Chapter Thirty-Three

With one last warning, Goldie sent Cierra and Cid back to the beginning of the trail in the forest.

"I guess we're back…," Cierra muttered before following Cid down the trail.

When she reached the clearing Nora, Hans, and Lonnie were seated around a hibiscus bush with gold blooms. Looking over the bush carefully, Cierra found that this one didn't radiate energy or vibrate in anyway. It was for all intents and purposes a normal looking bush, just with gold flowers.

On the far left, Nora sat wearing a beige spaghetti strap top with olive colored cargo shorts, while Lonnie was on the far right sporting a t-shirt and jeans. Hans sat between the two, looking the most stylish in a blue men's V-neck and tight white pants with tears at the knee.

Cierra shook her head, trying to not think about how well Hans clothes fit him. She looked down at her own outfit, never having paid it much attention before. She usually entered the dream realms in whatever she happened to wear that day, for example she had worn a matching navy gym outfit most of the day, and that's what she had on now.

She wondered if it was the same for them as well.

She turned her thoughts inward as she approached them; Goldie had given her a lot to think about. Primarily, she found herself wondering what Goldie was. She had wondered before, but for the first time Cierra realized she could be anything: She was able to watch them, seemingly come and go as she pleased, pull them from the waking world to the dreaming. With the knowledge that gods and goddesses existed here, Cierra was starting to think that Goldie could be one of them, making her more powerful than Cierra could have imagined.

But then the question was, which one?

"Hey," Hans called out, Lonnie waving, Nora looking up in her direction, "Took you long enough. We were wondering if you were going to make it."

Cierra tried to force a laugh, "Yeah, got caught up with homework," and when Lonnie gave her an odd look, she added, "Summer school. Calculus and I aren't close friends."

The others nodded sympathetically.

She wasn't sure how she felt keeping the fact that Goldie had secreted her away hidden from them, but Goldie's warning sounded, if nothing else, reasonable. She looked at each of them, wondering who she shouldn't trust, or if she should be wary of all of them.

"Added you online," Lonnie said, "Who's that blonde girl in some of your photos?" He wiggled his eyebrows at her playfully.

"That," Cierra said, sitting down near them, "Is my friend Dawn, and she is wayyyy out of your league." She tried to imagine Lonnie and Dawn meeting in real life, but her brain couldn't reconcile the image. Unless Lonnie suddenly looked a lot more like Jeremiah, there was no way Dawn would be interested.

Cierra tried to change the subject.

"Is this Goldie's message?," She asked, nodding at the bush. It seemed strange to her that Goldie had sent the calling card. Why couldn't Goldie meet with them today if she had the spare time to force her into the meeting at the abandoned home earlier? How busy was Goldie that she could only spare minutes at a time?

"Yup," Hans nodded, "First time I've seen one of these though. Usually it's just a single flower, not the whole plant."

"Maybe the amount of flowers corresponds with the number of days we'll have to wait?" Lonnie offered, trying to be helpful.

"Let's hope not, that's a lot of days," Nora replied, pulling at a leaf on the bush.

"By the way, I was online earlier, do we all live in the United States?" Cierra asked, curious. "That would be a crazy coincidence."

"Not me," Nora said, raising her hand. "I lived in Texas for a while, when I was younger, but we moved to Singapore and then Hong Kong. Now I live in Canada, for school," She continued. It was the most personal information she had given about herself yet.

"Wait," Cierra interrupted, "Do you think that there are other people that come here, but on different time zones?," Her eyes grew wide and she channeled her inner Dawn, "Have you ever taken a nap in the middle of the day to see if you can meet someone new?"

"Eh, I've napped before, but never met anyone new," Hans answered.

"I don't nap, so I wouldn't know," Lonnie said proudly.

Nora shook her head, "If there were others, Goldie would tell us."

Would she? Cierra asked internally.

"She's never lied to us before, I don't think she would keep us in the dark if there were others," Nora explained.

"Who's that older woman in your profile photo?," Cierra pried, betting on Nora being more talkative tonight, "Is she your grandmother?"

Nora was silent, and for a moment Cierra regretted asking.

"She was my grandmother," Nora answered, an undiscernible look in her eyes, "I'm not big on losing privacy to online information gathering like social media. I made that profile just for you guys."

"So, no Insta or anything, huh?" Hans asked, joking, "How is Lonnie supposed to know which of your friends to hit on?"

Lonnie and Nora, each on opposite sides of Hans, hit him in the arm at the same time.

"Ow! Hey, Cierra, aren't you going to help me?," Hans called out.

"Not a chance," Cierra laughed.

After a few minutes of chatter, Cid came and put his head in Cierra's lap. The clearing was peaceful, and in some ways, it reminded Cierra of sitting around a campfire, just instead of a fire it was a gold bush.

"Since Goldie isn't coming today, do you guys want to go somewhere else?," Cierra asked when there was a lull in the conversation.

Lonnie looked at Nora, while Hans stared off at the bush.

"Ever since the nightmares have become more active, Goldie's asked us not to go anywhere," Nora explained, mouth an unreadable line.

"Since when? You guys just," Cierra trailed off for a moment, "Sit here every night, waiting for something to do?"

The three shared an uncomfortable look.

"It's been this way for the last three months or so," Nora explained, "We only go outside of this realm when Goldie asks."

"But then…," Cierra looked at Hans, confused, "What were you doing in the Skogkatt's world?"

Hans looked to the side, avoiding her eyes, mumbling something. Lonnie and Nora shifted around uncomfortably.

"I'd kinda hoped you'd forget to ask…," Hans mumbled, then louder, "Goldie called us a few days before, telling us that someone new had arrived, but wasn't sure who they were or if they could be trusted. I offered to investigate since I'm the most easily…camouflaged…" His voice trailed off.

Cierra took a minute to let it sink in before responding, "You guys told me just the other night that you," She looked pointedly at Hans, "Were the ones to tell Goldie about me." She looked at the three of them, scowling, "Goldie knew about me this whole time and I still had to play hide and seek with you?"

Nora and Lonnie looked away, each staring in opposite directions.

"Well…" Hans picked at the grass nearby, pulling it up in clumps only for it to grow right back, "We weren't sure what you could do or who you were, so I led you around most nights while the others tried to come up with a plan. It was pretty easy… I mean… We could talk to each other online during the day…" He looked back up at her, "I'm really sorry, but you know how it is, we can't take chances."

"Riiiight," Cierra wasn't sure what else to say. Goldie had known about her for longer than she had thought; of course she had. Cierra bit at the inside of her cheek in frustration, face burning.

She must have looked like such an idiot to them to not have put it together the night before.

"I'm going to head out guys." Cierra said, waking up before they could protest.

Checking the time, she saw it was only two in the morning; too early to go for a run or sneak downstairs for a snack.

Turning over, she pat Cid on the head, thinking over what had happened. The way Goldie had made it sound earlier, it seemed as though she was going to be sending her and Cid off on their own to undergo some sort of special training. She wondered what her teacher would be like, or if she would be entering into some ancient mythological army and learning to fight from famous warriors like Heracles.

Why was Goldie doing all of this, yet keeping so many secrets? Why hadn't she said she had sent Hans to find her?

She'd gotten so engrossed in what Goldie had said and the conversation with the others, that she had completely forgotten to try summoning the kitchen knife.

"You ready to go back to sleep?" She asked, giving Cid one last scratch behind the ears.