The moment Kanrel stepped into the kitchen area behind the counter, a wave of heat and smells struck him. Two women toiled hard in such heat, one often by the stove, stirring whichever pot happened to have soup or stew in it at any given moment; the other walking between two tables, one where she washed vegetables and the other where she prepared them for another pot of stew. One of the women must have been Jork's wife, and the other, he could not say.
At first, he didn't pay much attention to either one, and instead followed Jork through the kitchen and to a door that led to Jork's and his wife's living quarters, but then he got a better view of the woman washing the vegetables. And he found himself stopping just before stepping through the open door.
She was quite tall. Taller than he was. And she wore a solemn expression as she focused on the task at hand, as though there was nothing else in this world but this. Her hair was black, braided so as not to get in the way. And her eyes were a bright blue, like a lake on a cloudless day. At first sight, she had seemed much younger, but the way that she carried herself spoke of many years of work. In fact, she must have been as old as Kanrel, or maybe even older.
Kanrel's brows furrowed. She seemed familiar, but before he could place a name to her face, Jork tapped him on the shoulder, making Kanrel move his gaze away from the working woman and onto the man, who looked at him with curiosity.
"You hungry still?"
Kanrel shook his head. "No, not at all, I just... tried to remember something, or someone."
Jork smiled. "I know the feeling, good man... I fear that it comes with age. Half forgetting and barely remembering, but worry not, in the end you'll remember. It ain't like you're sick or something..." he said, then his smile faded slightly. "Right?"
Kanrel scoffed, then gestured for the man to lead the way. Jork grinned and led them through the door, where a quiet home awaited, more than enough for two, or even more, but clearly only inhabited by Jork and his wife. The noise of the tavern and the kitchen turned muffled and almost fully quiet the moment the door was closed behind them.
They walked down a homely corridor with a few doors on either side; against the walls, there were shelves and even a painting of a boy and his parents. Kanrel stared at it in passing, but it didn't go unnoticed. "Our boy, Rowen, he studies in Lo'Gran, wants to be a scholar or something." Jork stopped by a door and stared at Kanrel. "He could've studied here in Atarkan, but he fancies himself a man of politics, says that even a son of a tavernkeep like him could make great changes in the world..."
"And you disapprove?"
"Of course! It'd be much easier to stay and study in Atarkan... he could even help with the tavern!"
"Yet you paid for his studies?"
"Well, of course... The lad has great aspirations, and I'm not one to stifle them for him. He's gotta figure out his own life for himself!" Jork grinned.
Kanrel scoffed. "Have you told him that?"
Jork's grin died, and he managed to look sheepish. "Well... I did try, once or twice, but he was busy and so was I... Didn't really have the time to tell him that."
"Then the next time you do see him, tell him; I think he'd appreciate such words."
Jork nodded. "I'm sure he'll come by when he has the time..."
Kanrel frowned. "Then write him a letter and let him know."
"Well... I wouldn't know what to write..."
"Your wife might," Kanrel said.
Jork sighed and opened the door. "I'll think about it..." He gestured for Kanrel to go through the door, then he asked, "Do you need a towel?"
Kanrel shook his head. "I've got some tricks to get myself dry. Don't you worry about it."
Jork grinned. "I suppose you priests do use some magic for your own convenience after all."
"Of course, otherwise there'd be no other use for it most of the time."
Jork snorted, then wished Kanrel a good bath, closing the door and leaving him to his own. Kanrel released a sigh that he had been suppressing. He had always found it difficult to advise parents when it came to their own children. And he did find it equally difficult to advise children when it came to their own parents. Usually, both parties tended to be somewhat... stubborn, to say the least.
Kanrel turned around and looked around the washing room for the first time... What it was was a small space with two doors. One led back to the hallway, and the other, he figured, led outside where there'd be a well or another way of easily getting water inside. There was a large wooden tub that was empty, as well as smaller buckets and a pair of wooden scoops. There was no sponge, but rather two small washing cloths hanging from a hook right next to the door through which he had just entered. There was also a small mirror that hung beside the door that led outside.
