Adventure (part 22)

(Sorry a day late… my mistake!)

The boy with the glowing eyes disappeared shortly afterwards, just as the other boy had.

Keilen checked Tabatha, but her eyes were normal in color and it didn’t seem like she had a mark on her.

What was different? Mr. Fadgit had touched her when holding her hand. His own mark, Exeter’s and Maggie’s, appeared where their skin came in contact with Mr. Fadgit. So why wasn’t Tabatha marked? Why had her eyes not changed like his and Maggie’s?

Of course he was glad. No markings would make her return home and to her life easier. But did it mean anything? Did those who were marked have other purposes? If so, why, and what did it mean?

So many questions with no answers. Maybe he should have taken the time to ask Anabel more questions. Somehow he felt he would have not gotten answers. Maybe just more questions.

They were making their way back. Back to their dimension or reality. It was the beginning of summer and Keilen and Siri were discussing that fact.

“What’s so strange about it being summer?” Malachai asked.

“Last time we were gone for three months.” Siri answered.

“And for us it felt like two or three days.” Keilen added. “We don’t know how much time passed after we tried fighting Maximilian. This just might not be the same summer we left on, to start this mission.”

Their way back didn’t show significant changes on the road. It was hard to determine how much time actually passed.

Tabatha told them Maximilian was invited to her birthday party. He had put on an amazing puppet show. That night he came to her room and told her he wanted to take her somewhere special. Tabatha felt safe and went with him. She didn’t remember anything out of the ordinary along their journey and couldn’t recall how many days they had been travelling. When asked if she heard fighting outside the wagon or any of their voices, Tabatha just shook her head. Maximilian’s small band reached some place where they met with another man. As she described him, it was clear she was referring to Mr. Fadgit. Maximilian told her she should go with the other man and she agreed, though she did mention Maximilian looked sad when they parted. The other man told her he wanted to take her somewhere very special. She didn’t remember much afterwards until seeing the three of them around her.

As they were coming closer to Millhaven, already seeing the town in the distance, they could see something next to the road branching off towards the town. On a high poll, something was hanging, swaying slightly.

Keilen looked at Malachai and then down at Tabatha, with a worried expression.

“Tabatha,” Malachai started in his hoarse voice “there is something ahead that we would prefer you did not see.”

“I can pick you up until we pass it, if you like” Keilen offered, but the girl shook her head, putting her hand into Malachai’s large palm and promising she would look away or close her eyes.

There was no point in arguing. They continued.

As they came closer, the three of them could recognize the hanging figure. It was Farllen. Dead for more than a couple of days, but not yet rotting, despite the early summer weather. He had a sign stringed around his neck.

“What does it say?” Keilen asked quietly.

Malachai looked at him for a moment before replying. “Traitor” he stated flatly.

They continued towards the town, shielding Tabatha from the grotesque sight.

At the gates they were recognized by the guards, who let them in.

Inside, they decided to separate. It was early afternoon. Malachai took Tabatha to the ‘Endurance’, Siri decided to look for the sword master she had met before they had left on their mission and Keilen wanted to see Maru.

The children were playing in Shiba’s garden, jumping in a mud puddle, spraying each other and everything around them in a brownish slush. As soon as they noticed Keilen, they ran into his open, waiting arms. Keilen hugged them both, breathing them in, relishing in the moment, not caring that he was getting mud on himself as well. It wasn’t like he was actually clean before.

Nessy, the chicken, chuckled behind them, as if pouting about being left out.

Maru pulled back. “You were gone for two bells and… and…” he tried to count on his fingers.

“Two and a half weeks.” Maggie said quietly, as if translating Maru’s calculations.

That wasn’t so bad, Keilen thought to himself, all things considered. And it did include two and a half days of travelling south and then again back to Millhaven.

“I missed you” Keilen said, his words directed at both children.

“Me too!” Maru almost shouted in his excited state, “can we go play now?”

Keilen smiled and nodded. Maru was not dismissing him. It was just the way Maru was.

“Oh no you don’t! Both of you are going straight to the shower- this instant!” Shiba’s tone was non- negotiable.

The children ran off and Keilen got back on his feet, brushing off some of the mud. Shiba was standing on the porch, a smile on her lips, but Keilen noticed it did not reach her eyes.

