The headaches were getting worse. Each day, he awoke with a pounding in his head, and voices in the back of his conscious that left him confused and shaken.

Why was he hearing voices? Was he losing his mind? Was something wrong with his head? His father had told him of creatures getting growths on their bodies, a sickness, and sometimes they could grow in the skull and cause madness and pain.

Was he sick?

So many questions filled his head, and so much pain occupied his thoughts, that Phrixos felt that his skull would literally crack in two.

And then where would he be? He told May nothing of this, and would wander away from her at night to think. But now he was afraid. Afraid that something was really wrong, and it wasn't just his old nightmares of drowning anymore.

The pain was unbearable at times, but he managed to keep his usual smiling facade when around the pretty white wolf. But now with the voices he kept hearing....It was enough to drive him crazy.

Even now, they whispered. Constantly in the back of his head, he heard snatches of voices that he shouldn't have been able to hear. Sometimes there was nothing, most times there were many of them, tangling in his head like vines in the forest.

What was he supposed to do?

For a moment, he pondered turning back....Going home. His father could heal him....maybe.....couldn't he? It was an unsure thing, and he couldn't go home yet. He hadn't found....whatever it was he had been looking for since leaving his pack.

And still, he was ever pulled East by something deep inside him, as if his body was a magnet seeking it's opposing polarity to cling to.

Even though neither of them truly knew which way they were going, Phrixos knew in his heart that his paws took him towards whatever destination he sought.

And currently his paws were wandering of their own accord, leading him, half asleep, towards the sunrise. Blinking, he stopped and looked over his shoulder, realizing that he'd traveled a good mile or two from his sleeping May without even knowing.

His tail drooped, and he scratched at the dirt in frustration, the pain behind his eyes nearly blinding him. The big male let out a pathetic whine that coalesced into a half-howl, half-yelp of pain before he turned around and started back towards the pretty white female at a fast lope.

Would this end if he reached his destination? Where did his body want him to go? Why?

More questions!! It made him furious, filled him with frustration. He was worried, angered, annoyed, and constantly in pain now. His largest fear, however, was losing the pretty white wolf whose company he had grown to thoroughly enjoy. Her presence eased his pain, and he didn't want her to think he was crazy, or sick.

If only he knew what was wrong with him.

Suddenly a piercing cry in his brain stopped him dead, sending him tumbling to the dirt in pain. A voice was screaming in his head!! He pushed his head against the ground, eyes and nose filling with dirt as he tried to push the voice away, the awful cry of what could only be something dying.

It felt like his skull would burst. The whole thing seemed to last for an eternity, making his body shake and quiver in agony.

Suddenly there was blessed silence, and Phrixos laid there as the cry ended, trembling and terrified, his lungs fighting to get air into his body.

The crack of a branch breaking startled him and he jumped, his head whipping around to witness an owl alighting on a tree branch, a heavy rabbit in its thick talons. He met the owl's wise old gaze and it let out a satisfied hoot before digging into its meal.

Phrixos didn't spare another glance at the bird of prey, instead closing his eyes until the blinding brightness of the moon didn't cause him anymore pain.

It didn't click. If he had been more awake, less confused and conflicted, maybe he would have put two and two together, but not in his half-zombie, pain-filled state.

As he rose to his feet again, shaky and weak, he continued back towards the makeshift den where he had left May at a much slower pace, not realizing that he had just heard the scream of the rabbit as it had died, not only with his ears, but also in his head.