Strange Noises Fiction by Rachel Greenham

Sam is there the next time I wake up. She’s sitting in the same window-seat Fareis was occupying the last time, reading a book. It looks like one of the ones I was given, with the inlaid wood veneer cover. She’s found some elvish-style tight work trousers or leggings and a medium-length tunic with a bodice, and looks quite smart.

It’s night, but the windows are still open. It’s warm and there are smells of cooking spices and oils and things in the air. The pain swells again as I rise to full wakefulness. I don’t think it’s any better at all.

“Hi,” I say.

“Hey you.” She looks tired and worried. But then Lee’s old grin flashes through. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to hold your hand.”

“What?”

“Never mind.” She does put the book down and lean over me to untie the ribbons around my wrist again. “I assume you’re not getting a taste for elvish bondage?”

“You assume correctl— Ow fuck!”

“Sorry. Here, sit up.”

“Having said that, I’m not sure I’m getting any benefit out of being untied,” I mutter. “It’s not as if I can do anything with them. God, this sucks.” She helps with the pillows so I can sit up comfortably. It’s amazing just how much you do with your hands that you don’t even think about.

“I don’t know why they can’t put some kind of dressing on them,” Sam says. “At least, you know, so you’ve got some padding. They just say they have to have sea air.”

“Probably right.” I sit back against the pillows, having to breath a little heavily. “I just feel so drained.”

Sam resumes her place on the window seat. “I’m not surprised. Listen, I’ve been listening to them talking. They think it’s going to be a long time before you’re really well again. I mean, it could be weeks or months.”

I sigh. “She said something about decoupling tomorrow? I think that’s something to do with getting these out?”

Sam nods. “You’ve taken real damage though. And you’re going to take more when they do it. I think it’s going to be messy. No help from the Goddess.”

“Well, shit.” I close my eyes for a moment. I think it’s only a moment. “What’re you reading anyway?”

“Oh…” She picks up the book she’s been reading and shows me. “Fairy tales. Getting a culture upload.”

“Heh. Hey, you read Elvish?”

She raises her eyebrows, looking at me. “Apparently I do. Want me to read to you?”

“I think I can read.”

“Yeah, but you can’t turn pages, can you?” She smiles.

“Yeah,” I say after a pause. “I’d like that. Bit later though. I think I’m going to have to go to sleep again soon.”

Sam nods and puts the book down.

“Sam. Are you okay?”

“Not really.” Her voice is strained.

“Tell me.”

She shakes her head. “Don’t worry about it. You just need to get better.”

“Tell me what’s going on.”

Sam still hesitates.

“Sami, I’m not sure I trust Satthei Fareis,” I say, doubly careful to be speaking in English.

“She seems to be doing everything she can to help,” Sam says.

“I know. It’s just a feeling. Tell me what’s going on, please?”

So she tells me, and it’s pretty much what Fareis said: Lotan ran away, the fucker, and hasn’t been seen since. Meanwhile everyone just assumes Kerilas did it because he’s a dark elf. He might be executed. And no-one’s listening to Sam saying Kerilas had nothing to do with it. Obviously she’s under an enchantment, they’re saying. “I think they mean, like, Stockholm Syndrome or something. By any other name.”

“This is so fucked up.”

“Yeah,” Sam agrees.

“They’re going to execute him!” It doesn’t seem real. It’s like a joke or something. “I can’t believe Lotan ran away. That’s just so… It’s so weak.”

“He panicked. I probably would too if I’d just done something like that. Jalese dead and you looked really… You stopped breathing for a while.”

“Shit.”

“Don’t call the Goddess a bitch again, huh?”

“You think she understands English?”

Sam sighs. “Look on the bright side; at least I haven’t got PMT any more.”

“Heh.” Oh. She meets my gaze for a few moments, almost expressionless. “You okay?”

She nods. “Don’t worry, I’ve done my comedy gross-out scene. Shame you missed it really, it was quite tasteless. Vomit may have been involved.”

“Sam, I’m sorry—”

“It’s okay. Everything’s under control. Actually I feel a lot better. A lot more…” She mimes a calm sea. It’s a Jeodine gesture. “In control. I mean, yeah, I’m getting cramps in places I’m not supposed to have places, but it’s not too bad, I guess. Dunno what all the fuss is about, really.”

Grin. She’s covering again. Making light of it, as she always does. And maybe that’s really the best way, especially when there’s so much to hold together right now. She’s the only one of us who’s intact and functioning at this moment.

“We buried Jalese day before yesterday,” Sam says, changing the subject. “Sea burial.”

It makes me cry a little. “I miss her.”

“Yeah, she was a good ’un.”

“We really fucked up, didn’t we? We’re just shit at this.”

We sit in silence. I want to grieve for Jalese properly but my head is full of how much my hands hurt.

Sam says suddenly, “You know, I keep waiting for a funny little old guy to turn up.” She turns suddenly to sit along the window seat, so she can look outside. I think she might be crying, but she wants to hide it. “He’d tell us where the bad guys are. He’d tell us what we have to do, set us off on some quest so we can… So we can go home.”

I don’t know what to say.

“I just feel like we’ve been abandoned. I mean, what’s the point? Why do this to us? Why bring us here and just dump us?”