He quickly undressed, allowing the colder air of the room to embrace him. It made him shiver, but it was nothing compared to the weeks he had spent walking here. He began the process with his robes and shoes, which he carefully washed with his magic. Making them as clean as they might have been on the day they were bought by whoever he had stolen them from in Jersten. He tended to the shoes with care, fixing any wounds they might have gotten during the journey; they needed to be clean, they needed to be fixed, and they needed to be as good as new. They needed to be treated with the utmost respect. The shoes, after all, had been someone else's. They were like a headstone in a cemetery, only that these ones were now worn by the person who had inadvertently been the doom of their original owner.
When he was done with his clothes, he carefully set them aside, hanging them from one of the empty hooks by the door, setting the shoes below them. He turned toward the tub and formed a code, filling it with warm water. Soon, he entered it, letting his skin crawl from the heat, letting it turn red as he drenched himself fully. He began scrubbing himself immediately, removing dead skin, dirt, and sweat that had accumulated during the weeks. Twice, he got up to dry the water out and clean the tub so as to fill it back up and continue washing himself. The final time he did so, he stayed in the tub for a while, embraced by the heat. He rested his eyes for a while.
He could hear the muffled sounds from the outside. The tapping of water falling from his hair and beard back into the tub and the floor behind him. He heard his own breath as he struggled to stay calm. Even in this moment, there was neither relief nor rest.
No silence. No freedom from the mind. No change to who he was. A man might clean himself a thousand times over, removing layers upon layers of skin, leaving the muscle visible; even then, he'd be the same man that he had been yesterday, or the day before that. And he'd be the same tomorrow, and a hundred days from then.
Even if there had been, through the years, thousands or more versions of himself, even he failed to fundamentally tell the difference between one version and another. The change, if there truly was any, was so minuscule that it might as well not exist.
He still had his guilt, the same one he had carried since forever. It had only swollen and grown larger as a thing. It took more place within his mind, swallowing memories as it flooded in, tainting them with its leering existence.
With his eyes closed, he saw it all so clearly. His body floated, barely, in a swamp. The bog pulled him down, filling his mouth with his own filth. It was cold, and the air was filled with the smell of rot. It had been so for as long as he could remember now.
A man cannot change, for he doesn't know how to let go of the things that have formed him, be they things that have brought him great harm, or be they things that have made him feel loved.
Letting go... for so long, he has not let go. Only clung onto what he was, onto things that he used to care about; only to people with whom he once shared a memory, or just simple familiarity. Even then, never letting go.
But of some things, you must let go. Don't you?
The water had begun to cool against his shoulders. He did not move to warm it. He barely noticed it.
A thing at a time, a number here and there, a conversation, let such things come to pass. Let these things wither, into dust turn, and thus be carried away by the wind or whoever cares enough to do so. Just let it all be far from him; from the memory of the thing, and from the memory of the memory, and even further than that from him. He heard a drop fall from his beard into the water, then another. None of it should exist. Nothing, all of it should he regret. Let these things come to pass; let such things pass into nothing.
So as to forego obsession and to give entrance for new things, even if said things become like those of the past, so as long as they aren't the exact same in form and mistakes as those of then. Let it all, instead, become a new thing that he might or might not regret a thousand or more days or versions of himself from now.
He felt his hands open beneath the surface, palms turning up; felt his fingers close, almost grasping at something, but nothing could he hold.
Of these things, of these memories, of these conversations and actions, of these people, one by one, he should let go. They may haunt, and from the past whisper, like the shadow itself it were and follows him around, but that he must accept, as he goes onto the next thing and much past that which has already passed. Even if it still shapes all, even if he must claim that it does not, even then he must let all such things go. His own breath felt too loud, even in the eternity of the swamp. He must let go, so as to accept that still he does and will forevermore cling to these things, which he will never truly forget or grow from.
