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The dreams started after Feyre left.
Elain had always had the most vivid dreams. So real, so lifelike that as a child she believed they had actually happened.
One time she had asked her mother when they could visit the castle again, and her mother looked at her witheringly and told her they had never been to a castle before. She could recall it so clearly—the scent of the flowers in the ornamental gardens, the cool stone walls she trailed her hand along in the hallways, the echoes and the creaks of doors opening and closing.
All her senses were always fully engaged in her dreams. And when she was older, she could separate out herself from the dreams and be both a participant and observer in them. She could watch from afar without interfering in the dream, but still feel the same things her dream self felt.
But the dreams of him—those started when Feyre left for their aunt Ripleigh’s.
Perhaps it was a way to make sense of the sudden change in circumstances—first Feyre had gone, then Father’s ships came back, and then they left their tiny cottage behind and were thrust back into society where everyone acted as if they had never left. Her once-unsteady world seemed to have finally righted itself, but she missed Feyre, and she had never been one for big sudden changes. She liked slow, gradual progress, like watching her plants flourish under her care. Too much all at once was overwhelming.
The dreams started out innocently enough. There was simply a warm, golden presence at the periphery of every dream. She’d wake up feeling warm and cozy even in the dead of winter under the threadbare blankets she and Nesta fought over, with no Feyre to provide extra body heat anymore.
Eventually the presence became the shape of a man, which was somewhat surprising and should have been a little frightening. Men had been leering at her and her sisters for years, and it was much worse during the years where they were poor and struggling, with fewer protections. Now, in their new home, with the safety of a much larger roof over their head and their father’s fortune restored, men who would have once looked down on them and taken advantage—had Nesta’s glares and sharp tongue not been so ferocious—now looked at them more shrewdly, calculating their value instead of lasciviously dragging their eyes up and down their forms.
But the man in her dream was gentle, caring, safe. She never felt for a moment that he would harm her in any way. He was every dreamy hero in the romantic stories she was told as a child about princes and dukes and chevaliers who saved ladies from their doomed fates, and always utterly respectful—a courtly bow, a kiss on the hand, a rakish smile.
As the focus became clearer in her dreams, she realized he was fae. Elain had never met any fae, had never seen one except in books. And from the stories and warnings she had heard, she had always been afraid of them, scared they would whisk her away over the wall like the Children of the Blessed.
But for some reason, she wasn’t afraid of the fae man in her dreams.
Once her family’s fortune was restored, Elain thought she’d be perfectly content again, with a new home, friends, family, security, everything she had ever wanted at her fingertips, but instead she was restless and bored. She was happy, of course, but she was itching to do something —travel, see the world, take advantage of this newfound wealth.
Maybe that was why she couldn’t stop thinking about the fae man from her dream. Maybe the fae represented something different and unfamiliar and foreign? It was the only explanation she could come up with.
But when Feyre returned, after Aunt Ripleigh died, the dreams of him changed from sweet and innocent to something more.
She dreamt of endless fields of flowers, a perpetual spring, the air scented with earth and loam and promise—and beside her, holding her hand, walked the strange fae man that haunted her nights.
And then the strange fae man—could she even call him a man if he wasn’t human?—pulled her into his embrace and kissed her.
She had been kissed before, of course—boys in the village had stolen kisses from her, but Nesta always found her before they could do more than stick their tongues down her throat. And if that was kissing, she didn’t really understand the appeal.
But with him, kissing suddenly made sense.
The first touch of their lips was gentle, slow, caressing, like they had all the time in the world and like he’d done it a thousand times before. He tilted her chin up and delved deeper—not enough to spook her and make her pull back, but tempting enough to make her want more. And she did, chasing his tongue with her own and revelling in the utter rightness of the moment. Nothing about this feeling of wholeness could be wrong.
Suddenly the kiss deepened even more, into something more passionate and wild, like a fire suddenly roaring to life, its flames flaring high into the air. She had never felt like this before, like she was the fire itself. But instead of being afraid of the burn, the heat was welcoming in its intensity, even as her body felt completely out of her control. She wanted to get as close as she could to him, till their skin fused together. The kiss became messy, teeth scraping against lips and tongue, his hand wrapped behind her neck, her hands up in his hair, scratching at his scalp, as they both tried to get closer and closer.
