THE SAGA OF BOY: BOOK I
Chapter 2: Fire in the Mind
Tonight, like every night, she went down to the crossroads and sat on a fallen log with her baby on her knee. She waited. He'd always come by twilight in the past, sneaking through town unnoticed by the supping residents. So she sat and waited for him to come again. But the hours she waited each night were not entirely wasted, as she sang to her growing child in the haunting language of his father's people. As he grew older, the nightly visits to the crossroads were spent in teaching the boy how to speak the language himself, and answering questions about his father. She taught him all she knew as she waited, and he was raised in a kind of desperate expectation of his return. But even though they waited there every night for ten long years, she never lost hope that her lover would return to see his son.
Nathanial couldn't be blamed for the first fire on Alderson's orphan farm, as he was asleep under a nurse's guard the entire night. But later people would talk in hushed, nervous voices. Everyone knew that Pietro was responsible for what had happened to Nathanial, so when the reaper claimed him in the blazing cattle shed that same evening some spoke of the Gods' justice, or retribution. But when each member of his gang met or narrowly avoided the same fate over the course of the next two days, folks remembered the charms to avert the evil eye, and revived old rumors of Nathanial's father in late-night whispers. Mayana's lover had never been seen, other than the occasional glimpse of a cloaked and hooded figure riding through town near twilight. Some thought Nathanial's mother had been seduced by the fey to produce a child, but as the fires continued the talk began to mention more demons than fey.
Nathanial woke on the fourth day after Pietro's death. He was first aware of a faltering, hesitant voice stumbling over the words to a familiar story. His eyes slowly cleared and he saw Brand sitting nearby, painstakingly reading aloud to him. Nathanial tried to speak but his voice came out a bare whisper and his throat was a raw, scratchy fire. Brand turned to look at him in surprise and Nathanial nearly cried out when a vivid vision of a bottle swinging at Brand's frightened face flashed in front of his eyes. It was gone almost before it registered in his mind, and when he shook his head to clear it a stabbing bolt of pain tore through his temple and awoke every outraged nerve in his battered body. He groaned and tried to keep his breathing even until the pain subsided to a steady throb.
Brand looked concerned and put down his book. Nathanial noticed bruises on his face and arms in varying stages of yellow and purple and opened his mouth to ask, but his throat was too dry to produce more than an unintelligible hissing. Brand eased Nathanial back onto the pillows and poured him a cup of the lukewarm water left by the nurse.
"Drink slowly kid, or you'll toss it right back at me."
Nathanial snatched at it eagerly and tried dutifully to pace himself despite his fierce thirst. He was glad he'd obeyed when his stomach protested even that small intrusion. He gestured to Brand's face, and had to cough before he could bring his voice above a whisper.
"If Pietro gave you those you're losing your touch."
Somehow at the back of his mind, was an odd certainty that Pietro had nothing at all to do with the bruises. Confused, he tried to think through the pounding headache, but it only seemed to intensify.
"Pietro didn't," said Brand in an eerie echo of his thoughts, "he didn't get a chance. He dropped a cigarette in the cattle shed a few nights ago, and died in the fire. Leastways that's what folks is saying."
Nathanial felt a surge of relief, followed by a brief flare of guilt for the relief. Who was he to be glad for someone's death? Before he could say anything, he was struck by an almost foreign sense of triumph and the lingering smell of woodsmoke, which faded too quickly to have been real. He glanced over at Brand, who avoided his gaze somewhat guiltily. The older boy told himself he wasn't lying to Nate; after all, some folks were still saying the death was accidental. Nathanial seized upon a terrible thought.
"Tell me you didn't kill him", he prayed silently.
Brand jumped and looked around the room, and then back at Nathanial, whose lips hadn't moved.
"Did you say something?"
Nathanial shook his head and tried loyally to suppress any suspicion of Brand as a cold-blooded killer. He was violent when attacked, but in many years Nathanial had never seen him hurt someone without direct provocation. Some worry agitated at the back of his mind, asking what Brand had heard him say, but Nathanial was too tired to fully acknowledge the question. When Brand picked the book back up and began to read carefully aloud again, Nathanial found himself drifting off to sleep.
He dreamed disjointed, vivid dreams of his mother's house burning, her body trapped inside, lifeless on the bed. In his dream a woman in a dark hood stood by the fire, a pleased smile on her lips, and malice in her eyes. As in life, his father was nowhere to be seen. Nathanial wondered if he'd even recognize the man anymore.
The burning house became a burning shed, with Pietro trapped beneath a fallen timber, screaming for help.
The burning shed became a burning tavern, with himself in the background, sobbing in rage. He bolted awake with sweat beading on his forehead. The images faded quickly and within minutes he'd forgotten every detail of the dream. He was left only with a vague uneasiness turning restlessly in the back of his mind. He settled back down on the coverlet and after only a few moments, managed to drift back into sleep.
