"Argh".

A terrible headache and a sore body were the first things he felt as soon as he regained consciousness.

A sharp pain pierced his right temple, almost stopping him from opening his eyes. He had to blink a few times before he could see and numb muscles reminded him of what he went through.

Looking around, he found himself inside a small stone room.

The room was packed with stuff; chairs were placed one above the other, chests were covered in dust and cloths, and work tools were scattered all around and a wooden door on the side.

The only source of light was some candles put on the floor.

He lay on a pile of hay, old and dirty, and a blanket covered him.

He pulled himself up, trying to sit on the bed, but as he moved, he felt the pain coming from the wounds of the fights.

He pulled back the blankets, exposing his chest, and the fingers fell, touching the old scars, now closed, but sometimes more painful than an open one.

That touch brings him back to the past, and memories and anguish clouded his mind, fragments of the damned day.

But before he got lost in his memory, pain cleared his thought.

Lost in those echoes, he had moved too much, and one of the wound reopened, staining the blanket.

He threw away the blankets and saw that someone applied some bandages on his abdomen and legs, bandages wrapped even around his forearms, from his elbow to his wrists.

Someone had even stripped him from the gown and dressed him, as now he was wearing a pair of pants with a rolled-up leg, probably to leave the limb breath, so it could heal better.

It had been a couple of minutes since he woke up, and now that he felt a bit better, he got out of bed.

But someone entered the room. A plumb middle age lady with a long gray dress, an average height,,, and brown hair gathered in a bum. She went for the table, leaving a basket on it, then she turned and only now noticed that he had woke up.

She got near the bed and smiled.

"Hello there. I am Nora, housekeeper of the White Castle. You have been asleep for a day. How do you feel now? You should be hungry."

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She spoke, but he couldn't understand any words she said, nor wasn't any language he had heard before.

"Who are you? What place is this?"

The woman frowned but soon regained her smile.

"I'm sorry, child. I didn't understand. Could you use the 'Common'?"

He couldn't understand what she said; she kept talking, but not any words she said sounded familiar.

Frustrated, he got out of the bed, blood still leaking from the wound.

He limped near the chair and took a cloth, threw it on himself to cover his body, and went out of the room.

"Wait, where are you going? You are still hurt, wait."

As he stepped out of the room, two guards tried to stop him, each on one side of the door.

"Stop right there."

One guard extended a hand, trying to grab him on the shoulder, but he reacted and with a swift move, he grabbed the guard's hand and twisted it, forcing him to kneel.

The other guard took a step back and tried to grab his sword.

The boy saw him unsheathing the sword and stopped him with a back kick, interrupting him and making the guard staggered a few steps.

He recalled his leg and used the momentum to hit the first guard with a knee on the chin, displacing it.

A bit of blood gushed out of the guard's mouth while the head bounced back and forth.

The guard's arm was pulled and twisted again; his body, now on the brink of losing sense, was forced to stand up and, with a kick, threw again the other guard.

Both the guards fell down on the ground and blood splatted on both their faces.

The boy turned around and limped off through the corridor, illuminated through arched windows with opaque glass.

The corridor opened on a lush garden with a multitude of flowers, hedges, and plants of the most different colors. In the middle, a kiosk made of white marble and black iron, over 7 meters high.

The base has a cross-shaped form with a raised center and columns, engraved with red and gold leaves, supported the roof.

He took a few steps and went down the two steps placed to facilitate the descent to the garden and looked around, trying to figure out where he could go, but the kiosk and the high hedges blocked his vision.

The walls of a beautiful castle enclosed three sides of the garden, the facades adorned with tall windows, columns and arches; and because the kiosk and the hedges blocked his vision, he couldn't see how far the other side of the garden extended.

While he was thinking of a better alternative than going into the garden, his gaze fell on a crouched woman.

In her hands, a red flower that she treated with the care reserved for a child, but which she observed with a look full of bitterness.

She wore a refined blue dress, from her neck fell a white necklace, almost touching the flower.

An oval-shaped face adorned by light brown and wary hair, thin lips and blue eyes. Few wrinkles marked her age.

She turned her face in his directions. The mere fact that she was looking at him instilled in him a primordial fear.

"Hey, you. Stop right there. Don't move."

Hearing screams coming from behind him, he came out of that state of panic; he turned around and noticed that the guard he had beaten before had caught up with him, and other had joined him.

He ignored the guards and decided to just go through the garden.

As he turned his head again in front of him, he noticed that the crouched woman went back to the flower, but that was slowly raising a hand in his direction.

"Kurviik Volum."

He heard a low voice, almost animal, directly in his mind.

A few words and everything went black.

He fell to the ground like a puppet with cut strings.