Hamza looked at it. The dead greyness of the screen. Its unyielding buttons. Then, he screamed, threw it across the room. Paced. His stomach hurting. Wondering whether he’d squandered his chance, his opportunity. It was only then that he heard the sound of a car door closing outside, dropping to the floor so as not to be seen. He tried to control his breathing as he heard someone knock at the door. Footsteps moving about. He saw a weak shadow on the floor, a looming presence at the window. His throat constricting as he pressed himself to the cold stones. The walls were so thick that he had not been able to judge whether the person had gone. He had no sense of time or direction. When he got up, he saw the figure of a woman. Her head just turning away. He pressed himself to the wall again but he was sure she had seen him. She must have seen him.

Afterwards, he had paced once more, picking up the phone to check it in vain. He considered leaving immediately. He could hike across the country, hide here and there, but he knew his chances of success would be pitiful. He could not believe how foolish he’d been. To have been seen. So simply. So unnecessarily. He knew that they could be on their way already. Perhaps Nefyn herself had gone to get help. His uncertainty grew with every minute that Nefyn was gone. His hearing sharpened so that he heard approaching footsteps every hour. He was sure he heard a helicopter, too. His mind wheeling back to Homs. The thundering air, bringing with it death and destruction. Everything that he had rebuilt, every small step of reparation, started to crumble in his mind. He saw faces in the stone walls. A sense of darkness encroaching, and when it did and there was still no sign of Nefyn, he had watched as the fire fell in on itself, and the gloom grew around him.

By the time Hamza had fallen asleep on the floor, the sky was black over the cottage, the stars lucid and sharp. Exhausted and spent, he did not hear Nefyn walk barefoot up from the cove and push the door open. He did not sense her feet leaving footprints on the slate floor, her clothes soaked through with seawater. Her dark eyes sullen. He did not see her stand over him, watching him sleep, a compass hanging from a chain in her cold hand.

21

Dwfn ♦ Deep ♦ Eamiq

‘NEFYN? NEFYN, WAKE UP!’

She was barely breathing.

‘Nefyn?’

Her clothes were wet, dark. Sodden.

‘Nefyn, please, where did you get this, Nefyn?’