He must let go, so as to exist with having not let go.
And still the water only cooled. Nothing lifted from him. Nothing left.
And for a moment, there is no swamp. There is no mind, and there is nothing. With his eyes closed, for this moment not long, there is nothing. And when Kanrel opened his eyes, the water around him was now just as warm as his body, so he got up and dried the tub and himself. His skin was smoother than it had been in a long time. His hair and beard were silky and not coarse like hours before. He turned toward the mirror and saw himself as he was. Naked, expressionless. Much had changed from what he had been a thousand or more versions of himself ago. He ran his fingers through his hair. Much had fallen out; no longer were there the luscious locks of his youth. He almost felt saddened by this mark of his age. Instead, he snorted and wondered how old he must have looked to all of those who had once known him.
Letting go. It wasn't like the hairs that had fallen out would grow back. Not even magic could bring it back. So he burned it. He burned them all away. Leaving but a tonsure. His head had never felt so naked. Had he looked like this when he had been born? He wondered and then formed codes to do the same to his beard, but instead of removing all of it too, he hesitated and only trimmed it instead.
And when he was done, he looked at himself in the mirror. Soon regretting what he had done. How much of a fool could he be? To get tonsure in the middle of winter?
He scoffed at himself. Dressed in the now clean clothes, he carefully put on the shoes and stepped out of the bathing room, but only after making sure that there'd be no mess left after him.
- - - - -
The door closed behind him with a silent creak, and in the hallway, he could already feel how strange the sensation of nigh-bald hair gave him. Instinctively, he swept his hand over his head, as though there still were hair to sweep away. He felt dumb when he realized what he had done and ended up standing still, staring at his hands, as if blaming them for making him feel the way that he did.
Past his fingers, at the end of the hallway, he noticed motion. A woman, pacing back and forth, her eyes fixed on the floor. Kanrel couldn't see her gaze, but he wondered if she saw anything at all with her lake-blue eyes, if she saw her feet or the floor or just something else altogether.
The woman was the same one who had been washing vegetables in the kitchen. Why she had come to the hallway, only to pace in her thoughts, Kanrel had no clue. He was about to just walk past her and go on his merry way, but it bothered him again; the face he could not name, so instead of just ignoring her, he approached her, clearing his throat as he reached her. "Excuse me, madam."
The woman stopped, and her gaze shot up from the floor. She stared at Kanrel with a startled expression. They stared at one another, wordless for a moment. Then she approached him. Step by step, hesitating whether to do so at all. And when she reached him, it was clear that she was taller than Kanrel was. She extended her trembling arms toward Kanrel's face, reaching for his face. Was it sadness she felt, or was it recognition that hid behind the blue of her eyes?
Kanrel almost flinched when the fingers of her right hand touched his cheek. "Madam?"
Slowly, her fingers explored that side of his face, then she suddenly pinched his cheek, causing Kanrel to flinch and take a step back; he brought his own hand to his cheek and massaged the now red spot. "What are you doing, madam?"
The woman's expression had shifted slightly, as a mischievous smile curled onto her lips. "That was for leaving without saying goodbye."
"Leaving? Goodbye?" Kanrel muttered and stared at the woman a moment longer. His eyes went wide as recognition at last came to him. The smile was the same; something that could never change.
"Vien?" he whispered.
She scoffed and tilted her head. "The very one... The exact one you left behind, leaving her without a word of explanation. The same one whom you once named a dear friend of yours..."
Kanrel nodded, still massaging his cheek. "Yes, I know the one... Isn't she the one who held on to my private journal for years without my knowledge?"
Vien blinked, and her smile withered away. Red emerged on her cheeks, as gentle as the horizon as the sun set on a summer day. "Well... I had thought you'd come to pick it up!"
Kanrel rolled his eyes. "And I would've expected that you'd return it to me."
Vien looked away for a moment. "I wanted to, but you..."
