Racking one´s brains

In the kitchen, I quickly prepared a stew with the vegetables I had wanted to cook yesterday, lentils and some dried meat and hopefully it would spare me cooking for the rest of the day. Additionally, I boiled the water for Connor´s bath. When I carried bucket after bucket out of the kitchen to fill the tub, I had laboriously dragged into a corner of the dining room by now, I had to order Connor to stay at the kitchen table several times. He wanted to help me and didn´t accept why he should rest while I was struggling with the heavy buckets alone. But at least he obeyed, although he was watching me with a grim expression, even over the edge of his bowl, which he was still emptying with great appetite. He had emptied four bowls of the stew, until I had filled the last bucket of water into the tub and put another one next to me to wash Connor´s hair with it. I put the content of the pouch, Dr White had given me for this purpose, into the water and took a deep breath of the aromatic scent that was spreading in an instant. I recognized the smell of lavender and balm and would have loved to get into the water myself. I loved such baths and I remembered what my governess had told me once. I went into the kitchen, put some milk into a pot, heated it and mixed in some honey. Babette had used to say that honey was encouraging the healing process of the skin and that milk in general was good for the skin. Furthermore: Didn´t they say that the Egyptian queen Cleopatra had only bathed in milk? They also said that she had been a beautiful woman. It could do no harm, I thought when I filled milk and honey into the water. But maybe I shouldn´t mention Cleopatra´s Beauty baths in front of Connor. Otherwise he would think that I was going to lace him up in a corset and powder his face next…

But still he needed a request until Connor rose from his seat growling, got undressed and sat into the tub. Probably he wanted to hold it back, but I clearly heard the contented sigh when he sank into the pleasantly warm and scenting water.
"Is it good like this?", I asked, while I carefully began to undo the leather ribbon in his hair that was holding his braid together. Connor only nodded. Softly I started to disentangle his hair with my fingers as good as possible, before I used a ladle to pour water over it. I rubbed some soap between my hands and began to wash all the sticking dirt out of Connor´s hair. I spread the soap in the black strands, washed it out and eventually took a comb to undo the knots. Connor himself stayed entirely motionless during the whole process and kept his eyes on a spot on the opposite wall. It seemed like he was totally lost in his thoughts and once again I became worried about him.
"Will you tell me what happened in the mine?", I asked and interrupted the silence that had reigned the whole time. Connor didn´t react immediately. He kept staring at the wall and I got the feeling that he hadn´t heard me. But he had. Without turning his eyes away from the wall, he began to tell me what had happened tonight. How he had found Ray in the cave, how they had started to fight and how Ray had finally caused the explosion by igniting the barrels. Ray had lured Connor into a trap and had thought that he could kill him like that. But Connor had survived and Ray had died. Died without ever seeing sense, because Connor also told me that Ray had obviously believed he could gain my favour, as soon as Connor was out of his way. It made me sad, but at the same time I didn´t dare to imagine what would have happened if Ray´s plan had become true. If Connor had died. Never I would have come to Savannah with my brother, because never I could have forgiven him. But what would have Ray done? Would he have forced me or killed me?
Inwardly I shook my head. I didn´t want to think about it. Connor was alive and Ray was dead.
"It is over. We should forget it", I murmured and grabbed for a rag to wash Connor´s body, too. When I ran it over his chest, Connor grabbed my hand and looked at me. "Not forget", he said seriously. "Assimilate it. You should not force yourself to forget your brother. Whatever he did, in his own kind of way he wanted to do something good to you."
"But he didn´t do anything good to me. He always kept hurting me."
"He was not himself anymore. I am sure he was not aware of it." Connor put a hand on my cheek and slowly moved it into my nape to pull me closer. "He and I basically wanted the same", he murmured. "We wanted to protect you."
"A hopeless undertaking", I grumbled and made him smirk for the first time since many hours.
"That is true. But a worthy one." Connor ran his fingertips through the hair in the back of my neck and I ignored the water drops that were running into my collar. Sighing quietly, I enjoyed this touch and the following, soft kiss on my lips.

