Chapter 27

At the end of that first day, Kestrel lumbered into the guards barracks, ripped off his trousers, then made his way to the barracks’ washroom where he stoked the fires that heated the large square bath that set in the middle of the tiled room and, with a loud sigh, settled into the steaming water.

Kestrel winced as the heated bath worked like a masseuse and loosened his tightened and aching muscles. His back and abdomen felt like they’d been twisted together in an unending knot. He hadn’t known how sore he was until the water started working its magic in relieving the stress that had built in him.

Kestrel had been surprised by the technique that went into a simple punch, to hit effectively wasn’t just a matter of winging your fist at your enemy. No, to throw even the most simple of punches properly one had to have their whole body work in unison.

If the feet weren’t placed properly, then the punch would have no power, if one threw the punch before twisting their hips, then the punch would be slow and easily intercepted. Everything had to work in harmony.

To box was to train the whole body.

Kestrel’s arms ached from his poor form.

Kestrel sighed as the stiffness seeped from him while the hot water did its work and acted as his personal physician.

The water not only relaxed his stiffened muscles, but loosened the memories Kestrel had tightly locked.

It was little more than four months ago he had been living on the streets, barely making enough to feed himself and Cillia.

Cillia.

Cillia truly was gone.

He had run from her death.

At first he’d focused on his recovery. Then his tutelage under Wallace had been his excuse for avoidance. His burgeoning relationship —or whatever it was—with Sephira was another way to avoid the pain that threatened to overwhelm Kestrel if he ever stopped. Now the training with Aris was his latest escape from reality.

But now, as the water seeped the pain from his wounds, it too released the memories. He couldn’t run anymore.

Tears began to leak from Kestrel’s eyes. At first he thought that it had been water dripping off of him from the hot bath, but soon he was sobbing as the weight of what had happened truly hit him for the first time since the attack that’d taken Cillia’s life.

Cillia was gone.

She was dead.

How was he supposed to deal with that?

Kestrel felt like an idiot and he tried to stop the tears from falling to no avail. No matter what he did they kept falling and soon his ribs were aching from the sobs that wracked him.

Kestrel had learned quickly that any sign of weakness could get you killed on the streets. One time he’d seen a boy —not much younger than himself— who’s family had recently died and one of the thieves guilds had found him crying outside of his family estate, which had been taken by debtors and the boy had beguiled him into joining their guild. The guild ended up using his knowledge of his family’s holdings to steal everything they could, promising him a reward for his help. After their robbery, they had slit the boy’s throat and tossed his body into the Trout River.

Where Kestrel had grown up, any sign of weakness could very easily get you killed and here he was, tears bubbling from his eyes like that of a baby.

He was a fool.

Still the tears continued and Kestrel faced the emptiness inside of him that Cillia’s death had created. His life had forced him to abandon any hope of love. His addict of a mother, who he was sure was long dead due to her substance abuse, had abandoned him in chase of any high she could find.

That had shown him from an early age what it felt like to be unwanted.

To be abandoned.

To be unloved.

When he had found Cillia abandoned and crying in the street, the wall around his heart had begun to chip. To Kestrel’s shame, he’d initially walked away, praying that someone else would find her, but his conscience hadn’t let him abandon her.

He had gone up to her, and offered some of the bread he was carrying. She hadn’t even seen the bread and had immediately wrapped her arms around him.

She hadn’t let go until she had cried herself to sleep.

Kestrel’s heart had flooded with an emotion that he had thought he’d banished in that moment. Love.

He had promised to himself to do everything in his power to save Cillia from the streets that had corrupted him. He would protect her from the darkness of the world.

Those first couple of days Cillia wouldn’t leave his side and he had bruises around his neck from how tight she had clung to. She had to be pried off of him. Cillia had soon brightened though, and despite his fears, the young girl who had cried herself to sleep in his arms upon their first meeting had become an irrepressible optimist.

Wherever she went, Cillia had brought joy and happiness.

Her death had split Kestrel’s world apart.

