The sounds came sooner than he had expected. Several loud cracks first, like branches being snapped in the night, and then soon after, the screeches of the newborn lizards rose up. The eggs were small, but the noise they made was tremendous.

Ramus ran faster still, distancing himself from the crying lizards and the small fire that had birthed them. The rain continued falling, and now his wet clothes were musty and warm from the sweat rising from his body.

He soon slowed, heart thumping, vision clouding, and he had to sit beside a fallen tree to regain his breath.

Shouts came from the direction of the camp. It was too far away to make out who was calling, but if he concentrated he could hear the voices moving into the woods, seeking out whatever made the noise.

He wondered where Lulah was and what she was doing.

And then he began to wonder about Nomi: Would she be scared, worried, concerned? Would she suspect that this was Ramus's doing? She would be in the camp, guarded by Ramin and Beko, perhaps, while the others searched the trees for the source of the sounds.

Ramus rested his head back against the tree and closed his eyes. The lizards' cries still pierced the night, and the pain behind his eyes sang as though in harmony. He had run farther than he had for a long time. Exhaustion took him, and before he knew it he was drifting away from this rainy night and into the more complete darkness of a nightmare.

_____

HE IS AT the center of things. To his right is a fire, burned down to glows and ashen sculptures; to his left are unoccupied tents; ahead of him is the wood from which a howl of rage continues to rise, going higher and higher and yet somehow never passing beyond the realms of hearing. Moonlight bathes the trees and silvers a thousand sword blades across their leaves. Raindrops and limp serpents gather and drop from the tree canopy, and each impact is the footfall of a killer. Steam rises and flows where there should be no steam, and the ground gapes open as it vents its own nightmares to the night.

He is at the center of things, and events radiate outward. He sees the running shapes darting away in their search for whatever threatens them. Moonlight streaks across the grass, as though illuminating routes for those who have gone, or those who have yet to go. And then events radiate inward as well, and the trees begin to part as things emerge and come for him. He has never seen or imagined these things before, but he recognizes them as something personal and secret to someone other than him.

RAMUS SCREAMED HIMSELF awake, huddled against the fallen tree. For a beat everything startled him, but then the nightmare—Nomi's nightmare—faded rapidly, and it was as if he had never dreamed at all.