by Jeremy Marr
Making his way back down from the mountain, after yet another disappointing morning watch, Brendon-Jago started to try to sort out the broken remnants of the dream still floating around in his head. He could not remember exactly what he dreamed during his short slumber, but the feeling of doom, gloom, and a deep cutting sadness were still ricocheting through his entire body, mingling with all the pain and numbness associated with the minimal sleep on the stone floor of his cave.
He was actually thankful, for that reason, to be making the six-hour walk down off the mountain to the little outlying village of WillSeeFirst, where his actual home was. His house was on the far outskirts of the tiny village, with only one other house within a two-hour walk, but he was more then content with the quiet and solitude it offered. The trek was usually something he despised making, except for the brief time he had to see Kyle.
Today, though, he needed to stretch his body and a long walk would give him the time to do that. As well as ponder the dreams he still could not quite remember. Each time he thought he was getting the scrambled slivers of dreams to form something coherent, thoughts of his purpose for this trip invaded his mind and re-scrambled, in a whirlwind, those fragments again. He knew he would have to finish his business first to be at peace enough to devote his entire concentration to the task of his dreams.
"Another reason to be all that much more mad at that fool of a woman," he mumbled to himself. "As if she needs another reason for that," he added with a violent nod of his head.
Putting the dreams up on a shelf in his mind, he began to make a mental checklist of what this voyage should accomplish. There was the whole subject of the extra meals that woman of his had taken it upon herself to have delivered in the name of the ‘OneWhoMustRemember’. Hand in hand with that, was she now got three times as many plates of food, but his son was still much too skinny; a by-product of Kyle not getting any more food than he was before the increase, which was not enough even then.
Those two things, as well as finding out what “little thing” it was he was supposed to have taught his wife to use on their son when he misbehaved were on the top of that list. Also on his list, was having Kyle say goodbye to his mother; not for good, but it would take many weeks for him to teach his son everything he knows about being the OneWhoMustRemember. He would have Kyle read and reread not only the Book of the Faithless, but also all the other writings of the many OneWhoMustRemembers that came before them both. Hand in hand with that, he was now going to start taking Kyle up the mountain to witness the watching of the sign.
The thought of spending that much time with his son brightened his mood greatly. The rest of the trip to his village flew by, as he jumped from one scenario to another about how he was taught by his father, and more importantly, how he was not going to teach Kyle in the same manner; no slaps for wrongdoings, no yelling, cursing or fighting of any kind. He assumed that his father had taught him as his own had taught. It probably went back like that for generation after generation, each one getting meaner and more violent than the last. He was going to break that cycle once and for all.
He would also have to find out the reason of why that woman would have cleaned his cave and stockpiled food and drink there.
“Oh, hello there, Jago, what a pleasant surprise,” a voice sang out towards his right.
Being so into his thoughts, he did not even realize the outskirts of his village were in sight. His long haul was almost at its halfway pause before he and his son were to be walking back up the path. He looked up and stumbled slightly as his eyes locked on her.
"Coleena!" his mind screamed out. As the name was still echoing throughout his head, his memories of her flooded out of their forgotten hiding places like screaming ghosts who demanded attention right then and there.
She was his first crush, his first true love, his first kiss. They grew up right next to one another and spent all day, every day, together. Life back then, when his papa was up on the mountain, was a magical paradise of fun, laughter and excitement. At least it was up until the week or so before his tenth birthday.
The two of them had been lying on their backs in the shade cast off his house, talking of the future and what it held for each of them.
"I want to marry you," he remembered saying. He recalled how she got up on her knees and looked down at him.
He had to struggle hard that day not to reach up and try to run his hands through her long, black hair. It was parted in the middle, and the left side hung down over that half of her face. At the point where the centerline of her hair met her forehead, a braid as large around as her mother’s index finger began. The braid glided down to just above her right ear where it slithered into her hair, hugging her scalp. Going under her hair from there to the backside of her head, it resurfaced and was coiled back to the front to make another burro just above where it had made its first. Another two raps were made around the dark, thin and shinny strands of hair that flowed down the right side of her head. On the third return, it bore in above the other two strands and instead of going back in and around, it went in and then down under the rows of braids where it was tucked behind her ear. It was then left to cascade down her neck and out of sight behind her shoulder. The style not only had half of her face showing, even if the wind blew, and one half that never saw the light of day, or the light of night. It was always the center of his boyish fantasies; about actually one day moving that hair out of the way and, once and for all, kissing her.
