Chapter 16

Kestrel’s healing slumber kept being interrupted by visions. It was as if he were reliving a life not his own. What was it that he was seeing?

What had happened to him?

Kestrel was too weak and too weary to know or care. His body demanded rest. His subconscious knew that without it, he would die.

So he slept and his consciousness alternated between the inky void and the recollections of another life.

How long he stayed there, between the darkness and foreign memories, Kestrel didn’t know.

When he finally awoke, he found himself in an alien place. He was in a proper, albeit modest, bed for the first time in years.

Strange.

Kestrel passed out again. Again he found himself in a canyon of memories. Ones he knew weren’t his.

Just what exactly was he seeing as he slumbered?

He had no clue how much time had passed before he awoke again. this time to a bright afternoon sun beating down on his face. Kestrel heard a sound coming from behind him. When he turned, his body exploded in agony. Every muscle inside him protested the movement. His vision swam, but before Kestrel passed out, he saw the form of a young woman.

She was beautiful. He felt her come to his side as the darkness was swallowing him. She knelt down beside the bed and spoke indecipherable words into his ear. Kestrel lost consciousness before he could decode what she had said to him.

The next time Kestrel awakened, he found himself desperately missing the young lady’s company as a rough calloused hand prodded his side. His ribs protested in torment. He felt as if a silver bear had made a toy of him and the gruff bearded man was hardly any softer in his poking.

“What are you doing!? Who are you?!” Kestrel croaked. His throat burned at the effort. He sat up, trying to move away from the painful hands. Nausea overwhelmed him and he collapsed back into the bed, feeling like he’d been crushed by a boulder.

“Well, it’s good to see you up and healing. You have no idea how close to death you were,” The mysterious man said.

He had the bearing of a soldier and a large grey beard jutted from his hard chin.

Who was this man?

“Who are you? What happened to me?” Kestrel asked. Just voicing those words strained him and it seemed as if each word stripped power from his body.

“I saved your life, that’s what happened,” the old man stated matter-of-factly. “Do you remember anything?”

The question opened a floodgate in his mind and Kestrel cried in pain from the sudden rush of memories.

“What is this!?” Kestrel hissed under his breath.

The old man raised his eyebrows in response.

Soon though, Kestrel was able to recall what had happened to him and he let out a cry for Cillia. It tore his throat raw. He didn’t care. Cillia deserved to be mourned.

He deserved the pain for failing her.

He sobbed for ten minutes straight, shedding tears that he didn’t know he had in him. He thought he’d steeled himself and walled out the pain of death and suffering. He was wrong. The old bearded man watched silently. His eyes told Kestrel that he had experienced similar pain in his long lifetime.

“Sorry, there’s nothing we could do for the youngling. They took her body before we could reach her. It was a miracle in itself they didn’t kill you then and there. In fact if it wasn’t for his child, you’d probably be…”

“Would be what?” Kestrel’s head was still filled with cobwebs. It felt like there were a million spiders crawling around in his head and even now flashes of those visions that had plagued his dreams rattled around in his mind.

“Dead. You’d be dead young one. If not for his girl…” the old man seemed like he wanted to say something, but changed his mind. “I told myself that I wouldn’t get involved when I saw your scuffle, but the way she rushed to your side shamed me. Her actions gave me no excuse. Be sure to thank her whenever she comes for a visit.”

“Who was she?” Kestrel’s mind drifted back to that face haloed in sunlight. It’d been but a brief glimpse, but he remembered her beauty.

Her hair had been a deep black, it shone like a raven’s wings reflecting in the sunlight. Kestrel briefly caught sight of her eyes before he’d passed out. They had been brilliant green. He longed to see her again.

Kestrel hadn’t realized he’d stopped talking when his train of thought was interrupted by a low grumbling from the older man. The gruff voice sounded like the mountains personified.

“What?” Kestrel asked.

“It was nothing,” the old man muttered, then resumed his prodding of Kestrel’s body. He inspected every inch of his body and every place he looked hurt.

It took everything Kestrel had to keep from crying out in pain when the bearded man unwrapped the linens that had covered so much of his body and replaced them with clean ones.

Kestrel broke when the grizzly man prodded the wound on the back of his head. He howled, then promptly lost consciousness.