He wasn't allowed out of bed for at least a week, and for the first few days his vision wavered enough to keep him from reading. The farmer had sent a replacement worker to the Tavernmaster while Brand sat up with Nathanial, playing war games with colored pebbles and pieces of cork for armies. On an afternoon when both were bored and restless from their confinement, Brand began discussing his plans to leave Franklin.
"Just you and me Nate, on the open road. We'll shake the dust of this town from our boots."
Nathanial looked serious, and somewhat skeptical. "I don't see how. We were born here, well I was anyway, and no one ever leaves."
"But think on it Nate me mate... We could go somewhere where no one knows anything about us. No more rumors about your dad! You can wear your hat and no one will know you're different at all! Besides if you don't like the road, you can always come back here."
The idea caught hold of Nathanial, who realized by the look on Brand's face that if he didn't go along, he'd probably be left behind; a bleak prospect indeed with no friends or family. Brand recognized Nathanial's reluctant interest and began going into details such as equipment they would need and what direction they would follow. He groused that they wouldn't be able to leave until he could save up the money, which could take years. Nathanial fidgeted a moment, and a long-suppressed memory floated to the surface.
"I have some money. Well I can get it anyway."
Brand looked at him for a moment and then smiled paternally, "we're going to need more than a few copper to eat on Nate."
"It's not copper, it's gold and silver, my mother's. As far as I know no one's ever cleared the remains of the house to find it."
Brand actually looked impressed and Nathanial grinned shyly at his expression.
"Are you sure YOU can find it Nate? I mean, it was a long time ago."
The boy nodded emphatically. "I know right where it is, we just need to dig. There's probably a couple hundred gold coins left in there, plus some silver. I was saving it for when I have to leave the farm."
Brand's entire faced glowed with impatient hope.
"Well then, that makes quite a difference! A matter of days instead of years. I only want to pick up my end-of-month pay next week and then we can go!"
He rubbed his hands together with glee and clapped Nathanial on the back.
"Nate, this is the start of a grand adventure, just you wait!"
The money never made a difference to Brand. Nathanial knew that his friend was dead before he even hit the floor of the Tavern, his skull shattered by the heavy glass bottle in the Tavernkeeper's hand. Something had been warning him all day, as a cloud seemed to hang over everything he did, and throughout the day he would find himself shaking with anxiety, something he'd never experienced before. His mood made him edgy and temperamental, and it was Corey's own bad luck that made him choose that day to torment him.
With their ringleader gone, Pietro's old gang lost some of their bite, but they were still willing to band together for the occasional looting or beating. They'd also discovered Nathanial would run away if enough of them worked together. When their new leader, Corey, decided to make a game out of seeing just how few it took to make him run from fights the others took the game up enthusiastically, and Nathanial was often out of breath from his escapes. But when Corey came at him with two cronies that daya slow cold foreign rage erupted in Nathanial and he balked. Corey's cronies, put out by their prey's unfair refusal to run, held Nathanial between them while Corey planted careful punches designed to hurt badly but leave no marks to show the farmer. Nathanial was crying with frustration, pain and anger but he didn't have the strength to get away from the older boys and he refused to back down. He was half aware of a steady stream of curses coming from his mouth as he fought to free himself. When Corey managed to get one step too far in the right direction Nathanial saw his opening and kicked him hard in the face, breaking his nose.
Cory's expression was ridiculously surprised around the bloody hand trying to staunch the flow from his nose. One of his friends made the mistake of snickering and Corey flushed dark with anger in the uneasy silence that followed. He spat blood onto the ground and gave a horrible grin as he pulled a knife from his boot.
Nathanial's stomach dropped as he suddenly realized his mistake. Corey was known for a violent temper, and both pets and people around the town bore horrific scars from the knife he now pointed at Nathanial. A strange tension began growing in the boy's mind, which set off warnings elsewhere but his fear and frustration were too consuming for it to register. Corey moved closer, and for lack of a better weapon Nathanial spat in his face. The silence in the small circle around them was almost tangible as Corey slowly wiped the spittle off his cheek. This time there was no smile on his face when he stepped in with the knife, but the moment the blade touched Nathanial's skin he felt the tension in his mind snap and his whole world went white. He felt the two boys release their grip on his arms and he blinked his eyes to clear them. He saw Corey lying on the ground, eyes wide open, and the others running and shouting towards the farmyard. They were screaming, Nathanial noted, that the freak had called down lightning to strike Corey dead.
