Dorian Wraith's Arc

Chapter 20 of 27

Callie set her jaw and pushed. The gray peeled back and the house rose around them. Dorian knew the shape of it before he knew the name. A low roof. Violet flowers under the windows. A blue front door with a chip near the handle. Callie stood beside him in her muddy pink dress and pointed. "Watch," she said. "This is us." Two children ran across the yard. A boy with black hair and a girl with brown hair and skinned knees. The boy was small and thin and kept looking back at the door of the cottage. The girl grabbed his hand and pulled him behind the woodpile. "They don't see you here," the girl said in the memory. "Stay with me." Dorian felt the hand in his own, older now, tighter. He remembered the smell of the wood. He remembered being afraid of the door. The scene shifted the way Callie made it shift. His mother stood in the kitchen with a wooden spoon and a jar of dried leaves. She crushed the leaves into a bowl of stew. Elara's face was calm. "He will not have it," she said to no one. "Not in my house." The boy at the table ate what she gave him. His hands shook and he did not know why. Callie squeezed Dorian's fingers. "She kept it down for years," Callie said. "She hated you for what you were. That was her, not you." The scene moved again. Elara slapped dorian for a reason he didn’t know. He didn’t know he had lit candles with his mind. Elara gave him more herbs to suppress his magic. Then the scene changed one final time. The boy stood in a field with fire on his palms and tears on his face. Callie ran to him through the grass. "You're not a monster," the girl said. "You're my friend. Put it down. Look at me." The boy looked at her. The fire went out. In the vision Dorian watched his own child face decide to trust her, and something in his chest that had been lost locked back into place. "Callie," he said. His voice came out steady. "I remember you." She let out a breath that broke halfway. The gray came back fast around the edges, but she did not fight it now. "I have to go," she said. "Wake up. They need you out there."