The Children of Hypnos

[Vol. 2] Chapter 15: Unknown Variables

The day after they banished Trevor's third nightmare, Emery received the invite to the gala he had mentioned. It turned up in her email. Within minutes, Jacqueline had texted her to ask about dresses.

The invitation only made Emery's stomach do flips, and every time she looked at it, she replayed her conversation with Trevor over and over again. It wasn't impossible for a person to remember a dreamhunter intruding on their dream, but it was uncommon enough to make Emery wonder constantly about it for the next week. It was even more uncommon for the person to remember enough about the dreamhunter in question to be able to find them in the waking world.

That Trevor remembered her also may have had something to do with the fact that she had held him in his dream and coaxed him to sleep, ending the nightmare. That had some weird implications that she didn't want to think about yet.

Emery was on her way to Hothram to find Marcia and ask her for help learning to make Dream gateways—in lieu of Klaus, who could rarely be found for lessons on anything outside of class, and probably wouldn't have been allowed to give them, anyway—when Moxie and Temper appeared from nowhere on either side of her.

"We heard about your success with Mr. Van der Gelt," Moxie said, smiling. "Great work. He sent in a message that you and Wes were pure professionals."

On Emery's other side, Temper gave her a cool sideways glance. "We expected no less from Liam and Zoya's daughter."

"Thank you," Emery said, neck suddenly stiff.

"How goes the doppelgänger hunt?" Moxie asked. Her voice was light, but there was a weight to her expression. "I hear there's been some trouble with dreamforming. Is there anything we can do to help?"

Emery shrugged. "Get me private lessons with Klaus?"

Temper laughed, and not kindly. Moxie just smiled. "I'll see what I can do. Klaus is quite a dreamformer. But I have to ask—your grandfather is also a renowned dreamformer. Any reason you don't ask him?"

"You saw the trials, right?"

"So I did."

Temper made another noise. Moxie shot him a glare, and he turned it into a cough.

"I'm going to talk to Marcia now," Emery said. "Maybe she can teach me how to make a gateway. I can't hunt down my doppelgänger if I can't get into the Dream. Wes can do it already, but I need to be able to do it, too. If he's going to put himself in danger for me, I need to be able to get us out of danger."

Temper fingered his tie pin. "You shouldn't go to Marcia for gateway-making."

Now it was Emery's turn to shoot him a look.

"He's right," Moxie said. "Marcia can't make gateways. She's dreamless."

"She's on DreamLess? But why—"

Moxie's braids shifted as she shook her head, smiling. "No, not the drug. Did Marcia never tell you? She's a dreamhunter who can't dreamform. The technical term is a negator—their physical being is able to negate the existence of dreamforms—but often they're just said to be 'dreamless.' Her father, Ares, is also a negator. After a certain age, they lose the ability to dreamform. For many of them, their weapons and armor are the only dreamforms they ever make. Only some of them can open gateways. Ares is one of them. Marcia is not."

Emery looked between Temper and Moxie. "Seriously? Marcia can't dreamform at all?"

"Why do you think they never used her as your dream theory teacher?" Temper said, with a smile Emery didn't like at all. "She's good for keeping you in shape and keeping the campus in a steady supply of DreamLess, made right from her blood. And she can take care of dreamform-happy problems like Dr. Sandman when they crop up." He held out a pointer finger and jabbed it in the air. "One touch and—poof. No more dreamforms."