Chapter 12

**Clary**


The screams were still ringing in my ears, my hands were still hot, and Lerina’s pain was still throbbing in my side.

When I drew in a breath I noticed that the screaming had stopped. Suddenly my eyes flew open and I sat bolt upright looking around me furiously. My head was pounding as I scanned the area around me, no other screams invaded my ears, no burning cottages and houses filled my vision, no scents of blood, sweat and smoke filled up my nose. When I looked over at the door of what I then realized was my room, Hezerial was standing there looking at me like I had scared the crap out of him. He was battle ready with a sword in his hands, ready to leap in if anything seemed amiss.

I took a shaky breath and ran my trembling hands over my face.

“Are you alright?” Hezerial asked as he strolled over to my bedside, kneeling on the floor beside me.

I looked over at him and saw the worry in his face. “I-,” I cleared my tender throat. Only noticing then that I must have been the one screaming, “I’m alright. It was just a dream.” I said staring off into the wall in front of me, gripping the bed sheets so tightly that my nails dug into my palms through the material. I only noticed a second after I said that, that I was staring at the mirror on my vanity table. My blonde hair, fair skin and oval face looked so foreign to me. I couldn’t make sense of the girl that I was staring at.

Hezerial frowned. “What is wrong with your hands my lady?” He asked.

I flinched and pulled one of my hands up to my face quickly. It was still hot, and small lightning-like scars decorated the palm of my right hand. I lifted my left hand and saw the same pattern mirrored there. I looked back down at the bed sheets and saw small burn marks along the material, as well as rips in the fabric. As if a live wire had been stripped naked and got dropped on the sheets.

I looked up at Hezerial’s stunned face and said the first thing that came to mind. “I had a dream.” I whispered almost fearfully.

Something tickled my cheek then and I gently wiped at it with my warm hand, feeling only the faintest trace of static electricity at the contact. I pulled back my hand and saw that it was a tear.

The next breath that I breathed in was a hiccup, and then my vision blurred and I couldn’t stop the torrent of emotion that cascaded out of me. I knew without a doubt that was not just any dream, it was a piece of a past that I had lived long ago. There was no doubting the information that came to my mind, the village, the bodies, Lerina. It was all real at some point.

I hugged my arms tightly around myself really starting to cry then. My pounding head only seemed to hurt more with the onslaught of tears, but I couldn’t stop myself. Hezerial was suddenly next to me, putting a hand onto my shoulder. His palm was light and warm. I felt a liquid warmth spread through my body from his touch. My heart slowed, my hysterical breathing stopped and evened out, the tears that ran wet and hot down my face slowed and my head went utterly quiet. No lingering vestiges of screams or images crowded me.

I took a long drag of the fresh air blowing in from outside and felt the breeze caress my damp skin. I looked up at Hezerial with his compassionate face. “Thanks.” I said. I felt better, but emotionally, I was feeling a little dead inside.

“It’s no worry at all my Lady. I will not put you to sleep this time, or again I think. Your dreams seem to be getting more intense, and I do not wish for you to be terrorized by less savory memories.” He said putting a cool hand against my forehead for a second.

I looked down at my hands which suddenly seemed normal again. I reached up to my loose hair and tugged a strand around my fingers. It only stopped a few centimeters past my shoulders, and I rubbed the ends between my thumb and forefinger feeling the loss of the length and weight that I had felt in the memory.

I nodded, confirming Hezerial’s statement. “A lot more intense, vivid, and real.” I looked back up at my reflection in my vanity mirror, and still didn’t recognize the girl I was looking at. “I don’t even recognize myself in the mirror right now.” Hezerial looked with me into the mirror and he saw that I really didn’t recognize her. This frail looking little blonde person I saw sitting in the rumpled bed was a far cry from what I used to be, from what I should be…

“May I ask as to what the dream contained my Lady?” Hezerial asked cautiously.

I looked at him feeling a wave of sadness rush over me. “It was about my dragon, and a battle.” His eyes darkened in understanding. He bowed his head as he withdrew from me.

“I am truly sorry that you had to relive that memory my Lady.” He said softly, bowing.

“I have a question, Hezerial.” I was surprised by my commanding tone. Hezerial seemed to find it natural that I spoke this way though, he lifted his face to me looking ready for anything, like it was second nature.

“Were you my guardian back then, when I had my dragon with me?” I asked him. Having a gut feeling that the timeline from when I accepted him was before the one where I rode Lerina through the skies.

“Yes my Lady. I was your guardian during that time as well.” He said without missing a beat.

“Then why didn’t you appear back then to help me and Lerina?” I asked, feeling a scowl forming on my brow.

“It was a new lifetime my Lady, and before then something drastic had happened to you that left your aura changed and harder for me to find. You also didn’t know my name or know that I was your guardian back then, so you were not able to call for me.” He was speaking the truth. I could feel it deep in my soul, he wasn’t lying and I knew that it was all fact. I frowned though.

“You say something drastic happened to me. How drastic?”

He looked at me with deep sadness. “Something, my Lady, that not even a guardian such as myself had a prayer of stopping.”

A pit was starting to bloom in my gut. “What was it?”

Hezerial just shook his head. “Long ago, you ordered me never to speak of it, not even to yourself my Lady.” He said, bowing his head again.

My mind was reeling now. Something so bad, so terrible, so life changing that I didn’t even trust my future selves to cope with it? Did I want to forget that it had ever happened? It was strange to think that I didn’t even make sense to myself.

I looked over at my alarm clock, it was my day to go into the shop. And if I rushed I would just make it in time to start my shift. Even though that part of my life suddenly seemed so … alien.

I got up out of bed anyway. “I have to go to work Hezerial.” I eyed him, not sure what to do with him. Bring him with? Make him stay?

Hezerial smiled at me. “I shall await your return my Lady. If you feel uneasy about anything, or feel like you are being watched. Call for me instantly. A part of your mind is connected to me for this convenient purpose so I can protect you.”

I smiled at that, relieved to know that he won’t be far away from me at all, even if he were on another continent. “What will you be doing?” I asked.

“I will be making arrangements for your arrival at the Order my Lady. I think that it is about time, do you not?” He frowned at me, like he wasn’t quite sure if I really wanted to go back so soon or not.

I turned and looked back at the mirror again. The face looking back at me started looking slightly more recognisable now, but I felt restless, confined in this small room, crowded by all the buildings around me, and the tar roads.

I looked back at Hezerial and said with a certainty that I haven’t felt in a very long time, “I want to go home.”