Chapter 87

"You truly don't care for coffee?" Phelan asked incredulously. "Everyone enjoys coffee."

I walked into the house and removed my shoes for a second time, appalled by the condition of my footwear. The laces were stiff with dried dirt and my trousers splattered with mud and the white fluff of dandelions. Given that Julia had packed all of the belongings for the four of us, I had no idea if there was another pair of shoes or boots in the trunk or if I would be returning to Paris barefoot.

"I prefer my sugar and cream with a splash of coffee."

Phelan grunted and opened a small white cabinet that was beside the cookstove and retrieved a container of tea from the top of the otherwise empty shelf. "You prefer sweet tastes, then?"

"I've been told it helps to lessen my otherwise surly and disagreeable disposition."

"I'm afraid there isn't much by way of sugar to curb your disagreeable mood."

"That is a pity," I agreed.

My brother chuckled to himself. "Thankfully my mood is always agreeable."

"Indeed."

By all means, Kire, make yourself at home," he said over his shoulder.

I wandered back into the main room and felt like an intruder in an unfamiliar space. I envisioned the narrow rocking chair my mother had occupied beside the fireplace, heard the creak of the wood in the back of my mind as she soothed herself. I looked across the room and down the hall at where the door to the cellar would have been and imagined myself crouched on the top stair, ear to the ground and eyes narrowed as I glimpsed her through the crack at the bottom of the door.

Hours of my day were spent in such a position, longing for the company I was denied. I listened to her sing hymns and recite passages or phrases over and over again, often in a language I didn't understand, and imagined her words had been directed at me. I was forbidden to speak to her per my father's orders as she found my presence disturbing.

My own mother thought I was evil, some creature sent to punish her for reasons I never understood. Respectfully, I watched her in silence and hoped one day she would change her mind.

Deep in thought, my gaze was drawn to a small oval portrait framed in cherrywood. The painting was no larger than my hand, dwarfed in comparison to the other, larger pieces of art on the emerald wall and somewhat plain compared to the other more decorative frames.

The size didn't matter, however, I recognized our mother's face at once with her high cheekbones, eyes set too far apart, and ink black hair. She looked less feral than I remembered in the oval frame, the disquiet in her green eyes replaced by a less severe emotion.

And yet still there was something about her face and the way she had been painted that was painful and true, as though if the image could speak, it would have released a blood-chilling scream that would have rattled the walls.

I felt almost ashamed of staring at her image, much as I had felt strange for wanting the attention of someone who had made it clear that she did not want me. Our eyes were the same color, our features angular, and yet she saw nothing in me that she found worth saving.

The tea kettle whistled and I jumped, startled by the sound.

"What do you think?" Phelan called from the kitchen.

"They're different from the gallery show."

"I meant the painting you've been staring at for the last five minutes."

I frowned with my back to the kitchen and stared at my mother's melancholy green eyes. Haunted, I thought, the eyes of a woman who was trapped helplessly within her own mind and never escaped. She had always reminded me of a lost dog with matted hair who flinched at every sound, afraid of the world and the cruelty it held.

"She looks so young," I said at last.

"She was," Phelan answered.

I turned toward my brother as he walked into the room pushing a service cart. The cups and saucers rattled as he approached and rolled over the rug. He left the cart between the two red chairs and retrieved Elvira from her perch before he sat.

"How old is she in your painting?" I asked.

I thought for certain Phelan would simply answer young, but he leaned back in his chair and appeared to silently count on his fingers. "Nineteen?" he answered. "A young mother."

"She was nineteen years of age when you were born?"

"No, she was fifteen when I was born."

My heart stuttered. "Are you certain?" I asked.

"Quite."

I stared at the painting again, horrified by the revelation. "My God, she was a child."

Phelan shrugged. He reached for his tea and simply stirred his beverage while steam rolled off the surface. "She was a naive girl from a poor family who foolishly left Denmark with a man she barely knew and sought refuge in an unfamiliar country. They wed when she was fourteen and he was thirty. From what I understand, Bjorn offered to purchase Gyda from her family."

