I descended the curling stairwell of the cottage, scaring Dwindle, my old calico cat, on the way down.

“Did I hear your father say to set him a place at the table?” Imonie asked, her back angled to me as she tended to meat sizzling in a skillet.

I often forgot how sharp her hearing was. She could hear through walls, it seemed.

“You did, and I don’t think he’ll listen to reason.” I stopped at the counter, where the pan of almost-burned cherry galettes was cooling. “And you should stop eavesdropping, by the way. One day you’ll hear something you wish you hadn’t.”

“We’ll see about that,” Imonie said with a snort, seeming to answer both dilemmas—my father’s stubbornness and her keen hearing. She glanced up at me, a rare smile warming her solemn face. “Now, are you going to help me fry this venison, or are you going to tend to that nightmare?”

“Ugh, I’m off, of course.” I pushed away from the counter but swiped two cherry galettes.

“Clementine!” Imonie cried, but she wasn’t surprised as I grinned and shoved one of the pastries in my mouth, bolting out the front door.

I lingered by the withering jasmine at the front gate, long enough to tuck the remaining pastry in my pocket and look up, to where the clouds were streaked like ribs across the sky, exposing a burning heart of sun.

What a strange day.

I glanced at the book of nightmares in my arms. It was a tome, the sort that could hold back an ironclad door. I had read only portions of it, and some accounts had made me laugh at their absurdity, while others had actually made me fall asleep, only to wake hours later with my cheek pressed against the caramel-tinged pages. But there were some recordings that made me shiver, dreams influenced by the mountains. They had sparked such fear in my bones that I hadn’t slept for a week after reading them, although none of these nightmares belonged to me.

No. I studied nightmares, and I confronted them every new moon in the streets of Hereswith, when the magic flowed freely from the mountain fortress and dreams were cursed to materialize. But I didn’t know what it was like to experience a nightmare. What it felt like to wake frightened from something that felt hauntingly real.

As a magician, I chose to never dream.

3