When she finally had to pull away for air, she got her first true look at his face. In her dreams before, she’d only had vague impressions of beauty. But gazing up at him, she was certain that even with the cruel scars streaking down the left side of it, it was still the most beautiful face she’d ever seen—the pillowy lips, the sharp lines of his jaw and cheekbones, the teasing look in his russet eye, and the ruthless calculation in the bizarre golden metal eye that would be incredibly strange to her in real life, but in her dream only fascinated her. He was a mass of contradictions, a paradox. How had her subconscious even conjured up these details about him?
Had she encountered him in the market—had fae not been the most rare occurrence in her world—perhaps she would have flinched at his scars and the golden eye and the fiery red hair and looked away. But there was something irresistible about his face that kept drawing her back like a magnet for another look to study its angles and its beauty.
And then she couldn’t help it—or at least dream Elain couldn’t help it, and she surged up on her toes to kiss him again. Instead of gasping at her forwardness, Elain was grateful her dream self had done it so she could experience the feeling along with her. A wave of intense longing for him, for his presence, for the ability to get even closer than they already were, pressed up against each other, chest to chest, washed over her, and she urged dream Elain for more, more, more.
This was not what she had been taught that girls should do, but could it be bad when it felt this good?
Real Elain admonished herself for even thinking that—she would never behave this way in real life. And yet, she didn’t want to wake up from this dream, especially when he backed dream Elain against a nearby tree, using one hand to lock both her wrists above her head. With any other man, she would feel vulnerable, afraid, but instead a thrill ran through her and she grinned up at him. He returned her grin, gazing at her like she was something precious and loved—
“Elain!”
Nesta was standing over her, glaring at her. “It’s nearly noon. You never sleep this late. Are you sick?” She put a hand over Elain’s forehead.
“No, no, I’m fine,” Elain told her groggily.
“Good. Get up then.” Nesta tore back the covers, which sent goosebumps over Elain at the sudden chill, and then went to the window and opened the curtains to reveal a grey, drizzly day. Her dreams of sunshine and warmth would have to wait for another night.
***
Elain was relieved when Feyre explained everything that had happened since she’d left and what she’d been doing in Prythian. When the glamour broke and her memories of that night at their cottage when the beast took Feyre away returned, Elain could finally rationalize her dreams of the redhaired fae. It was just her mind trying to make sense of what happened to Feyre when it didn’t have access to that memory, and maybe she just wanted to believe that the fae were much kinder than they had heard on their side of the wall, to make sure Feyre was safe and protected there.
But that didn’t explain why she was dreaming of herself with a fae. It was nothing, she reassured herself—he wasn’t real anyway, just the conjurings of a confused, heartbroken mind at the time and then a way to soothe herself. Perhaps now the dreams would disappear. But the thought of losing them felt like her heart being cut out, even though she knew she shouldn’t want more time with the fae man, even in dreams. What did she need dreams for when her waking life was so wonderful now?
The dreams kept coming, though, maybe a couple of times a week. But they were better than the nightmares she had other nights about Feyre covered in blood, Nesta screaming in a rain-soaked field, her father’s lifeless eyes. Those were the nights that she wished desperately for the redhaired fae to come back, to lull her into peaceful visions of sun and warmth and gentle affection.
Her dreams of the fae man—she wished she knew his name! should she give him one?—stayed relatively the same for a while. Nature walks, sunshine, conversations filled with laughter and friendship and intimacy that she could never remember in the morning, kisses that felt as easy as breathing and kisses that took her breath away.
But she couldn’t live in her silly dreams or let them dictate her life. She hoped Feyre was living happily on the other side of the wall—she refused to imagine anything else—but she was never going to cross it herself. Her dream man didn’t exist anyway; it wasn’t like she could go find him. He was only a fantasy she’d conjured up.
And then she met Graysen Nolan at a party, and he swept her off her feet. They were instantly smitten with each other, and he promised her everything she had ever wanted: love, a home, a family. Of course he wasn’t as handsome as her dream man, but it wasn’t fair to compare him to an idealized, unattainable idea. Graysen and his father hated the fae, so he’d surely hate the comparison anyway.