“We found her. She’s okay.” Keilen answered the unasked question.

Shiba’s smile widened and she nodded gratefully.

“I guess a lot happened, even if we weren’t away for too long.”

“Yes, we’ll talk about it later, with the three of you.”

Keilen looked around the garden. Something seemed different, missing. “Where is Orso?” He asked softly.

Something cracked in Shiba’s posture.

She thrusted her chin out towards a two story house that neighboured her garden. “The house is empty ever since all the resistance members spread out on missions, or moved to other locations.” Her eyes didn’t meet Keilen’s.

The silence between them stretched.

“How long?” He asked.

Shiba shrugged. “Since you brought him back. He is physically here, but it’s like he doesn’t want to be here. He had always tried his hand in brewing. I threw him out when the stench of his onion experiments was unbearable. He took all his things there. That was last year. Now he has been there since you left.” Her eyes were glistening with unshed tears. “Orsa is keeping an eye on him. I leave some food on the front porch every day. Sometimes only the flies enjoy it.”

Keilen’s jaw twitched. “I’ll go talk to him.”

“You can try, most of the time he’s unconscious.”

Keilen looked over at Shiba. She helped so many and yet here she was, helpless on how to help her own child. Orso was not a small boy by any measure, but for her, he would always be her child.

‘I can only truly lose by not even trying’ Keilen thought.

Coming close to the porch, Keilen noticed Orsa the bear outside one of the windows. She looked at him, moaned softly and returned to her post.

The foul smell was already present outside, but it almost made Keilen gag when he opened the front door. For a moment he was thrown to the stinking storage room in which he had been locked in on the slave ship. He rubbed the sides of his head with his fists and stepped inside.

It took a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the gloom. The place was a mess. Not just the neglect of an abandoned house, the soles of his boots stuck to the flooring, making a gross sucking sound with every step. There were glass and metal containers of different sizes all around, some with a bubbling liquid that only continued to enhance the putrid smell.

Orso was lying naked on his back on the filthy floor. His soft snores told Keilen he was alive. Keilen grimaced at the sight. Orso probably had not showered since that day he used his mother’s soap in the horse’s trough.

Turning around, Keilen walked out and back to Shiba’s garden. Picking up a bucket and filling it with water, he made his way back to Orso.

Standing as close as was safe from unexpected movements, he splashed the whole bucket on Orso’s face.

Orso woke up coughing and sputtering ”what the fuck?!”

“Time to wake up!” Keilen said calmly.

“Leave me alone.”

“I’m going to fetch another bucket.”

“Okay! Okay! I’m awake!” Orso moaned. “For what good, I have no idea…”

Keilen squatted next to him, giving him some time to come to his senses, at least partially. No doubt he was drunk.

“You know there are people who love you, care for you and are worried about you?”

“Whatever…” Orso slurred out.

“Is this what you want to do with your life?!”

Orso shrugged. “What does it matter? This whole resistance, all they’re trying to do- for what?! It’s useless!”

“Everyone needs something to keep them going, especially in rough times.”

“This keeps me going!” Orso raised a flask that just might have been stuck underneath him. “Want some?” He offered it to Keilen.

“No!” Keilen answered sternly. He never took to alcohol.

Orso shrugged, starting to bring the flask up to his lips. In a lightning- quick move, Keilen slapped it out of Orso’s hand, causing it to fly and crash on a nearby wall.

“What was that for?! That was one of the best brews I made!”

“Enough! Let’s get you cleaned.” Keilen made to pull Orso up.

“I can manage on my own!” Orso pouted, starting to push himself up unsteadily.

Keilen kept close, in case Orso lost his balance.

As they walked outside, Orsa peeked at them silently.

Orso half stumbled to the trough. As he made to bend to it, he slipped and crashed head first into the water. Keilen quickly pulled him so his head was out of the water and was soon met with a snore. Orso was out cold in the water.

Keilen sighed. There was nothing he could do right now. He pulled the large man so that he sat in the water, his head and arms out of the water.

Orsa came to stand next to him.

“You keep watch his head doesn’t go underwater.” Keilen told her.

She nudged his hand, licking it with her rough tongue and moved to place herself as Orso’s guardian.

