The Wraiths of Will and Pleasure - By Storm Constantine Page 0,142

good, something peculiar happens to remind you that nothing is certain.

Lileem didn’t mention anything to her companions about what had happened, but for the rest of the day she felt slightly disorientated. Her ears had started to ring, and it was a strange ringing that sounded like the distant lilt of a choir. If she put her hands over her ears in order to concentrate on it and hear it properly, it went away. But when she was speaking or others were making noise around her, she could hear it again, faint and insistent within her.

That night, she was plagued by troubling dreams. All of them involved voices shouting her name. They were calling to her desperately: come to us! But she didn’t know who or what they were. In the single word of her name, repeated endlessly, she perceived the message: you belong with us. Come quickly! It is time.

She wondered if it could be her hostling, and in the morning felt she had to confide in Flick about the dreams. She asked him to go for a walk with her in the woods, because for some unknown reason, she didn’t want Ulaume or Mima to hear what she had to say. Flick listened to her account of the call in the field the previous day and the events of the night. He did not interrupt, which was unusual, and unsettling.

‘Is it the Kakkahaar who was my hostling calling to me?’ Lileem asked, making a conscious effort not to wring her hands together. She couldn’t stop shivering.

‘I don’t know,’ Flick said. ‘I doubt it. Maybe it was just a bad dream.’

Lileem could tell he didn’t believe this, because his expression was deeply worried. ‘Is it…’ she began. ‘Is it the… other thing? Is this what happens? A call from somehar I don’t know, the har who’s supposed to…’

‘No!’ Flick said quickly. ‘I’m sure not. It could be something to do with the landscape here. We’ll move on. Let me know if anything else happens.’ He paused. ‘There haven’t been any other changes, have there.’

Lileem’s face burned. ‘No. I’d tell you.’

Flick nodded. ‘OK. Don’t worry. It’s probably nothing.’

The walked back to the boat in silence and Lileem considered how much Flick had changed since she first met him. It was as if she were seeing him for the first time. He no longer appeared so fey and vulnerable. He was strong and his hands were calloused. They rarely talked of the dehara nowadays, although Lileem had kept up her devotions to them privately. Flick had lost faith in all that was wondrous, as had Ulaume. Flick had always believed the world would be fair to him, and it hadn’t been. What had started in Saltrock had only been compounded by the events with Terez and the Uigenna. Flick never spoke of those things either, but sometimes Lileem could feel self-loathing coming off him like a black flame.

All day, Lileem felt nauseous. Her face was hot, her ears were singing and her head felt as if it was stuffed full of cotton. It was inevitable that both Ulaume and Mima noticed she was out of sorts. ‘You’re flushed,’ Mima said. ‘Do you feel all right?’

Lileem wanted to escape them all. She was terrified that the dreaded time of feybraiha was upon her. What would happen? What must she do? As the hours passed, the voices in her head became louder, calling her name insistently. She must be going mad. She would become like Terez had been, a half creature lost in darkness.

Just before sundown, it became unbearable. One moment, Lileem was sitting down on deck to begin the evening meal with her companions, the next she was on her feet, screaming aloud. She jumped off the boat and landed in the icy cold water with a great splash.

Deaf to the cries of her companions behind her, she swam strongly towards the eastern bank and climbed from the water. She wanted and needed to run, to keep running. Clawing her way through thick, thorny bushes, she headed east. It was the only way to go, and the faster she went and the longer she ran, the more the pressure let up within her. This was the way the voices wanted her to go. They lay in this direction: waiting. She found she was both laughing and crying as she ran.

Breaking free of the bushes, she hurtled down an old road that was cracked and half hidden by weeds. Here, her limbs took