Discovering Freedom

Chapter 2

Dawn finds me waiting under the cherry blossoms ready to welcome the sun’s warmth. The garden is my favourite place, it is ringed by sheer walls of rock but for a single entrance. However the warmth and light of the sun reaches the grass and tree at the bottom, only twice a day it is bathed in the full glow of light, when it rises and sets. I drink in the scene that surrounds me but all too soon I regretfully return to the bowels of the mountains with the knowledge that I will not be back.

I strap my twin swords to my back and without turning I know my brother is there.

“Your leaving aren’t you?” he asks but it was more of a statement than a question.

 “Don’t try to stop me. I can’t take the hiding and waiting anymore. I can’t just keep waiting for him to find us, not while people are dying! I have to do something! I have seen what Tamarack is like first hand and experienced it,” I reply determinedly, “You weren’t there. I’m going to join the resistance. He will stop at nothing to destroy everything. He lost the last of his humanity when he killed our mother. The only reason I’m still alive is because after he killed her he was so shocked at what he had done he left vowing to kill us too. You’ve heard the results for yourself. He has conquered this country and is slowly destroying people’s hope. I am going and not even you will stop me.”

I push past him, not daring to look him in the eye as I left knowing what I would see. Kayleb stood there with shock written across his face. My words were barely registering but he knew the full weight of my words. He has never even contemplated leaving our hideaway but now he is faced with the biggest decision of his life, follow me or possibly never see me again.

“Wait!” he calls after me, “I’m coming with you.”

I pause momentarily surprised and silently pleased at his answer. The hall echoes with his footsteps as he runs to hurriedly pack as I make my way to the stables.

I calmly finish saddling up our horses. Kayleb bursts through the door and attaches his saddle bags to his horse. I make a last check while my brother opens the doors. I climb onto my horse and leave without a backwards glance knowing Kayleb would be following.

We set off at a swift trot in silence as we are lost in our own thoughts. I turn my head towards my brother and again wonder why he came. He’s the level headed good natured one, I on the other hand have a short temper and tendency to act before thinking. We’re like two sides of the same coin opposites but never one without the other, the way it has always been. Kayleb breaks the silence and drags me from my thoughts.

“It’s getting late we should stop by that patch of trees and set up camp” he says.

We dismount and set the horses loose to graze. I start a fire while Kayleb unpacks the sleeping blankets; by the time we finish dinner it’s dark so we settle down to sleep.

The nightmares come. I struggle out of the twisted blanket and just sit and stare at the dying fire. Memories course through me.

I woke to find myself in Suri’s lap. I turn and find my arm and shoulder are bandaged, I still felt pain but it doesn’t hurt too much.

“Good to see you’re up I was afraid you wouldn’t make it.” she smiled with worry apparent in her voice as she helped me sit up.

I timidly stood and glanced fearfully around expecting Tamarack to for fill his promise but he didn’t appear so I relaxed and allowed myself to take in the devastation. The charred skeletons of what remained of our huts rose out of the ash coated ground. Blackened and burned corpses were being carried towards the row of dead that had been steadily growing since the fires died.

“Tamarack claimed he loved her but he killed her. It makes no sense to kill someone you love.” I stated.

“I agree with you, but I think I know why he did. He loved your mother but when she rejected him for your father, something in Tamarack twisted and broke, he lost himself to a darkness that has been eating away at him for 6 years. His logic changed and so did his reason, he came to feel that if she was not his then no one could have her,” explained a village elder as he came up behind me “You have had to learn the lessons of death at a young age, however it cannot be helped.”

The death that surrounded me made me angry and I wanted to lash out at anyone and anything. The rage slowly settled like molten lava into the very core of my being.

I hardened my heart that day and the anger has not left me although there are precious moments when I can forget about it for a time though never for long. I am trapped in isolation, where no one can save me. I tear my eyes from the now dead fire as I notice the inky darkness giving way to sunrise. The fiery colours blend with the clouds and promise hope but I feel no warmth as the rays hit my skin.