Caleb didn't remember too much about his older brother, other than the fact that he had one and that his name had been Thomas. He vaguely remembered trying to follow the older boy around the garden, his own stubby two-year-old legs no match for the long strides of a five-year-old. He remembered a crashing sound, and a lot of yelling. He remembered seeing blood, and his mother crying. Then Thomas wasn't around anymore and no one ever talked about him.

He remembered Sarah slightly better. He was four when his mother gave birth to his baby sister. Everyone said she was beautiful and healthy. Caleb thought she looked wrinkly and squishy, and he was disappointed when he couldn't play with her right away.

"A fine babe." His father proudly announced when he held her for the first time. "Do you hear how strong her cry is, Caleb? That's the sign of good strong lungs."

Caleb figured his little sister must have very, very strong lungs indeed because she cried a lot. But something went wrong. A few weeks after she was born, her crying got weaker and weaker. She wouldn't nurse. Caleb watched as day by day she moved less and less, her skin turning from the plump, rosy color it had been when she was born to a sickly yellow. Then one day she went away, too, just like Thomas had. When Caleb asked about her, his father told him not to bring up unpleasant memories, so he didn't ask again.

The next year Philip was born. No one said he looked healthy or strong. Instead they said he was born too soon, he was too small, he wouldn't last a week. Caleb worried that he would go away, too. But he didn't. In a complete reversal of Sarah's short little life, Philip grew stronger by the day until he was plump and healthy. Before he was old enough to crawl, Caleb would visit him in his crib to make funny faces at him and tickle his feet. He was so happy to have a brother to play with again, he didn't even mind it when Philip spit up on him or pulled his hair.

Caleb was nine when his mother became pregnant for the final time.

By that point he had figured out what death was. It had been a causal discovery. One summer day when he was seven he found a robin with a broken wing. Distraught, he brought the bird to his father and Father had set the wing and taught Caleb how to feed the bird until it could fly again. Caleb had been amazed. A few weeks later he found a nightingale asleep on the ground. It was cold and didn't struggle when he picked it up like the robin had. He brought it to his father to fix but Father just shook his head.

"I cannot help that one, son. Tis already dead. Best you can do is bury it and move on."

So Caleb did just that. As he pushed the dirt over the dead bird, he realized where his older brother and younger sister had gone.

Caleb never got a chance to meet his youngest sibling. Mother went into labor, and Caleb and Philip were sent outside to stay out of the way. After a few hours the midwife came out covered in blood and spoke with Father in a low voice. Father pushed past and ran into the house.

"Caleb, what's happening?" Philip asked. Caleb put his arm around his little brother.

"I don't know, Pip. But it's going to be okay. I'm here with you."

The brothers were left outside for a long time, no one told them what was going on, but Caleb could guess. He knew something had gone wrong, and something in the pit of his stomach told him that it wasn't just the baby that didn't survive.

He tried not to let his fear show, Philip was only four, he didn't understand what was going on.

"Come on, let's play a game." Caleb spent the rest of the day doing everything he could to keep Philip distracted. They played scotch-hoppers and chase, Caleb fashioned Philip a whirligig out of some twine and a piece of wood. He managed to keep Philip too busy to ask questions, but all the time he kept his eye on the door, waiting with bated breath for Father to come out.

After a long time he finally did, looking broken and defeated.

"Your mother is gone, boys."

"Gone where?" Philip asked.

Caleb put his hands on Philip's shoulders.

"She's gone to be with the Lord, Pip."

The following year, Father announced they were leaving England for the New World. Philip cried when they had to leave their home and all the familiar things behind. Father got cross with him. Father had become much harsher after Mother died. He was no longer the same kind, patient man who had once helped Caleb set a bird's broken wing. He was cold and distant on his good days and outright cruel on his bad days. Caleb did his best to protect Philip from the worst of Father's temper, even if that meant taking his younger brother's beatings. He hadn't been able to help Thomas or Sarah, or the little baby who didn't even live long enough to get a name, but he swore that he would never let anything harm Philip.

The idea of traveling across the sea frightened Caleb just as much as the idea of leaving England behind upset Philip. He had heard it said that the journey itself was dangerous enough, but once it was over the true danger began. England's first attempt to establish a settlement failed and the entire colony was lost. Since then there had been a few successes, but there were rumors that over the previous winter Jamestown had been nearly completely wiped out by a famine. Caleb couldn't understand why his father would possibly want to risk everything they had to travel to a hostile wilderness that seemed to chew up and spit out any attempts to tame it.

Regardless of Caleb's misgivings, Father's mind was made up. He said they had no future left in England. He reminded Caleb that the Lord would protect his chosen people, just like he did when Moses led the Israelites through the desert to the promised land so too would the faithful leave England and receive the Lord's blessing in the new world. Caleb knew the story well, as he was named after the servant of God who's faithfulness was rewarded at the end of the long journey from Egypt to Israel. But unlike the Caleb from the Bible, Caleb Wittebane wasn't sure if the promised land was worth the forty-years of suffering in the desert that preceded it. He was not brave enough to voice his doubts lest he be punished for his lack of faith.

It turned out that the voyage was just as perilous as he feared, and while Caleb and Philip both survived, Father did not.

By the time Caleb set foot in the New World, he was eleven, orphaned, and the soul caretaker of his six-year-old little brother. He looked around at his promised land and saw the desperate, suspicious faces of a community just trying to survive at the edge of the world.

Author's Note

Hey all, this story kind of came about as a result of my own history obsession, but the spark was specifically the stray thought, "I wonder if the Wittebanes had other siblings that didn't survive" which given the high infant mortality rate at the time, and the fact that when children died it was often not spoken about, that is very likely. Things just kind of snowballed.

True historical accuracy will be impossible to achieve in this fic while working within the confines of Owl House canon, but I am going to try my best to keep things as accurate as I can, and teach fun little facts whenever the opportunity arises. This chapter references Englands first attempt to colonize America under Queen Elizabeth, the infamous Roanoke Colony, which was founded in 1585 and found completely abandon by 1590 with no hint to where the settlers might have gone. I feel like by the time Caleb was a kid, that story must have become a well known Urban Legend. He also references the Starving Time in Jamestown, which I will explain more about in upcoming chapters.

Please comment if you like this story, I'm actually putting a lot more work in than I would usually do, but I'm having a lot of fun doing it. If you could let me know what you think, it would mean the world to me. If you could share, it would be even better.