I’ve fought what I was destined to be. I fight it every night of my life. But I am not Dark, not as long as I have the child to concern me.”
“Doesn’t change what you are. That’s not a choice you get to make.”
Macon’s eyes narrowed. It was clear that the bargain between the two of them was a delicate one, and he had jeopardized it by coming here. How many times? I didn’t even know.
“Why don’t you just tell me what happens at the end of the dream? I have a right to know. It’s my dream.”
“It’s a powerful dream, a disturbing dream, and Lena doesn’t need to see it. She’s not ready to see it, and you two are so inexplicably connected. She sees what you see. So you can understand why I had to take it.”
The rage welled up inside me. I was so angry, angrier than when Mrs. Lincoln stood up and lied about Lena at the Disciplinary Committee meeting, angrier then when I found the pages and pages of scribble in my father’s study.
“No. I don’t understand. If you know some
thing that can help her, why won’t you tell us? Or just stop using your Jedi mind tricks on me and my dreams and let me see it for myself?”
“I am only trying to protect her. I love Lena, and I would never—”