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Chapter Two: The Hand's Eyes
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Awareness returns to me a bit at a time; not so slow and alarming a process as how I had awoken last, though darkness continues to be my sight's only companion. The furs are pressed against my cheek, in all their unpleasant scent but welcome softness and warmth.... Warmth? The fire- where was it? That source of heat was no where to be found now.
I start to push myself up, pulling my legs under me awkwardly...a process made even more awkward when my mind finally realizes something else my senses have been trying to tell me. There is a new feeling, the touch of something abrasive about one of my wrists. I twist my hand around, trying to feel the restraint that's holding my wrist down- a rope. It is only about the one wrist and tightly though. I begin to tug and claw at it, a strangled sound of frustration rising from my throat as I struggle with it.
That old man and his grandson- had they dug me out of there simply to take me as a prisoner now? What had I woken into?
A sudden creak and blast of frigid air warns me the door has opened to let someone into this...hut? House? Hovel? I don't even know what I'm in!
"Here now; quit that! You're going to tear your hand up, you idiot!" It's the grandson; that not quite childish, not quite manly alto speaks of that. Something is dropped to the floor as the boy- Talen, wasn't it?- rids himself of whatever he was carrying, coming instead to my bed-turned-prison with heavy thumps and scrapes of his boots across the wooden floor.
Wooden...a house then...a surprisingly well built one for peasants. How I know this, I don't know...there's just an odd sense of surprise at the discovery, some whispering voice in the back of my mind telling me this is not typical of such folk.
It suddenly feels a silly thing to have been caught up in; during that little pondering, Talen had seized my bound wrist and began working at the rope. Rather than binding me tighter, however...the rope falls away and then strong, blunt fingers are prodding at my wrist.
"Ngh- what are you..." The pain is sudden, sharp and unwelcome...a quick little blaze I had not been expecting and that occasionally knowledgeable little whisper had not prepared me for. My attempt to reclaim my hand does little more but invite more pain..perhaps I am wounded, perhaps I am simply not strong at all...but Talen's hand refuses to relinquish its hold.
"Seeing what you did to yourself, plainly." The boy's tone is heavy with forced patience- odd how little sighs and a shift in tone can paint an emotion I can't see. "I told him you'd panic if you woke up like that...eh, no matter. Better than you going and walking into the coals or table, blind as a bat." There's a pause then as I shift back on the furs, though my hand remains a prisoner in his. A moment later, there's the touch of something cool and damp against my wrist; something is being smeared along it, then the roughish feel of something being drug across it. A feeling of tightness, almost painfully so draws a small sound of wordless protest from my throat...then it loosens slightly and my hand is released to fall as it will.
"...Where are we..? What has happened..?" The more aware I'm becoming, the less I find I like this darkness...this uncertainty of where everything is in relation to me. Talen is before me; I can hear his breathing, even if he hadn't just been manhandling my wrist. The furs are under me...but now, I have no idea if I am facing where the fire had been or away from it...I could not tell how large this place was, what was within it...nothing.
"Grandpapa's right; you're not much for thanking people who go out of their way to help you." That tone is as filled with disgust as it had been with the false patience before. It comes as a slap in its own right against my ears; I can feel myself flinch, instinctively shifting away from the boy. "...Geh, don't go looking like that. He'll think I've been beating on you." There's a pause then; I can almost feel the irritation slipping away from the scene as the boy makes a thoughtful sound. "...Eh, well..maybe if you don't know who you are or what you are- maybe you forgot manners too, huh? Well- when someone helps you, you say 'thank you'. Easy enough, isn't it?"
The chagrin I can feel welling up must surely be visible; the boy gives a sudden laugh as I turn my head away from the sound of his voice, hands suddenly descending on my shoulders with a startling strength.
"Aww, don't look so lost. Well since you didn't argue with me- guessing you still don't know your own name, eh? Well we can't keep calling you 'prince' or 'highness' so....How's about....Dorien? You look like a Dorien- all fancy and long haired. Doesn't look like you've done a day's hard work in your entire life!"
