Cleansing Memories in Ғɪʀᴇ

[Chapter 4] Relearning

Okay, now it's updates as normal.

"Language is the road map of a culture."

~Rita Mae Brown

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The news that Herobrine was alive and in the castle didn't cause the widespread panic that Notch and Steve had feared. When nothing changed over the next few days and he wasn't seen again, people merely shrugged and went about their daily business. Hero stayed in the alchemy building where Wolfgang still cared for him. Having been trapped in stone in a sleep-like state for over a thousand years, some might have thought that Hero would have had enough sleep for a lifetime, but in reality, he often dropped off to sleep for up to 14 hours a day.

Notch and Steve searched the castle's library and brought him books that were written in both their ancient language and in the modern day one. He started reading them side by side, slowly teaching himself the words and sentence structures of this 'new' language. Wolfgang's apprentices frequently visited the building for lessons, advice or just to chat and more than a few jumped when they saw Herobrine sitting cross-legged on the bed, a book open in his lap and one at his side, slowly flicking between the two. Unnoticed by those who came and went, Hero's diligent flicking of the pages halted for several minutes at a time during their conversations as he listened and attempted to understand their words.

Several of the more advanced apprentices sometimes came to craft the potions and antidotes they had been taught, with varying degrees of success. Some potions, such as ones which gave the drinker additional strength or speed, were imbued with magic, which made them difficult to make and store. Wolfgang didn't let his apprentices experiment with new potion types and he only did so very carefully.

He was experimenting with one such potion when Steve made one of his scattered visits to the building. A few other apprentices were there, talking quietly over books or equipment.

"Hey Steve," Wolfgang said absentmindedly, frowning over a book he held.

"Hey, how's things going?" Steve asked.

"Much the same. Diego's still bugging me about that combat training, but there's not much I can do about that at the moment. I still haven't heard back from A'chay, I'm beginning to run low on supplies and this potion is giving me grief, but at least I haven't had anyone blow something up for the past several days."

"All good things, all good things. What's this potion supposed to do?"

"It's supposed to make the drinker invisible," Wolfgang said, frowning at the bubbling liquid as if it had personally offended him.

"I thought you said that it's impossible to become invisible," Steve said in a puzzled manner.

"It's impossible to be completely invisible," Wolfgang corrected. "What this potion does is that it bends the light to trick people's eyes into thinking that there's nothing there. Well, it would do that if I found a good stabiliser."

"Stabiliser?"

Wolfgang gave a sigh. "The magic in potions can be unstable, so you have to add something to make it safe, but it can't react with the potion itself to make it something different. The stabiliser for every potion is different and this one is giving me grief."

"I don't suppose you can just chuck stuff in and hope for the best?" Steve suggested hopefully.

"Do you want to have to relocate?"

"Not particularly, no."

Someone snapped a book shut and Steve glanced over his shoulder to see that Hero had stood up and was walking past shelves full of sealed jars. He looked much better than he had a few weeks ago and more like what Steve remembered him to be like; walking with a determined stride, a steady gaze and his hair always more unkempt than Steve's ever was. His shirt still hung loosely on him. He picked out a smaller bottle from the shelf and tapped it down onto the bench next to Wolfgang, who had been so absorbed in his book that he jumped a little at the sound.

"Mint's always a good stabiliser," Hero said simply, walking back to his alcove. His accent still carried heavy traces of his native language, but he formed the words quite well as he added "It also makes it taste nice." Then he sat on his bed, opened the book again and looked as if he had never moved.

"Oh crap, I didn't realise that he knew the language already," Wolfgang whispered to Steve, eyes wide, as he slowly closed his book and picked up the bottle. "I've been talking to my apprentices about him and how he was one of the first known sorcerers and stuff, I didn't realise that he could understand us. I feel crap now."

Steve grinned. "You do know that he also has excellent hearing, right?"

Wolfgang's eyes widened even more and he glanced over his shoulder. Herobrine had a wide grin on his face as he casually flipped a page, oblivious to the stares he was getting from the other students, or perhaps he did see them and enjoyed the attention. With Herobrine, you could never really tell.

Over the next few days, Herobrine could be seen around the castle and the village. He always stuck to the shadows and to the edges of the streets and squares, moving along as soon as he got more than a few stares or glares. Because of this, people were mostly able to ignore his presence and every evening he would be back in the alchemy building, reading his books (Notch was starting to think that he should really have a room inside the castle).

On one particularly sunny day, a man with a fiddle and his fiancee with an old-fashioned lute struck up a very jaunty tune in the middle of the village square. The tune was that of a well-known folk song and almost instantly, a crowd of people began a circle dance, spinning around the centre of the square while others laughed or clapped to the beat. Herobrine stood in the corner, leaning against the shadowed wall of a house, watching with a guarded expression that he had perfected to hide his emotions.

Unfortunately, there were a few people it never worked on; Steve being one of them. He spotted Hero standing rigidly in the corner, unblinkingly staring at the laughing and dancing people. He made his way over and tapped lightly on Herobrine's arm. The man didn't jump; he had seen Steve coming of course and he followed without a word when Steve gestured for him to come.

The two left the square and walked slowly up the main street. As they walked, no one could mistake them for anything other than brothers. Their strides were of similar lengths, they had the same upright back as they walked (although Hero's lowered head made it look like he was slouching), their hair was a similar shade and they had the same self-confident look in their eyes as they walked. The only difference was that Herobrine was a few centimetres shorter.

"You know that you can join them, right?" Steve asked quietly, speaking in their native tongue.

Hero gave a shrug. "Not really. Even if I have been gone for... a long time, people still don't trust me. I've heard the stories."

"Doesn't mean that all of them are true. Hero, the only reason why people aren't trusting you is because they have no reason to. But on the other side, they have no reason to distrust you either. I'm willing to bet that most of them are holding their potatoes."

Hero gave a bark of laughter. "I think you mean judgement Steve, not potatoes." He laughed more when Steve gave a huge groan and said in the modern language; "I'm never going to get that bloody language right again."

"You just need practice," Hero said, clapping Steve on the back. "It gets easier the more you do it."

"Speaking of which, your accent is less intense."

"Thank you, I've been working on it."