I'm free...
I'm free...
We're free...
Those were the only words that remained in Jack's vocabulary. He gripped both of his siblings' hands, the trunk was hindering their hike uphill and the satchel caused Jack's weight to shift to the right. They were lost in darkness, at the mercy of the brisk November air and only a small lantern to light their way.
Jack noticed none of it.
I'm free.
I'm free!
He felt his face crumple and Jack suddenly dropped both Jamie and Mary's hands.
"Jack?" Jamie shivered. They watched as Jack wandered, his mind gone. His face stared into oblivion, gazing blankly.
He could still feel the grip of the gun around his fingers, the heat from the kickback. Silently, Jack looked up and watched the snow fall from the sky like tears. He asked himself how did he ever end up here. Instinctively, to get as far away from the village as possible, his feet continued to carry him, his brother and sister trotting parallel, forgetting the trunk behind them.
Finally, like a sinking ship, Jack stumbled to his knees. His heart was pounding in his ears, the euphoria and terror of liberation, the shackles around his neck breaking. Jack did what he could to stifle his sobs, but it was painfully obvious to his siblings that he was now a mess of tears, his hands clutching the frost-covered grass beneath him as his fingers went numb. Try as he might, he couldn't staunch the flow of tears from his eyes, not for a good solid minute.
Then, as if it had never even happened, Jack wiped his face dry and got back to his feet. "We need to keep moving." He reminded them with vehemence and picked up the trunk.
Mary was hugging herself, trying to stay warm, "Where are we going to go?"
"I don't know." He said, "But we'll find somewhere to sleep tonight. Somewhere safe." On a much warmer night, he'd willingly rough it there in the wilderness until daybreak. But he had no option when he could hear his sister's teeth chattering. He took them both by the hand again and walked farther from the place they'd called home.
Jamie kept trying to turn his head to look back, but the urgency of the situation required zero stops.
I should've brought mead. Jack was already kicking himself—it would've kept them warm; he had no time to contemplate the morality of feeding a child alcohol, but all it would take was the smallest dose to fill their bellies with fire that would buy him more time before they started to go hypothermic.
It was too late. No turning around, not for anything.
In less than ten minutes, they were orphaned and homeless. That house could go to Jack, but he didn't dare show his face there ever again; the way he'd left it, it was obvious it was a crime scene. He'd be lucky if anyone who came across the house believed they'd been robbed and then kidnapped.
I wish I'd spit on him. Jack found himself snarling. One last remark as he drew his last breath to say 'fuck you.' May the Devil take you. He said silently, words more of a prayer than a request.
...
An old, empty shed out in the woods would be their inn. It was once used for storage purposes but was long-since abandoned.
Jack did everything in his power to keep the cold out by pushing the trunk against the door. The lock was broken and it wouldn't bolt shut, so they'd have to deal with the chilly breeze. It was better than nothing. The twins sat by the lantern, covered in their father's coats which now functioned as extra blankets. The gravity of what they'd gone through showed in their faces, trapped in thousand-yard stares.
Feeling his lower lip, Jack pressed his fingers to it and saw he'd been bleeding. That would explain the taste of metal he hadn't been able to get rid of. Doing what he could to ignore the pain, he used rolled up shirts to make them pillows, setting everything up so it was like they were camping, his own cloak placed between where they'd be sleeping so they were both beside him.
"This is only for tonight." He reminded, forcing himself to make it a promise.
"And then we're going home?" Jamie asked, still shaken.
Surprise made Jack stupid—he almost didn't answer. "No. We can never go back." He refused to call it home; if Jamie were older, he'd understand. The child looked crestfallen. "Jamie..." He then saw Mary's equally heartbroken face and took both of their shoulders. "We couldn't stay there. Our father was a vicious—evil—human being. I know you're both too young to understand that, but the things he did to us, all of us, were not normal. And it's nobody's fault but his own. All right?" He caressed Mary's chin when he saw tears sitting in her eyes.
"Is he gonna find us?" Mary's voice was fearful.
Jack knew then that neither was aware of what he'd done. He looked her straight in the eyes, "He will never find us." And that was a promise he could keep. "I'll never let anyone hurt you two ever again... I should've taken you away from there a long time ago."
Jamie, verklempt with shock and anger, blurted, "So why didn't you?"