"Her family sold her?" I asked, horrified by the notion.

"No, her family refused and she ran away with Bjorn in the middle of the night. A fairy tale turned a nightmare."

"Did she tell you this?"

Phelan looked past me at the wall of paintings. "Her mother did. The woman in the red shawl above the painting of Gyda is Hilda. Our maternal grandmother."

I immediately turned back to the wall and the portrait of a sturdy, plain-faced woman who appeared to be in her forties or early fifties. Her upper lip was wrinkled like a raisin, hinting at lost teeth, but her eyes, green as her daughter's, were keen and hopeful. Her hair was black, her skin pale, and the red of her shawl matched her lips. I thought she was beautiful in the most ordinary way, an older version of my own mother.

"You knew our grandmother?" My heart truly lept with unexpected joy of discovering a new relative.

"Know," Phelan corrected. "She is still alive, as is our grandfather on Gyda's side. Or at least they were the last I heard from them."

"How long ago was that?" I asked.

"A month ago."

My chest felt as though it could barely contain my heart. I had grandparents; living grandparents.

"Are they in Denmark still?"

Phelan inhaled. "Sit," he said. "I'll not have you standing over me with your myriad questions."

Like an obedient little brother, I sat across from him, my eyes drawn back to the paintings. "Are they all depictions of family?" I asked before turning my attention back to him.

Phelan shook his head. "Not all, but there are Gyda, Hilda, and Toke."

"Toke? Our grandfather?"

He nodded. "He is a true viking."

I scanned the portraits, eager to find the painting of my maternal grandfather. The moment I spotted him, I smiled inwardly. He looked like a king with his sharp blue eyes and angular face, same as our mother and grandmother. His braided hair was white-blond, his eyebrows and beard equally pale, and his expression regal. He was a man to be admired and feared, I thought, not because he was cruel in nature, but because he was fierce and strong.

"I met them shortly after I moved to Belgium," Phelan said before I asked.

"How did you find them?"

Phelan inhaled. "Gyda used to sing a nursery rhyme about the great viking king Toke of Skyderhelm."

"Konge Toke," I said. "She repeated it often. I thought it was gibberish."

"Gyda never learned much French, but she was of course fluent in Danish and knew German. She would sing all sorts of nonsensical songs, but that was her favorite. I discovered the town was a real place by accident and since I had no interest in Paris and no desire to settle down, I may as well see Skyderhelm and it's famous king.

"I found three men named Toke; two with the surname Clausen and one Ostergaard. The latter was the one I wished to meet. He was quite flattered when I strolled onto his dairy farm inquiring about a king."

I had never once given thought to my surname or my mother's family after I left Conforeit with my uncle. As far as I was concerned, I was only Erik and had added Kire simply for the sake of having my music considered. Now I had more branches on a family tree; a history rather than a blank page.

"Did they know of their grandchildren?" I asked.

"They had no contact with Gyda once she left home and never saw or heard from her again. Gyda could not read or write and had no way of corresponding, though I doubt she would have done so if she was capable. I suppose they assumed she bore children, but they had no confirmation until I paid a visit." Phelan took a tentative sip of his tea. "I told them of the song she sang and they were both familiar with it. Apparently it was a bedtime song from her childhood, a sort of family nursery rhyme. They were surprised she sang it and thought it was endearing that she shared her childhood with her own sons and quite frankly, I didn't have the heart to tell them her songs were little more than nonsense mumbled to herself."

"Was she ill before she left Skyderhelm?"

Phelan regarded her portrait a moment, his expression strained. "From the time she was nine or ten they attempted to bleed the demons from her unsuccessfully. Blessings did not work nor did calling upon Norse gods in desperation."

My heart sank. I had never blamed my mother for the way she had treated me. From a young age I had realized there was something amiss and I had wanted nothing more than to ease the suffering she experienced. I would have loved her unconditionally if she had allowed it.

"When did you paint them?" I asked.

