Amanda checked in on the kids first, none of whom were actually asleep yet apart from Gemma and Lily. Salem was out at a friends house. Her other two girls were reading, the middle child had her nose buried deep in a spell book, the youngest was reading adventure fiction. Bobby, she could hear talking to older Lily from the hallway and she didn’t bothered disturbing them.

  She went into the room she shared with Sirius, shut the door and sat on the bed. He probably wanted to go over some stuff from the last shipment and maybe look at some bills. Her fingers itched and she thought about going back downstairs and practicing her guitar for a bit, but she didn’t want to wake Gemma and the baby.

  She’d never been much of a ‘read before bed’ sort of a person. Sirius was and sometimes she’d get him to read a chapter aloud, not so much because she was interested in the story but because she liked the sound of his voice.

  If he was looking at shipment stuff he probably wouldn’t be up for a little while yet. She had other things she liked to do to relax though. One of them in a little bottle hidden behind some horse trader magazines. Even when she wasn’t drinking, knowing it was there gave her some comfort. The smell reminded her of her father and evenings when he’d drink and tell stories of wild musters or card games gone wrong, like the time he got himself thrown out of one of the casinos in Paradise, luckily with his limbs still all intact. Amanda had never been thrown out of a casino, but then she never cheated at the game.

  After retrieving the bottle of sweet-smelling spirit and pouring herself a double into a glass she kept by her bed, she fished out a pack of cards from the top drawer of her bedside cabinet. Casually she shuffled them between sips, finding some comfort in the familiar movement. She didn’t continue for too long and once the drink was finished she put the bottle back, the cards away, slipped off her clothes, and fell quickly asleep.

  She awoke to the ringing of her cellphone. She wasn’t sure how long she’d been asleep and briefly noted that whatever time it was, Sirius hadn’t come upstairs yet. She didn’t think much of it until she answered the phone and heard his voice on the other end of the line.

  “You need to come over to Kass’s and bring some dreamwalking infusements. I think I’ve found the dreamweaver.”

  For a long moment she was speechless, her brain taking a moment to catch up and process the situation.

  Sirius continued with an explanation. “I was worried and I just thought it wouldn’t take long to check, and then I got here and well... I can’t wake her up. She’s alive but... I think it’s the dreamweaver, but I can’t be sure without dreamwalking magic. I need to you to bring some.”

  “I’m on my way.” She focused on the bit about the dreamweaver and decided the rest could wait for later. Kass was in trouble and needed help. That was all it took for Amanda to slip out of bed, throw on jeans and a shirt and make her way quickly toward her middle daughter’s room. She hoped Katrina was still awake so she wouldn’t have to wake her.

  Katrina was still sitting upright on her bed with a large black book laid out in front of her, not the same one she’d been reading earlier. She was crouched over it when Amanda burst in. She slammed the book shut and started to push it toward the underside of her pillow but stopped half way as if realising it was too late and would just draw more attention to it.

  Amanda recognised the book and the title. One she had locked up downstairs, an old one that had belonged to Sirius’s father, one on necromancy. She wasn’t worried about that right now though.

  “Sorry.” She apologised first. She didn’t usually just burst into the kid’s rooms. Knocking was expected but this was an emergency. Still, she took a second to calm herself. She didn’t want to worry Katrina after all. “Do you have a dreamwalking infusement?”

  “What?” Katrina asked.

  “You went to see aunt Cat for more dreamwalking magic, did you mange to get some?”

  “Uh, yeah?”

  “Can I borrow it?”

  Katrina hesitated and narrowed her eyes, obviously assessing if there was an opportunity to bargain.

  Amanda made an offer before Katrina could spend too long thinking about it. “I’ll teach you some proper necromancy.”

  Katrina’s response was fast. She nodded and in no time she’d fished out a necklace from her desk drawer and handed it over.

  “Thank you.”

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “What’s it for?” Katrina asked.

  “Your father thinks he’s found the dreamweaver.”

  Her eyes widened. “Can I come?”

  “No. You stay here,” Amanda told her in no uncertain terms.

  Katrina pouted but Amanda left before she could argue.

  She was saddled up and on her way toward town in no time.

  When she reached Kass’s apartment she found the door was open. Sirius was standing in Kass’s room, off to the left, looking worriedly down at what appeared to be a sleeping Kass.

  Kass had obviously laid down on top of her bed to rest just for a moment and fallen into a deep sleep without even bothering to remove anything more than her shoes. Someone, probably Sirius, had thrown a loose blanket over top of her.

  “Where’s Jesse?” Amanda asked.

  Sirius blinked. “Uh... I don’t know.” He glanced in the direction of the boy’s room but it was obvious from the horrified look on his face that he had forgotten to check.

