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When they stopped for the night, they were near a forest. Not a magic forest, not a Lindenmere or Cabeswaster, but it still felt… energized. Bryde had mentioned keeping them close to a ley line, and at this point Ronan was too exhausted to argue with any decisions.
The motel had a bored desk manager, rattling air conditioning, and an available room with two beds. They would sleep in shifts - protect each other, Bryde said. He would take the first watch, he said. Ronan had a stack of red flags by that point, and Gansey’s voice in his ear saying something about motels at night and strange men. But Ronan still had a sword in his hand. He locked eyes with Hennessy; she also had a sword in her hand, and a timer on her phone set for twenty minutes, and drooping eyelids. Bryde would take the first watch, then.
The bed wasn’t comfortable, but there weren’t any bugs. He glanced at his phone - it was dead, probably had been for a few hours. He tried to picture what Adam’s response to his attempted call would have been. Then he pictured Adam. And then he was opening his eyes to sunlight streaming through verdant leaves.
He sat up slowly, but he wasn’t disoriented. This place was more familiar than his own hands. It greeted him, somehow, whispered his name through the branches and called him forward towards a little pool of water.
Adam was standing at the edge of it.
He looked up when Ronan was only three steps away, and Ronan was almost too distracted by the way Lindenmere’s sun glowed in his hair to notice the panic fading to relief on his face.
“Lynch,” Adam said, and it sounded like thank God.
“Parrish,” Ronan responded cautiously. “Are you just a dream?”
His mouth quirked. Ronan’s knees felt weak.
“No, I’m here. I’m scrying.”
“Alone?” Ronan reproached.
“No,” Adam said, and the look in his eyes matched the shithead smirk. “Opal is here.”
Ronan blinked mentally.
“You’re actually in Lindenmere.”
“Yeah.”
“You went to the Barns.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m not there.”
“I figured that out for myself, thanks.”
They stared at each other. Adam, waiting less than patiently for an explanation. Ronan, fighting for a way to give one that wouldn’t mess everything up.
“Does Opal know how to help you if you need it?” he asked instead.
Adam saw the deflection, but answered anyway. “I told her to give me 30 minutes. If I don’t come out of it by then, she’ll call my name. If that doesn’t work, she’ll push me.”
“And if that doesn’t work?”
Ronan would do almost anything to continuously inspire the mirth in Adam’s expression.
“I told her to kick me in the shins as hard as she could.”
“Damn.”
“Yeah.”
They breathed. Lindenmere breathed around them. The air caressed Ronan’s cheek, and it felt like Adam’s fingers.
“Ronan.”
“It’s complicated,” he responded, even though Adam hadn’t asked anything out loud.
“I can handle it.”
He could. Ronan knew he could, but he didn’t want him to have to. He inhaled slowly.
“I met another dreamer,” he began.
“Oh?”
“Her name is Hennessy. She can’t dream anything but copies of herself.”
“Alright.”
“I think Declan is in love with one of the copies. Jordan.”
“Oh…”
“We met another dreamer, but… he’s also more. He’s helping us, I think. He goes by Bryde.”
“Okay.”
“And Matthew knows. He knows, now.”
“Shit.”
Ronan didn’t look at Adam’s face. He didn’t want to see what had replaced the joy and relief from before. He stared at his hands instead, his beautiful hands, and birds began to sing when the silence became too loud.
“Where are you?” Adam asked.
Ronan exhaled through his mouth.
“There is a group of people who are apparently hunting and killing dreamers. They found Hennessy and me. We escaped with Bryde, and now we’re kind of on the run.”
The birdsong fizzled out. It was replaced with literal crickets chirping. Fuck his semi-sentient forest.
“You tried to tell me.”
Of all of the beratements Ronan had prepared for, that was not one of them. He finally looked up, and he found Adam standing closer than before. His pale eyes were tight.
“You used your phone and tried to contact me. I missed the messages because I was studying. I’m sorry, Ronan, I’m-”
Hugging Adam in a dream, even one as vivid and tactile as this, was never as good as the real thing. But it was necessary in this moment - Ronan had to feel Adam, had to crush him to his chest and wrap his arms around him like a vice. Adam’s dumb apology was cut off once his face was smushed into Ronan’s shoulder, and it took him only a second to return the embrace. It was almost perfect, almost the place Ronan wanted to stay in forever: early summer comfort in Lindenmere, all of Adam’s lines matching up with his, no one else around.
But he couldn’t quite feel Adam’s warmth.
“Where are you?” Adam asked again when he leaned back to see Ronan’s face.
“A motel near the ley line.”
“Our ley line?”
Ronan would never fess up to the ripple of satisfaction that went down his spine.
“I think so. We haven’t left Virginia yet.”
“Okay. Good. Your brothers?”
“Not sure. Declan was taking Matthew and Jordan somewhere… else. Safer for us not to know at this point.”
“Got it.”
Their foreheads were pressed together. When did that happen?
“Ronan.”
“Hmm.”
“I can hear Opal in my bad ear.”
“That little brat.”
Adam’s huff of laughter would have ghosted over Ronan’s lips had this been real life. Ronan just had to settle for pressing a firm kiss to Adam’s mouth. His magician traced a finger over the unseen curves of his tattoo and cupped the back of his head to dive in deeper.
“Call me when you wake up,” Adam said in the meager space between them.
“My phone is dead.”
“Bring a charger back with you. A portable one. With unlimited battery capacity”
Ronan could feel the weight of it in his back pocket, building itself from Adam’s words.
“I love you,” Ronan whispered against his good ear.
“Don’t say it like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you won’t get the chance to call me when you wake up.”
“Fine.” He slid his hands up into Adam’s hair, his thumbs on his temples, and let himself drown in his gaze for one gluttonous moment.
“Unguibus et rostro.”
The worry did not go away, but Adam still smiled, and Ronan would have promised him anything right then.
“Call me. We’ll figure this out.”
We.
“We could keep talking here.”
“My shin hurts.”
“What a little shit.”
“I asked her to.”
“Whatever.”
Adam’s form was a bit hazy now. His hair felt more like the breeze. His eyes were the pool behind him.
“Tamquam,” said Adam.
“Alter idem.”
When Ronan woke up, he plugged in his phone.