Skeleton Keys (on hold)

Chapter Seventeen

After I had calmed down, Hypnos and I walked through the white expanse of nothing and watched as more of the golden frames appeared with their paintings blurred. It took a lot of concentration to clear them, to be able to touch them so that we could step into them. Too often we would come to a frame, and after concentrating on it, find that it wasn't mine. Most of the time it would be Apollo's but occasionally we would find one of my father's or Elise's memories. 

After hours of this, Hypnos stopped. "We have done more than enough for tonight." 

I rubbed at my face, tired, but still somehow not sleepy. "I don't know how I'll make it though another day. Between the Scythe training all morning, and this all night." 

Hypnos chuckled. "While your mind is working, your body is resting. Yes, it will be practical to take 'breaks' from dreamwalking eventually and rest your mind, but first you need to master the basics so that you can so safely." 

"Awesome." I turned looking around the expanse of white around us. "What is this place, anyway?" 

He smiled at me. "It's your mind."

"It's a little empty, don't you think?" I asked, glancing around.

Hypnos shrugged. "It looks how you will it to look. Since you have not willed it to be something else, it is nothing." 

I thought about what he said for a moment, and then thought of something else entirely, focusing my thoughts on a particular memory. The white around us faded, the frames faded away too, leaving darkness surrounding us. I tilted my head up, knowing that when I did, I would see the stars just how they would be if I was standing outside the Grandpa's cabin at the lake. 

Hypnos stepped up beside me, following my gaze up to the stars. "You should probably be going. We can practice more tomorrow night."

Sun light glared through my window. I pushed myself up enough to look at the clock and plopped back down into my covers. I didn't want to get up. My muscles ached from all the 'training'. Though I don't know what more training was going to help me with. I got the basics down, great. Did I really need to know how to fight with it? What was I going to do? Go fight crime and stop bad guys with my very illegal giant knife?

I rolled over, studying the patterns in the popcorn ceiling. There was one plus to training. It was with Apollo. I thought about the memories of his that I walked last night and the girl that I'd seen him with. Lily is what he'd called her. I sat up, pulling my knees up to my chest. Apollo had called me Lily in his dream the other night. Had he mistaken me for her? 

Max ran screaming down the hallway and, even with the door to my room shut, I felt my eardrums vibrate with the noise. 

"Ugh!" I pulled my covers back over me and covered my head with my pillow to muffle the noise. What I wouldn't give to be in my own room, back in Florida in Mom's condo. 

I finally got up after Max's third trip down the hall and got ready for work. A pair of jeans, a tank top and sweater later, I stood waiting for Dad in the hallway by the front door. As much as I didn't want to see him, he was my only ride in this town. I missed having my own car. And my room, and all my stuff in it. It wasn't that Florida was anything special, it was just home, and I missed it. 

Dad came down the stairs with Elise a step behind. "Ready?" 

I forced a smile to my face. "Yep." 

Elise stepped up and straightened the collar on my jacket. "Thank you for helping your dad get the business in order. I know it must be boring going through all those old numbers." 

"Uh-" 

Dad was already out the door, but I could hear him starting the car. "He's probably going to leave with out me." I rushed out the door without answering her, and jumped into the passenger's seat. 

"Old numbers, uh?" I asked dryly as I buckled my seat belt. 

He shrugged. "I needed an excuse, and I wasn't about to tell her the truth." 

I stared out the window at the passing neighborhood houses. "No, you wouldn't want to do that now, would you?" 

The silence stretched between us, broken only by the vibration of my phone. I dug it out of my bag, and after a glance at the Caller ID, sent it to voice mail. I so did not what to talk to my mother. I was having enough trouble dealing with my father. 

Neither of us spoke for the rest of the ride to the shop, and Mom called once more and left three text messages. 

When Dad pulled his car into one of the always vacant spots out front, I jumped out and made a bee line for the door. It was early enough that Apollo wasn't down yet, and the coffee maker sat empty and cold in the back office. 

I stashed my things in the desk and pulled out the grounds to start the coffee. Dad came in right as I was finishing. I flipped the coffeemaker on and headed straight across the hall without a word, shutting the door behind me. He didn't say anything. 

My Key seemed to find its own way to my hand and shift into its scythe form. I started moving through the forms that Apollo taught me, but I moved faster than I should have. I pushed my anger through them, not caring if they were right or even close to what they should have looked liked. I just moved, because if I stopped, I'd have to feel all the hurt that was building inside me. I'd have to deal with it, and I wasn't ready to do that. 

"Anger can be a great emotion." Apollo's voice rang over my own labored breathing and I swirled to face him. He stood in the doorway with a mug of coffee, eyes studying me with intensity. "But it clouds mind and while it seems to make you stronger, anger will actually weaken you." 

I struggled to control my breathing. "I was just releasing some stress-"

"If you want to do that, then go for a run or to the gym," he said sternly, surprising me. "This isn't a game, Mary." 

It wasn't enough that Dad had to be hiding more crap from me, Apollo had to have a stick up his ass too? 

"Well, maybe I wouldn't treat it like a game if people actually told me what was going on. Or why exactly I need to know how to fight." 

Apollo's serious expression didn't change. He turned slowly, setting his coffee down by the door before straightening and facing me again. He held up his left hand, and orange flames lashed out forming his black wooden staff with the gold caps. 

Without a word he came at me, attacking with moves that I only just manage to block. I did my best to defend myself but the blows were never ending. 

I kept retreating, moving backwards until my own back hit the wall of the room. With a quick of his wrist, Apollo sent my Scythe flying to clatter on the floor behind him and used the brief moment of my surprise to pin me to the wall with his staff across my shoulders. 

My body froze even as I still gasped for breath, but it was the look in his eyes that frightened me the most. In the depths of his nearly black eyes there was a rage and sorrow so deep that I couldn't understand. He leaned in closer. 

"Reapers and Charons train," he said slowly, "because not everything out in the Realms is as peaceful as it is here on Terra. And sometimes, it spills over. Reapers don't just deal with the dead. They protect the living." 

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