Chapter 30

“What were you doing with Wallace on the mountain?” Aris, who had been waiting outside of the barracks’ bath, startled Kestrel with his sudden appearance.

“What are you talking about?” Kestrel asked, forcing calm into his voice. He wished he could answer the General, but he didn’t want to put his position with Wallace in jeopardy. He had made a promise and he intended to keep it, no matter how foolish he thought Wallace’s stipulations to be.

“Don’t play the fool with me young man.”

Kestrel winced at the granite hardness of Aris’ voice. He hated deceiving the General who had opened his home to him and who had taught him the martial disciplines.

But he had given Wallace his word. Kestrel prayed that Aris could see the conflict dancing in his eyes. Maybe then he could find a way to answer without answering.

Aris’ eyes never wavered from his hard stare. They focused on Kestrel with military discipline.

“I’m not going to let you leave until you tell me what’s going on,” he growled at Kestrel.

“I’m sorry, I wish I could answer you, I really do. But if you want answers you’re going to need to confront Wallace. I would tell you if I could, but I just can’t. I won’t betray Wallace’s trust in me. Not after all he’s done for me,” Kestrel answered after a long pause.

Aris glared Kestrel, who’s scarred young body shone in the moonlight. Kestrel reddened under his stare, wanting to cover his body, embarrassed at the scars from the beatings he’d collected over his time spent living in the brutal back alleys of Fiell, but he did his best to stand his ground and return Aris’ stare.

“You really aren’t going to tell me, are you?” Aris asked, running his fingers through his blonde hair, already knowing the answer that Kestrel would provide him with.

“I wish that I was able to. I honestly do. But I can’t, Wallace forbid me and I made a promise to him and if anybody knows what it means to keep your word, I think that it’s you.”

“Well then I guess it looks like I’ll have to have a talk to our mutual friend Wallace,” Aris said. “Thank you for keeping your word.”

Aris was surprised by Kestrel’s loyalty, he didn’t know where the young man had gotten it from. One with as many scars as Kestrel possessed were usually the last to swear loyalty to anyone. They protected themselves above all else.

The fact that Kestrel didn’t buckle under the pressure Aris put on him spoke volumes to the young man’s character.

Kestrel smiled back at Aris’s words.

He hadn’t betrayed Wallace, but he had been able to force the conversation that he had been begging his mentor to have.

*****

“What were you doing with Kestrel on top of the mountain yesterday?” Aris’s question awakened Wallace who grunted and wiped sleep from his slate-gray eyes.

“What time is it?” the silver bearded man asked, deflecting Aris’ question. He felt like he had just fallen asleep.

“That’s besides the point,” Aris batted away his inquiry. “I have questions that demand answers and I let the little adventure that happened during our reunion side-track me from my original intent. But it’s long past time you explain to me what’s going on.”

“I’m not sure I know what you mean,” Wallace grunted sleepily, he had been alert from the moment he’d woke and he suspected Aris knew it, but something was off with Aris’ line of questioning and playing the fool was his best option to keep the questions away.

“Don’t give me that ‘fake tired’ routine. Surely you remember teaching me and Van the same trick when we were under your command.”

Wallace grinned and sat up straight. His old friend’s instincts had only sharpened with time. How much had he been forced to develop them in the Imperial court? Military politics had been too much for Wallace, how was Aris able to balance court politics, military duties, and handle a family life?

The younger man was truly amazing.

“What do you want to know?” Wallace said, adjusting himself in the bed and wincing as a shot of pain tore through his shoulder.

“I think that you already know. You’re keeping something from me, something that's very important.”

“What do you mean?” Wallace feigned ignorance.

“Emperors balls! You think I’m an idiot?” Aris hissed, uncharacteristically angry. Wallace’s avoidance chaffed the General.

“You know what I think of you,” Wallace answered.

Aris saw a struggle in the eyes of the older man. The truth wanted to escape from Wallace’s lips, but there was some sort of dam holding it back, keeping it from spilling.