"A year or two after I purchased the house. The ones from my most recent show were actually completed a few weeks after Bjorn passed. Two of them I sketched while sitting at his bedside."

"Have the ones here been part of one of your shows?"

His gaze glided across the room to the easel and the solid gray canvas before he looked at the portrait of our mother again. "They've never been on display and are not for sale or loan. They are mine alone."

My brother's words made me feel as though I had been allowed to witness something deeply personal, a glance into a part of himself that no one else had been allowed to see.

"They are beautifully done," I said.

He inhaled and tapped his fingers against the armrest without looking me in the eye. "I have another painting of Gyda back home, similar to this one. It's not framed and has done little more than take up space. If you would want it, I will have it sent to your home."

"I would," I said without hesitation. "And I will gladly compensate you for your work."

He waved a dismissive hand in my direction. "Consider it a gift."

"I appreciate it more than you know."

Phelan simply nodded. "I told Toke and Hilda that their younger grandson is a famous composer from Paris and quite renowned throughout the world," Phelan said. "They are avid listeners of folk music and quite pleased by this news."

I smiled with an unexpected swell of pride. My grandparents, my living grandparents, knew that I existed.

"Being that Toke and Hilda have never left Skyderhelm in the eighty-five years they've been alive, they've never heard of you or your music and are not familiar with opera. I did, however, promise to send them a review from Testan so that they could become better acquainted with your work."

"You did not."

Phelan appeared quite satisfied with himself. He smiled and drank the rest of his tea. "Of course I didn't."

I turned my cup of tea in my hand. "Are they well?"

"As well as could be expected for two people of their age, I suppose. Toke still operates their small dairy and Hilda will fret and fuss until you've had a second helping of supper, but they are good people. Hard of hearing and stubborn, but salt of the earth and honest."

"Do you visit them often?"

Phelan leaned back and Elvira pulled at a thread loose on the chair's seam. "Every year for the last twenty or so, I've paid a visit in spring and autumn. For the first two days Hilda will yell at me in Danish before she remembers I've spent most of my life speaking French and German. My Danish and her German improves twice a year for the sake of conversation."

"Do they have other immediate family nearby?" I asked.

Phelan shook his head. "Gyda had a twin sister who drowned when they were twelve and a younger brother who died as an infant."

"What about our father's side of the family?"

Phelan's expression darkened. "I've no interest in Bjorn's lineage," he answered as he placed his empty cup onto the service cart and pulled out his watch. His lips parted and eyes widened as he turned his attention back to me and abruptly stood. "It's after five," he announced.

I stared at him for a moment. "That cannot be. Your watch has stopped." I reached for my pocket watch and confirmed that it was indeed a few minutes after five.

"Do you wish to return?" Phelan asked.

I looked from him to the paintings on the wall and shook my head. "Do you know where our uncle's home is located?" I asked.

"Of course."

"If time allows, I would like to see it."

Phelan put his watch away and untethered Elvira. He inhaled and straightened his spine. "It's on the other side of town."

"Is that a yes or a no?" I impatiently asked.

He eyed me sharply. "I'll have the carriage brought around."

With that, Phelan returned Elvira to her stand and exited out the house through the kitchen. I considered following him and waiting outside, but my attention was drawn to the hallway and the wall that had once been the entry into the cellar.

I swallowed and approached the end of the hall. There was a bedroom to the left and another room that I had never seen before to the right. Both doors were open and my curiosity pulled me toward what had always been forbidden. I recalled seeing the bedroom my parents shared in brief glimpses as I was brutally returned to the cellar. The room was always dark and the contents shapeless shadows.

Phelan had turned it into a space with white walls and a simple bed that had a trunk at the foot, a matching dresser, and a mirror.

This is where my parents had slept, mere steps away from the hell they had confined me to for as long as I could recall. A young, unwell woman and her heavy-handed, drunken husband who had taken her from her own family slept in a bed they shared while I curled up like an animal in a corner.

