“I think we’re somewhere in the United States, maybe the Midwest, but it’s drier than Missouri or Illinois, different vegetation, too.”

“I thought you only appeared in the desert where your soldiers were fighting.”

“I did, until now,” I said. The sun was bright overhead. If a car came down the road we’d be exposed to view. Up to this point only the soldiers and those fighting with them had been able to see me, as far as I knew, but someone getting pictures with their phone of us standing here like this would be on the Internet in minutes. I pushed the thought away and tried to “feel” who had called me, us, and why? Always before, people’s lives had been in danger. What was dangerous here, and who was in danger?

“I thought only you traveled in dream at the Goddess’s bidding?” Sholto said.

“That was true, until now.” I stared at the house with its ramshackle barn. I thought that was our goal, but I wasn’t sure. Appearing here and not in some faraway country had thrown me, and having Sholto with me like this puzzled me more.

“I am the first of your men that the Goddess has drawn with you?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said.

He smiled then, and said, “I am honored.” The scent of herbs and roses grew stronger as if we walked in a garden surrounded by a bank of wild roses, instead of the barren yard that smelled of sunbaked grass and some bitter weed baking in the heat. It wasn’t as hot as some of the deserts I’d been in, but it was still much hotter than Los Angeles.

I smiled at the fact that he was happy to be with me even here, not knowing why, or where. I squeezed his hand a little tighter, which made the vines squeeze a little tighter as if they were happy with us. It should have hurt, but it didn’t; as before when we were handfasted by Goddess, it was more pressure than anything, though the blood dripped a little more. The dry ground soaked up the blood eagerly; moisture was moisture to the earth and plants.

“Why are we joined as a couple?”

“I don’t know,” I said, softly; we weren’t whispering, but our voices were hushed the way you did in human churches sometimes, as if you knew God was near.

“Does your crown always manifest in dream and vision?”

“No, almost never.”

“Is your soldier in the house?”

“I think so,” I said, but I was … distracted and puzzled that Sholto had come with me. I’d been asleep and touching a lot of the other men, but they’d never been transported with me. Why Sholto? Why now? Why in our “wedding” finery? I tried to let the questions go so I could hear Goddess’s message. If you let your thoughts get too loud, then you can’t hear God, or Goddess.

I took in a deep breath, closed my eyes, and stilled my thoughts, but the warmth and solidity of Sholto’s hand in mine was a part of that stillness. The wind touched my face, and I raised my head, eyes still closed, and knew that the house was where we needed to go. I couldn’t have explained it in words, but “knew” in the same way that the flower knows which way the sun is rising; it is just that simple, and that complicated. I started walking toward the house, leading Sholto by the hand. He didn’t question, just came with me, and that was a kind of faith. I wasn’t sure if it was faith in the Goddess, or faith in me, or both, but I walked forward believing, and he came beside me the same way. Our blood decorated the ground as we walked, and began to decorate our white clothes as the dry, hot wind whipped my dress around us. It spattered our blood across the white like a Jackson Pollock painting.

Most of the paint had peeled off the house, leaving it shades of weathered gray, the wood pitted and marked as if it had been beaten by small, sharp objects, but I knew that it was just the elements of wind, rain, heat, and time. Houses need love and care just like animals and people; without it, our dwellings begin to fade and die just like we do. No one had loved this house in a long time.

We stepped up on the warped, uneven boards of the porch and I reached out to the screen door. It had been torn long enough that the edges had begun to discolor, the screen going almost brittle with heat and neglect.

The inner wood door was peeling and had warped so badly that I couldn’t push it open easily. Sholto put his hand on it and together we opened it. It should have made a horrible racket of breaking wood and scraping metal, but it didn’t. The door opened as soundlessly as if it had been recently oiled and opened only moments before, though I knew it had to have been weeks since the door was used. With the silence of the door came a more profound quiet, as if the world were holding its breath. I saw the living room under a layer of gray dust, the floor littered with mail as if months’ worth had just been thrown on the floor. There was a couch sagging under a pile of knitted afghans, and a pillow. A small gray cat was curled up on the pillow, blinking huge yellow eyes at us. I wondered if it could see us.

As if in answer to my thought it hopped down from the couch in one graceful arc, padding toward the only hallway that led to the left. It turned and looked back at us, and gave a plaintive meow, tail twitching.

“It wants something,” I said.

“I’m more interested in what Goddess wants,” Sholto said.

The cat gave him an unfriendly look, then looked at me, dismissing him, or that was how it seemed to me. The scent of roses and herbs grew stronger.

“It’s like standing in a sun-warmed garden full of herbs and roses; the scent of everything is stronger. Why?”

“The cat knows where we need to go,” I said, and led us toward the waiting cat.

I think he opened his mouth to protest, but in the end he simply followed where I led. He followed me better than almost any of the men, considering he was a king in his own right; it was impressive.

The gray cat walked ahead of us, tail held high, tip twitching slightly. She stopped in front of the first closed door in the short hallway. There was another screen door at the end of the hallway. I wondered if that was the door people came in through, or if no one ever came into the house, or ever left it. No, the cat was too much a pet, too well cared for; it hadn’t been alone for months.

The cat put a delicate paw up against the door and looked at me with those intense yellow eyes. It gave another plaintive meow.

A man’s voice called out. “Stop it, Cleo, stop wailing outside the door. I left a message for Josh, he’ll take care of you.”

The cat meowed again and scratched at the door.

“Stop it!” he called out.

I thought I knew the voice. “Brennan,” I said, softly.

“Who’s there!” His voice sounded strident, almost panicked.

“Brennan, it’s Meredith.”

“Meredith, you can’t be here. I am crazy.”

The cat pawed at the door again. I used my free hand to touch the doorknob and open it. The cat slid inside as soon as there was an opening big enough for her slender body. We had to open the door wider for Sholto and me to step through.

The cat was already rubbing back and forth on his boots when he finally saw us. The dark of his desert tan had lightened, but his large brown eyes and short dark hair were the same. The hair was a little longer, but I knew that face now. One hand was around his necklace, and the other was holding a gun. It looked like a Glock, but I wasn’t an expert on guns. I recognized ones I’d shot, or the people around me used frequently.