Angela's thoughts and her heart skittered away from that knowledge. She threw herself into laughing and teasing with her friends among the students, pointed out new treasures she had brought into the shop, and listened to her regular customers talk about plans for the rest of their break, or term papers they were working on.
She almost forgot about her dreams by the time she closed up the shop and went upstairs to make dinner. The warmth of the spring day had collected in her apartment. After opening the windows and turning on the ceiling fans, she decided the heat wouldn't dissipate fast enough to suit her. She made a salad and a fresh batch of iced tea and went out into her garden to enjoy the soft breezes coming up the slope from the Metroparks.
"Where are you?" she whispered, startling herself.
Where had that thought come from? Who had she been talking to?
The aching feeling inside her hinted at memories she had either put away for the sake of self-preservation...or she had lost altogether. But how could that be? Taking a deep breath to brace herself, Angela moved backwards in her memories, investigating that disturbing dream from the night before. Perhaps the answer was there? She tried to see the knight's features inside the shadows of his helmet, tried to make out the colors of the garden, anything that would give her a stronger clue to where and when, if this was nothing but a dream, or a valid memory. And if a memory, why had she put it so far away in her mind that she had forgotten it?
More important: Why was it coming back to her now? What magic was at work, sifting through the images filling her memories from her very long, full life, attempting communication in those pictures? Friendly magic, warning her? Or inimical magic, attempting to paralyze her with fear, or distract her from something she needed to sense so she could protect against it?
A queasy ripple in the net protecting the shop yanked Angela out of her thoughts. Her heart leaped as she looked around. The shadows had grown long all around her, like cold, dark hands reaching from the night to enfold her. Her hands and knees shook faintly as she hurried to gather up her dishes and go back into the shop. That shiver of fear bothered her more than the sudden certainty that something was out there in the darkness, watching her.
Worse was the realization that she had lost all sense of time and location, just long enough to be terrified. Which was ridiculous. She had done it to herself. Hadn't she?
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