What Lay in the Dark

12. The Impossible

The creek water trickled through the rocks; the sound tickled my ears. I could tell I was in a forest somewhere; I smelled the pine trees. The only light source was the flickering of thirteen black candles placed in a circle. They lit up a small area of pine needles and a bowl placed in the middle. Some kind of burned herbs inside the bowl added to the aroma. Slowly I walked towards the bowl and stopped at the edge of the circle. Something, intuition perhaps, told me I shouldn't cross the boundary made by the candles.  

Changing my mind I followed the sound of the water. I soon found a small creek running just past the circle. I was surprised to feel a change under my feet. I now stood on a path clear of pine needles. I walked down it for a bit. Soon there was another path crossing the one I followed. I stood at a crossroads. 

"Ailia?" The voice sounded distant, as if it was far away, but I felt somebody's breath in my ear. I stared over my shoulder searching for a source of the voice, but couldn't find one. 

"Ailia?" the voice repeated, louder this time. Something in the back of my head told me to follow the voice, to trust it. "Ailia, come on, wake up." 

My eyelids twitched open to look straight into the brilliant green of Egan's eyes. "Hmm?" I groaned, turning to look at the time. 3.25 am. "What's wrong?" 

"You were rolling around murmuring about candles and evil." 

"I was dreaming," I muttered, pulling the blanket up to cover my shoulders. 

"What about?" 

"It was weird. I was in a forest with candles and a circle," I murmured, still half asleep and not really understanding why it mattered. 

Egan tensed, "What did you see, exactly?" 

I sighed, "Thirteen candles in a circle. All of them were black. There was a bowl in the middle with some kind of herbs in it. There was a creek which I walked along until I reached a kind of crossroads in the path. Then you woke me up." 

"That's all you saw? You didn't see the herbs?" 

"No. I was going to look, but I felt like I shouldn't cross the boundary." 

"And the crossroad was near the circle?"  

"It was right next to it. Why?" 

"I don't know a lot on the subject, but it sounds like a demonic summoning ritual." 

I swiftly lifted my head up, suddenly wide awake. "What?" 

"It's possible you were dreaming about the place your demon was summoned." 

"What does that mean?" 

"It means we should talk to Mikayla and Samuel about it when they get here. If anyone's going to have an idea about the dreams, it's them." 

I nodded, sighing and falling back onto my pillow.  

"Hey," Egan pulled me close and wrapped his arms around me. "Don't worry about it. It's probably just a dream."  

I could see the doubt in Egan's eyes, but still held on to the hope that what he'd just said was the truth. It was only a dream. 

We sat outside. Egan sat in a chair, playing with a few wires he was trying to intricately connect. I sat next to him on the lawn with my arms around my legs, attempting to shield myself from the cold. Andy and Brenden sat on the grass too, arguing over whether or not a squirrel would be able to fit through a hole in Egan's fence. It was tempting to tell them about the human-sized hole behind them, but I managed to fight the urge to do so.