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I evaded his questions as best I could and did my best to focus on my weaving, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t escape the painful fact that I always lost, and lost bitterly. My only refuge after each painful failure was dream watching, which I did almost daily, especially on the nights after I accidentally stumbled into one of Darius’s creepy nightmares.

However, whenever Stardust wasn’t around, things were different—not only was Darius kinder, but there were many times when I’d glance over to find him watching me not with his usual glower, but with a softened look. It was during these moments that he seemed so sincere. But I couldn’t ignore the hard look that filled his eyes whenever he mocked me and called me Nemesis, nor the moments when our gazes met and he’d hastily look away with another comment about how long I was taking and how he didn’t have to wait for me, although he always did. Darius’s one redeeming quality was that he always gave me a fighting chance.

“That’s rather unusual for a Nightmare,” Angel said when I told her and Iris about Darius’s strange behavior during a picnic in the park. “A Mortal’s initial dream is harder to displace, so being the first to finish gives a Weaver a slight advantage. Every Weaving between me and Blaze is a race to see who completes their dream first.”

“Sometimes Darius doesn’t even start weaving until I’ve finished.” Thank heavens, or I’d have zero chance of winning. I silently cursed the fact that dreams were only effective if they were created on Earth; if I could create them before the Weaving, I could take more time with them, giving me a more fighting chance of winning.

Angel stared, thunderstruck. “I suppose he’s not completely unfeeling,” she offered reluctantly, though with unmistakable doubt.

Iris looked up from the crown of flowers she was weaving together in her lap. “Of course not. From what I’ve heard about the Head Nightmare’s son, he’s always very fair. He clearly understands the importance of the balance between dreams and nightmares and is allowing Maci the chance to see a dream while also providing Eden the opportunity to increase her skills.”

I didn’t like the idea of my weaving partner going easy on me; it only meant that even when Darius wasn’t performing his best, I still constantly lost. I’d even spent several weavings heeding the advice of my friends, but it never made a difference, which made it all too easy to revert back to my original strategy.

Iris thoughtfully twirled a vibrant green flower by its stem. “Perhaps you should ask him for help.”

Angel rolled her eyes. “Why would he give it? He’s a Nightmare, not to mention they’re competitors.”

Iris shrugged and tucked the flower into her floral crown. “He seems to possess an unusual amount of confidence. I’m sure he’d be so flattered you asked—and perhaps a bit willing to show off—that he’d assist you.”

It was true that Darius never wasted an opportunity to gloat, though surprisingly it never seemed to affect his willingness to give me advice—advice I always ignored. But I didn’t want his assistance; as Angel had mentioned, we were competitors, and any suggestions from him would surely be a ploy to help himself. It was the main reason I’d been determinedly disregarding his advice ever since our competition had begun…that and because of the information I’d discovered in my own studies.

I propped the book I’d brought to the park up on my knees, one of many I’d been faithfully studying the past several weeks in an attempt to improve my craft. I flipped to one of my bookmarked passages. Even though I’d read it often enough to have it memorized, I scanned it again:

The more detailed a dream, the more immersive the experience for the Mortal, which increases both its strength against its competition and the amount of dream dust it yields.

That statement alone proved that Darius’s advice to weave less complicated dreams was nothing more than a ploy to see me fail. My lack of education and experience was already a difficult enough hurdle; simpler dreams would make it nigh impossible to win. With my background of dream viewing, more detailed dreams seemed within reach, the only advantage I had due to my deficit in other areas of dream construction.

But I’d continue to practice. I not only had to earn my place in the Dream World, but newborn Maci deserved a night filled with pleasant dreams. The fact I’d failed her every night of her short life thus far caused a swell of anxiety to squeeze my heart.

I had to be better, Iwouldbe.

I immersed myself in my studies of dream construction, only to be tugged away by Iris’s sharp gasp. “You’ve been stolen fromagain?”

My gaze jerked up to meet Angel’s, my book entirely forgotten. “You’re missing more dream dust?”

Angel gritted her teeth and nodded. “I am. I’m starting to get dangerously low. If I don’t do something soon, I’m worried it’ll negatively impact my livelihood.”

I hadn’t considered that consequence of the dream dust thefts. How many other Dreamers’ livelihoods had been affected because they’d lost so much of their weaving earnings?

“It always happens on the nights I win my weavings,” Angel continued. “Giving me more reason to suspect it’s my weaving partner. It’s his revenge for losing.”

“Angel, we don’t know—” Iris began, but Angel cut her off.

“Stop defending him. Blaze is the dream dust thief, I’m certain of it.”

Her outburst had drawn the attention of some other Dreamers sitting nearby—a paired union picnicking with their two young children. They glanced over, their expressions wary. “You’ve been stolen from, too?”

“At least once a week,” Angel said.

“We’ve both lost our weaving earnings twice now,” the female Dreamer said. “And that’s not the only thing we’ve noticed.” She nervously fiddled with the feather clip in her hair that matched her bluebird style. “I’m a Birdsong Composer in my side profession, and lately my music has become corrupted with wrong notes, making my songs almost…eerie. It’s as if dark magic has tainted it. Do you think…the balance could be tipping?”

A sense of foreboding trickled up my spine. “What balance?”

“The Universe remains balanced when magical power is evenly distributed between the two worlds,” Iris explained quietly. “Each world is responsible for different aspects of magic on Earth, but if one becomes more powerful than the other—in this case, the Nightmares—then all that they’re responsible for—such as storms, diseases, darkness—increases. It would not only wreak havoc on Earth, but eventually the Nightmare Realm could eclipse the Dream Realm, and it—in addition to everything the Dreamers create—would cease to exist.”

My trepidation increased. “What could cause such a thing?”

This time it was the bluebird Dreamer’s Pair who answered. “My brother is on the Investigations Team and is in charge of looking into these strange incidents. The thefts and the corruption tainting Dreamers’ creations aren’t the only occurrences, though he’s kept silent about the others. All he would tell me is they’re beginning to suspect a connection between the tipping balance and the Weaver who disappeared.”