She was in love, newly engaged, and at the very beginning of wedding planning when Feyre returned as the very thing Elain’s soon-to-be new family feared.
She was relieved that the fae men Feyre brought with her seemed much kinder than the Nolans would have ever expected the fae to be, but she also understood why they were so afraid of them. The effortless power, the calculation in their eyes—especially in the one who was clearly in love with Feyre—and the preternatural stillness about them, like a coiled adder ready to strike… they were not to be underestimated.
Even though her fiance would hate it, her love for her sister, who had protected them for so long, and her trust that her fae dream man had engendered—which was insane, he wasn’t even real , and yet she knew he was the kind of fae who would side with Feyre in her quest—ensured that she would help Feyre without question. Nesta tried to convince her otherwise later, but she remained adamant. When she set herself to something, she wouldn’t budge—stubbornness was an Archeron trait—and Nesta knew when to stop pushing her.
The night after Feyre and her friends left, her subconscious must have known she needed something to soothe her, so of course the fae man was back. But this dream was unlike all the ones that had come before. Before, it was him and innocent handholding and maybe a fiery kiss or two. But now?
They were lying together outside, stretched out on blankets covering the soft moss of a forest floor. Dappled sun slipped through the leaves of the willow trees swaying gently above them, painting their bodies with light. She was resting her head on his abdomen, and her hand covered his as they stroked her swollen belly.
“What do you think she’ll be like?” dream Elain asked him. His heartbeat thumped steadily by her ear, and she snuggled in closer to him.
Usually at this point in her dream, his voice would be muffled—she wouldn’t hear it, but she’d understood somehow what he said and could continue the conversation. This time, though, his voice rang out clearly, and the sound of it, deep and rich and melodious, made her stomach flip. “As beautiful and fierce as her mother, of course,” he responded, lifting her hand up to his mouth to kiss.
Real Elain held back tears at the scene her dream self was living. Graysen had promised her all these things too, and they loved each other, but there was a kind of adoration between dream Elain and the fae man that she yearned for, an intensity that wasn’t really present in her relationship with Graysen. There was always some invisible barrier between them preventing them from being as comfortable with each other as the dream couple was. Elain reasoned that it would happen eventually, after they were married; they would learn each other better then.
But the way the fae man was completely at ease with dream Elain and she with him—she envied them that. They were each other’s home. What if she never had that with Graysen? They barely knew each other, really, and had gotten swept up in the romance and then he was proposing and of course she had said yes.
Guilt washed over her. It wasn’t fair of her to compare the two relationships, when one of them wasn’t even real. Graysen was real, and solid, and hers, and she needed to focus on that, not some kind of deep wish fulfillment fantasy she’d dreamed up. She and Graysen would grow in love and be happy together over the years. That’s what she wanted, and that’s what she would make happen.
***
As much as Elain wanted to focus on planning her wedding and starting her married life, she knew that if humans and fae couldn’t come together, Feyre’s dire predictions for the future could actually come true—and then Graysen could be called away to war, and who knew what could happen to the human lands?
Nesta had given her a talk about what to expect in the marriage bed, along with a bunch of romance novels, and Elain read those sections of those books over and over to prepare herself to finally lie with Graysen. She’d wanted to wait until their wedding night, but his ongoing persuasion and her own desires had won out, plus the urgency of a war pushing on their borders.
So she ignored all the voices in her head telling her it was shameful or whorish or improper for unmarried ladies to even be contemplating such things, and had gone to Graysen’s bed. It had been…fine. Certainly not as earth-shattering or as all-consuming like the romance novels had made it seem. Nothing had really changed between them—they loved each other, and now she didn’t have to worry about the wedding night. What more could she ask for?
Apparently a lot more, if the dreams that followed had anything to say about it.
She had never seen this place before in her dreams. Even though it wasn’t anything like their usual haunts, he was here, she was sure.
It was night, in a wide, dark hallway, filled with exotic plants and art covering every available space on the walls. And there, in a dark corner at the end of the hall, there they were.
The fae man had dream Elain up against the wall and they were kissing wildly. Her legs were wrapped around his hips and his hands grasped her bottom, and while her skirts were hiding what was going on beneath, he was inside of her, and dream Elain was definitely enjoying it.