"When you say it like that, Talen, I find a sudden dislike for the name." I must have been grimacing along with those words; for another peal of laughter greets them, along with a thump of one of those hands against my shoulder. Honestly, what did this boy eat to sound so young and have hands so heavy? I'm still swaying under that as he steadies me with the return of that grip, still chortling.
"Well that got some fire in you. Heheh...well, consider it a reason to start remembering, Dorien." The amusement trails off after a moment though; silence holds the room for a time then. Then his hands are disappearing from my shoulders...returning to grasp my own hands and pull them up from the furs I'm still clutching to. Holding on to something makes it feel more real; as if I am somehow anchored. I twist my fingers tighter into the furs, loathe to give that grasp up. "I'm not going to hurt you, Dorien. Come on, let go- I'm just going to show...er...well...teach you something an old woman back in the village used to do. She couldn't see either."
I reluctantly loosen my fingers from the furs at that insistent tugging...and he guides my hands upwards to his face, settling the tips of my fingers against his skin. It's rough to my fingers; if he's put my hands to his cheeks, they are devoid of beard as his voice hinted they should be. Yet the weather has done its own work, that I can feel. It is so very rough, almost abrasive to my fingers.
"Now- start moving your hands over my face, careful now. You don't want to make me blind, too! Just use the tips and move them around some." Feeling incredibly awkward and invasive, I start to do as he instructs...and slowly I start to get some idea, at last, of what at least one of my rescuers looks like.
The rough skin has none of the round softness beneath it that whispering voice in the back of my mind tells me a genuinely young sort would have; the jaw is heavy and squared beneath my fingers, leading to a chin marred by a thick band of flesh that is tougher than the skin about it.
"...A scar, Talen?" A sound of agreement rises from the young man; for that is what I am positive he must be now, youthful voice or no. I trace the scar upward, to find it crosses over softer flesh; though that is a rather relative term. The lips then...thin and somewhat wide set as my fingers trace over and upward; one continuing to trace the scar on its upward journey across the cheekbone then dipping down to the corner of the eye and continuing onward to disappear into a rough mop of hair I pull back from with a grimace before I can quite stop myself.
Talen, fortunately, seems to find that more amusing than insulting if that sudden snicker is anything to go by.
"Hey, don't give me that look- you aren't so clean right now yourself! You must've gotten used to your own scent in that hole there because you reek, Dorien." I can feel the embarrassment alighting on my face then; my cheeks are warming at that rather matter of fact statement. I pull that hand away and allow the other to continue its exploration- a surprisingly narrow nose after how thick the jaw had seemed, the tip upward turned some. It's rather long, too- when I finally find the eyebrows, they surprise me yet again...sweeping upward at a sharp angle. The eyes below them are also a surprise after that heavy jaw and scar; long and narrow to match the brows, though they do not rise at so sharp an angle.
Why this seems surprising to me, I cannot say. There's just a whisper of unease from the back of my mind, something murmuring that it was not a proper set of features. I wave that away restlessly; I am certain I had not been blind all of my life. How could I trust something from a life I cannot even properly recall when it plainly wasn't geared to 'see' like this?
"Well there you are then; now you know what I 'look' like. Pretty hard to forget, eh?" He takes hold of the hand still hovering near his face...turning it to place it to my own now. "Now it's your turn. Mirrors aren't going to do you any good, Dorien, so there you are." I can hear Talen settling back then, plainly waiting for me to begin. I hesitate a moment, lowering my fingers to the furs to rub the tips lightly against them...then I raise my hands to my own cheeks.
Dirt is the first thing that I feel; that should be no surprise. I had been mostly buried, after all. The skin beneath it, however, is as unalike from Talen's as...as the fire's heat from the chilly drafts that crept into this place. It is quite soft to the touch, though lacking that roundness the mind still insists would indicate someone very young. That brings a startling revelation in and of itself; I do not even know my own age. My hands tremble at that, breaking the start of the 'image' I had begun to build in my mind of myself.
Was I young? Middle aged or nearly so, perhaps? On thinking back to my own voice...I cannot tell there either. It isn't the horrible, cracking croak it had been before my rest, but it was by no means recovered.
