Ehren was jarred from his sleep by someone shaking him and the screams. The screams he had thought were part of his dream until he began to wake up and they didn’t stop. He rubbed his hands over his face. Ferros stood at his side looking worried. Ehren sighed.

“What is it, brother? Why do you look as if father has ordered you to war?” he asked around a yawn.

“You hear them don’t you? The screams?” Ferros returned.

“Of course I hear them, you dolt! I’m not deaf!” Ehren snapped. “How long has she been screaming?”

“I’m not sure,” Ferros said sheepishly. “I only got home an hour ago.”

“You kept Mavi Eames that long?” Ehren asked.

Ferros shrugged.

“You do realize that despite his appearance he is well over a hundred years old, right?”

Ferros shrugged again. Ehren groaned and rolled his eyes. He swung his legs out of bed and made for his dressing gown. Before he could grab it, another pair of hands had snatched it up and held it open for him. He turned. Kase and Kanoa stood silently by their masters. They had appeared seemingly out of thin air.

“Kase, the lady in the next room, how long has she been screaming?” he asked.

“It has alternated between moans and screams most of the day your highness,” Kase replied, taking his arms and putting them through the sleeves of his dressing gown.

“Has anyone tried to wake her?”

“No, my lord, they are too afraid.”

“Afraid? But why?”

“My lord, when anyone tries to get close enough to wake her no one can touch her. She recoils from all touch and screams like she’s been struck.”

Then it dawned on him, Akira was trapped in a memory of her time with the nuns. He ran past his brother, Kase, and Kanoa straight to her door. Askel stood with his Uncle Arri outside the door. Each time Akira screamed, he flinched.

“Uncle, Askel, what are you doing here?” he asked.

Askel turned to him then. Despite his similarities to his father, he looked like a completely different person.

“She doesn’t sleep much,” he said absently glancing back at the door. “Hasn’t really since she came back from the nuns. Night terrors weren’t something we ever thought she’d deal with when she came back from that place but after finding out what they did, how could she not have them?”

“It couldn’t have been that bad,” Uncle Arri chuckled.

“If by bad you mean she was whipped over 150 times for a minor infraction and over 200 before those even had a chance to heal, then no it was easy as pi,” Askel snapped. “They very nearly killed her. It’s a wonder they didn’t break her. She’s always been strong but she fears sleep now because it’s the only time she can’t block those memories. You know she used to sing all the time? Started when she was two, mostly just to help our mum get me to sleep. I haven’t heard her sing since I was two and she was four, not until yesterday. It’s been nearly twenty some years since I heard her sing. It had to have been music that kept her sane and music that got her in trouble. When these terrors start, you can’t stop them. All you can do is ride them out.”

“What was her favorite song to sing?” Ehren asked.

“It wasn’t a song she could sing that was her favorite, it was a suite written for the unaccompanied cello by Bach,” Askel answered. “But her favorite to sing was a hymn called ‘Lord of the Dance.’”

“Strange,” Ehren muttered.

“It was one of the few songs the nuns allowed her to sing on a daily basis.”