*****

Maru and Keilen were playing with the building blocks again. This time they were trying to build the tallest tower with as many blocks balancing on each other, without it coming crashing down.

As Keilen picked the child up to add a block, to the now taller than Maru tower, Maru looked at the bookshelf on the wall in front of him.

There were a dozen or so books with leather covers arranged neatly on the shelf.

“Will you teach me to read?” Maru suddenly asked.

“I can’t.”

“Why not?!” Maru’s face and voice seemed offended.

Keilen chuckled. “Because I don’t know how to read and write.” He spread his hands to the sides in surrender.

The boy’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “You don’t?”

Keilen shook his head. “I grew up on a small farm. We needed working hands. I was always told it was enough if I could count my coppers.”

“You think Shiba can teach me?”

“Maybe. We can ask her. Maybe Maggie would like that too.”

*****

It was late. They decided to get an early night’s sleep and meet the next morning on the ‘Endurance’.

The children were already sleeping and so were Shiba and Siri. At least there was total silence from their rooms. Malachai and Tabatha were staying on the ‘Endurance’ for the night and Keilen hadn’t seen Sun since they returned.

He had come to a final decision. He just hoped he wouldn’t get cold feet once he reached the actual act.

He had finalized it on their way back, but earlier, after he tried to talk any kind or amount of sense into Orso, he came to the conclusion he wasn’t going to wait any longer.

No ‘Sorrow Thorn’, which he had no access to. No tattoo, which would demand he reveal parts of himself to people he didn’t know or trust.

Keilen checked the blade’s edge of the dagger he had pushed into the flames of Shiba’s hearth.

It was already gleaming red.

A flashback of Marcus standing over him with the red hot branding iron caused his heart rate to peak. He steadied himself with deep breaths.

Listening again for any signs of someone awake, he was met with peaceful silence. Only a cricket in the garden broke the quiet every once in awhile.

Keilen took his shirt off. Immediately his eyes moved to Marcus’s mark, on his right upper forearm. Again he breathed in deeply. Rolling a leather strap, he stuffed it in his mouth, biting into it.

He picked up the dagger in his left, his dominant hand. Standing back against the wall, he would mark his right upper arm with two lines from each side of the dagger’s end edge. Hopefully he would manage to get it done.

Breathing deeply again, stress causing his nostrils to flare, he brought the dagger to his upper arm, just below the shoulder. He moaned once as he felt the heat radiating from the red metal.

Then, with final determination, he touched the searing edge to his skin.

The pain was blinding. His scream came out as a moan through his clenched teeth on leather. His eyesight blurred and nose started dripping.

He breathed a few ragged breaths. He must get the second line done or he’ll lose his courage.

Tightening his grip on the dagger’s hilt after turning it to the other side, he almost immediately touched the unused side to his skin, just a small distance away from the first line.

Another muffled scream escaped him. This time he let the dagger slip from his grasp and fall to the stone floor. His knees buckled and he also slid down the wall until he was sitting on the cool floor.

The pain was immense and he was groaning with each exhale. He slid to his left until he lay curled on his side, his left hand grasping the middle of his right arm, below the branding, in an attempt to ease the pain.

Keilen closed his eyes.

He thought of Danya and Willow. His mind was forcing the last terrible picture he had of them- dead. But he was mentally fighting himself to remember earlier times. Pure, simple memories of their lives.

‘For you… for you…’ he kept chanting to himself. ‘I will never forget you…’

Time passed. The pain slowly subsided. The lines still throbbed, but it was bearable.

Keilen pushed himself back to sitting. The dagger’s blade was still hot. He picked it up and slowly rose to his feet. Swaying slightly, he walked over to the table, on which a water bucket stood waiting. He dropped the dagger in and it hissed as it touched the water, steam rising.

Scooping up water in his left, he dripped it over the branding, winching once again as the water touched the raw flesh.

Only then did he carefully pull the leather out of his mouth, passing his tongue around and drinking some water.

Keilen returned everything to its rightful place. Carefully he put his shirt back on, biting his lower lip when the sleeve touched his brands. Holding the cloth with the fingers of his left, he lay down in his bed.

It took time until sleep came to him that night.