"Go on, Dorien. Just stay calm, eh?" The man's tone is oddly gentle there; Talen's hands brushing against the back of mine to press the tips back to my face again. "Just take it slow; let your hands see for you. That's what that old woman always said."
"Y..yes..of course...thank you..." Still nothing to go on in that pitiful ruin of a voice. I can only hope that was not how I naturally sounded. I begin my exploration again...soft, smooth skin about the cheeks...I must be young then. There's nothing of the stubble my mind whispers to associate with older men, no roughness to indicate I had ever had to cut such away. That brings an odd kind of reassurance to me...if I was young, then my memory could not have been so very long.
If it will not return...then I still had time to make a new life. I was not an older man with a long life of experiences suddenly taken from him. It is an odd bit of hope to have, perhaps, but one that heartens me to hurry along with the 'seeing'..suddenly desperate to know how I look.
My cheeks rise high toward the eyes, not settled low as Talen's had been. I follow the up sweep of them to the eyes themselves...pausing a bit at what I find there. Like Talen's, they are long and narrow, though perhaps a bit more tilted than his own had been. I find the eye brows to match as well, though they are thinner than what I had felt on my current companion's face; thinner and softer.
The forehead I find to be narrower than Talen's had been...and on tracing down the sides of my face now for the jaw, I find my own face to be narrowing sharply in comparison to the gentler curve his had possessed. There is no gradual descent to the jaw; it comes sharply, leading to a much narrower chin. An upward slip of the fingers reveals soft, narrow lips set over a smallish mouth; and rising over that, a narrow and sharply upward tilted.
"So what do you think, Dorien?" Talen's question startles me out of my reverie and I drop my hands to my lap with a long sigh.
"...I think perhaps 'Fox' might have been a better name; it is all so sharp and narrow." Why this bothers me, I couldn't say...beyond it was so unlike what I had felt on Talen's own features. The man just starts laughing, however, clothing rustling...he must be standing, for his voice is now coming from higher above me.
"Well everyone looks pretty different from each other, usually. Don't worry too much about it. So now you have a name and you know what you look like; let's see about getting you-" Whatever else he means to say escapes my ears...for another sound has suddenly caught my attention. The sound of something crunching rapidly; gasping breath punctuated here and there with a vicious curse...It is outside of the house, but drawing nearer. "Eh? Dorien? What is it?"
"Someone's coming..." There's a marked pause to Talen's movement...then he's suddenly moving for the door, throwing it open to the frigid winds and letting the sounds I had caught in all the clearer.
"Grandpapa! What's happened to-" Alarm is rife through his tone, enough to drive me to my own feet for all I sway unsteadily as I step off of the furs. There is more noise from outside now; I use that and the cold as my guide to slowly make my way to the door. Outside, Talen's voice and frantic steps have ceased...there's only wind to be heard now until I gain the door frame. Then, just over the wind's moaning, I can hear what is being said.
"...get into the cellar...you and him both...not far..village is taken...Galdabar's soldiers..." Galdabar. I take the word and turn it about in my mind a moment...yet that whispering voice is silent. There is no touch of warning, no thrill of fear or recognition. Perhaps I had never known it..? I break out of my musing at a sudden sound, however...a soft, ragged breath followed by vicious coughing.
"Ease up, grandpapa- it's not important! Stop talking, just let me..." Talen's voice is peculiarly tight; the tone rigid and controlled in a way unnatural to my mind after hearing him speak before. "Just let me get you in the house and we'll dress this up..."
"Take him and hide!" The old man's voice temporarily regains strength; then the sound of more crunching...snow, my mind supplies at last. It's further off and steadier, accompanied by a low clanking. "If they find him, you know what they'll do! Now go!" The old man coughs harshly again; this time they do not break for him to speak again though I can hear him struggling to catch his breath between them.
"...There are more people coming...Talen? We should get him inside-" The coughing finally eases, the older man growing quiet. Yet even as that distant sound of movement comes ever closer- it is only one person I hear approaching through what my mind is now telling me must be snow. I can feel it swirling around my feet where I stand in the door.
