Feral Hearts

32

Lukas woke up with that sudden convulsion he get when every muscle he own suddenly realizes it’s dropped off on duty.

Next, came the shock of realizing how deeply he’d been asleep. For a moment the darkness would yield nothing to his confusion.

Lukas reached for his sword and found only soft sheets.

He's here now! It came back to him. Lukas remembered the scene when he was with Elder Jadissa and as well with her spell. Lukas rolled to the right. He always left his gear on his right side.

Nothing but more mattress, soft and deep. He's not blind for all the help of his wolf senses. Though, he guessed the shutters were shut tight, for not the slightest whisper of starlight reached him. It was quiet too. He reached out for the edge of the bed, and didn’t find it.

A wide bed? He thought, trying to find some humour in the situation. He let go the breath he’d been holding, the one he sucked in so fast when he woke. What was it that made him start?

What dragged him out of Elder Jadissa's spell in this oh so comfortable bed?

Lukas pulled his hand back, drew his knees to his chest. Somebody had him to bed and taken his clothes. Not his servants, they won't leave him naked against the night.

That somebody and him would be having a discussion soon enough. But it could wait until morning. He just wanted to sleep, to let the day come. Only sleep had kicked him out, and it wasn’t about to let him back in.

So he lay there, naked in the strange bed, and wondered where his sword was.The noise came so quiet at first he could believe he imagined it. He stared blind into the darkness and let his ears suck in the silence. It came again, soft as the whisper of flesh on stone. He could hear the ghost of a sound, a breath being drawn. Or maybe just a night breeze fingering its way through the shutters. Ice ran up his spine, tingling on his shoulders. He sat up, biting back the urge to speak, to show what's hidden and the unseen terrors.

Lukas is not a six years old child, he told himself. He have made the dead run. He threw the sheets back and stood up. If the there was really horror waiting in the darkness, then the sheets would be no shield. With his hands held up before him, Lukas walked forward, finding first the elusive edge of the bed, and then the wall. He turned and followed it, fingers trailing the stonework. Something went tumbling and broke with an expensive crash. He barked his shins on an unseen obstacle, nearly groined himself on a sideboard of some kind, then found the shutter slats.

Lukas fumbled with the shutter catch. It defied him maddeningly, as though his fingers were frost-clumsy. The skin on his back crawled. He heard footsteps drawing closer. He hauled on the shutters with all his strength.

Every move he made seemed slow and feeble, as though he moved through molasses, like in those dreams where the demon chases him and he can’t run.The shutters gave in without warning. They flew back and Lukas found that he was standing high above the execution yard, drenched in moonlight.

He spun around. Slow, too slow. And found nothing. Just a room of silver and shadows.The window threw the moonlight on the wall to his right. His shadow reached forward in the arch of the window and fell at the feet of a tall portrait. A full length painting of a woman. Lukas went numb: his face felt like a mask. He knew the painting.

Mother.

Mother in the great hall. Mother in a white dress, tall and icy in her perfection. She said she would never like the painting which his father forced her to have, the artist had made her too distant and weak on which, it was his father’s liking.

Only Lukas made her smile when it was painted, she said. If it had not Lukas hugging to her skirts, she would have given the picture away or destroy it, she said. But she couldn’t throw it away knowing it was their only family portrait.