In Dreams

The nights that Maitland came to feed were always her favorite. After drinking his fill, he would lay her down in her bed so she could close her eyes and ride out the intoxication of his venom. Holding her pillow as if it were a lover, she fell into dreams. They were always the same, perhaps not in location but they were in subject.

Cassander.

It had been months since their goodbye and while she remembered the feel of his hands on her body, his face had become a bit hazy. Her drawings, as Millie noted, looked more like Maitland now than the Prince of Athanor. A fact that distressed her greatly. In her dreams, though, Cassander's face remained his own. It was the one place she could remember.

This night, she was brought to the house in Winter Bloom, the first night she spent with him. Her memory played with the moment he lifted her from the bathtub and laid her on the floor in front of the fire. She remembered his eyes, half lidded as he gazed down at her, how warm his skin was under her touch. They’d spent hours that night exploring each other with fingers, lips, and sometimes tongue. She remembered the quick annoyance in his voice when, at one point, a knock on the door interrupted them. His demand for the intruder to go away and leave him alone was quickly heeded, allowing them more time together.

But there was never enough.

Outside of her dreams, back in Armada Cove, Maitland watched over her. He dabbed the tears away from her eyes as they appeared, the guilt and concern on his face palpable. This was unavoidable, he knew, and she would only beg him for this time again the moment he looked hungry.

With a lovelorn sigh, Volatia rolled away, turning her back on him to continue her dreams.

She’d just jumped over her shield to face him after he’d refused to surrender. The large flakes of snow fell all around them and one had landed on her eyelashes. Rather than throwing the snowball he’d prepared, he dropped it to the ground and moved to brush the flakes delicately from her face. He still wasn’t prepared to surrender but she did, the moment he cupped her cheeks in his hands and leaned in for a deep kiss. They moved in unison, he led while she stepped backward, right up to a building. It wasn’t long after that their kisses turned hurried, hungry, and he growled when her cold hands shocked the skin of his abdomen. She giggled, then let off a shrill squeak as he picked her up over his shoulder and carried her to Revelry’s. They’d shared their bed with another that night, but the only face in her dream belonged to Cassander.

Her eyes opened, bleary and unfocused. On the other pillow she saw a man with long dark hair and she smiled as she reached out to touch his cheek. More tears spilled from her eyes as she caressed his skin, but the hand that covered hers was cold. Her smile dropped and an expression of anguish washed over her features. “I miss you,” she rasped, not to Maitland but to the man she imagined in his place.

“I know,” he replied, soft, before he hushed her back to sleep.