It was only now though, that he’d come to face the gaping hole her passing had left in his heart.

If he wasn’t able to protect her despite his best efforts, could he ever be trusted to protect anyone?

How could Kestrel love again when he had failed the only person he had ever cared for so badly? It was his fault she had ran away and been caught by those city guards who had split her head. It was his fault that Cillia was dead.

Kestrel’s blossoming feelings for Sephira frightened him. What if he failed her like he had failed Cillia?

Was love worth the pain that it brought?

Kestrel wasn’t sure how long he stayed in the bath, but when he left it, his whole body was wrinkled like that of an old man.

He felt simultaneously lighter, but more wearied than he had been in ages.

The weight of caring pressed down on him like a vise. He had done his best to fight it and avoid it, but it wouldn’t leave him now. The life of solitude he had once had was now broken. He’d become a part of something bigger than himself.

Kestrel was startled to find just how much he cared and it terrified him, but at the same time was somehow freeing.

*****

Kestrel fell asleep almost as soon as his head hit the old lumpy pillow —a luxury he wished to never go without again— on the hard padded barracks bedding. Kestrel had been surprised that some of the soldiers who complained about their beds. To him it felt as if his body were sinking into the gigantic mountain snow-drifts. He’d couldn’t recall sleeping on something so soft ever before.

When sleep took him, so did the dreams. Many of the memories from Dren that he’d soaked in like a sponge would drip into his mind and manifest themselves in his sleep as alien visions.

Kestrel’s dream brought him to a tavern. He was lamenting a bad day with a large tankard of Spruce-Ale, an alcoholic beverage that ingeniously used sap from the common evergreen tree to give the drink an odd, tangy, but delicious flavor. He was so absorbed in his thoughts that he didn’t realize that someone had taken up a seat next to him and ordered the same saying, “I’ll have the same as my comrade here! If it’s good enough to quiet a young man in such a rowdy bar, it must be worth every coin.”

Dren looked up to see an average sized, but well built, black haired military man sitting beside him. His lip turned in disgust at the sight of the uniform.

“I know, the colors are pretty atrocious, aren’t they?” the soldier grinned with such a warm and inviting smile that Dren felt himself being drawn in despite himself.

“What’s your name?” he asked the soldier after a couple seconds of hesitation.

“My name’s Van. Van Ravenscroft. And you?”

“Dren.”

“You got a family name Dren?” Van nodded thanks to the bartender that had delivered the large tankard of Spruce-Ale to him.

“Not for a stranger.”

“I’m not a stranger, you already know my name, so we’re practically brothers,” Van smiled and took a large swig of the ale. “Emperors balls! That might just be the best ale I’ve ever had! I understand why you were so enthralled with it!”

“Yeah, there’s only one other tavern that serves Spruce-Ale, and the boss there happens to be the little brother of the owner of this place,” Dren replied, chuckling despite himself. “Also, are you allowed to say that as a soldier?”

Van’s eyes knitted in confusion. “Say what?”

“Use the Emperor as a curse-word.”

“Oh that,” Van laughed. “It has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it? Anyway, that old fart is powerful enough that I doubt someone using his genitalia as an expletive is gonna hurt him. Besides, that’s pretty tame compared to some of the other expletives I know. Wanna hear some of them?”

Dren laughed in response.

This Van person was completely different than any other soldier he had ever met. Before he knew it, they night was halfway gone and they were still talking.

He felt like he’d found a long lost brother.

Van had told Dren everything about himself. He explained how his younger brother had recently joined the service, and how they had escaped an abusive father. Before the night ended, Dren knew that he had made a friend for life.

The visions shifted again.

Van was telling him about the beautiful young woman that he’d recently met and, how, upon laying his eyes on her, he knew that he would marry her. The moment he had met her, he had strode up to her and introduced himself as her soon to be husband.

She laughed at him and walked away, but he had found where she worked and had gone back every day since then with a new gift each day. He was wearing down her defenses.

Van was sure of it.

Something nagged at Kestrel’s mind.

