Free The Last Of The Wilds by Trudi Canavan

that, I’ll do what I can.”
    He looked around the cavern. It was not the cozy hut in the middle of the forest that he had been hoping for, but the void made up for that. It would have to do. Slipping the straps of his pack off his shoulders, he set it down on the hard stone floor.
    “Then I guess we had better start decorating.”

4
    It was night. It was always night.
    An eerie light hung about the ground. She could not see its source. It made the faces around her appear even more ghoulish.
    Her path was blocked by a corpse. She stepped over it and moved on.
    I’m looking for something. What am I looking for?
    She thought hard.
    A way out. An end to the battlefield. Escape. Because…
    Movement in the corner of her eye set her heart racing with dread. She did not want to look, but did. All was still.
    Another body blocked her path: a priest, his upper torso and head blackened and scorched. She stepped over him reluctantly.
    Don’t look down.
    Something below her moved. Her eyes were lured downward. The priest stared up at her and she froze in horror. He grinned at her, then before she could step away, his scorched hand grabbed her ankle.
    !
    She jumped at the urgent, unexpected shout in her mind. Suddenly she was staring at the ceiling of her bedroom. Her heart was pounding. Her skin felt hot and sweaty. Her stomach was clenched.
    “Scare Owaya?”
    A small form leapt onto the bed. With the moonlight behind him, she could see the distinctive fluffy tail and small ears of her veez twitching with concern.
    “Mischief,” she breathed.
    “Owaya ‘fraid?”
    She drew herself up onto her elbows. “Just a dream. Gone now.”
    Whether he understood or not, she couldn’t guess. Did veez grasp the concept of dreams? She had seen him twitch and mutter in his sleep, so she knew he had them. Whether he remembered them, or understood that they weren’t reality, she couldn’t guess.
    He moved across the bed and curled up beside her legs. The pressure of his small body against hers was comforting. Lying back down, she stared up at the ceiling and sighed.
    How long will I have these nightmares for? Months? Years?
    She felt vaguely disappointed at herself, and at the gods. Surely being a White meant she didn’t have to endure bad dreams as a consequence of a war in defense of Northern Ithania and all Circlians? Though the Gifts that they had given her protected her from age and injury, they did not appear to include protection against nightmares. Surely the gods didn’t mean for her to suffer like this?
    Dreamweavers could help me.
    She sighed again. Dreamweavers. Now there was a matter to prick her conscience. She knew removing the Dreamweavers’ influence over people by encouraging priests and priestesses to absorb their healing knowledge was ultimately the right thing to do. She would save the souls of people who otherwise turned from the gods. It just seemed too… too
sneaky
.
    After the meeting at the Altar she had decided she’d better find out if any healer priests and priestesses were willing to work with Dreamweavers before approaching Dreamweaver Adviser Raeli. She had told herself she was being efficient—she could ask if any were willing to travel to Si at the same time—but she knew she was putting off the moment when she would have to start being sneaky.
    Several volunteers had come forward. She had been expecting enthusiasm for the post in Si, but had been pleasantly surprised by the numbers interested in working with Dreamweavers. All had been impressed and humbled by what they had seen in the aftermath of the battle. Many were eager to learn from Dreamweavers, though for some it was out of a determination to match or surpass the heathens in knowledge and skill rather than because of any newfound respect for the cult.
    She had delayed further by finding a location for them to work in. It needed to be a place where neither Dreamweavers nor Circlians had greater influence. She had found a disused storeroom