“You hesitate, my love?”

At the sound of his voice a shiver passed through my body, and terrible, mocking laughter whispered through the leaves of the trees.

“Who are you?” I was glad that my dream voice didn’t betray the fear I was feeling.

His laughter was as deep and beautiful as his voice, and as frightening. It echoed in the limbs of the watching trees until it drifted almost visible in the air around me.

“Do you pretend you do not know me?”

His voice brushed against my body, making the little hairs on my arms stand up.

“Yeah, I know you. I made you up. This is my dream. You’re a mixture of Zac and Johnny.” I hesitated, peering at him. I spoke nonchalantly even though my heart was beating like crazy because it was already obvious this guy was not a mixture of those two actors. “Well, maybe you’re Superman or Prince Charming,” I said, reaching for anything but the truth.

“I am no figment of your imagination. You know me. Your soul knows me.”

I hadn’t moved my feet, but my body was slowly being drawn toward him, like his voice was pulling me. I reached him and looked up and up…

It was Kalona. I’d known him from the first words he’d spoken. I just hadn’t wanted to admit it to myself. How could I have dreamed him?

Nightmare—this had to be a nightmare and not a dream.

His body was naked, but it wasn’t completely substantial. His form wavered and shifted in time with the caressing breeze. Behind him, in the dark green shadows of the trees, I could see the ghostly shapes of his children, the Raven Mockers, as they clung to the limbs with the hands and feet of men and stared at me with men’s eyes from the mutated faces of birds.

“Do you still claim not to know me?”

His eyes were dark—a starless sky. They seemed the most substantial thing about him. That and his liquid voice. Even though this is a nightmare, it’s still mine. I can just wake up! I want to wake up! I want to wake up!