  Amanda went to Jesse’s room and peered in. There was no sign of the boy though so she returned to Kass. She felt for a pulse and checked for breathing, as she figured Sirius had already done, but it was good to be sure, and her brain had sort of gone into autopilot for crisis response. Kass looked pale and her lips were dry and cracked as if she hadn’t had any water in awhile.

  “She was wearing those clothes the day before yesterday when she came and told me Cat had been arrested,” Sirius explained.

  “Shit.” Amanda pulled the infusement necklace from her pocket. It was a little cat charm necklace, one of Katrina’s favorites. Gingerly she poked at the magic in it. Would it be enough? What was it Cat had said about dreamweavers?

  “Let me do it,” Sirius said.

  When she glanced at him he added, “I’m better at this than you.”

  He wasn’t wrong about that. For most magic, Amanda was the expert between the two of them but when it came to dreamwalking, that was one of the few areas where Sirius excelled. He’d done it with Cat as kids. Dammit, why did Cat have to be locked up right now? Amanda hesitated as she thought of Cat. Even for Cat, going in to face the dreamweaver had been risky.

  “What if it pulls you in as well?” Amanda asked.

  “I’m hoping, given it’s been feeding on a few people now that maybe it’s not so hungry anymore. Worst case, it won’t kill me quickly and I’ll buy Kass some more time. If I’m not back out in 5 minutes then call for help okay?”

  Amanda bit her lip. She hated it but Kass’s pulse had been slow and her pallor definitely wasn’t right. Waiting for who knew what other plan was riskier. She gave a single nod.

  Sirius turned back to Kass. He pulled her hands into his, with the dreamwalking infusement clutched between them, he knelt at her side and then he closed his eyes.

  Amanda found it hard to watch, not just because she was worried about Sirius, and admittedly Kass as well, but because seeing the two of them so close together like that made her suddenly feel very much like she was the one on the outside.

  Unable to watch, she took note of the time and then she paced around the apartment, checking in occasionally to make sure nothing was going wrong. She figured she’d hear if anything did but it was still good to check.

  The place was spotless. It hardly looked as if anyone lived here at all, other than a few books, kept tidily on a shelf below the television. The largest item was a light-coloured wooden cabinet against one wall. Not a single dirty dish lay about anywhere. There were a couple of small potted plants but not much else. Even the plants, Amanda knew were the low maintenance variety.

  Amanda considered opening the wooden cabinet but thought better of it. That was Kass’s private property and she shouldn’t snoop. She casually glanced at the book titles. Those were at least sort of publicly on display. They were mostly non-fiction history books all sitting upright in between a couple of legal books with one or two pulpy romance novels stashed at the end.

  She returned to the bedroom door. Sirius hadn’t moved. Neither had Kass. Both were still alive and breathing. Kass’s room was just as bare as the rest of the house. Not a single piece of wall art. Just a closet, bed, and two nightstands with very little on them, two lamps, a case of reading glasses, a book, and a watch. Kass must have taken it off before she’d laid down.

  Amanda did another loop around the apartment, checked her own watch, then did another loop. This time her curiosity got the better of her and she peeked inside the wooden cabinet. She was momentarily surprised to find it wasn’t a cabinet at all, but a safe. Probably guns. That made sense for Kass. Probably spare cash too and whatever else one might need to grab if they had to leave in a hurry. Kass had been here almost two years now and still it didn’t seem like she had really settled. Amanda had seen glimpses of Kass’s previous life in pictures, of a house that had been full to the brim of books and art, a family and even picket fence. They almost seemed like they’d been taken from a different woman’s life.

  She checked Jesse’s room again and wondered where he was and if she shouldn’t be sending someone out looking for him. His room looked more like the room of a standard boy, with stuff on the floor and posters on the wall, mostly of sports. One looked like a soccer player, another a surfer. The walls were painted blue in contrast to the off-white throughout the rest of the apartment. Amanda wondered if it had been like that when they’d arrived or if Kass had painted it.

  She shut the door and headed toward the main bedroom again. She checked the fridge on the way, half thinking it might give her an idea if Jesse had been here recently. There wasn’t much in the fridge either. The bare minimum, milk, veges, cheese, a dip, a jar of olives, a partially wilted lettuce. No evidence of whether anyone had been in here over the last day.

  Sirius and Kass were still in their same spots. Amanda checked her watch again. It had been almost 5 minutes now. Somehow it felt like even longer.

  She stood in the door and she watched Sirius for a bit. The dreamworld was difficult to traverse and time never flowed quite right there. He’d probably meant 5 minutes in more of a general sort of sense rather than the literal one. Amanda had seen such things take longer before. But how long was she supposed to wait and watch them, hands together like that?

  She picked up her cell and was about to dial a number she knew she’d probably regret dialing later when the door to the apartment suddenly opened.