Chapter 7: Carys

My head pounds and my ears ring. Rhydian tries to get my attention, but his pleas are drowned out by the sound of my mum's voice in my head. I can't handle it. She's trying to help me, I know that. But why is she acting this way now? 'Stop pushing your problems down,' she says. 'Deal with them. You need to get away, these people don't want you here, they don't care about you. Not the way that I do.' Her voice gets louder and louder, it layers over itself so all I can hear is a mess of the same voice. Then, she gets mean. The words stop forming properly and become gibberish. She starts shouting, and then screaming. Then my shouting becomes screaming and Rhydian has to put me down on the ground in the middle of the woods, it's only now I realise he was carrying me; I've had my eyes closed the whole time. I open them for a moment, and I swear I see her standing in front of me in wolf form, baring her teeth and growling at me. I scream and close my eyes again. "PLEASE!" I yell out. "Rhydian, get me out of here, I don't want to see her. Not when she's like this."

"Just breath Carys." I shake my head. "There's no one there. Open your eyes." I feel Rhydian's hands squeezing my arms, he shakes me gently.

"No, I can't, not if she's here." My hands find their way to his and I grip tightly.

"I promise you're safe, there's no one there. Open your eyes, Carys."

I silently count to three, take a deep breath and I open my eyes. She's not there anymore, I look around me, making sure she really is gone. Her voice has gone too. He was right. And I'm crazier than I thought.

"What happened?" Rhydian says. I look at him and he looks so worried. I don't want to tell him I'm hearing voices and now seeing things. But he probably thinks I'm a basket case anyway. I don't answer him, I just look at him. The cold wind makes the tears on my face feel like icicles, I wipe them away. "Let's go take a walk." He stands and helps me to my feet.

We walk around the village for hours. I decide to tell him about my nightmares, not in too much detail. I just tell him that I sometimes see my mum and that I think what just happened might have been a similar thing. I don't tell him about when I hear her voice or her song. He'll think I'm crazy. He tells me about his nightmares too, I guess we have more in common than I first thought, but at least he's not losing his mind.

We get back to the Kafe at about 10:30 pm - it's a Friday so they're open late- but I can't bring myself to go in. Jana is going to know that something's wrong, she can see straight through me, and I don't know how to explain myself. I've never felt like I can't talk to her about things. Apart from the stuff about my mum, but I don't talk about that with anyone.

"It's okay," Rhydian takes my hand. I'm still nervous but he makes me feel a little bit better. Jana sees me straight away and gets up from the table to run to me.

"What happened?" She asks, putting one hand on my neck and the other on my face, wiping away some of the tears that started streaming out of my eyes the second I saw her.

"I'll let you guys talk," Rhydian says. I'm sure he wants an explanation too, but he has enough respect for me to leave us to it.

"Carys?"

"Nothing, it's just I can't handle all of this, the stress is getting to me. Ava wants us to live with her and she's not going to rest until she gets her way. She knows where the pack's camp is, there's no way Ceri and Gerwyn will move the whole pack just for me. Anyway, Ava knows how to find me on instinct and scent alone." Jana looks at me in shock. "We just have to let this happen, she's probably going to call social services and they'll take me into care until she gets what she wants. She's calling it a fight, but I don't have a legal guardian so there's no one to fight with."

"You can get a job when you're 16, with Segolia, you can move out, she can't force you to stay there. You're so strong and resilient, you'll get through this." If only could see how weak I really am. If only she saw what happens in my head when I'm alone.

We sit down with the others, Rhydian has explained what happened at Ava's to the others, but I don't think he told them what happened after. It played on my mind throughout the day. While the others talked about what we were going to do about Ava, I was thinking about the others thinking I'd lost it. I have, I'm hearing voices, seeing things. Just as Jana starts saying something, I hear the voice again. 'They don't care that much, stop caring what they think. Especially her,' she says.

"Leave me alone," I say. And I realise I said it out loud. To Jana.

"Carys?" Jana questions.

"Sorry, what?"

"I just asked if you wanted a drink," she looks confused, I look round at everyone else, they all look confused. Apart from Rhydian, who looks like he knows exactly what's happening in my head, and that scares me.

"Sorry, I can't- I have to get out of here," I get up and leave. I hear Jana stand up to follow me.

"Let her be, Jana. She just needs space to think," Rhydian says.

I walk out into the village, normally I'd be inclined to run to nature, but I feel like that's where everything gets bad. So, I walk around the village until I can't anymore. Her voice gets louder. She tells me to fix the mess I keep making. She tells me to be with her. She tells me I know what I have to do. She tells me I'm stupid if I don't know what she means, and I don't know what she means.