Page 45 of Cursed Dreams (Shadow and Dreams #1)

T he following morning, the library was quieter than usual, muted, as if the rising tension within Thalia had settled over the stone walls themselves.

She sat at their usual corner table beneath a tall stained-glass window, her hands clasped tightly in her lap.

She barely touched the tea Nyla had pressed into her hands.

Across from her, Cellen dropped into his chair, casting a suspicious glance around the shelves like they were being watched.

He leaned in and stage-whispered, “Alright, I’m here.

What’s the emergency? Secret plot? Rebellion?

Are we overthrowing the temple or…?” Thalia didn’t even try to smile.

Nyla shot him a look, and Marand’s expression was already tight with concern as she slid into the seat beside her.

She took in a long breath to steady herself, glancing at Nyla for her silent nod of support, then without ceremony, Thalia told them everything.

No witty lead-in. No sarcasm to soften the edges.

She laid it bare: Caelum, the soul bond, the dream realm, the lost Temple of Kek, the erased history of the High Fae.

Vaelith. What he truly was. What he’d confessed and finally how he’d threatened, to stop her at all costs.

Her friends listened in stunned silence as the quiet, sacred space of the library wrapped around them.

By the time she finished, her throat was raw and her heart felt exposed.

There was a long pause, before their questions began.

“Wait—Vaelith is a dragon fae?” Marand asked, voice hushed but trembling.

“And he’s the one who locked the prince away?” Cellen added, all the usual mirth gone from his voice.

“How long has this been going on?” Marand’s brows drew together. “And why not go to the High Priestess with this?”

“That’s what I said,” Nyla jumped in, giving Thalia a glance. “But—”

“It won’t help,” Cellen said, his voice suddenly serious in a way that made Thalia’s stomach twist. “If this is true and after hearing all that, I believe it is, then we’re talking about power none of us fully understand.

Vaelith isn’t just a lesser fae noble or a General.

He’s a dragon fae… and that means if he is hiding something, manipulating something, no one in the temple could stop him. ”

Marand paled. “Not even the High Priestess?”

“He fought in a war that wiped an entire people from history,” Cellen said, quietly.

“He’s been here for years and no one even suspected him.

If he’s capable of that, do you really think he’ll blink if someone like Elara confronts him?

What do you think he will do to Thalia is he suspects she’s exposed him, Dragons are insanely powerful. ”

The silence that followed was thick. Heavy with the weight of Cellen’s words.

Nyla leaned forward, her voice firm. “Then we don’t go to her. Not yet.”

Thalia met her gaze, grateful.

“We do what we can,” Nyla continued. “Caelum is high fae, he’s our only shot. If what you said is true, Thal… he’s the only one who can go up against Vaelith.”

Thalia nodded, a knot in her throat. “But I need to find him. Really find him not just in the dream world. To get him out, I need to find the Temple of Kek. And the Forgotten Forest. Caelum said the answers were hidden there.”

“So we start digging,” Cellen said, flexing his fingers. “We hunt for clues. Temple maps. Lost cities. Anything that mentions old magic or forgotten gods.”

“I’ll check the restricted texts in the medical archives,” Marand added. “They have older volumes on places of healing, if the Temple of Kek was destroyed it might have been referenced.”

Nyla turned to Thalia. “And you? Are you okay with us doing this?”

Thalia looked around at the three of them, each of them clearly still in shock, but no one backing down from the task ahead. For the first time in what felt like forever she felt like she could breathe. She wasn’t hiding from them anymore, she didn’t have to lie to them.

“I want your help,” she said. “More than anything.”

Then she added, voice barely above a whisper: “I think the gods sent me the right people, we can do this.”

Cellen snorted. “Well, if that’s the case, they clearly have a twisted sense of humour.”

The scent of old parchment clung to Thalia’s hair, to her robes, to her fingertips.

It had become as familiar as the smell of brewed tea and healing salves.

Weeks had passed since that first desperate conversation in the library, and though their lives continued with their daily classes, rotations, temple rites every free moment had been poured into this search. And still, they had found nothing.

“Tell me again why we’re doing this and not sleeping like normal people?” Cellen asked, stretched dramatically across a low couch in their corner of the library.

Thalia didn’t look up from the brittle book in her lap. “Because normal people aren’t trying to locate a temple wiped from existence by dragons.”

Marand smirked over the edge of her notes. “You really need a better answer if anyone ever overhears us.”

“Right?” Cellen said, straightening. “Like… maybe we’re trying to win a particularly obscure scholarship.”

“You’re the obscure one,” Nyla muttered, elbowing him gently.

Thalia smiled faintly, her gaze scanning another page.

The banter helped. It made the waiting bearable.

The silence between failures less oppressive.

Their friendship had changed. Deepened. There were shared looks now, a quiet understanding in Nyla’s raised brow, unspoken support in Marand’s lingering glances.

Cellen, despite his endless sarcasm, had become someone Thalia knew she could lean on.

Trust. They studied together late into the night, not just about temples and gods, but also anatomy charts, medical etchings, and magical convergence theory.

Their hospital rounds had only gotten more demanding, and they each juggled exhaustion with grim determination.

Thalia’s fingers paused on a line etched into the old page. She leaned closer, heart quickening.“…the shadows remember even what the world forgets.”

Her pulse fluttered.

“Guys,” she said quietly.

Three heads turned immediately.

She read the line aloud. “It’s from a poem on an old shrine in the southern wilds. It doesn’t name the shrine, but it says it was dedicated to a god of shadow and silence. That could be Kek.”

