Things slipped sideways. The words of his psychology textbook blurred, and for a moment Adam thought he had literally toppled over. Am I that tired? he wondered. Wouldn’t be the first time.
But then the book wasn’t there. The room wasn’t there. Everything went black.
Some time later—Adam wasn’t sure how long—he became aware of discomfort. His right shoulder rested against something hard, his head hurt. His entire right side was damp for some reason. His eyes felt glued shut, but he forced them open.
Green-yellow light. Adam squinted. A Bambi-like deer stepped into view and put its nose to Adam’s forehead, snuffling his hair.
“What the…?” Adam struggled to sit up and the deer backed away, turned, darted off into a stand of trees. The dampness had been the dewy fallen leaves, now stuck to Adam’s arm and the side of his face. He sighed and picked them off then craned to get a better view of his surroundings. Trees, tall and thin as sentinels, crowded around the patch of leaf-strewn dirt where he sat.
Cabeswater.
Ronan had been recreating it, but Adam couldn’t understand how he’d ended up there. He hadn’t scried.
“Persephone?” he wondered aloud. Maybe she still existed there, somehow. Maybe she’d dragged him there because she needed him to do something. Usually she came to Adam in his dreams, but maybe she hadn’t been able to wait for him to fall asleep. Maybe it was an emergency.
The forest remained stolid and silent.
“Ronan?” Was he here, working? Had he somehow called Adam in?
Nothing.
“Goddamn it.” Adam got up, his limbs protesting; he felt banged and bruised, like he’d fallen from no little height. He looked up at the swaying treetops, as though to find the entrance. He didn’t know how he’d gotten there… which meant he didn’t know how to get back out, either.
How long had he been there? How long did he have before his body decided he wasn’t coming back?
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