As told, many of the travellers suffered in this way; and both Garth and Layla, during snatches of sleep, they also knew bad dreams. But mainly, having finally come together, their dreams were plagued by a single, recurrent theme: the fear of losing each other…Garth’s of being snatched away from Layla into a hellish, mindless half-world, unable to return to her, and Layla’s of losing him to the fly-by-nights—amounting to much the same thing. But in fact since leaving the Southern Refuge contacts with the mutated vampires had on average been limited to just two or three per week: many sightings of individuals and small groups, half-a-dozen skirmishes and kills by the outriders, four savage attacks in which five men had lost their lives…all of which culminating in the massed onslaught by the swarm in the ruined town: the clan’s worst ever losses, which once again had woken up every traveller anew to the never-ending threat of the fly-by-nights. Garth had learned several valuable lessons that night, not least from Singer’s malicious, vengeful behaviour: the way the bully had left him short of equipment, out of contact with his colleagues, utterly alone and vulnerable in the dark of night.
