Will Graham was at home, burning. Flames licked around him as he moaned and thrashed and arched his back and tried to escape the ever-present heat. He was at the center of a ring of fire, shadowy figures pacing just out of sight. The stag was there, of course. He had come to expect its presence. It was reassurance that everything was all in his head. Which wasn't much help at the moment, but at least he knew – intellectually – that he wasn't burning alive. That didn't change the fact that he was mad with fear.
Suddenly the fire began to hiss and recede like a struck animal as a mist of cool droplets rained down from above. The stag, minutes before haloed eternally in flame, wailed and staggered away. Although its association in his mind was undoubtedly negative, for a minute, crazily, he wanted it back. And then he lost himself in the imagined rain and slept, for the first time in a long while, dreamlessly.