Marand leaned in beside her. “Does it mention a location?”

“No,” Thalia said, deflating. “Just something called the ‘Grief Stone’—and a warning not to speak names aloud beneath it.”

“That’s cheery,” Cellen muttered. “A stone that cries when you say names?”

Thalia gave him a look, but Nyla murmured, “It could be a marker. A grave site or boundary stone. If it’s real, maybe it’s the edge of the forest.”

Thalia sat back, rubbing her eyes. She was tired.

Her whole body ached from a long hospital rotation earlier that day, and she hadn’t seen Caelum in weeks, not since the night of passion they shared that perfect night which was subsequently destroyed by Vaelith , who had turned out to be a thing of nightmares.

She burned with the need to find him. To save him.

She missed him with an ache that left her breathless in quiet moments.

At night she curled into bed and closed her eyes, heart silently begging for him to find her again.

Sometimes, she swore she felt him watching her in her dreams. Sometimes, she swore Vaelith was there too which should have terrified her more than it did.

And the more days passed without a breakthrough, the more that old frustration bubbled beneath her calm.

“What if we’re wrong?” she said suddenly, voice sharper than she meant. “What if we’re chasing shadows? I keep thinking something will jump out at us, but maybe we’re just… wasting time.”

A beat of silence passed.

Then Cellen leaned back in his chair, laced his fingers behind his head, and said, “Nah.”

Thalia blinked. “That’s it? ‘Nah’?”

He grinned. “Look, I’m not the smartest one here. That’s probably Nyla, or Marand when she’s had caffeine. But I know what people look like when they’re chasing something real. And you, Thal, you’re chasing something that’s practically humming off your skin.”

Marand added softly, “You haven’t been wrong yet.”

Thalia exhaled slowly. A knot of tension unwound just slightly in her chest. She looked down at the line again.

The shadows remember even what the world forgets.

“I’m going to copy this,” she said. “It might mean nothing. But it might also be our first real lead.”

Nyla nodded, already flipping through her own text. “Let’s look for more mentions of shrines. Forgotten gods. Anything tied to shadow and silence.”

Thalia dipped her pen in ink and began to write.

The evening air clung to her skin like mist as Thalia approached the Temple of Amara, her steps hesitant but determined.

She hadn’t seen Caelum since the night Vaelith interrupted their dream.

No glowing forests. No whispered promises.

Just silence. The still, aching kind that made her wonder if he was even still out there, trapped behind the veil and unable to reach her.

But tonight… tonight she would try again.

She needed to feel that connection. To know he was still with her, even if only in dreams.

The temple’s great doors shimmered in the golden light of the sconces, casting warm illumination over the stones.

For a moment, she let the sight soothe her.

She looked around, then stopped dead. Leaning against the left column of the entrance like a statue carved from shadow and silver, Vaelith stood unmoving, arms crossed, eyes glittering in the torchlight.

His pale hair caught the flicker of the flames, making him look even more otherworldly, less man, more dangerous creature.

Thalia froze breath catching in her throat. He was guarding the temple.

No. Guarding me from it.

A jolt of panic surged through her chest, and she ducked behind a stone archway, heart hammering.

Had he followed her? Was he always watching?

She peeked around the pillar. He hadn't seen her.

Not yet. She turned and ran, her footsteps as quiet as she could manage on the cobblestones, trying not to let her fear spill over into full-blown panic.

All thoughts of Caelum, of the peace she'd looked for, were gone, replaced with the sharp memory of molten gold eyes, of fire curling beneath skin, and fear. She didn’t stop until she reached the hallway near her dormitory, lungs burning.

Before she could open the door, shadows peeled back.

He strode out of the darkness, every step purposeful, the shadows clinging to him until the last moment.

“Don’t go back there,” Vaelith said, voice low, sharp with anger. “Don’t dream walk with him again.”

Thalia whirled, backing into the wall near her door. “What—how did you—?”

“I told you he was dangerous. You didn’t listen. Now I see you’re willing to risk everything just to touch him again.”

“I risk nothing with him,” she snapped, though her voice trembled. “He’s never hurt me. You’re the one who keeps showing up in the dark, hiding truths, twisting warnings into threats.”

His eyes narrowed. “You’re being played.”

“You said that before,” she hissed. “And I didn’t believe you then either.”

Vaelith stepped closer, shadows clinging to his boots as though reluctant to leave him. “You don’t know what he is.”

“I know what you are,” she threw back. “I’ve read the histories. I know what dragons are—what they do.”

His face went stone-still.

She continued, “Power-hungry. Deceitful. They tried to steal the gods' magic and burn the world down when they couldn’t have it.”

“Lies,” Vaelith growled, stepping forward. His hand lashed out, not in violence but in desperation, fingers closing around her wrist.

“Don’t touch me,” she cried, her voice shook now.

He stared down at her, his fury so strong she could feel it on her skin.

“You don’t know what he’s doing to you.”

“Then tell me!” she cried, wrenching free. “Tell me what he is, what you are, why you hate him so much, why you’re—”

The door burst open behind her.

Nyla stood in the entryway, hair mussed, a frown creasing her brow.

“Thalia?” Her gaze darted to Vaelith. “What’s going on?”

In an instant, he was gone, like a shadow curling back into the cracks between the stones.

Thalia stared at the empty hallway, chest rising and falling too fast.

“Thalia,” Nyla said again, voice softer. “Are you alright?”

Thalia nodded.

She wasn’t.