"Military Commanders marry, silly, but if we could, I want you to prove it," she said with a teasing nudge to his shoulder.
“How?" he asked. Never before had he been asked to prove something like that.
"You have to ask me, that’s how," she said. "It's as simple as that."
He stood up and gazed down at her. "Will you marry me?" he asked innocently.
"No," she replied.
He felt crushed inside, more than he ever did at the hands of his father. Tears started welling up in his eyes.
“Why not?” he asked her, while feeling like he should find somewhere dark and far away to spend the rest of his life.
She giggled and said, “Because that's not the way you ask someone. You are standing and I am kneeling, this is backwards. Now you will just have to do it again, and do it right.”
He was feeling rather confused, but found it hard to resist her words. He did as she asked and kneeled down only after he helped her stand up.
"Will you," he started.
"No," she said. "You are not holding my hand and you need to." He gently reached up, took one of her hands in his, and tried to start anew.
"No, I don't think this will do it all," she talked over him. She started looking angrier as her right eye narrowed and her words came out like liquid fire erupting from her mouth. "You need to give me flowers so I can hold them while you are talking. If you do not think I am pretty enough for flowers, how can you expect me to say ‘yes’ to you, Jago?
“You need to look up at me and say my name. If you don't, how do you expect me to know I am the one you are asking?
“At that point, I could think you are talking to someone else and that would break my heart, Jago. You would not want to break my heart, would you?” she asked as if she expected him to say “yes”.
By this time, Brendon-Jago had just lost every shred of patience his almost ten-year-old mind had. He looked around and saw no one else. “How could you think I would be talking to someone else when we are the only people around?" He felt himself getting angrier and then something within his mind bent, or twisted.
“She wants to know who I’m talking to?” he asked himself. “Fine,” he replied to himself.
He took her left hand in both of his as he glared up at her. "Coleena," he said while tapping the backside of her hand, which he held tightly within his own. His left hand turned her hand around enough to expose the top side of his. “Jago,” he added while tapping the upper side
of his own hand.
“You may go on,” Coleena said with a grin showing on the open half of her face.
He inhaled to tell her, “Never mind, if you are going to start acting all crazy with being mad at me one second and then smiling at me the next, and always telling me what to do, I don’t think I want to marry you”, but as soon as her breath, upon which her words rode, touched his nose, all his resistance was gone.
All tension drain from his body as he looked up at Coleena. His will power melted. The sun was starting to reach the point where it was completely covered by the mountain range behind her. The dying rays of sunlight haloed the most beautiful creature he had ever had the pleasure of knowing. She was happy, smiling even, looking down at him. “I’m a lucky person,” he thought, as time seemed to almost stand still.
“Coleena’s breath. Ahhhhhhhhh,” he thought. He always looked forward to the times he was close enough to her mouth to catch even just a whiff of her breath as she talked. He could never quite explain why he loved her particular breath the way he did, but he did love it. Now here he was, kneeling down in front of her like her very own Knight of Darkness, and she, his Queen, with the sun light calling her name in harmonious song all around her. He almost felt like crying, the feeling was so strong. He knew in his heart that he would do anything she ever wanted of him if only for a smile like that. “She is looking down at me, and she is SMILING,” he thought again. “I really am the luckiest man alive.”
“Jago, dear,” Coleena said, still beaming a smile and looking very proud to be standing there that day, “I said you may continue. Now do it, this time, like you mean it.” Her words were no longer cold; they were like little butterflies of all different shapes, sizes and colors riding on the wind created by her breath. He felt spongy and not quite solid on the inside as he breathed in the warm air still carrying her scent. Looking up into her eye, he wished with all his heart to be able to say the right thing this time. “Remember the emotions,” he heard a voice, sounding like Coleena’s, sing from the depths of his mind. He gently turned his wrist back and sandwiched her hand and both of his.