Why did the woman Van talked about seem so familiar? Why did his life feel divided when he mentioned her.

Who was this woman?

When Kestrel woke, his eyes were red from crying, and not from Cillia this time.

*****

“You missed me that much?” Wallace poked fun at Kestrel, grunting while he unwound the bandage that wrapped his injured shoulder.

Kestrel grimaced at the sight of the large tear of flesh from where the crossbow bolt had pierced the older man’s shoulder. It was a miracle that Wallace hadn’t died.

Kestrel had seen enough disputes between rival thief guilds to know how dangerous even the smallest bolt could be in the hands of an experienced bowman.

Those that didn’t die from the shot often completely lost function of their affected limb, the bolts having torn through a number of the prominent nerve bundles housed in the wounded area.

It was only the expert care that Wallace had received that kept him from the same fate so many less fortunate souls had suffered.

“First you’re wiping tears from your eyes, and now you’re grimacing at the sight of me. You know how to make an old man feel special, don’t you?” Wallace joked in his odd rumbling tone. “It’s the memories, isn’t it?”

Kestrel nodded silently and splashed the cold water from the barracks washing basin in his face, the shock of the icy water on his skin secured his wakeful state.

“It’s like I’m living someone else’s life, I feel what they feel. Their pain hurts me, their loneliness tears at my heart, their loves remind me of how empty I am. Why would anyone in the world want that for themselves?” he asked.

“Because; despite what you may believe about how the world has tainted you by the lot you’ve been given, you, Kestrel, are still a gentle person, you have the heart of a protector.”

Did the old man really mean that?

He was a fool.

“I don’t think it’s even crossed your mind about just how much power you actually wield,” Wallace explained. “You’ve seen the enormous wealth that those who run the guilds have. How do you think they get it? They usually have Memory Mages in their employ. Any smart business main will pay a pretty penny to employ a Memory Mage like you. Though we’re few, our services are one of the best worst kept secrets out there.”

Kestrel leaned in to listen to the gruff soldier’s explanation.

“Anyone who’s someone will know of us, but the rest of the world is unaware of our existence. Our powers are far more than just a nuisance. By using one’s memories, we can shape the world to how we see fit. Seeing ones memories can be a curse, and maybe it truly is one, but we can change the course of history. We have the power to reshape the world. Never forget that.”

Kestrel shivered at the thought. He had never stopped to consider what exactly it was that the older man was tutoring him in.

He had known its usefulness from the moment he’d come to realize the power he possessed, but he it had never crossed his mind that others like him were paid to stay behind the scenes and shape the society they lived in.

How many officials held their power because of Memory Mages used for blackmail? Hold a man’s memory, and you held their perception of the world.

What about Aris? What would he do if he knew of my ability? Would I become a tool to him? Or does he already know that I have this power and the only reason he’s training me is to make me into a weapon he can wield to gain further acclaim? Can I really trust him? The thoughts suddenly seized Kestrel in their vise-like grip, stopping him in his tracks.

“What is it?” Wallace asked the younger man, reading the conflict on his face.

“Do you think Aris knows? Is he just training me to be some sort of tool for himself to wield against his enemies?” a hint of bitterness crept into Kestrels voice.

He wanted to believe the best about the General, but trust got people killed in the streets.

A look of anger flashed over Wallace’s features, startling Kestrel. He had never seen that look on the gruff man before. Even when they had made their desperate escape to Aris’ estate, Wallace hadn’t shown any sign of anger as he took the lives of the mercenaries payed to hunt them down. It had just been a cold agreement between veteran soldiers that whoever fell first was the lesser man.

“Don’t ever speak of Aris like that! He’s better than that! His brother sacrificed his life to keep him from our world, and I intend to uphold that sacrifice. If you try to drag Aris down into our world, you can find yourself another teacher. Do you understand me?!”

Kestrel winced at the words.

He was taken aback by the steel in the old captain’s voice. There was no give in his statement.

He knew Wallace’s words weren’t a threat but rather a promise.