The next time Kestrel awoke, he was being bathed in bright noontime sunlight. The wrappings that had cover his body seemed to have decreased by at least half and his head that had pounded like a deep bass drum had dulled in intensity. It now feeling more like the military snare drum with its constant sharp jabbing.

“Hello?!” he called out, his dry voice cracked painfully.

There was no answer.

“Is anyone there?” he called out again to the silence.

An irrational fear gripped Kestrel as he examined his surroundings. Who was the old man that had rescued him? What did he want from him? Had he healed him just to use him for some nefarious purpose?

If there was one thing that Kestrel had learned in his life on the streets was that nothing was free. There was no such thing as philanthropy. Whoever helped you either expected something in return or was performing a religious duty to assuage whatever existential guilt they had accrued. Nobody was truly altruistic.

The cabin that Kestrel scanned was spartan. In the middle of the main room that Kestrel was housed in, there was a wood-burning stove that kept the place warm during the harsh Fiell winters. On the walls and above the door a small assortment of pots and pans hung.

Kestrel was shocked when he saw the small pile of books. Reading was a rich man’s activity. It was rare to find a common person with books, especially one as gruff as his savior.

Kestrel felt a pang of jealousy as he eyed the books. He knew the shorthand that was common among the plebeians, he’d made sure to learn it, but he wished to elevate himself. Reading opened new worlds inaccessible to one such him.

Maybe he could trick the old man into teaching him some letters.

“I was surprised too,” a distinctly feminine voice rang out.

Kestrel turned whipped around to find the source of the voice. His body protested the movement and he grimaced in pain. When had she entered the cabin?

“It’s her. She’s real,” Kestrel thought, his eyes finding hers.

“Hello, my name’s Sephira. It’s good to see you finally awake. I’m so sorry that I haven’t been able to visit you more often. I had a familial scare of my own, so I’ve been busy. I hope that you’re recovering well,” the young woman said with a smile that at once seemed both familiar and altogether alien in its warmth.

“Umm…hello…ma’am,” Kestrel replied, feeling like an idiot as he struggled for words.

Here was the woman that had apparently saved his life, and the best he could come up with was a shocked ‘hello’ as a reply.

What an idiot.

Kestrel soon checked himself and averted his eyes when he noticed her face reddening from his unbroken gaze.

He cursed himself for making her uncomfortable. He hadn’t meant to stare, but there was something about her that had made it impossible for him to keep his eyes off of. Her eyes held a deepness he hadn’t seen before. She was captivating.

She was beautiful.

“Sorry, I just was a little shocked,” Kestrel dropped his head, embarrassed.

“It’s okay. I should’ve announced my presence,” She said.

Kestrel’s heart jumped as he noticed her still flushed face.

“It’s good to see you healing up…I was worried you might not make it. To be honest I thought you had died from the beating that you took at the hands of those horrible men. I was so worried for you. It was a monstrous thing they did. It gives the city guards a bad name.”

Kestrel shot out a wad of spit at the mention of the guards, surprising himself and Sephira with the depth of his bitterness.

Those monsters had killed Cillia and taken her body.

A mixture of pity and anger crossed Sephira’s face. It was there for less than a second, but Kestrel caught it. What had that look meant?

Kestrel knitted his eyes in confusion. She clearly had been telling the truth when she’d denounced their violence as horrible, but it seemed like she had a personal investment in them. A lover perhaps? Kestrel’s stomach twisted at the thought, surprising him.

“I don’t even know her, why should I be jealous? I’m an idiot,” Kestrel thought.

Soon Sephira broke the awkward silence that’d grown between them. “Anyway, I’m glad to see you healing. Old man Wallace…”

Kestrel felt a tinge of shame at not already learning his protector’s name. Why hadn’t he asked the gruff man his name?

“…told me that you were completely out for nearly a week. There were knots in his stomach. He said every night felt like it might be your last. You have no idea how many times you came close to dying…Or at least that’s what Mr. Wallace told me. He said that the one or times you came to, you weren’t really there.”

Kestrel looked at her with quizzical eyes. “What do you mean?”

“Well I wasn’t there. I already told you that I had a family emergency. My uncle collapsed and no physicians knew what was the matter with him. I only had time enough for one visit during that time. What’s strange is you were mumbling just like he was.”

Kestrel tried to piece together just how long he’d been out, but the numbers hurt his head. Soon he had a headache.

“How long was I out for?” he finally asked.