“What is it you can’t say?” Aris asked, his tone imploring.

Wallace shook his head in silence. It was as if the gruff old soldier was fighting a battle in the deepest parts of himself. Aris just needed to push a little further and he knew that the older man would break. He could see the words Wallace held back practically forcing their way from his lips.

“I almost died trying to find you. You owe me this in the very least,” Aris nudged the older man with his words, trying to pry the truth from Wallace.

He was almost there. Wallace was so close to spilling whatever secret it was that was bubbling inside him.

“I can’t. I swore on it.”

“Is your word worth my life?” Aris growled. “Is a promise really worth the lives of me and my family?”

Wallace, who’s eyes had averted from the General’s in shame, returned Aris’ gaze. He was surprised to see fear in his old comrade’s eyes. Even in the midst of the worst battles against the Wendig tribes, he hadn’t seen the uncertainty that plagued the General now.

Wallace sighed.

He had sworn to Van that he wouldn’t let his younger brother get caught up in their world. It had been the older Ravenscroft’s last request. So, despite his every desire, Wallace had kept that promise and disappeared from Aris’ life. He had promised he would keep Aris from their world and he had done exactly that.

But here Aris was, already neck deep in Wallace’s dark world without realizing it.

To be blind would in the world of Memory Magic could easily mean death. Was it really worth risking Aris’ life keeping a promise to a long dead man?

“Mother of a whore!” Wallace cursed. Was he really about to break his decade long promise? “Fine, I’ll answer your questions. But I have some requirements…”

Aris nodded. “You know that I’ll do what you say. Now tell me what I want to know.”

Aris truly was desperate.

That scared Wallace more than he would ever let on.

“First off, let me sleep, then after I wake, find that boy your niece fancies, and we’ll climb the mountain together. There, and only there, I’ll answer all your questions.”

Wallace waited until Aris grunted in affirmation and then dropped back down on his bed, pulled the wool covering over his head, then closed his eyes to sleep.

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Aris waited near the bed for nearly forty minutes before he was convinced that the old man was truly asleep and wouldn’t sneak out before he returned to his chambers and silently slid into bed next to Corrine.

She let out a soft grumble as he embraced her.

He loved this woman. He would protect her and whatever secret Wallace kept was the key to her safety.

*****

Despite his midnight confrontation with Wallace, Aris felt strangely rested when he rose. It was as if a weight he hadn’t known he had been carrying had been lifted from his shoulders.

It wasn’t until he had voiced it that he had realized the burden of worry his visions placed upon him. He knew Wallace was the key to understanding the secrets he found himself floating in.

What it was that needed illumination, Aris didn’t know, but he felt lighter than he had in weeks. He was finally making progress. There was finally something for him to grasp onto. After weeks of dead-ends, he was finally going to get answers he’d been digging for ever since he’d woke from his coma.

“I love you,” Aris leaned over and kissed Corrine on the forehead.

He then donned his clothes and made his way to the kitchen where he grabbed a large leftover rib and a small satchel full of golden-red apples. Aris then went to the barracks where he woke Kestrel, who blearily wiped sleep from his eyes, tugged on some clothes, and followed the General without question. Kestrel just yawned and eyed the older man with curiosity as he followed him into the small private room at the north end of the barracks that housed Wallace.

Wallace greeted them at the door with his customary huff. The old man’s grunts were a language in and of themselves.

These ones spoke of frustration mixed with relief.

“Lets be off then,” Wallace growled silently as the small group stood in front of the tiny chamber in an expectant silence.

Aris said nothing and neither did Kestrel but they followed quietly behind the older man who led them outside of the compound and into the deer trails that zig-zagged their way up the small mountain Wallace had chosen as their training ground the moment he’d been able to move without agonizing pain plaguing his every step.