Given what they were saying, though, they weren’t exactly happy with each other.
“You like this, don’t you? The risk of being discovered?” he taunted in a low voice, which was infuriatingly attractive. “What if they found you fucking me here like this? What would they think of sweet little Elain then?”
Oh, he was mean . And she…liked that? It secretly thrilled both dream Elain and real Elain that he wasn’t playing nice with her, even if neither of them exactly understood why. Maybe it was because no one was ever mean to her. No one was ever real with her, for fear of upsetting her or for the sake of protecting her.
Dream Elain was equally angry with him, though. “Do you ever shut up ?” she whisper-yelled, trying to keep her voice down. She kissed him hard as if to prevent him from speaking again.
He broke the kiss, panting, then continued on as if she hadn’t said a thing. “What would they think of you taking me and not having me?”
His words, harsh and suggestive, and her actions in response only served to spur them on further, but there was a truth unspoken between them that neither was willing to admit. Were they together? Was dream Elain allowing him this when they weren’t even married? How had she gotten to this point? Dream Elain’s emotions were all over the place—enthralled, infuriated, aroused, possessive. And most of all, she was insistent she wasn’t any of those things at all.
“We shouldn’t be doing this,” she halfheartedly protested as he hiked her up higher and hit a spot that had her eyes rolling back in her head.
He gave her a feral grin. “Who’s gonna stop me, Elain?”
She moaned in response, too far gone for words.
“No one,” he answered for her. “The only one with the power to stop me is right here, and you don’t want me to stop, do you, dove?”
This time her only response was to sink her teeth into his still-clothed shoulder and muffle her scream as she shook in his arms.
“Yes,” he hissed in delight. “Hold on tight.” With his foot, he nudged open the door they were standing next to, stepped inside, and waved his hand, locking the door with an audible click. It was her room, but one she had never seen before. It was most definitely hers, though—it was exactly the way she would decorate it, from the plants on every available surface right down to the soft sage green of her bedding.
They crashed onto the bed, and he maneuvered them so that she was sitting on top of him with him still buried deep inside of her. The bed already smelled like an intoxicating combination of both of them—the stronger scent of her jasmine and honey, and his citrus and spice underneath—so they had clearly found themselves here before. And dream Elain knew exactly what to do, undulating her hips against him that had both of them groaning and panting.
It was so hot, like the bedsheets were aflame—or was it his skin, heating them both to a fever pitch? Was this some kind of fae magic? Nothing had ever felt this good. She could feel her release building up in her and tried desperately to hold on so as not to give him the satisfaction of making her come again. Elain could not fathom how her dream counterpart’s dynamic with him had become so complicated.
Their hands laced together, giving both of them more leverage to push harder against each other, but he remained infuriatingly in control, even as he made her body sing. He laughed. “I didn’t put a sound shield up, but you’re going to scream my name, aren’t you? Let everybody hear what we’re doing?”
Dream Elain wanted to protest, too worried that if she screamed out loud, she’d wake the whole house, but the scream was working its way up her throat, her tongue was curling to say his name—
And then the real Elain woke in her bed, blankets twisted around her legs, and utterly frustrated. The romance novels had at least taught her how to pleasure herself, and she was so turned on from the dream that she found her peak almost instantly.
As she tried to catch her breath, a pulse of shame hit her. Not for touching herself—the romance novels had also taught her that that was perfectly fine—but for being so swept away in her dream world and the decadence of this fae man. He made her feel too much, things she wasn’t supposed to feel, especially engaged to someone else. She covered her face with her hands in her dark room.
She had to stop this. He couldn’t keep haunting her dreams like this. She was going to be married soon, and she couldn’t keep imagining a different life. It wasn’t fair to Graysen and she was appalled at herself for even thinking such things about anyone but her fiancé.
She was just nervous about how things would change when she married. That was it. So she threw herself into society and party planning and any kind of work she could do to make sure she’d fall into a deep, hopefully dreamless sleep.
***
But the dreams didn’t stop, and neither did the fantasies of the fae man.
Graysen never appeared in any of her dreams, which confused her. Shouldn’t he be? But then maybe she should be glad that he wasn’t—it would somehow make her feel worse for him to be competing with her dream man, and she did not want to know who dream Elain would choose between the two of them (even though she knew deep down who it would be).