"Come on, Dorien...the cellar's this way." Talen's voice has lost that odd, rigid control...it's simply...toneless now. Emotionless...though the hand by which he's seizing my arm is trembling, the grip weaker than the earlier ones. "If you can hear them they're not far off. Let's go."
"What of your-" The hand on my arm gives a sudden vicious jerk, all but throwing me ahead of Talen. He continues to shove and push me along, with little care for what may be in the way; my strength certainly can't compare to his and soon enough it's taking all of my concentration just to keep to my feet. He doesn't stop until there's another sudden creaking...this time from the floor. He claps his hand over my mouth roughly, dragging me back against him as he jumps forward- and I can only cling to his arm as the floor disappears from beneath us.
There's a heavy thudding overhead as we come to a sudden halt against a reeking pile of what feels to be more furs...then he's dragging me up, one arm caught in his other hand while his first remains tight across my mouth, stifling the questions that are racing through my mind. He forces me along, and I find fear and general helplessness making me compliant...I could not fight him even if I knew what was going on, not with the strength he's now displaying.
When at last he stops moving, the scent of damp earth is around me again though not so close as it had been. I can sense nearness; not only of him but of other things on all sides...walls? An earthen room, perhaps, dug beneath the house?
"I'm going to move my hand now; not a word out of you." That is hissed against my ear as he releases my arm, fingers loosening from across my mouth. "There's no point in us dying too...."
Dying too? I freeze at that...and my mind goes back to the scene we had just fled from. The coughing, Talen's alarm...the silence after that last bout of coughs. The final bout of them. Realization is gripping at me now, sliding out of the depths of my mind with that insidious little knowledgeable whisper...my own inner mind laughing at me for not realizing I had been hearing one of my rescuers draw his last breath.
Talen moves away from me for a moment, shoving me against a wall to keep me on my feet. I can hear him doing something where we had entered this little room from...just as the sound of something being broken- the door?- comes distantly from above us. I can't quite choke down the cry of alarm; faint and ruined my voice may be, but it is plenty to bring Talen back from whatever it is he's doing, hand sharply pressing a cloth over my mouth and nose.
The scent on this cloth; I know it. It had risen from the drink he had given me before. I claw at his hand with both of mine, uttering a wordless protest even as I can feel my senses dulling...then he's pulling the cloth away, easing me to sit on the floor of the room as lethargy steals what little strength I could claim.
"...That's not enough to knock you out, but it will keep you quiet." The good humored, gentle tone of earlier is far gone. It hardly sounds like the same person who had just been teaching me how to 'see' or who had knelt out by a dying man. "So sit down and be quiet..."
He settles down next to me then, one hand a steel vise about my arm. I can form not coherent protest...even my thoughts are growing cloudy under that scent's influence. All I can do is listen as they tar the house to pieces above us...people shouting in a language I don't know as they tromp back and forth over our heads. I cannot even muster the will to act on the fear that tries to tear at my system when I hear the floor being shattered.
They know where we hid; how couldn't they? If there were snow, it would be plain enough we hadn't run. More tidbits that little whisper is offering; knowledge I wish it would keep away. I want to scream as I hear them moving closer and closer- Talen's only reaction is to tighten his hold on my arm, the scent of that rag briefly becoming stronger as it rustles closer...that brief bit stealing away more of my strength, though he does not place it too close to my face this time.
And yet, for all the fear...the sounds begin to move away. Men are still shouting, things are still being broken...but the cellar now lies empty save for us. My voice refuses to budge, choked by terror and drug both...but I reach up to try to shake Talen's shoulder with, to demand to know what has happened. It is not his shoulder I find, however..it is his face, turned down while we waited....
And the hand's eyes 'see' what my ears could not through the harsh, dead tone he had spoken in. Against my finger tips, a warm dampness escapes down his cheek, though he keeps his breathing steady and soft, his form still and silent. I let my hand fall away, tips wet with the tears he's shedding for his grandfather and slump back against the wall.
And so, with both of us in a darkness of varying kinds, we wait and grieve silently as the soldiers of Galdabar finish their work above us.
Original Story