They crested the foothill and made their way to the small plateau in time to see the evidence of the sun before it peeked out from below the horizon and bathed the sky in a series of brilliant pinks and oranges.

Aris pulled the apples from his canvas satchel and tossed one to the two others in his small group. They ate in silence, devouring the apples and the portions of meat that Aris had cut from the donkey rib he’d grabbed.

Aris soon broke the silence that permeated the air after the meager breakfast had been finished. “Now you will answer my questions.”

Kestrel smiled, unabashed even after the glare he received from Wallace.

“I’ll answer whatever questions you have, but first, I will decide what is acceptable for you to hear, and second, you will join young Kestrel as my pupil. Do you understand and accept these terms?”

Aris nodded stiffly. Even years removed, he carried that same military demeanor that he’d had as a young recruit. It was so ingrained that Wallace thought the younger man would maintain that military rigidity until he died.

He, on the other hand, had tried his best to shirk the ingrained demeanors the moment he’d been released from duty.

“And you, Kestrel, are you okay with this?” Wallace asked.

“You already know the answer,” he responded with a grin. The fact that the General was here with them felt as if he’d won a small victory against the old soldier.

“Good,” Wallace huffed. “Now, I think it would be easier giving you a demonstration of what’s been happening to you before I try to explain anything. It will be easier that way.”

Aris looked from the retired soldier to Kestrel with confusion in his eyes but neither offered an explanation.

“Kestrel, if you would please,” Wallace gestured to Aris with an outstretched hand.

“What would you like me to find? His time in the military with you?” he asked.

“No, that’s easy enough to explain away, anyone could know that. You need something much more personal. Something only Aris would know.”

What was going on?

Kestrel nodded and stepped over to Aris side where he placed his calloused hand on the General’s well muscled forearm. Aris opened his mouth to question what was happening, but Wallace silenced him with a loud ‘shush.’

Moments later Kestrel released his grip. He looked as if he were about to cry.

“What’s happening?” Aris asked, frustrated.

Why did he feel so alien here?

“If you would please,” Wallace made a point of ignoring Aris’ inquiry as he addressed Kestrel.

The young man nodded and locked eyes with Aris.

“Your brother’s name was Van right?” he asked. “He begged you not to come to his execution. You fought him, but finally listened. Despite everything, you loved him. He was more of a father to you than your own father was. You fought and fought, but he made you swear on the lives of his wife and daughter that you wouldn’t go. The last thing that he told you was that you were Sephira’s father now and it was up to you to save her and his wife as well. You protected Sephira, but to your great shame you weren’t able to protect his wife. You don’t know what happened to her, but it’s like she disappeared off the face of the world. You can’t even remember her face. There’s a hole where she should be,” Kestrel choked as he relayed Aris’ memories back to the sturdy blonde man.

“How did you know that?! Who told you that?! We were alone then!” Aris’ demeanor suddenly shifted and his voice turned iron.

Kestrel took a step back. Aris’ fury was as imposing as the mountains that towered over them.

“You told me that,” Kestrel said, hands raised in the air. “Or rather, your memories told me.”

“What do you mean, ‘my memories told you’?” he asked, his voice was as hard as granite.

Wallace stepped forward, placed his hand on Aris’ forearm and released it seconds later. “You kissed your wife goodbye this morning, right here,” he said, pointing to the top of left corner of the forehead where Corrine’s hair parted.

Aris glared at the two. “What’s going on?! What’ve you done?! How did you get that information?! Who’s spying for you?!”

“Nobody is spying for us. Rather, I believe that you are just like young Kestrel and I,” Wallace answered. “And your late brother Van too,” he whispered that last part under his breath.

“How am I like you two?” he asked.

What was going on?

“You’ve been seeing strange visions right? Things that belong to other people? It's how you were able to crack open so many of your cases and how you got to where you are now, right? It was almost as if you could see into the past of those you interrogated, right? You knew they were lying because what they were saying didn’t match with the past of theirs that you envisioned.”