All she wanted was to dream of easy things, happy things, things that normal people dreamt about, even if they were silly or nonsensical. Why couldn’t she simply dream of a past life or flying horses or something? But instead it was always him, always the beautiful redhaired man.
And now her dreams were seeping into her lived reality and becoming something she thought about all the time, even while awake. She tried to convince herself he was nothing like Graysen, steady and kind and real. The fae man was far too much of a rogue, and he was… he was… dangerous, surely. What misadventures have happened to him that he’d gotten that scar on his face? Even his outfits—with their bright colours, ornamental designs, and unbuttoned shirts—were too flashy, too perfect, too… tight. She preferred Graysen’s usual, respectable grey tunics instead.
No matter what she did to try to keep them out, her dreams kept supplying her with more fantasies of the fae man. And they had started to become more feral, more fae-like.
And her dream self in these visions. She was out of control—free and unabashed and so unlike real Elain. But she was the one whose mind was coming up with the scenarios that played out in her dreams, so this was part of her in some way. Who was she, then? Was there an untapped side of her that she could never let out in her real world? If she acknowledged that part of her was real, could she truly keep it trapped inside her forever?
But she had done and seen so much in her dreams, more than she would ever probably do in her real life, much as she wanted to. She had known when she accepted Graysen’s proposal that she would probably never go to the continent to see the tulip fields—his and his father’s work was in their country under the wall, and as a proper wife and eventually mother, she couldn’t go gallivanting around the world. So she’d tucked that dream away. Maybe that was why her dreams at night had become so vivid and insistent.
In her dreams, she went to places she’d certainly never been before but still felt entirely familiar to her. She’d heard about the concept of deja vu from the continent, so at least there was a phrase for the sensation she experienced regularly in her sleep.
Her most recent dream was in a…kingdom, it must have been. There was an ornate palace, gilded and gleaming in the bright sunshine, with open, curved windows to let all of that light inside. From the steps of the palace, green fields stretched as far as she could see on one side, while the other looked down to a bustling, shimmering city below. There was something utterly serene and comforting about it that allowed her to close her eyes and relax, the sun’s rays wrapping its warmth around her.
Then a set of muscled arms wrapped around her as well, and he was there, kissing her shoulder. “Come,” he commanded, pulling her into the palace and to their rooms. Did she live here?
By the time they got to their rooms, they had made a number of servants walking the halls respectfully avert their eyes. His chiton was half hanging off him, and her perfectly arranged curls were already a mess. Through laughter, she unwound the rest of the light, thin layers of fabric on him until he was gloriously naked and then sank to her knees.
Elain had often wondered if she was intruding on these scenes by objectively observing, but they were her dreams and she was in them, so could she really be a voyeur in that case? Still, she was mortified at the position her dream self was in, but dream Elain was not mortified in the least. She revelled in it—the messiness of it, the taste of him on her tongue, the marks her nails left digging into his thighs. She was powerful here on her knees, wrecking this man who was nearly shaking because of her.
“That fucking mouth,” he moaned and pulled her off of him and up on her feet again. “Come here.”
The kiss was bruising and intense, and the next thing she knew she was being picked up and tossed onto the bed, sinking into the silky smooth sheets, and then his head was between her legs and oh—
She had never felt anything like that before. She had read about it in Nesta’s books, but experiencing it was vastly different from reading about it. She wasn’t sure if it was like this with anyone, but she was sure he excelled at everything he did when it came to… carnal pleasures.
He slowly traced every fold with the tip of his tongue gently, teasing her with unhurried strokes. His touches were feather-light, but too gentle, and he knew it. She rolled her hips, trying to tempt him into more, but he simply smirked and then returned to his achingly slow pace.
His fingers began tracing random patterns on her upper thighs, creeping closer to where she needed more but never getting there, his nails leaving indentations in the plush skin of her thighs like she had to him. Though she was distracted by his mouth and the long, slow movements of his tongue over her most sensitive parts, she was able to distinguish when the patterns switched from random to spelling out words—she could make out “Elain,” “love,” “mine.”