I turned away from their bedroom and glanced into the smaller room on the other side of the hall. From what I could see, the walls were scuffed and dirty, the floor still dirt unlike the rest of the house. It was familiar despite me knowing for certain I had never stepped foot inside the room. The door was always closed and I had been too afraid to know why. As a boy, I had convinced myself that the demons and monsters my mother feared were harbored inside that room.

"Our room," Phelan said.

The sound of his voice made me jump out of my skin. I turned to face him, my heart wildly beating as I stammered for an excuse to be wandering the house.

"Relax, Kire, I've nothing to hide," Phelan said. "There is not much to see, but you are free to look around."

I pushed the door further open and looked inside the small space, unsure of what I expected to find in an empty room. No fleeting childhood memories came to me as I had been weeks old when I would have last been within the bedroom. There were two narrow windows, both covered in dirt and cobwebs. The one directly across from the door was cracked from the top to the bottom and it looked as though a bird's nest hung from the outside in a clump of twigs and dried grass.

"It has not changed in forty years," Phelan said as he came up behind me. "One day I will paint the walls and add furniture, but for now I find it intolerable."

I didn't ask my brother to elaborate and I doubted he would say another word.

"How far are we from our uncle's home?" I asked as I followed him out of the house.

"Thirty minutes."

I furrowed my brow. "It took thirty minutes to travel from the cottages to this house. How can that be?"

"It's a twenty minute walk on foot through the woods, he explained over his shoulder as I walked down the stairs and waited for him to lock the door. "Possibly twenty-five minutes with all of the rain the last few days."

"Very well."

I looked down at my shoes, which were already covered in mud, and sighed, wondering what my wife would say when I returned filthier than the dog. There was a decent chance I would spend the rest of our holiday curled up by the foot of the bed while Bessie took my place beside Julia in bed.

Phelan looked past me and I turned my head, eyeing a crumpled heap of moss-covered stone nearly lost in the surrounding wildflowers and a stand of young birch trees that grew like bony fingers protruding from the earth, white against the splash of green grass and the yellow and purple dots of summer blooms.

My blood ran cold as I stared at the gravestone. My gravestone. It seemed further away from the house than I recalled, but I knew precisely what it was and how deeply the sight of the marker had always disturbed me.

"I doubt the ink was dry on the paperwork for the house when I came out here after dusk and took a sledgehammer to the damned headstone," Phelan said. "I apologize that any part of it still remains, but I am not here often enough to properly dispose of the rubble."

I said nothing in return and Phelan turned away, briskly walking toward the carriage that was in the same spot as when we had been dropped off. He briefly spoke to the driver before we climbed inside and sat across from one another.

"Alak's home has been vacant for quite some time," Phelan warned. He crossed his arms and stared out the window. "But due to its location, I imagine the property is still largely undisturbed."

"Why do you think our uncle and father settled here?" I asked. "Of all places?"

"I think they grew up in the vicinity. It's quite possible that Alak never left and Bjorn returned after he removed Gyda from her family."

My thoughts were drawn to Lisette, who was only six years younger than my own mother had been when she bore her first son. Any man who would have thought of abducting her from my home would have found himself suffering an unimaginable fate.

"You knew they were fishermen, correct?" My brother asked. I nodded. "They were third generation, I believe. I've heard the carp is good in these parts, but I've never tried it."

"Did you fish as well?"

"Fishing held no interest to me. I wanted to sketch the waves and the shoreline as opposed to cast nets and lines. And of course Valgarde turns green simply looking at waves, but he spent many days at sea with Alak to keep him company and toss bottles of wine overboard when his father was preoccupied with nets."

"He was fond of wine?" I said. I could not recall him drinking more than a glass of wine here and there in our brief time together and I knew for certain he had never been inebriated in my presence.

"Fond? Alak's affinity for wine was alarming, not endearing. He would finish a full bottle at sea and another in the evening," Phelan answered. "Valgarde practically carried him home some evenings when they returned."

"I had no idea. He was not...belligerent toward me."