Aris was visibly shaken.

He had never told anyone how he’d caught so many of the criminals that had sky-rocketed his rank. He figured that people would either think that he was insane or in league with the criminals, either one was damning to his career. “How did you know that?”

“The world isn’t as simple a place as it seems to be,” Wallace replied. “You already know that. Your line of work has insured it.”

Aris nodded.

“Anyway, there’s magic in this world. Not like in the stories that you tell your daughters to help them fall asleep at night, but magic nonetheless. It doesn’t effect the natural world around us but rather the unseen world. The world of memories,” Wallace’s voice had the cadence of a lecturer. “You and your brother share a magic. One he made me swear to keep from you. He didn’t want you being dragged into our world.”

Aris’ eyebrows knitted into a glower. What did Wallace mean when he said that Van had been a mage and had hidden it from him?

Why?

“Save that question for later,” Wallace commanded, reading Aris’ mind. “As I was saying, the three of us, four if you include your late brother Van, are all mages. We’ve been given the gift of being able to read the memories of others. What you’ve seen isn’t intuition, it’s magic.”

“What do you mean ‘magic’?” Aris asked, still unclear on what the older soldier meant.

“How do I break this down?” Wallace asked rhetorically.

Kestrel looked back and forth between the men.

“Everyone has memories.” Wallace started to explain. “They’re what shape us. Our memories, for better or worse, make us who we are and influence every decision we make. We are who we are because of our memories.”

Aris nodded, paying attention to every word that fell from Wallace’s tongue.

“There are some in the world who are able to manipulate those memories. We are the scribes of memory, if you will. There are those like us —that is you, Kestrel and I— that have the ability to look into the memories of others. We read the personal history of others. We have the ability to look into one’s past. Whenever we make contact with the skin of someone else, we are able to absorb how they see their previous life experiences. We take their memories.”

Aris stood rapt attention. He wasn’t sure if the old man was crazy or not, but upon his explanation, pieces to the puzzle that Aris hadn’t known he had been missing, started to fall into place.

“As far as we know, there are three other types of what I like to call ‘Memory Mages’. There are ones like you and I that are called ‘Takers.’ And just like in physics there is an opposite reaction in magic. The antithesis of the Takers are the ‘Givers.’ They are exactly what they sound like. Givers have the ability to share their memories with others.”

“But where Takers have to touch someone to receive their memories, Givers are able to share theirs from a distance?” Aris asked.

Had the assassin, Dren, been a Giver? His death had changed everything. It was upon his passing that Aris had collapsed and the visions had begun.

He must have been a Memory Mage.

“You’re right,” Wallace looked stunned. “How did you know?”

“It just made sense,” Aris lied. He wasn’t sure why he’d done so, but something held his tongue.

Why?

Kestrel glanced from Wallace and back to Aris. He could see that his tutor in magic knew that Aris was lying but he also saw him deciding to stay silent on the matter so he followed Wallace’s lead despite the questions that itched away at the back of his mind.

“The other two are much less known, so much so that many would argue that they are little more than legends, but I’m sure they exist. The first are ones I like to call the ‘Forgotten.’ They’re rare, it’s not known how many there are because their power essentially erases the memories of others, and they work like us. They have to be in physical contact for their power to work. There’s only one well documented case of one. If you’re curious about it, you can ask Kestrel later,” Wallace grunted. “And the last, and by far the most frightening, of them are what I like to call the ‘Manipulators.’”

“That’s a terrible name,” Aris quipped.

“Shut up, you’re just as bad as this kid here,” Wallace pointed to Kestrel who was grinning. “Very few believe they exist, but I’m certain they do.”

Aris listened closely.

“Those with this power are able to write themselves into the memories of others. And just like the Givers, they are able to do so at a distance. How far is unknown. Nearly every trace of them has been erased from history. It’s a small miracle that any Mages survived the purge,” Wallace’s voice dropped.

The purge?