Whispers She Heard

Наташа Айверс, Natasha Ajvers

Whispers She Heard

PROLOGUE

I woke up screaming.

For a moment, I couldn't see or hear anything. It was as though I'd been buried deep underground, in a place where I couldn't tell up from down, surrounded by darkness and silence. Then I became aware of the cold creeping beneath my clothes, making my skin prickle.

There was a sound, too. Something faint and strange, almost like wind rustling through leaves. But it wasn't coming from outside. It seemed to be coming from somewhere inside my head, a soft, persistent whisper.

Shhhh...

Suddenly, I felt a hand grip my shoulder and shake me hard. The sensation vanished almost immediately, and the room came back into focus.

I sat bolt upright, gasping for breath and struggling to remember where I was. The cabin was bitterly cold. The fire in the woodstove had gone out, and the window was fogged with condensation. My heart was pounding, and I could barely catch my breath. I realized I'd instinctively raised my hands in front of my face, as though trying to protect myself from something.

That was when I noticed the dark stains covering them.

Faint moonlight filtered through the window, just enough for me to see that both my hands were smeared with some kind of dark liquid. I slowly brought them closer to my face. I recognized the smell immediately, though it took me a moment to believe it.

Blood.

It covered my hands from wrist to fingertip. The blood beneath my fingernails had dried to an almost black crust, while the blood on my palms was still wet and sticky.

"What the hell..." I whispered, my voice catching in my throat.

I threw off the animal hide I'd been sleeping beneath and scrambled out of bed, looking frantically around the cabin. The wooden bench, the floor, the cold stove—everything was exactly where it should have been.

I turned toward the door, suddenly unsure whether I'd remembered to lock it before going to sleep. The bolt was still firmly in place.

I went to the window. Only the small upper pane could be opened, and it stood slightly ajar, letting in the freezing night air. Beyond the glass, the darkness was almost complete. I could barely distinguish the outlines of the trees, and somewhere in the distance, a few dogs were barking.

I crossed to the bucket beside the door and plunged my hands into the water, breaking through the thin layer of ice that had formed on its surface. The water immediately turned dark, and the sharp, metallic smell of blood rose from it.

The pounding in my temples grew worse.

I had no memory of leaving the cabin. No memory of getting out of bed at all. Had I somehow injured myself? Where could all that blood have come from?

I scrubbed my palms and fingers, digging the dried blood out from beneath my nails, then carefully examined myself for injuries. I checked my head, my stomach, my arms and legs, running my hands over every part of my body I could reach.

There were no wounds, no bruises, not even a scratch.

Which meant the blood wasn't mine.

"Then whose blood is it?" I whispered. "What did I do? Where was I? Did I go outside? Was I sleepwalking?"

What if someone was lying outside the cabin, injured and bleeding? What if I'd gone out there in my sleep and somehow hurt them?

Or worse, what if I'd...

I couldn't bring myself to finish the thought.

The possibility that I'd hurt someone badly enough to end up covered in their blood made me feel sick. For a moment, I could hardly breathe. Then I rushed to the door, pulled back the bolt, and stepped outside.

A blast of freezing air struck my face, carrying the smell of woodsmoke and pine. Snow crunched beneath my bare feet, and I realized I'd forgotten to put on my boots. I hardly noticed the cold as I searched the ground around the cabin.

A light snowfall had left the ground untouched and white. There were no bloodstains, no human footprints, not even the tracks of an animal.

Nothing to suggest that anyone had been there at all.

Standing in the snow, I suddenly remembered Tuyara's warning that I was not to leave the cabin before sunrise.

I hurried back inside, bolted the door, and got the woodstove going again before climbing back into bed.