My brother shrugged. "Alak was quite the blissful, storytelling type of drunk. Some days he hid his condition better than others, probably because of the tolerance he built up. He could hold an entire conversation and not once slur a single word, but you could see it in his eyes."

"It killed him," I said softly. "His eyes and skin in the end...he was yellow."

I hadn't understood at the time that his poor state of health was the result of cirrhosis of the liver or that he was overly fond of drinking. His eyes and flesh were the color of summer squash and I had been too naive and enamored with his kindness to realize he was dying.

Phelan eyed me. "Same as Bjorn. He had no desire to drink the water I provided, but he clung to a half-empty bottle of whiskey in his last days, nasty and ill-tempered as ever. I suppose that isn't much of a surprise that it killed both of them. It is a terrible vice, little brother, one that has a far-reaching hand," he said quietly. "Generations, sometimes."

"It stopped with me," I said sharply.

"Good."

"I still cannot tolerate the smell of hard liquor. Wine I can drink on occasion, but whiskey reminds me of..." My voice trailed away, the words I managed to speak feeling like a strange and shameful confession.

Phelan met my eye. "Of Bjorn?"

"Yes," I answered and left it at that.

"Whiskey reminds me of his death. If anger had a smell, that is it. Wine I've never much indulged in," Phelan said. "I do not keep either in my home. It is better that way."

We weaved our way back through the town, drawing the same looks of ire and curiosity as when we had driven through hours earlier. Phelan leaned toward the window and stared back at the people who gathered, his gray eyes hardened and unwavering. Most people pretended to busy themselves once they noticed my brother returning their glares.

"What is the rumor you mentioned earlier?" I asked suddenly.

My brother hesitated. He continued to stare out the window, his expression more distant than hardened as we traveled past the last building and away from the crowd. He briefly looked at me from the corner of his eye. "That I am Bjorn."

I stared at him while he continued to look out the window. "That is absurd," I blurted out quite defensively on my brother's behalf.

"Indeed, and yet I expect nothing less from a village filled with people who have not traveled more than a half-day from the place of their birth," Phelan bitterly replied. He sniffed and narrowed his eyes. "I've found lines of salt in front of the door and rings of iron on the door knobs from time to time typically a day or two after I arrive," Phelan said.

"Why would they think you are him?"

"The same reason you were made speechless the afternoon we met in Valgarde's courtyard," he answered.

The resemblance to our father was uncanny, however, our father had been a greasy, red-faced and unkempt drunk while Phelan dressed impeccably and appeared much healthier than our father had ever been.

"They think you are our father resurrected?" I asked incredulously. "Delivered from the grave thirty years younger and in remarkable health for a man who drank himself to death?"

Phelan sat up straighter and gripped the side of the carriage as it came to a sudden stop. I was nearly thrust forward, but managed to catch myself at the last moment. The driver hopped down and opened the door, looking at me first and then my brother.

"An hour, Monsieur Kimmer?" the driver asked.

"Seventy-five minutes," Phelan said. He removed his waistcoat and tossed it back into the carriage before rolling his trouser legs up past his ankles. "You know where we will be, Christophe?"

The driver could not contain his look of annoyance at a specific time, but nodded nonetheless and stepped aside for us to exit, muttering that he would return in seventy-five minutes before he drove away and left us standing on the outskirts of town.

I looked around, unable to spot anything that made this particular part of the road any different than the rest.

"I suppose returning to Conforeit after sunset to care for Bjorn did me few favors and helped fuel their superstitions."

It took me a moment to realize our conversation regarding the rumors had continued. Phelan glanced over his shoulder and motioned for me to follow before he ducked beneath a low branch and moved swiftly off the road and into the woods, leaving me to scramble after him.

"I'm not sure I understand how that fueled superstition."

"No one aside from the physician had seen the drunken fool for months as he was unfit to leave the house," Phelan explained. "The doctor told me that Bjorn was presumed dead weeks earlier."

"No one bothered to check on him?" I asked.

