Daydreams And Nightshade (DaN #1)

Chapter 66: Blight siblings

Why hadn't she looked around to see where he'd run off to? It would have been one simple movement to know which flight of stairs he'd chosen at least, but no. Luna had to guess where Noah had disappeared to, and it sure didn't help the panic in her chest.

"Noah?" she called out as she hesitantly chose the left corridor, wincing as a crack appeared in the wall she'd just passed by. She grimaced, and took a sturdy grip of her satchel in an attempt to have some kind of comfort to hold on to before continuing. "Noah, can you hear me!?"

No answer, and she spun around to see if she'd missed something. Then she noticed the corridor continuing around a corner further away, and she hurried towards it.

"Noah!" she yelled again as she sprinted forward, but just as she'd reached the middle of a new corridor an ear-deafening crash sounded above her and the ceiling broke into pieces.

She was thrown to the side, avoiding most of the debris but still got hit by a piece of wood in her arm.

"Shit," she whispered as blood ran down onto her bracelets, forcing them to twist into symbols of nothing. There was no time to waste on such a loss though, and she looked around.

"Noah!" She hurried forward to help her brother up from the floor. She gritted her teeth. So he was the one who'd pushed her out of the way, saving her once again. What was worse, it looked as though his right side had taken quite a hit from some rubble. "No. No, scourgefucking damn it, Noah! Why did you do that!?"

"Excuse me?" His face twitched as he was helped to his feet, stumbling as his right leg seemingly didn't support him. "Think I'd let you get crushed by all that?"

"I would've been fine! If Frey can survive it, so can I. Besides, you were way more important to protect and now you're hurt!"

"I don't know what to tell you. I couldn't just... Watch it happen." He glared up at the ceiling. "... Dreadful blight."

"What?"

"The mara's hand. It went through the ceiling," Noah clarified as Luna helped him walk, and she paled.

"Wh—What? But—But the mara can't cause damage to our plane right now, can it?"

"I... I don't know," Noah admitted. "But it happened. Maybe since it's part of Father's nightmare now, so it's... Real to him? It can affect our plane somehow? Or... I don't know."

"Wait, if it went through the ceiling, can't you touch it?" Luna looked up through the hole in the ceiling. "It's right there, we should be able to reach it!"

"It retracted it." Noah shook his head. "It's not far off though. It—It's spotted the others, so we need to keep moving, and quickly."

Luna pursed her lips, glancing down at Noah's damaged leg. They'd better find those stairs soon.

"I'm uh..." She frowned as they stumbled forward. "I'm sorry, Noah. For... I mean—I haven't done... You know, anything..."

Noah squinted at her.

"... What?"

"I just—" She thought back to her nightmare again. "I've always been so—So useless at times like these, and I... Wish I could have done more, so... I'm sorry."

"Well, what the Waste can someone do in these situations?" Noah shrugged, still facing forward in order to focus on their task. "It's a nightmare blight. It's not so easy—"

"But you did something!" Luna wouldn't have any comfort talk. "You can pull all these creatures into our plane so we can hurt them, but I can't do shit!"

"I..." Noah's breath was heavy, and he looked impatient with their conversation. "... That was never an actual effort. It's just something that was forced onto me, and... Weighing these so called perks of my oddity against... Against how much I've suffered for them I... Can't feel like they've been worth it. Today aside, I've always wished they'd go away, you know."