The Boy in the Field (15 page)

When they came, there was nowhere to run. You were surrounded
on all sides. It didn’t matter which way you turned. There was no way you would
survive this fight.

Noah held your hand and made you surrender. He knew it was the
only way you would get out with your lives. Your hands were tied behind your
backs. They dragged Noah to his feet.

“I’ll find you,” he said, as the Taatars shoved him into the
back of a cart. “If it’s the last thing I do, I’ll find you.”

You were taken to a separate cart. Five other women huddled in
a corner of the vehicle. One was a soldier. The other four were young and
skinny, probably hostages from some nearby hamlet. The door closed behind you,
blocking most of the light. You felt the cart begin to move and you settled
against the wall. No one spoke. There was no need. The darkest fears any of you
held were about to come true.

The End
(Back to start)

“I’m sorry,
laraki
,” Ethan’s medic said when you went
to visit. “He’s not going to recover.”

You smiled. “Will you wake him so we can say goodbye?”

“I think it would be better not to,” she replied.

Noah shook his head. “If I have to say goodbye, I want to know
he heard me,” he said. “I don’t want it to be like last time.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Discharge him,” you said. “Into my care. I’m trained to look
after people. I can care for him at home.”

The medic sighed. “Very well.”

She took out some papers from a folder and had you sign them.
You and Noah then carried Ethan on a stretcher to a waiting therin cart which
took you back to your small apartment. Once Ethan was settled in Noah’s bed,
you tried to wake him.

At first, nothing happened. You removed the radust you needed
from your belt and clutched it in your hand, feeling the power was strongest
when in direct contact with the skin. His eyelids twitched and then opened and
he stared at you, no expression crossing his face at all.

“Ethan?” Noah clutched his hand and knelt at his side. “Ethan!”

Ethan turned his head. He didn’t speak as he looked at Noah. He
didn’t smile. Noah frowned.

“Ethan?”

You swallowed. “Ethan, do you know where you are?”

He turned to face you, but still said nothing. You asked him a
few more questions, said things that you hoped would jog his memory and, in a
last ditch attempt to provoke some kind of reaction, even spouted gibberish at
him for a few seconds. Nothing changed the way he looked at either of you. His
eyes were only following the direction of the sound.

“He’s not Ethan anymore, is he?” Noah asked after you put him
back to sleep. He sat at your side at the top of the stairs.

“I don’t know.” You held his hand. “I don’t know if there is
anything we can do to fix him.”

“I thought I’d found him at last,” he said. “I thought we would
have our family back.”

“Sometimes it doesn’t work like you want it to,” you said.

The End
(Back to start)

You went to visit Ethan alone the next time Noah managed to
drag himself to work. The medics told you everything they knew about Ethan’s
condition. Nothing they said gave you any hope of him ever recovering.

“Don’t prolong this,” you said. “If there’s no chance he will…
It’s kinder to end his life.”

“We’ll have to speak with his next of kin before we can make
that decision,
laraki
,” the medic said.

“That’s probably his brother. I don’t think he can make that
decision.” You smiled. “Which means the decision comes to me.”

* * *

“Noah, we need to talk,” you said when he got home from work.

“What about?”

“It’s Ethan. He passed away.”

Noah stared at you. He said nothing. It was as if he had just
stopped. You hugged him.

“He can’t be gone. They said he was stable. They said he was
okay!”

“Medics aren’t always right, Noah.” You rubbed his back. “I’m
so sorry.”

* * *

The funeral was the closure that Noah needed. It took him a
long time to get over the loss of his brother, but knowing what had happened to
him helped. In time, he would put himself back together and continue to fight,
protecting the city to honour his brother.

The End
(Back to start)

You grabbed his arm before the pen could touch the page.

“Wait.”

One of the men looked at you. “There is nothing to worry about,
laraki
,” he said. “We will take good care of him until he is fit to take
care of himself.”

“He would make a good peacekeeper,” you said. “I’ve no doubt
about that.”

Noah looked at you. “I promised you a good life. Let me do
this.”

You looked back at the men. “Could he be a magister?”