"He was belligerent and destitute. He had no friends and the house was in such poor condition that looters had no interest in broken furnishings. Anything of value had been sold to pay the doctor and eventually there was no silver or jewelry remaining," Phelan explained. "As it was, I doubt there was much to start with either as he drank and gambled away whatever coin found its way into his pocket."

I swatted and sputtered my way through a cloud of gnats and attempted to follow quite literally in my brother's footsteps through the woods. The flies were biting and insects buzzed past, all of which Phelan ignored or failed to notice.

Phelan stopped abruptly and mopped his brow with his handkerchief. Once he finished blotting his sweat-sheened face, he rolled up his shirt sleeves, leaving his scarred arm exposed.

"Does this surprise you that he died destitute and alone?"

I shrugged and attempted to avert my gaze from his injured arm. "I suppose not."

Phelan climbed over a tree that appeared to have fallen some time ago and squinted up at the cloudless sky and the bright light filtering through the leaves.

"The physician was kind enough to deliver a week's worth of food so that I was able to remain in the house," he said. "And then of course Bjorn took his last breath in the middle of the night and the priest came to tend to the body and arrange his burial. I walked into town the following afternoon to hire a cab and return home and the whispers began."

"Surely you could put the rumor to rest by telling them who you are."

Phelan grunted. "I could."

"But…?"

"But they think they are bold when they are little more than cowards far too afraid to look me in the eye. I prefer them keeping a careful, superstitious distance from me at all times."

With his eyes cast upwards, I studied the reddened, ruined flesh on his arm. My jaw clenched at the thought of a father purposely harming his own young child. Alex had nearly burned himself several times on candles, and despite how he screamed and fought in protest of being restrained, I kept him safe from touching the flame or covering himself in hot wax.

"Is it worse in broad daylight?" Phelan asked. He held out his left arm and spread his fingers, fully displaying the extent of damage from the burn that spanned nearly the length of his forearm.

I blinked at him and stammered for an excuse, mortified that I had been caught gawking. "I wasn't-"

"You were. If I did not want you to see my arm, I'd have worn gloves and kept my sleeves in place," he said before turning away and continuing further into the woods. "I will ask again, Kire, does it appear worse in broad daylight?"

"It isn't the condition of the scar that draws my attention," I said. "It's the rehensible reason behind it."

Phelan ignored my words and kept walking in long strides. We made our way in silence up an incline in the terrain where the trees thinned out and the ground was dryer.

"Do keep up," Phelan said impatiently.

"How do you know where you are heading?" I asked.

"Perhaps I don't," he answered.

His words did nothing to ease my growing concerns of being lost in the wilds of Northern France after sunset with my obstinate, long-lost brother leading the way.

"Perhaps I intend to feed you to the wolves."

"Are you still seven?" I groused under my breath.

"Yes," he dryly answered. I looked up in time to see him smirk. "My hearing is quite impeccable, Kire. I would suggest you speak kindly to your older brother less you wish to find your way alone."

"Is that a threat?"

"Of course not. It is a statement of fact."

The moment he looked away from me, I made a face, proving that if he was still seven, I was eternally three.

Once I caught up to him at the top of the hill, he nodded to our right and I noticed we had gained greater altitude than I originally thought. A ribbon of fast-moving water cut through the woods in a white-water rush. It followed a ridge of sand, stone and twisted roots.

"We're close," Phelan said. "Watch your step. The rain tends to expose more roots."

He proceeded to hop down from where we stood onto a lower trail with tree roots stretched across the length of the path like rungs on a ladder. The ground was mostly sand instead of mud, which made it easier to keep a steady pace. I glanced toward the right and the stream that was directly to our right and down a very steep drop. The water flow was steady, bubbling over rocks that were currently green with moss.

"We both fell down there once," Phelan said over his shoulder. "Scared the hell out of both of us. Thank God it was during a drought and the water was much lower than it is today or we would have been carried off and drowned."

"What were we doing that we fell?"

"You were looking for rocks, as always, and I held onto you with one hand and a tree branch with the other. The branch snapped and rather than let go of you and regain my footing, I fell with you. Or rather, I fell on top of you."