Jack was struck. Wordless, he slowly shifted his gaze at the ground, realizing his own failure. If he'd known that it wouldn't matter how much money he saved up, how long he tried to keep the beast tame for, he would have stolen them both in the night away from that monster. He tried to find a reasonable answer, but he knew nothing he said would appease the ten-year-old who'd just lost his father, his home, his friends... He hadn't even had time to process his grief over Pippa!
Jack wrung the rope marks on his wrists and straightened out their makeshift bedrolls. "Tomorrow, I'm gonna figure something out. We're going to be okay." He said, hiding his own doubt. "I need you both to hang in there for me." Despite all the tension, there was an air of trust between the three of them. Brother, brother, and sister. They needed each other more than ever in their short lives.
The two pups crawled forward and Jack took them both in his arms. He buried his nose into Jamie's soft hair, "I'm always going to take care of you." He rested his cheek to the crown of Mary's head. "Both of you."
Jamie pulled away, Mary's hand was still clasped to his. "Jack..." He swallowed, "I'm scared."
Jack nodded. "Me too."
Mary came close and saw in the faint light of the lantern that Jack had terrible bruises on his neck. They'd been concealed by his shawl, but now they were exposed. It was a reminder of what a monster he'd rescued them from and Mary hugged him again, closing the gap between their realms of understanding.
...
The children were terrified of the wind that kept making the wood creak and the door occasionally slip open a crack; so much that even in their sleep, they were clinging to their brother for protection. Jack lied awake and stared off into space, tears softly ran down his face in a vertical line as he mulled over his mother's underserved fate. To not only die at the hands of a creature who had not known love a day in his life, but to know she was going to die, he didn't know which was worse.
It didn't matter. None of it mattered. He had Jamie and Mary, and Jack knew that all she had wanted was for her children to escape that beast. Jack would try to close his eyes, but every time he did, a flash of his father's pale face as he lied covered in his own blood would reappear and he couldn't bear it. His disturbing look of pride in his last moments made Jack wonder if he'd given him what he wanted, to become something that used violence to get his way like he did.
What would he tell Elsa? Where did they go from there? He still had a third life he would soon have to worry about. Jack was abandoning his old life, but not Elsa. Elsa had always been his future. That, he'd known.
Mary clung to his tunic more tightly, face contorting in pain as she flinched in her sleep. Was she cold, or was it a bad dream? Jack took care as he pulled her a little closer and let the tips of his fingers stroke her face calmingly. "Shh... Shh, I'm here." He whispered. Hearing his voice in her sleep proved to do the job as she started to settle again. "I'm here." He said again. "You're safe."
Jack was so tired, he began to doze. Soon enough, though he tried to fight it, he was dreaming. Dreaming about the forest around them as the sounds of the wind outside burrowed its way into his subconscious.
...
It was fascinating how resilient a child's mind could be, for Jamie dreamed like nothing the night prior had occurred at all.
He was dreaming about the fjord, where he and his friends and sister had spent countless hours playing together. The entire inlet of the sea had been frozen and they each took turns racing each other to the shore and back. It was he and Pippa's turns, and Jamie couldn't help noticing that the length of the fjord kept shifting with each turn his friends took. Pippa looked bright and cheerful as she dashed ahead of him, her short red hair covered by her winter cap.
The last time he saw her in his sleep, the sweet dream quickly became a nightmare when Pippa suddenly fell beneath the ice and Jamie's friends all vanished, leaving him to watch her drown helplessly. This time, it was only the two of them laughing and skating. His heart felt free.
...But soon the picture faded and Jamie opened his eyes to a dim light peering through the crevice of a rotted shed door. He blinked a few times, trying to clear his vision. Where was he? Why was Jack with... He remembered. He had no bedroom anymore. Though Jack had put in all his effort into giving him as much cushioning as possible, Jamie's back ached from the hard surface he'd slept on. It was a foggy morning, the kind where one couldn't see a meter in front of their face.
Mary's head was perched on Jack's chest, and Jamie realized that he'd been clinging onto his arm the entire night. He couldn't help feeling sorry then—as uncomfortable as he was, he didn't know how Jack had gotten a wink of sleep with the position he was in. His brother's chest rose and fell in soft, even breaths, and his lips were slightly parted, making the cut on his lower lip more noticeable. It reminded Jamie that this wasn't just his struggle, but Jack's and Mary's as well.
