“I was never so happy to see one of us as when Sly came running into the clothes flying room and pulled me out of there.” Temp says.
“I was in the attic. Justice got me out,” Titus said.
“I was in the dining room,” I say.
“Me too. Sly got me out,” Nix says.
“I was in the clothes room. Justice rescued me.” Sal says.
“I was in the attic,” Justice says. “I know it was only a dream, but, yeah that’s going to stay with me for a while.”
“Same,” I say, as do the others.
I can’t believe that dream traumatised us all, but it looks like it has. They all have sadness and the remnants of horror in their eyes. I’m pretty sure my eyes look the same.
Score one for the dark witches.
“Let’s go downstairs, I think we could all do with coffee,” Adhan says.
“So much coffee. I’m gonna be needing a vat of coffee,” Nix says.
“I’ll make sure you have some baby,” Cam says, leading Nix out of the room, the others following.
As soon as the last person leaves, I turn back to Adhan and lean into him, hugging him close.
His arms wrap around me. “It was just a dream sweetheart, just a bad dream.”
I nod. “I know. I didn’t at first when I watched Nix die, but when I found Temp hanging in the flying clothes room, I realised it must have been a dream,” I pull back and look at Adhan. “It felt so real.”
I don’t realise I have tears falling down my cheeks until Adhan uses his thumbs to wipe them away.
“They’re alive sweetheart and Sly and Justice pulled you all back. Let’s go and see the others and you can reassure yourself again that everyone is alive.”
I nod. “Yeah, let’s do that.” We get up and I throw some sweats and a t-shirt on, before taking Adhan’s hand and walking downstairs with him.
We’re the last ones to arrive in the kitchen. I look around and see neither the boys nor Nora are in the kitchen.
“The children are in the lounge watching films. I thought it was best to keep them occupied, they’re also watching Connie,” Emily says, obviously guessing what I was thinking.
I nod my thanks and we sit. Titus passes me the coffee pot and I pour coffee out for Adhan and myself. Food is on the table, but I can’t face eating anything and wrap my hands around my mug. Actually, now that I think about it, no one is eating.
For some reason, I feel worse now than I did when we went to the post-apocalyptic plane.
When Justice was having issues with his biologicals, they created ripples in time. We sent our magic out to have a look at a ripple, but our magic got stuck. Not wanting to leave it there, some of us blasted the ripple with magic. The blast knocked us out and we came round to a completely destroyed town. We thought we had killed practically everyone and that we’d lost our magic. I felt bad enough then, I wonder why I feel worse now.
“They actually found the perfect way to unsettle us,” Temp says softly. “Kill us one at a time.”
“I’ve never felt as helpless as I did in the haunted house. Nothing I did worked,” Nix says.
“Once I figured out what was happening, I tried blasting my way out of the dream, but nothing I did worked either until Justice showed up and pulled me out,” Titus tells us.
I look at Justice, his magic is slightly darker than normal but not much. “Your magic is almost back to your light grey.”
He nods. “It is, being with Alfred helps it lighten up quicker,” he picks Al’s hand up and kisses the back.
“Love you too, my Doc,” Al says, leaning into him.
“We need to redo the wards around town today then have the BBQ,” I remind everyone. I’m so not feeling the happy vibe I would usually have thinking about a family BBQ, but yeah, those wards need sorting.