“Coleena,” young Jago said, “the Coleena that lives next to me, Jago, the very Coleena whose heart I would never break, you are the very Coleena that I, Jago, want to spend my life with. The same Coleena, standing in front of me, Jago, I want to give to you my love and my heart for all time. Will you marry me and someday become my wife?” he asked.
“That sounded good,” he thought. It amazed him that he could actually talk like that, with his head swimming as it was. And to say it all without making a mistake was almost too good to be true. He could see a tear forming in her eye as the exposed half of her mouth started to quiver. She reached her left hand up under her hair and it paused there. A long moment of silence followed.
Already full of frustration, the pause and quietness unseated him. He dropped her hand and stood up, ready to find that dark place to spend his life. In that one second he was angry and feeling like his life was over. In the next second, however, he found himself wrapped up in Coleena’s arms with her mouth pressing against his. A shadow fell over the couple as they stood there, his arms to his side, dumbfounded, and hers circling around his neck.
She gasped as he was lifted into the air and out of her arms. The shadow belonged to Jago's papa. The look on his face spoke of the anger and hostility it usually did, but there was something else mixed in with it that even to this day Jago could not put his finger on.
"You are not welcome around here girl," his father said. "I don't ever want you to come near my son and that goes for your mother as well. Take this note she wrote and bring it back to her. You tell her my son and I are leaving for the cave, and if she knows what is good for her, she will never again go there,” he spat. “Do you understand, heathen?" he asked. "Go, now," he said when she lowered her eyes and nodded. She did just that, and to this very day, his papa’s command had been followed.
“You stay away from her boy," his father told Jago while setting the boy down. He turned his son around to face him. "She and her mother are liars and nothing but trouble. Never again will you talk to her." He led Jago into the house and packed the few simple belongings he had collected through his short life. Later that day, Jago was led up the mountain to the Cave of Remembrance where he stayed for a long, long time. His father never said another word on the subject. Before long, all real thoughts of Coleena faded away and then disappeared altogether.
The sound of giggling snapped Jago out of his daydream. "You look like you seen a ghost," Coleena said. Her words floated on the air cheerfully.
"Coleena," he said in almost a whisper
She was older now, as was he, but age did not take away any of the beauty he was just now remembering from the past. She was wearing a very snug, hand-made dress the color of dried sand, which flared out as it hugged the ground around her feet. It did that with the same grace that it did her overly hourglass figure. There seemed to be hundreds of tiny cog buttons that held the taut fabric together. They all fell vertically down the front of her dress, from under her exposed cleavage to just inches from the ground. They also hugged her body on the same tight course as the fabric itself. The tips of her feet were left to fend for themselves as they protruded from under the dress. They were covered in what looked to be simple hand stitched leather slippers. Slender arms and shoulders flowed out of the sleeveless and neck-less top. The front and back of the dress was joined together by thin strips of cloth upon her shoulders. The dress exposed more skin than he was used to seeing, but it certainly was not a burden on his eyes to see. Her hair was the same beautiful black and shiny color it was when they were little, though much, much longer. On the right side of her head, the hair was kept in the same fashion as it was as a child; being held off to the side of her face with a wound braid tucked behind her ear. The left side, though, was no longer hanging over that half of her face. It mirrored the right side, and left bare for him to see that entire half of her face that he was never able to see before.
“Imagine,” he thought, “all those years looking at her face and thinking she was the most beautiful creature on earth, and I am just now seeing her full beauty.” The left side of her face mirrored splendidly with the right side. He saw what appeared to be a lightning bolt tattooed on her left cheek up between her eye and ear. The upper portion of the lightning bolt was completely blackened, and the middle half of the bolt was a light gray color. The third section, outlined in black, was the same color as her skin. Gazing at her, Jago found he now had thousands of questions he would like to ask her.
“It certainly has been a long time, Jago," she said.
He blinked with surprise when he saw her now standing within arms reach of him. So wrapped up in his thoughts, he had not seen her walk up.
"Yes, yes, many years," he said slowly. Forgotten went most of the things he wanted to talk to her about, now that she was actually standing right next to him and he was able to actually identify her as the woman Kyle had talked about. She was the “sweet and beautiful one” who had shown the boy kindness.
"What brings you down from the cave today?" she asked.