"From this height?" I asked. We weren't standing terribly far above the stream, but the drop was nearly straight down and I assumed would have resulted in severe bruising and potentially broken bones, especially to young children.

Phelan nodded. "It wasn't as steep back then, but we tumbled all the way to the bottom. You busted your lip from either hitting a rock or biting it and I had a black eye and a goose egg on the back of my head." He turned toward me and lifted his chin, feeling beneath his beard. "And I cut my neck. It's difficult to see, but at the time it looked as though I had unsuccessfully slit my own throat."

My skin prickled. "Our uncle must have been furious."

"The abrasions on both of us and the cut to my neck were punishment enough. Alak was relieved we hadn't been killed." Phelan turned toward me and smiled. "Two days later, we were out again, trouncing through the woods without a care in the world."

The path narrowed so that I followed behind him single file, mindful of where I placed my feet so that I didn't end up in the stream as an adult. The current grew stronger and louder, and I imagined the wooded outskirts of Conforeit must have been an unmatched natural playground for boys to explore. Undoubtedly we dashed through the stream when the water was low, climbed trees, and hid from each other behind boulders.

There was a man-made bridge over the stream, which we crossed. The wooden planks sagged slightly in the middle, the wood covered in forest decay and moss with a sapling growing out of a split in one of the boards. Phelan paused in the middle and I followed his gaze to a very large letter K at the highest part of the arch.

"Is that from you?" I asked.

"Valgarde," he answered. "But we left our marks elsewhere."

The romantic notion that I could perhaps restore my uncle's home in the same fashion my brother had transformed our parents' house flitted through my mind. I imagined us meeting several times a year in Conforeit, repairing more than houses in the process.

No sooner had we crossed over the bridge that the house came into view and I paused, taken aback by the condition of the property.

"As I said, it has been vacant for a long time," Phelan said once he noticed I had stopped following him. "I'm surprised it is still standing."

The house itself stood, but the windows had been busted out and there was no longer a door in the frame. The roof had several young trees that had taken root and would eventually collapse the structure while the chimney had missing stones and looked as though it had been struck by lightning at some point.

"When were you here last?" I questioned.

"Probably close to a decade ago."

"How long has it stood vacant?" I asked.

"I would assume from the time you and Alak left here when you were twelve."

I shook my head. "He lived above a butcher," I said "It was closer to the rest of town."

Phelan crossed his arms. "Then perhaps it has been vacant since Val and I were sent to Paris."

I stepped past him, yearning to see the home where I had been taken as an infant and where I had spent three and a half years of my life fed, warm, sheltered and loved.

"I would not step inside," Phelan said.

Ignoring his words, I peered inside the doorway and heard some creature that had taken up residence scurry down the hall and dash out the broken window.

"Of course you don't listen," Phelan grumbled.

Cobwebs hung from a ceiling that was moldy and looked ready to collapse at any moment. The floor was uneven, the boards warped from water damage while what was left of the curtains and rug were rotting and filthy.

If there had been any good memories inside waiting for my return, I felt that they had at once vanished as my heart sank with grief. There would be no repairing this place. The woods had taken it back and there was nothing to be saved.

"Why were you sent to Paris?" I asked as I took a careful step into the house's skeletal remains and tested the flooring. Something crunched beneath my shoe and I stepped over it, finding the skeleton of a mouse or vole.

"Alak went to prison," Phelan answered.

I whipped around, finding my brother directly behind me. "He what?"

Phelan examined the overhang above us and a bird's nest tucked between the wooden beams. "Alak went to prison," he answered. "Sentenced to transportation at first."

"What was the crime?" I asked.

"Theft."

"Of?"

"We were not privy to that information," he said. "Alak made us pack a few belongings and sent us to Paris to live with his sister-in-law's family until he could return, which didn't seem likely given he was sentenced to Devil's Island."

"How did he avoid transportation?" I asked, taking several more steps into the house. Despite the overall damage, the floor seemed sturdy enough to bear weight.

