Philip paused in reading his red book to stare over at the child. “What’re you building, sugar?” He’d become more open in his affections for Heidi Hunt Ives recently; he’d been dreaming about her almost every night. She was fast transforming into his own flesh and blood offspring.
“A portal,” she said mysteriously, still not looking up. “You *do* like to get high… don’t you?”
“High?” Philip coughed. “Nah. That’s more Marion’s bag. Nickle bag, hehe.”
“But…,” she continued while making her sand castle, “… you *do* want to keep him calm and happy. Because he then calms you down. Remember how it was *before*? You were not the nice person that you are now.”
Philip considers again that Marion should have never told the kid about their backgrounds. But she insisted if she was to be part of the group, the *gang*. He remembered his own briefing about the girl. “Shapeshifter,” Marion reinforced. “Can turn old, middle aged, young. She’s even got a dog transmutation… poodle, she claims, although I haven’t seen it up close and in person. Then there’s another one she’s working on, Philip, and this will take the cake. Bug,” Marion says, making him laugh. And now that’s what he keeps calling her in these dreams. My little bug, etc.
Philip decides to walk over to the sand box and take a closer look. It seemed quite detailed from his perspective. She was just finishing up the northeast turret.
“Hana Lei is where it will take us,” she began again. “We thought she was dead but now it’s been found again.”
“What — or who is this Hana Lei?”
“Island,” she speaks, halting her work and looking up at Philip now. *Is* this his child? he wonders, staring into her green eyes.
“Pitch,” she then utters.
“Pitch?”
—–
Pitch Darkly rouses himself. By his side, Mary was staring at him, wide awake already. “You had another dream didn’t you?”
Sunklands 