The Wandering Isles

by C. L. Schneider

  My bones aching worse than they should for a man in his forties, I bent to retrieve the net. Forcing my unruly fingers into position, I stared at the innumerable scars etched into my calloused skin. Before leaving Langor, I lifted a pair of gloves from a street vendor. I wore them for myself as much as others. Today, for some reason, I forgot to put them on. There was nothing to hide my gnarled knuckles and misshapen joints as they—

  —turned festering and bloody.

  Gasping, I stumbled back, watching welts form and skin split. Dark bruises grew, bloated with fresh swelling. “Go away,” I muttered, shaking my head. “Go away… It’s not happening. It’s not real.”

  Blood escaped the sides of my lacerated palm. The Shinree ruins Ian carved there were unreadable now. Seeing them as a reminder of Langor’s most hated enemy, my guard took offense to the marks and destroyed them.

  They were the only piece of the past I had left.

  Breathless, bathed in a cold sweat, I closed my eyes and repeated the affirmation. “It’s not happening. It’s not real. It’s not happening…” It’s not real. I breathed deep and long, concentrating on the ocean scent. I willed myself not to panic, not to give attention to the pain. I struggled to feel nothing but the warm, morning breeze.

  Sometimes, it worked to shorten the flareup. Other times, I’d be lost in my head for hours, as days mixed with years and faces blurred. Distinguishing now from then, or dream from reality, was impossible until the disorientation passed. More than once, I woke fearing this was the dream. I never left Darkhorne. I wasn’t in Kabri. I was still in my cell.

  And always would be.

  Even now, I wasn’t sure.

  I wasn’t sure it mattered, either. I could go anywhere, but I’d never escape. Not the memories, nor the dark pit inside me. There was no remedy. No magic capable of restoring what I lost when Ian died. I would be like this, with half a soul, steadily descending into madness, until the day I joined him in the ground.

  Opening my eyes, I let out a breath of relief. The wounds were gone. All that remained was the usual distant ache and old, puckered scars. The beatings, the cage, my cell; only felt like yesterday. “Gods… Will it ever stop?” Why am I still being punished?

  Shoulders trembling, tears welled with my anger. I pushed them away, knowing they meant nothing. They changed nothing. I’d lost years of my life. People I loved. My home was consumed by Langor’s alliance with the Shinree Emperor. Mirra’kelan now lived as I had for the last twenty years: in darkness and fear.

  All both of us had left were memories of better, youthful days.

  As I reached for the net again, I caught a glimpse of movement on the dunes.

  Straightening, I wiped my eyes for a better look.

  A man was walking the trail into the city. He was alone, tall, and dressed in dark armor. His white hair blew in the morning breeze, caressing the sword strapped to his back.

  I watched him a moment. I know that stride…

  “No. It can’t be him. He’s not…” I called out to him. “Ian?”

  He’s alive?

  Slowing at the sound of my voice, he turned slightly. His strong features looked no different than when I last saw him. Like twenty years hadn’t passed.

  It hasn’t, I thought. We were just on the ship.

  My head throbbed in waves. Each one brought a memory: fighting by Ian’s side, laughing together as we raised the sails. There was a horse under me, a forest around me. I breathed in the cool night air, surrounded by endless, dark water.

  “Go away…” I squeezed my eyes shut. “Go away…” But the strange, random notions wouldn’t leave. I shoved an agitated hand back over my hair—and found none. Muttering in denial, I fingered the crusty sores on my shaven scalp. I slapped it, wanting my mind to work. Why were my thoughts so jumbled today? My memories were twisted and incomplete. How long had I been back on Kabri? I couldn’t remember. Had it been months, as I thought, or days? Did I only just arrive? Is that why my hair hasn’t grown?

  I narrowed my focus to Ian’s silhouette. I watched it crest the rise and disappear down the other side, and my mental state became unimportant. My friend was alive.

  He was too far away now to hear me. I hollered anyway, “Ian, wait!”

  Hurrying to catch up, I moved as fast as my busted knee would allow. The sand transitioned to grassy dune, then to the well-worn footpath leading to the city’s back gate. I’d crossed it many times in my life, since I was old enough to walk. Yet, as I reached the peak where Ian was a moment ago, the twists and turns became long and unfamiliar. Vine-covered boulders lined both sides, narrowing the passage. A thin mist drifted over the ground.