"Now let me finish washing you", I murmured, when I reluctantly pulled away from him and leaned back again to follow my words with action. He let me do it and even closed his eyes when he began to enjoy how I was cleaning his skin with gentle movements of the rag in my hand. He relaxed noticeably and when I was done and told him to stay in the tub, he did. In the meantime, I went into the kitchen and started to prepare the willow bark- and valerian-tea, as well as the paste made of comfrey roots I was supposed to treat the bruise on Connor´s side with. I brought a steaming cup, a teapot and a bowl on a tray into the bedroom, put everything on the bedside table, took a big towel out of the cupboard and went downstairs again. There, Connor was still sitting in the tub, but had fallen asleep. His arms were resting on the edge, his head had sunk against the wooden wall and some strands of his wet hair had fallen into his face.
Smiling to myself, I kneeled down next to the tub to dip a hand into the water. It had cooled down already, even wasn´t lukewarm anymore. Connor shouldn´t get cold beside his injuries. Gently I stroked the strands of hair out of his face and this touch alone made him open his eyes. Blinking he looked around, as if he had to orientate himself first. But when he noticed that he was still sitting in the tub, he sighed and slowly sat up.
"I did not want to fall asleep", Connor murmured, but I just shook my head. That was what he had to do. To rest.
I helped him standing up in which he screwed up his face in pain once again. I had never broken my ribs and in the face of this sight, I never wanted to make this experience. Connor was a person who normally wasn´t bothered by pain, but this time he couldn´t hide that every movement was hard for him. But still he insisted on drying himself on his own. He said he was no invalid after all and so I obeyed his pride and waited until he had wrapped the towel around his loins and went upstairs with me, where I gave him fresh trousers out of the cupboard in which he slipped in an instant. Then I treated the area over his broken ribs generously with the paste, wrapped a bandage around Connor´s chest and finally went to the bed, where I kneeled down on the front end and patted on the mattress to request Connor to sit down. But he didn´t pay attention to me. Connor was standing with his back to me by the chair I had put his dirty clothes at and took his coat.
"Connor, you need to rest and go easy on yourself so that your ribs can heal", I said frowning. "Furthermore I have to wash and patch your things first."
Connor didn´t react. He pushed his hand into the pocket of the coat and pulled out Ray´s Necklace with the stone on it, but finally came to the bed with slow steps. Through a hint with the comb in my hand, I told him to sit in front of me and he did. Connor allowed me to run the comb through his still wet hair, but I quickly got the feeling that he wasn´t mentally present anyway. His fingertips kept sliding over the stone in his hands, which didn´t appeared quite special to me. It was pretty. Completely smooth, deep blue, had almost the shape of a teardrop and was quite flat. It had a fracture on its side, as if it had broken into two pieces there. I couldn´t see any further irregularities with the naked eye, but it rather appeared like glass and not like stone. Once I had heard that some goldsmiths were using glass stones instead of real gems so that the poorer clients could keep up the appearance of being able to afford gems or to betray clueless lovers of gemstones. Maybe this was such a cheap piece of jewellery.

"What did you mean when you said you want to find out what it is?", I asked while grabbing the leather ribbon and tying the sides of Connor´s hair to his usual braid.
"I am sure you will think I am crazy when I explain it to you", he murmured and enclosed the stone with his hand. I became more serious after these words and moved away from my position to kneel next to him and to look at Connor.
"You shouldn´t think something like that. I´m listening to you and I will never take you not for serious. I know that you always have a good reason for the things you´re doing and I trust you. So, what did you mean?"
Connor was silent at first and opened his hand with the stone again. It seemed like he was still searching for the right words and I gave him this time. I sat silently next to him and ran my fingertips over the blanket, until Connor inhaled audibly and began to speak.
"During the fight, Ray became limp in my grip all of the sudden and was like paralysed at the same time. At first I thought that he had seen something in the tunnel behind us, but then I saw the white in his eye and he started to recite some words." Connor paused and lifted the stone to hold it into the light that was falling through the half closed curtains. Blue spots of light fell against Connor´s hand and danced over the blanket. "The stone shone under Ray´s shirt. On its own, I am sure of it."
"So there was no light falling on it like now?"
Connor shook his head and lowered the stone again. "But I could not see it clearly enough. Ray regained consciousness before."
"Regained consciousness?" I frowned. "You mean he was unconscious? I thought he talked to you."
"I do not know if he talked to me." Connor screwed up his face and raised a hand to press its heel against his temple. "It was strange. I had the feeling that Ray was in some kind of trance…" Connor stopped and shook his head. "But maybe I was mistaken and it was a trick of him."
I looked him over in concern. He had lowered his head and had closed his eyes and appeared to be beside himself. It seemed like he was doubting his own mind.
Slowly I sat up a bit, wrapped an arm around Connor and leaned my forehead against his temple.
"You are exhausted", I said quietly. "You should sleep and then your thoughts will order themselves on their own. You will find an explanation for all of this, I´m sure of it."
"Maybe you are right", Connor murmured. "I am really tired."
I nodded, kissed his temple and stood up to give him the cup of willow bark-tea. "There´s also some valerian-tea in the pot. It will help you falling asleep", I said, while Connor slowly emptied the cup without screwing up his face.
"Thank you", he said, when I took the cup from him again, but I just shook my head. He didn´t need to thank me. I was his wife. It was my duty and also my wish to care for him. He should recover as soon as possible and above all, he should also put the past behind himself. All the problems with Ray had been not less burdening for him than they had been for me.

