“I told you to stay out of the business of gods and angels,” says a gray-haired woman who holds a younger woman protectively. She’s dressed in a lamb’s skin, complete with the head that drapes over her forehead. It has fangs attached to it like some kind of saber-toothed beast.

Raffe begins walking away from the village. “Either come with me or stay. I can only help those who want to be helped.”

The older woman pushes her daughter toward Raffe. The others follow, huddling together and rushing to keep up like some weird menagerie.

Music builds near the bonfire as we walk away from it. The tempo speeds up and the beat throbs until the women’s breathing matches it.

Just as I think the crescendo will crest, the music stops.

A baby cries into the night.

Then it suddenly stops in the middle of a wail. It ends too abruptly to be natural, and the sharp silence makes the hair on my arms curl.

A woman cries out brokenheartedly. There’s no surprise to it, just pain and mourning.

It makes me want to both run to the fire to see if the baby is all right and to run away from these barbaric villagers. They seem mostly unsurprised and unaffected by whatever is happening near the fire, as if this is part of their normal ritual.

I want to tell Raffe that we’re not all like these people. That I’m not like these people. But I’m just a ghost in my own dream.

Raffe quietly pulls out his sword, on full alert.

They’re coming.

Just as the music begins again, this time accompanied by chanting, Raffe spins to look behind him.

The hillside slithers with shadows.

13

CROUCHED AND LOPING. Stunted black wings. The shapes of emaciated men.

I don’t know what they are, but my primal brain recognizes them, because even in my dream, my heart speeds up and my instincts whisper run, run, run.

The shadows leap toward us.

Two of them land on a woman, knocking her down. They claw at her. She begs Raffe with her terrified eyes.

One of his warriors loved this Daughter of Man. Gave up his whole life for her. Worried over her even as he was being condemned to the Pit. The why of it is beyond Raffe’s comprehension, but that doesn’t stop his compassion from blooming.

Raffe kicks off a hellion that lands on him and swings his sword at the demons attacking the woman.

Then a strange thing happens.

Strange even for this dream.

Raffe goes into slow motion.

And so does everything else—except for me.

I’ve never had a slow-mo dream before. I can see almost every muscle as Raffe shifts his sword and cuts into the hellions that are clawing at the fallen woman.