“Close to three weeks,” come Sephira’s surprising response.

Had he really been at deaths door for that long? How had he survived? What were the foreign memories that plagued him? Why did Sephira seem so familiar? All the questions were starting to make that bass drum start pounding in his head again. He closed his eyes and tried to massage the pain away.

Save those questions for another time.

“I’m called Kestrel by the way,” he told the raven haired beauty, he was desperate to fill the awkward silence that had grown between them.

Why had he told her that? What would she care? She was obviously from a noble family. He was pretentious telling her his name.

“Kestrel?” she asked. “That’s an interesting name. It’s quite beautiful. Were you named after the bird?”

Kestrel nodded. He didn’t remember his real name. He’d lost it when he’d lost his junkie mother all those years ago. His name had faded from his memory just as her face had.

He’d been called ‘Boy’ for longer than he could remember, but Kestrel had always held an affinity for the birds that soared over the Fiell without a care in the world. They were a symbol of the freedom he aspired to.

He especially loved the raptors that lived in the area, and the Kestrel had appealed to him the most. It was a small bird, but it was fierce and noble. No matter how overlooked it may be, it was always strong, smart, and dangerous.

He’d taken it’s name. He aspired to be just like the little bird of prey.

“Did your parents give you that name?” Sephira asked.

Kestrel shook his head ‘no.’

“I never knew my father, and I barely remember my mother. She died a long time ago from either some disease she got at the brothel, or her addictions. I don’t know which. She had already abandoned me by then. It doesn’t really matter though. She never really was family. The only real family I had was taken from me at the hands of those guards,” Kestrel wasn’t sure why he was opening up so much to young lady, but the words spilled out from his mouth.

Tears formed at the corners of Sephira’s eyes. She felt a deep sympathy for the young man. “I also lost my family at a young age. My father was taken from me, and I don’t remember what happened to my mother. I’m just thankful that my uncle was there to take me in. I’m sure I’d be dead if it weren’t for him.”

Kestrel was startled at her revelation and even more surprised to find his heart aching for her loss. This Sephira woman was proving to be a deep well.

Kestrel found himself staring at Sephira for the second time, and apologized when she blushed and turned to start preparing the food she had brought from the market.

“Thank you,” he mumbled, embarrassed and unable to think of anything else to say.

Sephira shot a quick glance back at Kestrel and smiled inwardly as she noted the flush that had also crept across his face. At least she wasn’t the only one who was embarrassed and uncomfortable without knowing why.

“I need the practice anyway. My aunt and uncle tell me that if I don’t learn to cook for a man, I’ll never get one,” Sephira told Kestrel. “I secretly think that they don’t want that to happen though. They're ANNOYINGLY affectionate. You should see my uncle with his daughters. Everybody thinks that he’s a hard man, but when he’s not at work, he’s practically butter in our hands.”

Kestrel felt a pang of jealousy. All he’d ever wanted in his life was somewhere to belong. He couldn’t count the times he had looked on longingly when he’d seen happy families walking past him on the streets. Every smile and child’s giggle was like a knife stabbing into his side, reminding him of something he’d always wanted but would never have.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Sephira’s voice brought Kestrel back to the present.

He hadn't realized how long he’d zoned-out for. He gave her an apologetic smile.

“I was an idiot for talking about my family like that, especially right after you told me how you didn’t have one of your own. Forgive me?”

Kestrel nodded a ‘yes’, it hadn’t crossed his mind that she might be concerned about what she said around him. The only person who’d ever cared about what Kestrel had thought was Cillia.

She was dead now.

Kestrel wasn’t sure how to react to Sephira’s kindness. It was an alien thing to him.

Sephira began to chat with him. Desperate to break the awkward silence. She hadn’t realized how long they had been talking, when before she knew it, she had finished the soup Wallace had asked her to make for Kestrel.

She briefly searched for a bowl and then filled it and walked to Kestrel, who refused her offers to help spoon it into his mouth.

“This soup is good,” he said with an obvious struggle.

“What is it about men that compels them to be prideful idiots around us women?” Sephira’s eyebrows wrinkled in consternation as she watched Kestrel tremble from the simple act of raising the bowl to his mouth to sip the broth.

“It reminds me of…” Kestrel froze. His eyes glazed over and he let out a wail of pain.

The bowl dropped from his hands and piping hot broth spilled all over his body.