"The sentence was changed to a year of hard labor. Valgarde would know more than me on the subject as they corresponded frequently. I heard from Alak once after we were sent away."

"He never spoke of it to me."

Phelan had nothing else to say on the subject and crossed his arms. He pushed debris around with the toe of his shoe and stepped around me. I watched him walk through a doorway to our left and immediately turn around and head back out.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Nothing."

I stared at him briefly before walking toward the same doorway and into what had most likely been the kitchen. The table that had been in the middle was gone, but there were marks in the floor where the legs had been and several boards from shelves had collapsed.

"As I said," Phelan commented before heading toward the rear of the house. A bird flew past him, screeching as it wheeled through the room and out the open door.

The overall condition saddened me. I followed him into the short hall that separated two small bedrooms, one with a tree growing in the corner and the other with the wall bowed inward. Phelan walked into the room with the tree and stood in the center, his hands on his hips and back to me.

"This was our room," he said. "Your bed was there and mine here," he said, pointing at the corner with the tree.

My brother turned to face me and I assumed he waited for some moment of long lost clarity to take hold. His staring did nothing to ease my already anxious mind. I examined the tree, willing myself to remember something, anything from the only part of my childhood I wished to recall, but to no avail.

At last I shook my head, disappointed by my lack of memories.

"Here," Phelan said. He touched the corner of the wall and smiled. "Do you see it?"

I looked over his shoulder and squinted at the darkened corner. The marks were faint, but still visible.

"Our initials. You scribbled yours on first and then I added mine. And of course to keep from being in considerable trouble, I had to move the bed over so that Alak wouldn't see it."

"Do you think he ever knew?"

"Yes, because you told him as soon as he returned home that evening. You could never keep a secret."

"My son is the same way," I commented.

Phelan studied our initials. "When Alex speaks, it's like being able to hear you at that age," he said fondly. "The way he gestures, the sound of his voice, and his expressions are you."

"I rarely see myself in him."

"He is much more pleasant than you are."

"Of course," I dryly replied.

Phelan reached up and touched the ceiling, which sent down a shower of debris onto both of us. "I do not think it is safe to stand in here for long. A gust of wind is likely to topple the whole building."

In silence I followed him out the way we had come in. Something scurried over the roof, an animal that sounded much larger than a squirrel or mouse.

"He did his best," Phelan said once we were back outside. He offered a heavy sigh and studied the dilapidated structure.

I stared at the house rather than my brother as he spoke, afraid if I met his eye that he would not finish whatever was on his mind.

"After his wife and the baby died, Valgarde said he was different, but then you disappeared and he was never the same. The drinking had always been bad, but he lost himself far too often. Valgarde and I took up the responsibilities of purchasing goods and making certain there was food on the table while Alak grew more and more distant."

"I cannot imagine him silent."

"Not silent, but literally distant, Kire. He would be gone for days at a time, sometimes a full week, and he never said where he was heading or when he would return. To this day Val and I have no idea where he ventured, though I suppose neither of us wanted to know, particularly after he was imprisoned."

Theft didn't surprise me as I had watched my uncle skillfully steal a woman's ring in order to purchase a room and a hot meal. I had thought his actions justifiable as the woman had other jewelry and fine clothes and we were walking with little more than the clothes on our backs.

"He never spoke of prison or the time spent away from you or Joshua."

Phelan shrugged. "We raised ourselves. Of course Val did a considerably better job than I did."

I turned to face him, expecting further elaboration.

"Have you seen enough?" he asked.

I took one last look at the house and nodded, my emotions mixed. For better or worse, I was certain I would never return to this spot again and couldn't decide if I should be saddened for the loss or grateful to see my uncle's house one last time.

"This way," Phelan said, nodding toward the rear of the house.

I narrowed my eyes. "Where are we going?" I asked.

He offered no reply, giving me no choice but to follow.

OoO A/N: Transportation, if you weren't familiar with the term, is being sentenced to a remote location as punishment. Very few were able to afford to return to their families, so once you were sent away, you probably weren't ever coming back.