The man smiled at you. “If he shows promise as a peacekeeper,
he will be given the opportunity to join the magisters. But he has a long way
to go before he thinks about that,
laraki
. Whatever he wishes to do,
this is the first step. The first stage of training is the same for all grades
of law defender.”

You let go of his hand and blushed. “My apologies,
yaske
.”

You smiled and watched as he put the ink to the page,
dedicating the next few years of his life to the protection of the Serloran
Empire. Part of you was proud, sure he was going to make the best peacekeeper
the Serlorans had ever seen, but a voice deep inside you was worried,
frightened that he was going to be fed to the Taatars as bait, frightened that
he would leave on an assignment and never come back.

He held your hand as he walked away from the office, a smile on
his face. “You really think I could make a magister?”

You nodded, but couldn’t force a smile. “You would be
brilliant.”

Noah stopped walking and held you to him. “I will be okay,
parahe
.
Everything is going to be okay. You’ll see.”

You smiled. “You shouldn’t call me
parahe
.”

He frowned. “But you are. You’re my
parahe
. You’ve
always been my
parahe
.”

You shook your head. “I’ve been your
parahi
.
Parahe
is for if there was more than one of me.”

Noah smiled. “You’ve been letting me call you that for years.
I’ve been getting it wrong the whole time?”

You nodded. “I didn’t like to correct you. It was so sweet,
hearing you speak my language. But it’s their language too now. I just want
them to respect you.”

Instruction:
107. Noah Begins Work

You watched him put the ink to the page, signing his life to
the protection of the Serloran Empire. Part of you was proud, but something
about it made you sad. Serlora… You owed them nothing and yet he was signing
away his life.

You shook you head. No. Not signing away his life. Signing up
to a cause. He was going to fight the men that had driven you from your home.

Noah smiled as he took your hand and lead you away from the
office. “Soon,
parahe
. Soon, I’ll get you and mother out of lowtown.”

You smiled. “You shouldn’t call me
parahe
.”

He frowned. “But you are. You’re my
parahe
. You’ve
always been my
parahe.
”

You shook your head. “I’ve been your
parahi.
Parahe
is for if there was more than one of me.”

Noah smiled. “You’ve been letting me call you that for years.
I’ve been getting it wrong the whole time?”

You nodded. “I didn’t like to correct you. Hearing you speak my
language made me happy.”

Instruction:
107. Noah Begins Work

“Have a nice day,” you said, watching him leave.

It was too hard. The house held only bad memories. You went to
your room and put the few things you owned into a bag. It was easier if you
left now. Ethan wouldn’t know until he came home and by then it would be too
late for him to try to stop you.

You sat down at the table and wrote him a letter, explaining
why you had to leave and asking him not to look for you. Asking him to take
care of Kama. It was easier for you to be on your own.

Choice:
108. Go it Alone
or
109.
Search for Noah

You went about your day as usual, smiling the whole time to
hide the fact that you felt sick. You visited Kama’s tree and cleaned the
house, ran your errands and began to cook a dinner. Seeing Ethan’s face at the
end of the day only made you smile more. Noah was gone, but you hadn’t lost
everything.

“What’s put you in such a good mood,” he asked, kicking off his
shoes and shrugging off his jacket.

“Ethan…” You looked away. “Ethan, I love you.”

He looked up at you, half-laughing, half-serious. “What?”

“I love you. And I don’t want to lose you like… like them.
You’re all I have left now.” You smiled. “And I know you’re not him. You’re
nothing like him. But what if this is supposed to happen? What if we had to
lose him to find each other?”

“What if you wake up next to me in three years’ time and regret
it?”

“What if you get called up tomorrow and I never see you again?”
You smiled. “We don’t know what’s in the future.”

* * *

It was two years before he asked you to marry him. You came
home one evening to find him in a kitchen filled with flowers on one knee with
a silver ring in his hand.

“I’ve always loved you and I never thought I would be enough
for you. I never thought that I could make you happy,” he said. “And I’m sure
that I can never make you as happy as you make me, but I want to try. I will
try for as long as you let me. And if you accept, I would like to try forever.
Will you marry me?”