In that moment of dazed confusion, an image struck him with such vivid realism that it drove him to his hands and knees, screaming. Brand was throwing up his arms in defense, but it was too late. Nathanial saw the bottle strike him, saw the side of his head cave in like an overripe pumpkin, and saw the lifeless body fall to the floor. It was almost a physical blow to Nathanial, and at the sight of Brand's blank stare he vomited onto the ground in front of him until his entire body hurt from heaving. He stumbled to his feet and ran to his room in a daze, where he huddled in a corner for hours. When he had cried all the tears left in him, Nathanial's anguish became anger, then hatred. He brought up the image of the Tavernmaster in his mind as he'd been in the vision and then watched in grim satisfaction as the bottles behind the man exploded one by one into imaginary flames. The fire raced across the dry wood floor and up the walls, with the Tavernmaster trapped screaming in the inferno. The bar burned around him in a funeral pyre for the last family he had known. When he'd vented a good deal of his anger, Nathanial started to back off from his imaginary fire, but found it had taken on a life of its own. Instead of dissipating the image grew more vivid, until he could feel the blistering heat and began to cough from the strength of the smoke. The screams of the Tavernmaster sounded more and more real, and while his hatred didn't diminish, the sound was so horrific that he had to clap his hands to his ears in an effort to muffle them. His gut wrenched in sympathy as he was caught up by the vision and watched the Tavernmaster slowly roast to death. Only when the man finally dropped silently to the floor completely obscured by flames was Nathanial able to banish the entire image. He crawled to his bunk and fell across the covers, slipping into an exhausted sleep.
It was well before dawn when Nathanial woke to a vigorous shaking. He looked up into the farmer's frantic face, and tried to put together the words Alderson spoke through his own sleepy confusion.
"Nathanial, wake up son, you must wake up!"
He rolled over, confused at the urgency in the farmer's voice. The man was looking at him in concern, sorrow, and not a little uneasiness.
"Nathanial, you have to get up; you have to leave before the townsfolk get here!"
"What happened, what's going on?" Nathanial wondered briefly if he was still dreaming, but when the cold pre-dawn air made him shiver, he started to fear he wasn't.
"Corey's dead from a lightning strike son, and the inn burned down tonight with the Tavernmaster in it. The town is scared. They think you had something to do with both, and in the mood they're in I don't trust them to remember you're just a boy."
The farmer was throwing Nathanial's things into a backpack, tossing a set of clothes at him impatiently. The boy was sick and horrified, remembering his imaginings the night before and how they'd taken him over.
"Get dressed! You have to be long gone before they get here!"
Nathanial pulled on the clothes and fumbled with the laces on his boots. He shrugged on the backpack and dazedly accepted a few silver pieces from the farmer. Alderson looked at the meager amount of money and sighed with real regret.
"It's all I can spare Nathanial; you'll have to find a way to work for your living."
The farmer took him downstairs and sent him quietly out the back door. He whispered a last word of advice, "stay off the main roads until you're well away boy, and don't stop."
Bewildered, Nathanial turned back to him.
"But sir, when can I come back?"
The farmer looked around nervously.
"Never son, never. Like it or not, you're finished with this town. Don't even write to let me know how you're getting along; looking back's an invitation for trouble to follow you. If anyone asks I'll say you're missing; with luck they'll think you died in the fire and won't look for you elsewhere! Good luck boy, and may the Gods watch over you!"
The farmer firmly closed and locked the door leaving Nathanial standing outside, watching his breath steam on the night air. Reluctantly he turned and started off across the hedgerow, still wondering whether he was dreaming. He was on the other side of a stone wall from the road and considering how long to follow it when he heard angry voices and saw the orange glow of torches bobbing along the other side. He ducked, breathing hard, and pressed himself against the wall as they passed. He heard them muttering to themselves, but only caught bits and pieces.
"He's a Demon freak, the Devil's own spawn…"
"…murderer, kill us all in our beds…"
"…put the torch to HIM! Only way to kill his kind! Let the devil scream for mercy…"
"…a tree makes as good a gallows as one built I say!"
It was with some shock that Nathanial realized they were talking about him. These were people he'd never hurt, some he'd never met. He bit his lip until he drew blood in the effort to remain silent and unnoticed until they'd passed well by. Once they'd turned down a far corner he cautiously unfolded his shaking limbs and started off again. After a short while in the eerie pre-dawn silence he broke into a trot, then a wild sprint as fear of pursuit overtook him. He rushed to the site of the burned out cabin he'd been born in, paced out the distance in the rubble, and started to dig, looking constantly back over his shoulder in a cold sweat. He came to the metal box he remembered from childhood, and pulled it out to find his mother's gold and silver coins undisturbed. With trembling fingers he distributed the coins around his belongings and cut through the woods in a vague easterly direction. He drove himself to get as far away from the town as possible, always looking and listening for pursuit. When he could go no further he dropped from exhaustion and slept like the dead.