  An unnatural silence tugged at my nerves. This is wrong.

  I descended the slope at a tentative pace. Hot wind gusted through the corridor. Its echo whistled past me, like a fading whisper.

  Determined, I kept to the path. I took every turn. There was something intimidating about the low-hanging fog, the way it billowed and retracted like a steady, even breath.

  When the edge of the city finally came into view, I slowed to a stop. The straightaway in front of me was unoccupied. No one was at the gate, not even a guard. Ian was gone.

  If he was ever here.

  A nagging twinge invaded my arm. Rolling up a sleeve, my eyes widened. My clothes were… “Shabby,” I murmured, picking at my rough-hewn tunic and trousers. Tattered and stained, they hung like they were cut for a man twice my size. A man who slept in the mud and begged for coins on the street, by the smell.

  The garments were far from the comfort and craftsmanship of an archer’s supple leathers or the fine garb of a royal messenger. But I was neither of those things now.

  Pulse racing, I shouted for him, “Ian! Ian! Goddamn it, where are you?”

  It was foolish to hope, but I did it anyway.

  Turning my attention inward, like I used to, I tried opening the link between our souls. I expected nothing. I wasn’t even sure I was doing it right. It had been so long.

  The breath caught in my throat as his presence rushed in. “Gods…”

  It was him on the trail. How?

  The link was weak. I could hardly sense him. But he was alive.

  It was a place to start.

  I walked the rest of the way to the gate with a smile on my face. It was an expression I had little use for anymore. It was nice, but the smile, and the sentiment behind it, quickly faded as I entered the city.

  Kabri was my home, my heart, but it was far from the prosperous, shining seat of royal power I grew up in. Raided and conquered more than any other in all the realms, there were only so many times the city could rise to what it once was. Still, Rellan resolve was a powerful thing. Our unwavering determination was what we were known for, and what the Langorians hated about us most. They knew, no matter what they did to us, Rella would always endure and rebuild.

  That Langor owned us, and funded the restoration for their own benefit, stung, but we swallowed our pride and moved on. Rellans were known for that, too.

  While I was in prison, entire streets were reconstructed, replacing homes and businesses that were damaged beyond repair. A new, larger dock was built. Trees were ferried over from the Rellan mainland and planted on the hillside. Extensive refurbishment was done on the castle at the top, to properly house the regent who handled Rella’s affairs. Soot-darkened stones were removed and replaced with ones white as snow. New spires reached for the clouds, wrapped with a twist of gold. It was a sharp contrast to the gloomy outer fringe of the city where I stood.

  Here, at the bottom of the hill, in the disregarded back rim of Kabri, was the one place repairs were overlooked and forgotten. The whole area was forgotten, walled off and separated by an imposing, wooden wall. The barrier was the height of three men. It cut, unbroken, across the slope, protecting the city’s thriving core; separating it from the sad, gray husk of poverty and neglect that lived in her shadow.

  Its inhabitants were impoverished. Ti
red. Damaged. Like me.

  A watch roamed the streets. They were nothing like the honorable castle guard of my day, in their crisp, blue and white attire. These men were of Langorian descent, and dressed more as mercenaries in heavy, studded leather and chain. Their imposing weaponry and somber expressions instilled no sense of safety or confidence, only apprehension.

  One of them noticed me. The stale smell of last night’s drink wafted off his body as we crossed paths. I’d seen him before. Distracted by an itch in his beard, he offered me a nod and a grunt. The recognition in his stare was tainted by a dulled sense of hostility, as if his anger had faded to bitter acceptance long ago. It was an expression worn by many in this part of Kabri.

  Clouds moved in, dropping a drizzle onto the streets as I wandered, remembering what it used to be. Youthful memories conjured potted herbs on every windowsill. Peddlers filled the streets. Their carts flaunted vibrant colored garments, jewelry, household items, fresh fruit, and decorative wares. A cobbler occupied the corner building; the finest in Kabri. His wife was often seen chasing after their six rambunctious children. Their laughter echoed through the alleyways.

