THE SANDMAN ☞ TRAVIS STOLL

ONE

VALERIE GREENWOOD DOESN'T QUITE KNOW how the nickname started. How and why they started calling her the Sandman.

Actually, that's a lie. She knows exactly how the identity of the Sandman came to be.

She's always had vivid dreams, for as long as she can remember. Her mother used to say, with a wicked twinkle in her eye, that the Sandman must have been paying special attention to her. It wasn't until Valerie started to develop control over the dreams of other people that she started calling her her father's daughter.

That was when her mother told her the truth about who her father was. Morpheus, god of dreams. The Sandman himself.

Val had never met the man—god, whatever. He'd left before she was born, something she can't fault him for. There was no one to train her, though, not for a while. No one to teach her the rights and wrongs of her gift, to teach her that trespassing on people's dreams was bad.

When she was nearly expelled for putting her fifth grade English teacher to sleep—a complete accident, truly—that was when Chiron stepped in. He came to Valerie's elementary school one day, pulled her out of class, and brought her back to Camp Half Blood, a place that he promised would help her hone her ability into a finely tuned machine.

If she's being honest, she went a bit crazy during her first year at camp. Sneaking into the dreams of her peers was just too easy. It had started with a strange boy when she was too young to remember, but when she was surrounded by people her age, sleeping peacefully all around her, it was easier than breathing.

Her mother put the nickname in her head originally, but it was Val's idea to take the identity of the Sandman. So when she slipped into the minds of the other campers, she showed the slightest glimpse of her face, whispered the Sandman into their dreams, and withdrew before dawn.

One by one, they all began to call her the Sandman. Not to her face, of course. When they were speaking to her, they just called her Valerie. But behind her back, they referred to her as the nickname she'd planted in their minds.

It was great, honestly. For the past ten years, most of them have been too intimidated, if not scared, to bother her. Even Chiron gave her space, under the promise that she showed up to training and meals and at least attempted to socialize. People left her alone.

Except for Travis.

⏐

"Valerie, we talked about this."

Val hates when Chiron looks at her like this. It doesn't happen often, at least not with her, that he gets that disappointed look on his face, but when it does, it makes her want to curl up into the fetal position.

"I couldn't sleep."

Chiron sighs and crosses his arms. "You are one of the only people alive who has utter control over sleep. That's an awful excuse." He says pointedly. "Why did you walk into Katie Gardner's dreams? You know better."

Valerie weighs her options. She can tell him the truth—the horrible truth that would land her a month of stable duty—or lie to him, but the idea of lying to Chiron makes her almost sick to her stomach. She's lied to him so many times over her ten years at camp, but as she's gotten older, not telling him the truth hurts more and more.

She shifts in her seat across the desk from him, and her voice is quiet when she answers: "She was flirting with Travis."

Silence sets over the room like a blanket. Chiron's eyebrows raise, and he looks too surprised to even be angry with her.