She went quiet. Her expression had fully changed; the earlier mischief had long gone, and only that sadness flashed past the blue of her eyes. But then she lifted her gaze, meeting his eyes. The lake poured over, as two gentle falls down her rosé cheeks. "I waited for you," she muttered.
"For a long time, I did."
"There were days I'd miss you; nights when I'd read through your journal, still hoping that you'd return."
Her tears flowed down, and she didn't do a thing to stop them. Kanrel had never seen her cry. If there ever was grief she had to deal with before, she'd make a joke, and soon move on to the next thing. Without thinking, he found himself stepping closer; his hands on her cheeks, drying away her tears before they could fall past her jaw.
Kanrel kept exploring her face as he did. And in those eyes he saw the truth. She had meant every word, and at last Kanrel understood what he had left behind. Who he had harmed when he had walked into the forest so as to never return. Regret and shame washed over him. "I am... a fool," he managed to say after a long silence.
Suddenly, Vien pulled him closer and wrapped her arms around him. Kanrel could smell a flowery fragrance beneath the many smells of the kitchen. And she spoke; he felt her voice vibrate through him: "I know, dear friend."
"I'm glad that you've returned from the dead."
They embraced each other for a moment. Then Vien spoke again, "You're much balder than last I saw of you... But the beard fits you."
Kanrel scoffed, and soon the hug ended as they observed each other at arm's length. Kanrel tried to come up with anything that he could joke about, but found nothing. His posture was as if deflated after a long sigh. "And you look as beautiful as ever... Younger than me, somehow."
Vien blinked, then grinned. "Well, my dear friend, I've managed to become quite a wealthy lady in your absence. And you know what they say about money, don't you?"
Kanrel shook his head. "No, I really don't."
"If it doesn't buy you happiness, it might buy you beauty."
"I don't think that's true."
Vien placed her finger on his lips. "Shush... I was clearly trying to make you feel better."
Kanrel said nothing and just stared at the woman who smiled the same way she had always smiled. The tears were gone, the red on her cheeks was only faint, but the blue in her eyes sparkled as what Kanrel recognized as happiness. He tried to smile back at her, hoping that past himself, past it all, she might see that he truly appreciated her.
They conversed for a while, first in the hallway, and soon in the kitchen as Vien demanded that he help with cleaning. He had no argument against it. He did owe Jork for the meal and the bath.
- - - - -
Kanrel lay in a soft, warm bed. The first one he was allowed to sleep in for months. Not built from stone and later cushioned with pillows and blankets like the ones in the Atheian lands. But an actual, real, wooden bed. It was much better than any other bed that he had ever had... if it being soft meant that. Of course, there was the bed from his childhood, in his own room, which was surely the best bed he had ever slept in, but even that wasn't as soft as this one. Or so he recalled. It had been a long time since then.
Jork had given Kanrel his own son's room after Roslyn vouched for him. Though before that she had to, of course, comment on Kanrel's hair. She had called him, 'The masculine version of Professor Oidus.' A great blowback on Kanrel's ego, but no recovery in sight.
Jork had led Kanrel to the room and shown him around as any proud father would, or any man who had done well for himself. After all, in his son's room, there was a surprisingly large collection of books on many different subjects. Most of them had been second-hand when he had bought them, but even then they projected considerable wealth. Truly, the tavern had turned into a cash cow for the man and his family.
Though, of course, he did curse the books, blaming them partially for his son's decision to pursue politics and further education, the rest he blamed on the kid's smarts, saying that the boy had clearly gotten too much of it from his mother. Though the smile on Jork's face told enough. He meant none of it as a slight. He was simply bragging to another man about his own son.
But finally, after a long day. Kanrel was allowed to rest. He had arrived in Atarkan at midday and come across old friends from decades back. He had been questioned on his identity and on his whereabouts. He had been more social than he had been in months. And each moment among other humans, he felt surreal. As if none of it were real. As though he might awake the next morrow, only to find himself at the feet of Ignar as another long forced-upon vision had come to an end.