He had to buck up. Be brave.
Jamie couldn't escape the morning routine that was relieving himself and he tried to sneak out of the shed to go quietly, but the chill hit his face and the immediate revelation that he'd be totally alone in the wilderness sent him scrambling back to his older brother. "Jack!" He shook his chest and his head shot up.
"What?" He startled, eyes half-closed.
"I have to pee." He confessed bashfully, but Jack nodded and maneuvered Mary off of him in a way that wouldn't wake her. He pushed the trunk out of the way and let Jamie do his business in privacy—close enough where he could still see him, but far enough so that it wasn't obvious what he was doing. Jamie was grateful he didn't wet the bed like he used to. It was bad enough that urine was difficult to wash out of fabric, but now the blankets they had were their only blankets.
Jack wiped the sleep-dust from the corners of his eyes and deduced that it had to be around six in the morning, judging by the sky. He didn't expect to sleep so heavily, nor so soundly, yet he was still exhausted. "Are you hungry?" He asked Jamie once he was finished.
"A little."
Jack brought him back to the shed and checked the eggs in the satchel. The blanket hadn't been enough to protect them and they were all busted. Jack sighed; he'd been half-expecting this to happen. Mary was still sleeping and Jamie looked hopeful for a hot meal like he got every morning. Why did he have to be in such a panic? He could've brought the basics like vegetables to hold them off.
He tried to think about what to do, the silence giving Jamie anxiety the longer it went on. "How's your neck?" He asked impulsively.
"What?"
Jamie rubbed his own neck where Jack had bruises.
"Oh, it's fine."
"What about your lip? Does it hurt?"
"Jamie," he looked at him earnestly, "don't worry about me. I just need to think for a second about how I'm gonna feed you."
"It's okay. I'm not that hungry."
"Well, we gotta find somewhere to stay anyway. Somewhere that has food... and maybe a bed." He started to gather his things together.
"Do you think we could go to wherever Mom went?"
Jack's expression looked haunted. All the color drained from his face and he said, "Jamie..." He took a heavy breath, "Our mom's not alive."
Jamie furrowed his brow, utterly baffled. "You always said she left us."
"I thought that too. But our father lied to us, and he told me that lie so much that I finally believed it."
"So... Where do we go?"
"Jamie. I don't know." He repeated, voice heavy with apprehension. "But it'll all be taken care of. I promise." He kept his voice as hushed as possible to not wake Mary, who'd had a troubled sleep. Hell, Jamie looked disastrous and sleep-deprived. They all did. "If you need to lie down for a little longer, it's okay." Jack reassured, but Jamie shook his head. Why did he look so repulsed like Jack had done something wrong? Jack's eyes narrowed with worry, "Are you mad at me?"
"No." Jamie grumbled.
Jack wasn't sure what to do, but he tried, delicately, to take Jamie's face, "It's okay if you are—"
Jamie forcefully flinched away, "I'm not!" His voice rose.
"Shh!" Jack hissed, turning to see as Mary stirred a little. "Clearly you are. I know I took you away from our home, but he didn't give me a choice! I wasn't about to leave you both—" Out of nowhere, Jamie got up and stormed out of the shed. "Jamie!" Jack was appalled at how quickly the boy managed to move ahead of him. "James!" His uncharacteristically furious tone got the boy to halt. "Look, you can be angry with me, you can hate me! But I need you to listen—" When he took his arm, Jamie writhed away like he was struggling.
Jamie had seen so much death; the bird, Pippa, maybe their father, and now their mother he didn't even know. "Why?" Jamie shouted. "Why are there so many dead things?" He broke down in tears and Jack's heart broke—he looked like he was crawling inside of his own skin as he wept aggressively and painfully. Jamie ran forward and pressed his face into Jack's chest. "Jaaaack!" He moaned as he cried and Jack held him tightly. At least now Jamie could let it all out... But it was so painful to watch.
"I know, Jamie." He rocked him slightly in his arms, he had been doing this since he was just a baby. "I know. It's okay."
Mary was awake now; all she'd heard was Jamie's wailing and all she saw was Jack comforting him. It was a reminder that this was all far from over.