You put your hand to your mouth. “Yes!” You threw yourself down
beside him. “Ethan, yes.”

He kissed you, wrapping his arms around you and refusing to let
go. “You have no idea how happy that makes me,” he murmured, his voice
wavering.

“I think I do,” you replied.

“I love you. I love you so much.”

“Not as much as I love you.”

You laughed and pulled back so that Ethan could slide the ring
onto your finger.

“I’m going to be Mrs Wicker,” you giggled. “I never thought…”

You shook your head. You had thought about being Mrs Wicker. It
was just the other Mrs Wicker that you had considered being.

“Never thought what?”

“I never thought you would ask,” you said. It was true, just
for a different reason. Different emphasis. I never thought
you
would ask.

“I never thought you would accept,” he replied. “I wanted to
make sure you didn’t regret this first.”

“Never.” You shook your head. “I don’t regret it at all.

* * *

Your wedding was quiet. Your new life had earned you a few
friendships, but most of the guests were Ethan’s colleagues. It was the
ceremony you had always dreamed of; your favourite flowers on the tables, a
dress that made the most of your figure and the man of your dreams at your
side. Ethan had hired a violinist to play your favourite songs and when he
danced with you, you could tell he had been practising.

The marriage only made you worry about him more when he went
out on assignments with the army. Every day until he returned, you would read
the news sheets and search for stories from the military, hoping for a story of
unbreakable peace, but satisfied with every sentence that told you Ethan would
come home. You hated the reports of missing soldiers and unidentified corpses.
Any man without a name could be your man.

The men that had invaded Landia were Taatars and they were
pushing further across the country of Kinel, their army growing with each town
and village they conquered. It upset the Serloran Empire to the north, their
Emperor fearing that their own borders would be under threat. They sent
soldiers of their own into the country along with a few their elite, the
magisters.

The news began to report it as a covert invasion from the
Serloran Empire. The locals became cagey whenever Serloran soldiers were seen
on the streets. Fights began between the Serlorans and the Kinns, the violence
accelerating when a gang of street kids attacked a pair of Serloran soldiers in
an alley, beating them half to death before a Serloran magister stepped into
the fray, killing their ring leader. The incident led the people to demand the
withdrawal of Serloran troops. Serlora refused. The King of Kinel declared war.

“You’re going to be gone a long time, aren’t you?” you asked
Ethan as you sat down for dinner that evening.

He nodded. “They need me,
hani
.”

“Are you going to be safe?”

“Yes.” He nodded.

You knew he was lying – he didn’t know that he would be safe.
He couldn’t know.

“I don’t want you to go.”

“I’m a soldier,
masuki
. This is my job.”

Choice:
110. Beg Him to Stay
or
111. Let
Him Work

“Ethan Wicker,” you said. “His name was Ethan Wicker.”

The soldier smiled. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

He walked you to the law hall where he had you wait for over an
hour in a dank room at the back of the building. When he returned, he had Ethan
with him, who he pushed into the room with you.

“Did he do it?” he asked, as soon as the door was shut.

You nodded. “I think he was trying to help me.”

“Then why are you blaming me?” He crossed his arms over his
chest. “Why didn’t you say it was him?”

“I panicked.” You moved to sit beside him on the cold floor. “I
didn’t want to get him in trouble and if they think I did it, they’ll send me
away. I’m sorry.”

Ethan shook his head. “There’s only one problem with your
story.
He’s
the one with the bruises.”

* * *

The orphanage in Chapra wasn’t as bad as you had expected it
to be. You had a warm bed and free food and for most of the day, nobody was
watching you. In the mornings, you hopped over the wall and canvassed the town
for odd jobs and errands to run, hoping to scrape together enough money to buy
you a ride to freedom. You could never return to Landia, but there were still
plenty of other towns ready for you to call home.

But you never forgot the twins. And even though they never
replied to your letters, you couldn’t help but think that someday, somehow, you
might just run into them again.

The End
(Back to start)