Hyacinth: Excerpt #1 – Griffin’s Dreams

“Hey, Griff!” Ellie bounded into his room without knocking first and plunked herself on his bed.

Griffin paused in the process of loading his laptop into his backpack which sat on the bed beside his sister. “What are you doing here this early in the morning?” he asked as he resumed what he was doing.

Ellie shrugged a slim shoulder. “Nothing special.”

Griffin paused again, giving Ellie a narrow-eyed look. “Okay. What’s up?”

Ellie flashed him an exasperated look. “Why does something have to be up for me to visit my brother?”

“You only block my mind reading when you want to hide something from me.” He zipped up his bag and slung it over his shoulder. “Alex here too?”

“Yup. He’s downstairs letting Lucy stuff him with breakfast.” She hopped up, following Griffin out of the room. “Where’re you headed?”

“Library. I have to finish this last paper for my economics class.”

“Hmmm. Makes me glad I didn’t do summer school this year. I though you got that paper done last night?”

Griffin grunted. “I need a little more quiet than this mad house affords. Even late at night.”

Ellie laughed. “I guess we were up pretty late playing Trivial Pursuit. You shoulda come down and joined us.”

Griffin paused at the top of the stairs and turned to her. “Hey Elle? You’d tell me if Selene appeared to you in a dream, right?”

“Of course!”
“So she hasn’t?”

“Not since we killed Gideon.”

“Okay.” Griffin started down the stairs and missed his sister’s concerned look as she followed him.

Reaching the bottom he turned, gave Ellie a peck on the cheek, and said, “See ya later.”

“Have fun,” Ellie kept her worry to herself, gave her brother a casual wave, and wandered off to find Alex.

Griffin let himself out of the house and walked around to the shed where he kept his motorcycle. Hopping on he started the bike and headed into town. He loved this ride most of the time. The winding road through the mountains had spectacular views with vibrant hues of blues and greens that nature presented him. But lately the views had been lost on him. His concentration instead turned inward. He hadn’t wanted to bring up Selene with Ellie, but after last night…

It’s got to be coincidence. He reasoned with himself.

Selene hadn’t approached him in his dreams since the last time he’d seen her. An image of her standing in the field in the mountains, regally gorgeous with her silvery fair hair and dove grey eyes, was constantly with him. And then she’d walked away from him.

Initially, after everything had settled down, Griffin had convinced himself that he never wanted to see or hear from her again. Despite the fact that he was positive she was his te’sorthene. He pushed that fact away from him as irrelevant in the face of what she was responsible for.

But he’d missed her. Despite himself.

He’d believed her to be just a dream, and now that she no longer appeared to him at night when he closed his eyes, he did miss her. And somehow that just fed the bitterness in his heart.

His dreams lately, however, had featured flashes of a white wolf.

I only know one white wolf, but there’s got to be more out there. And maybe it’s just my own mind coming up with this, Griffin thought to himself.

But somehow, deep down, he didn’t think so. The images that would come to him periodically in his sleep were never anything very clear. Only flickers, like an old-timey movie but with more time between pictures. And last night…

Last night he could have sworn he’d heard sobbing.