Slowly, careful not to cause more pain than necessary, Connor sank on his back and spread the blanket over himself. In the meantime, I had gone to Emily to wake her up gently and to lift her out of her cradle. She whined quietly and tiredly buried her head in my shoulder. But she would have woken up soon anyway and Connor needed to rest now and not a child that was crying for its breakfast. When I went to the door with Emily, Connor had lifted the necklace with the stone again and let it dangle over his face so that blue spots of light were dancing through the room again. I already opened my mouth to tell Connor that he shouldn´t rack his brains over it for now, but it was Connor who started to speak.
"Guardian, walk through the gate. Follow corridor after corridor, will get lost in this place. But brave guardian be assured, it is always right to choose the path of death." Connor turned his head to me and gave me a questioning look. "Are these words somehow familiar to you?"
I shook my head in confusion and went back to the bed, where I sat down on the edge. "How do you know them?"
"Ray spoke them after he lost his consciousness and the stone shone. Are you sure you do not know them? Did Ray mention them before?"
I shook my head again and frowned thoughtfully. No. These words were entirely unfamiliar to me, although I was already searching my mind for them. I had read so many books or had often visited the opera. But these lines hadn´t been in any book, any story, any poem and in any opera I knew.
"Maybe Ray made them up", I guessed. "You said yourself that he probably wanted to trick you."
Connor nodded slowly, but I saw that he wasn´t convinced by his own guess. Whatever he had seen, it was gnawing at him and I already knew that it was going to bother him for quite a while. But at least for this moment, I wanted to prohibit it. I gently took the necklace out of Connor´s hand which he allowed me without resistance and I said: "Rest. You can rack your brains another time."
"If it would only be so easy", Connor murmured.
"Drink the tea and it will." I shortly put a hand on his cheek, before I stood up and rearranged the position of the sleeping Emily on my arm. "I´m downstairs if you need something and hope that you haven´t eaten all the stew."
A faint smile flitted across Connor´s lips, but it was enough. It let this serious, thoughtful expression disappear from his face for a moment, which I would like to see more often.

I didn´t know if he had drunk something from the valerian-tea or not, when I eventually entered the bedroom to get Connor´s dirty clothes, he was sleeping soundly. Nothing suggested the strains of the last hours or his agonizing thoughts. I tried to see it as a good omen. A sign that Connor was going to recover quickly, not only physically but also mentally. But he wasn´t the only one who needed this recovery. Around midday of the same day, Caleb returned from Dr White´s. His burns were covered by layers of ointment, but they couldn´t hide their actual extent. The wounds were covering the left side of Caleb´s face like many single marks, as well as a part of his neck and were still visible under the collar of his shirt. They would become scars which maybe wouldn´t disfigure him, but would always remind him of last night. Exactly these memories were already agonising him now.
When he returned, I was just cleaning Connor´s clothes in front of the house. I tried to scrub away the dust, blood, sweat and scent of burnt black powder, until it felt like the skin was washed off my hands. I almost hadn´t noticed Caleb when he wordlessly went to the front door, but before he could go inside, I had leaped up and had run to him. I dried my hands on my apron, before I firmly pulled the boy into my arms. Caleb tensed up, but finally wrapped his arms around me, too and snuggled up to me. He was trembling, as if he was crying. I pushed him away from me and put my hands on his cheeks, when I really saw tears in his eyes, which he tried to hold back.
"I´m so incredibly proud of you", I said with a gentle voice, whereupon Caleb lowered his eyes.
"But I let him trick me. He would have killed me if you hadn´t defended me. But I should have been the one who protected you."
His voice sounded so remorseful that it almost hurt me. He was a child, no matter how adult he wanted to be. He maybe was already thirteen years old and on the best way to grow over my head, but for me he was still the little boy we had taken with us three years ago. For whom I cared as if he was my own flesh and blood. I didn´t want him to be plagued by such thoughts.
"You protected me", I said and stroked through his blonde hair. "You stopped Ray from threatening me and with that, you also protected Emily. It wasn´t your fault that he tricked you. I should have warned you, but the two of us protected each other last night and you don´t need to reproach yourself, my little one. You were very brave and should be proud of yourself."
Caleb still wasn´t looking at me, but when he embraced me again, I had the feeling that I had been able to take a bit of his burden off him at least. Now he knew that I wasn´t angry with him. I kissed his forehead and freed him from the embrace.
"Go inside. There´s still something to eat."
Caleb beamed at me. "Something with bacon?"
I laughed and shook my head. "Close. Stew. I hadn´t enough time for a breakfast like that. Take it as an early lunch."
Caleb appeared to be disappointed, but when I added a "Maybe tomorrow", his eyes lightened up again and I watched smirking, how he went to the house with loping steps. It was easy to comfort a joyful soul, although he would certainly need some time to assimilate the whole events. But when I shortly saw the image of my dead brother in my mind, I painfully realised: We all will need it.