Everything was too light, too delicate—just enough keeping her floating with pleasure, but never quite enough to take her all the way under. Need made her squirm, made her spear her hands into his hair, trying to bring him closer to where she needed him most, but he simply made his licks kitten-soft and almost imperceptible. It was slow, teasing torment, and she couldn’t take it any longer. “Please,” she begged. “I need… I need…”
He removed his mouth only long enough to say, “What do you need, dove? Tell me what you need and I’ll give it to you,” and then immediately went back to his slow torture.
“More. Please, please, faster, harder, more of you, love, please.”
As soon as the words were out of her mouth, his mouth was everywhere, practically devouring her as heat raced through her at the sudden change in passion and she shrieked as finally, finally he gave her the exact right pressure and suction where she needed it. His hands on her thighs pulled her in closer to his mouth so that it was impossible for her to do anything but writhe against it as her body shook with instant release.
He gave a satisfied moan against her and then he was climbing up her body and his mouth was on hers again. She tasted herself on his lips and wrapped her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck, and then he slid inside her. Both of them gasped in relief at the first thrust inside.
“Ah, Elain,” he panted. “So good, love.”
This was so unlike the time she’d gone to bed with Graysen that she wondered how she’d conjured up such sensation. She’d been under him too, but in a few thrusts, Graysen had been spent. Elain lost track of time with the fae man, who seemed to want to prolong her pleasure for as long as possible. When they finally collapsed together, panting hard from their respective releases, she wondered how real life would ever be able to match up to this vision, this feeling of completion and wholeness.
“You’re mine,” dream Elain told him sleepily as she curled up next to him. Elain scolded herself for the pang of jealousy that hit her over the dream couple she’d created in her mind.
“Always,” he said. “I love you.”
“Always,” she vowed, linking her hand with his. A flash caught her eye, and she realized there was a ring on dream Elain’s left hand, matching the one on his left hand, which was wrapped around her waist.
Dream Elain snuggled closer to him and drifted off to sleep. He hadn’t fallen asleep yet, though, even though his eyelids drooped. Those mismatched eyes turned to stare directly at real Elain, even though her body wasn’t actually in the room—but she somehow knew he was looking right at her.
“This could be real, you know,” he said.
She woke in her own bed with a gasp. In all her years of lucid dreaming, her dream subjects had never acknowledged her presence, had never known she was there. What did it mean that he had breached that divide between dreamscape and reality?
Had she carried anything of dream Elain back to the real world? She checked to see if there was any sign of the words he’d written on her upper thighs, and her heart dropped when she found nothing.
Just one of her very strange dreams. It wasn’t real, she assured herself.
But she almost wished it had been.
***
The next night, before she could dream again, Hybern came and took her and Nesta.
She prayed it was just a nightmare and that she would wake up any moment now. She prayed for the nightmare to change into a dream of her fae man, even though she’d told herself she shouldn’t dream of him anymore. She prayed that what was happening to them wasn’t real, that they weren’t in their nightgowns and being ripped from their home.
But she couldn’t wake up because she wasn’t asleep. It was real, and everything was happening in a slow-motion blur around her. She was outside of herself in a way she’d never experienced in her dreams before.
Somehow in a motion that felt like her whole body had been swallowed up and spit out again, they were in some kind of fortress, somewhere she had never seen before. It was cold and grey and sinister, and she wanted to go home. Nesta was screaming, and she was sobbing, and then suddenly there was Feyre and her friends, covered in blood. Feyre was begging, begging as some man wearing an ugly crown said… he was going to put her in a cauldron ?
And then she was underwater and it was cold and dark and unspeakably painful as her body and mind died, reanimated, and rearranged themselves into something strange and foreign and completely unlike what they had been before. With a splash, she found herself on the cold stone floor, shaking uncontrollably, and practically naked in her see-through shift.
“Don’t just leave her on the damn floor” was the first thing she heard, from a voice that seemed hauntingly familiar. She cringed away from the male figure behind her, but he simply wrapped her in something warm and she allowed it. She only came back to herself when Nesta grabbed her and frantically inspected her, sobbing.
A glimpse of red in her peripheral vision had her turning to see who had given her the coat she was now wearing. She stared.
It was him.
He stared back.
“You’re my mate.”