  I heard one child survived the raid. He hadn’t spoken since.

  Few did, on this side of the wall. There was no camaraderie, no laughter or playing. No cobbler. Fire had caved in the roof of his workshop, and no one bothered cleaning it up. The remains were left to crumble and decay, stinking with every rain. The same blaze reduced a number of other structures in the neighborhood to scorched, dilapidated hovels. Boards filled vacant window frames. Ruts and cracks disturbed the muddy cobblestones. A foul blend of mold and piss drained out of the alleys, carried on a persistent fog.

  Only a handful of people were out, roaming the once-lively streets. Huddled against the light shower in patched cloaks and worn boots, there was a sense of panic to their hurried steps, as if they couldn’t get out of sight fast enough.

  A cart, laden with coffins, bounced on the pitted road. The man pushing it neither noticed, nor cared, he was splashing mud on the weathered, old woman sitting on her stoop. She didn’t flinch, just kept on clutching the wooden coin cup in her bony hands, singing some old child’s rhyme I hadn’t heard in years. Her voice shook as much as the cup.

  How? I thought. How did it become this?

  The last time I was in Kabri, before my imprisonment, I offered to survey the status of repairs for the new King. I walked the streets for hours, making lists, and stopping off for a pint or two along the way. Later that night, I strolled the castle gardens with Liel. Ian and I were leaving in the morning, with no plans to return. It was the last time I would ever hold my son again. Liel…

  I have a son.

  I came to a hard stop. There is no occupation, no regent. There can’t be. Ian came for me at Darkhorne. He liberated the prisoners. We fought together for Langor, for all of Mirra’kelan, in a great battle. There was a celebration. We won.

  Then why does Kabri look so tired? Why did I spend two decades in prison?

  Did I? Was that right? I had recollections of another life, a time when I was free and whole. With equal clarity, I remembered freedom and my long confinement.

  How could I have two sets of memories inside me?

  Ian will know.

  I have to find him.

  If he was here, alive, it meant everything I thought I knew was wrong. It meant the fits I suffered weren’t caused by the deterioration of the binding spell, but the deterioration of my mind. It wasn’t a part of my soul I lost in prison. It was my sanity.

  “I didn’t lose it,” I fumed, in the middle of the street, undone by a bout of helpless rage. “They took it from me!”

  Hostile glares and murmurs of scorn drifted my way. I ignored them all. I didn’t care what these wretches thought—not faced with the knowledge that I’d forgotten my own son. And his mother. Her leaving was the beginning of my end. I let go then, of everything. It hurt too much to hold on. It was easier to surrender to the isolation, to let the darkness suffocate me.

  But for how long?

  How long did they keep me in that wretched pit? Two years? Or twenty?

  The clatter of wheels, and a surly bark of, “Out of the way!” scattered my thoughts. I jumped clear of the swerving wagon, narrowly escaping its path. One wheel left the ground. Barrels slid off the back, hit the street, and shattered. Contents spilled, filling the holes in the cobblestones with puddles of red wine.

  The driver yanked his team of flustered horses to a stop. The ends of his rain-spattered coat flew up behind him as he jumped down. With a toss of unkempt hair, he trained his anger on me and rushed up. The fact he’d been going too fast around the corner didn’t enter his mind. His spilled product was my fault, and he wanted a fight.

  At one time, I could have taken him. At least, I would have tried. I wasn’t always good at considering odds or recognizing a confrontation I couldn’t win. Having access to Ian’s soul, his experience and training tempered my recklessness. But that was long ago, the man was big, and I was in no condition to fight.

  I backed up with an apologetic, “I’m sorry about the barrels. It was an accident. I didn’t mean to get in the way.”

  “That’s the trouble, Kane,” he seethed. “You’re always in the way.”

  His tone pricked at my temper. “Do I know you?”

  “Yesterday, you did. You knew all of us. Today?” Slowing his pace, the man lifted his arms in a dramatic shrug. “Who knows?”

  “I don’t know what you want from me. No one got hurt. Get back on your wagon and go. I’ll pay for your lost product.”

  “You’ll pay?” he laughed. “Pay me with what. Do you have any coin?”