He was startled, at first, when she spoke. He lifted his eyes off the ground by his feet and found she had moved even closer to him, to where her scent had no choice but to fill his nose. He closed his eyes and breathed in. "Ahhhhhhhhhh," he thought. “After all this time, she still has that breath.”
"I, I was just, ahhhh," he started, but no real words came to mind. He wanted nothing more than to hear her talk again so he could breathe her in once more. Regular air was not worth breathing compared to even a small sniff of her scent. He heard her as she inhaled, and his body started to quiver in anticipation of what her words would be. His eyes dropped to her lips as they parted for the beginning of her speech.
“You look tired,” she sighed. “Have you been getting enough sleep?” She r
eached her hand up and laid it to rest on his shoulder.
His entire body was flooded with tiny prickles of electricity from her touch, which grew stronger with his next lungful of fragrance more beautiful and any wild flowers that dotted the landscape.
“Tired,” he repeated. He really was tired all of a sudden. “Not much sleep to be had,” Brendon-Jago added.
“Come with me, my promised,” she whispered in his ear. “My bed is big enough for you.” She reached her hand up off his shoulder and ran her fingers through the hair growing in wisps on the back of his head.
All thoughts of everything swiftly melted away. They left a clean white slate with only Coleena’s image right dab in the middle of it. He heard her inhale again and found himself holding his breath, waiting for her next words.
“Come, oh great and powerful OneWhoMustRemember,” she whispered. “I want to go home, and you,” she continued while caressing his neck, “will take me there.”
He made eye contact with her and instantly he saw her as she was years and years ago. He thought, “Whose heart I would never break, tonight, of all nights, your heart is safe.”
“I will do as you ask, Coleena,” he heard himself say. “We have the rest of our lives to do everything you want. Just speak and know it will be done.”
Something started to buzz from somewhere in the back of his mind. He was unwilling to investigate what it could be; there would be time later for anything that was not Coleena or her wishes. He started walking down the path towards the two houses that were slowly materializing in the distance. One was on the left-hand side of the path and one was on the right. When they got closer, he started veering towards the left and the little buzzing that was still in his head grew softer. Coleena guided him back to the right side of the path. As he let himself curve back, he found the buzzing grew more annoying. Within a few feet of the door leading into the house on the right, he stopped and looked at her confused.
“What's the matter, love?” Coleena asked.
Just as he finished breathing in to speak, he heard a young boy screen from within the house across the path.
“No, Mama, NO!!” the boy’s voice broke through the otherwise still night.
Jago looked over his shoulder as the buzzing in his head felt as though it was going to burst out through his ears. “What's happening over there?” he thought. “It sounds like someone is dying.”
“Don’t worry, Jago,” Coleena purred, while turning Jago's head back towards her with her fingertip. “Your father can't stop us from being with each other now.” She smiled, and squinted her eyes slightly. “There is nothing for you over there,” she said slowly, as she tilted her head towards the other house where the voice carried forth from. She watched him breathe her words in and saw his face smooth as his eyes took on a slight sheen. She breathed in and could not miss the way his jaw started to twitch in anticipation.
“Yes,” she thought, “the time is finally at hand. She cupped his checks in both hands and softly said, “It’s just you and me, all alone in this world, and the time to be together has finally come. Take me inside, Jago, take me inside.” She made sure to speak slowly and breathe right into his nose.
He released all tension within his neck and face; half in fear of breaking her heart by showing resistance to her touch, and half in fear of causing himself to be anywhere but in this perfect position in case she choice to speak again. He saw her dress rise in she breathed in. He looked Coleena in the eyes and exhaled all of the air from his lungs.
“I am indeed a lucky man,” he thought. He was prepared to fill his lungs to the top with her sweet smell. The buzzing starting echoing from somewhere within his head again, but he was easily able to mute it out. “Almost time,” he cried to himself, “almost!”
This time when he heard someone yell, “Yes! Yes! He said tonight he is coming, Mama, please!!” he did not even give a small portion of a second thought on who it could be, and why they were yelling.
“Is she?” Jago started in his head. “Yes, she is! She IS smiling at ME!”
“Come inside, Jago, we must talk about a few things, you and I,” she said slowly, and then turned her back on him and she started in the house’s single entrance.
He did not hesitate to follow, and shut the door behind himself.
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE TRUTH OF IT ALL