Which is why he found himself afraid of falling asleep. Each time he almost did, he forced his eyes open and turned onto another side. Sometimes laying on his back, staring at the darkness of the ceiling and the boards that ran across it. But like death, from sleep you cannot run away. Dreams, they come either way. So his eyelids, too heavy, became frozen shut, and he could not tell if he were awake or asleep...
Static poured in, and cold embraced him. His eyes burst open, and he stood in the thick of snow, surrounded by trees covered in heavy banks of snow, forcing some branches to bend at the weight of it. But what he saw and stared at, truly, was not the snow or the trees.
A man stood and stared at him. He was only ten or so feet away.
He wore padded winter clothing. He was taller than Kanrel was. He had high cheekbones, a prominent jawline, and a slightly crooked nose; below it, a thin black mustache. And he stared at Kanrel with those dead, brown eyes of his, and wore an expression that seemed dull. As though he was bored by it all.
"Torin?" Kanrel heard himself say, but the static swallowed all sound. "You're alive?" He tried to step toward him, but his legs refused to. He couldn't move; he couldn't breathe, and in fact, the words he thought he had spoken had never left his lips.
Torin's clothes flapped with the wind, but his hair remained still. He was like a statue forced to stand in the face of the cold and the wind.
And then he spoke, his voice cutting through the static, dividing it in half like a sword would a man. "Why didn't you save me?" It was empty... without even an iota of emotion. A flat, monotone thing that spoke to him.
Kanrel tried to reply, to give a reason, but like back then, nothing could he say. Not a muscle could he move. He could stare ahead and witness Torin, the empty being he had become.
Then it went dark for a moment. As though for a blink of an eye. In that moment, the shadows embraced and covered all else; Torin's body engulfed in dark flames.
"Why didn't you save me?" His voice cut through the static once more.
Bright light exploded from Kanrel in a thunderous roar, burning away all, burning away his vision, burning away the darkness, burning away even Torin. He saw only the light, and when at last his eyes opened, he saw a figure in his view, pointing something sharp near his neck; his instincts taking over, a code released as he pushed away the figure and the harm they might do to him, with a strong gust of wind, forcing them against the ceiling. The two now looking at one another, both panting in terror and surprise...
And what Kanrel saw was a woman he had never seen before. The woman had tears in her eyes, and her rose-colored lips trembled as though she was about to weep as loud as she could. She wore an ornate dress and jewelry around her neck. She was slender and quite short, and must have been in her twenties, and probably quite beautiful, though of that Kanrel couldn't be sure.
He looked at her for a while, then gently brought her back down, placing her at the other side of the room, against the wall, far away from himself so as not to get stabbed by what looked like a very sharp, long hairpin that must've usually found its place in the woman's long brown hair. Kanrel made sure to keep the codes up.
He cleared his throat. "And to whom do I owe the pleasure?" he asked.
The woman just stared at him for a while, with sheer hatred in her eyes.
"Orfia Lewnrer," she said through gritted teeth.
Kanrel furrowed his brows. "Lewnrer?" he muttered. Only the last name sounded somewhat familiar. He stared at her for a while, not saying a word, trying to remember where he had heard such a name.
Then, he suddenly stopped the codes, allowing the woman her freedom. She looked at him with surprise.
"Are you related to Jeso Lewnrer?"
The woman nodded. "I am his one and only sister."
Kanrel could see him. Poor Jeso. His limbs had been pierced by long wooden stakes, his body suspended above the floor. Rose petals beneath the bloodless corpse, covering the floor, but its gruesome shadow swallowed even that momentary beauty.
Orfia looked at him; she trembled, and slowly her anger mellowed, and only her sadness remained. Perhaps she had seen it in Kanrel's eyes. The pity he had for her and for her brother.
The hairpin fell, and a bright sound of metal hitting the wooden floor echoed once through the room. She buried her face into her hands. Her body shook uncontrollably as she wept tears that had at last swelled and then spilled over. "I'm sorry, I wasn't going to harm you," she said through her cries.