  “No,” I admitted.

  From her stoop, the beggar woman snorted. “Course you don’t, fool. None of us do. Thanks to you.”

  I shifted my barely restrained anger onto her. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  She put her cup down with a string of nonsensical mutterings and stood. Taking up the piece of timber leaning in the doorway, she supported her crooked frame and ambled up beside the wagon driver. Together, they advanced on me.

  I shot a nervous glance around as others approached, emerging from dark corners and ramshackle buildings, exiting alleyways I could have sworn were empty a moment ago. Many were frail, disfigured from poorly healed injuries and burns. Grime darkened their bony faces. I spotted no weapons, but the intent to harm radiated from their focused, livid stares.

  I warned them with an apprehensive, “Stay back,” as I turned, trying to keep the ones circling behind me in sight.

  “You did this,” the beggar woman accused, lifting her cane to point at me. “You did this to us, Kane. We suffer because of you.”

  “You’re crazy,” I shot back. “I’ve done nothing to you. I don’t even know who you are—any of you!”

  Overlapping murmurs of assent ran through the crowd:

  “You sailed away and left us here!” a woman cried.

  “Left your city,” another put in.

  “Your home,” a man said. “Your son.”

  “You vowed to protect us. You couldn’t even protect yourself.”

  “Stop!” My frenzied shout silenced their accusations, but it didn’t stop their stares from burrowing into me. I met each pair of eyes, searching for an answer and an end to my situation that didn’t require spilling blood—theirs or mine. It would have been easier if I could trust myself. As it stood, I had no clue what I did to earn their ridicule and contempt, and no idea how to fix it.

  Needing Ian’s strength and instinct for self-preservation, more than ever, I focused again on the link. I reached in for the part of his soul inside me—and there was only the cold, familiar hollow. The link was dead again. He was dead. “I don’t understand.” I felt it.

  I closed my eyes, concentrating harder, and the darkness behind my lids grew. Taking on a life of its own, it pressed in, sitting like an anvil on my chest. Like it used to. Like it did
every day, every second. Infiltrating my thoughts, seeping into my dreams—squeezing my lungs. I never understood how something hollow could weigh so much.

  A hand touched me, and I flung open my eyes. While they were closed, the mob had shuffled closer. The fog had grown thicker. It shrouded the buildings now, concealing everything beyond the wall. Fingers were reaching, grabbing me. Bodies crushed against mine, taking the air for themselves. I had no room. I couldn’t move…

  “Get off me!” I lashed out, shoving them back. Shabby boots and bare feet slid over the wine-slick street. It bought me seconds, before the crowd closed ranks. “What do you want?” I elbowed and pushed randomly at the targets rushing me. “I’ve done nothing to you!”

  “Liar,” the beggar woman spat. “You turned your back. On Kabri. On us.”

  I met her rheumy stare. “If you know me, as you claim to, you know where my loyalties lie. I love this city. My mother served the king. My father fought and died for Kabri, for all of Rella. And I bled for it.”

  “And what of your son? Hmmm…? Growing up under Langorian control, in Draken’s house, he became a lapdog, a mouthpiece—rising to power on our blood and sweat.”

  “What are you talking about? Liel is a child.”

  “Useless,” the wagon driver hissed. “It’s all slush in there now,” he said, tapping his own temple. “Doesn’t matter how many times we beat it into you, Kane, your wits leak back out the next day. Your mind is full of holes.”

  “Like your soul,” another man said.

  “And your son’s heart,” a woman whispered.

  The wagon driver snorted. “If he had one.”

  “This is bullshit,” I snapped. “I’m sick. I know that. But Liel can’t be what you say. Elayna is a good woman. And Malaq adopted the boy. He would never—”

  “Malaq Roarke died for his ideals many years ago,” the beggar butted in. “His corpse left for the wolves on the frozen tundra of Langor. ’Twas a shame,” she sighed. “He was the only decent Langorian I ever did see.”

  I shook my head against the terrible image. “Who told you that?”

  “You,” she cackled. “You were there for his execution. They didn’t bother with a trial. He was found over his brother’s body with the murder weapon. Guess Langorians don’t take kindly to the attempted murder of their king, eh?”