That freedom didn't matter, for he didn't know where to go. He couldn't flee to the medical tents behind the line. Nothing but death awaited anyone who crossed into that canvas wrapped hell. He could not turn toward the enemy and scale the castle walls to attack them where they sat safe and shielded, and watched Death take their side in the conflict. It was some comfort that at least they were as wet as he.

He wanted to call lightning down upon those heights, strike after strike, his fury brought to life in jagged streaks of fire and destruction, but he was powerless.

Powerless. Useless. Helpless.

The thunder boomed louder and louder, and the cannon and the musket fire and the screams of the struck and the dying.

Lysander jerked awake to find himself kneeling on the floor in a darkened room, his mouth stretched open in a silent rictus of dread. He remained quite still at first, freezing himself in place. He knew if he didn't, the dream would carry him on, and things would be broken and people might be hurt. He held himself immobile by force of will, trying to catch the breath which burst from him in great gasping sobs and that he could not seem to get back.

He must stop. He could hear that he sounded insane. He mustn't allow himself to sound mad. He must breathe.

He couldn't tell himself the nightmare wasn't real because it was. He could tell himself, however, that it was past. That it was over. That it had ended and he had left it far behind him, even if that assurance felt like a lie.

Why must he carry it? Must he carry it forever?

He knew the answer to that. Of course he did. He knew why he deserved this burden, and why it must follow him.

No. Don't think about Theo. No.

Instead, he thought about his hands. His dry, if somewhat clammy, clean hands. No mud. No blood. They were fisted so tightly he was losing sensation in his fingers. With his full and total concentration, he willed his fists to slowly relax and for his fingers to open one by one.

He had no need of fists to defend himself here. His hands need hold no knife, no firearm, not even a bludgeon. He flattened his open hands downward and rested them on something cool and smooth.

He made himself focus on discovering what that was. It warmed beneath his touch more quickly than stone. Wood, yes. If he slid his fingertips a bit he could feel the grain and the seams between the boards. It was very clean, for no more than a speck of grit presented itself to his touch. Cool and clean, and solid and real.

The wood was a floor. Where was this floor?