Scales and Swords ✓

48: Pasts

"It was you wasn't it?" The young boy asked. 

My heart pounding in my ears. My breathing louder than my thoughts. I pressed a hand over my mouth and listened.

Those words, spoken by someone who had been abandoned and left to care for a child before they could understand war, seemed so private and painful. But I couldn't just leave, knowing that I'd leave Lance to a boy—no, a young man who had taken down someone as powerful as him. So I listened though it pained me to stand around wishing and only wishing to cut those chains that tethered Lance in that dark cold corner. And though it pained me, listening to the boy's story.

"Look at me," Nareem said, his tone measured but slowly loosing patience.  "Look at me!"

"Don't you remember me?" The young man went on. "I was this tall when you came striding into my village with your knights to warn us of an attack. You promised everyone would be safe, you said we'd all be given a new home. You never once said, we'd lose anyone."

I fought the urge to take a peek, but lost. Lance had yet to raise his head. Nareem stood, his hands gripping the bars that separated him from Lance. That protected Lance from his wrath.

"Why didn't you come back for us? Why did my parents have to fight for us in your place? Why did they have to die, when you said we had nothing to worry about? At least give me a reason! Lie to me won't you!!" His voice cracked, urging me to take the little boy in my arms and to tell him all would be fine.

"I waited, I held onto the hope that you'd come. You were a knight, you were our protectors, you'd save us, I told myself. But they came instead, those monsters, and they showed no mercy. Where were you? What made you forget your promise?" He paused only to take a breath. "My parents protected us till their last breaths, fighting till their last moments just to allow us enough time to escape."

I looked away. Lance's words suddenly gained new meaning. Knowing that you tried but failed, though you did your best. He tried his best, yet he still failed and now he carrys those failures in his heart.

"My sister was just a baby and I was just a kid." His tone eased but that made it harder to listen. "But I took her, held her, though she cried. And I, I took care of her the best I could. But my best wasn't enough, she needed her parents. I needed our parents...why won't you speak? Why?"

A moment of silence passed, the sound of shuffling feet then Lance's hoarse voice uttering these words, "your sister....how is she?"

The atmosphere deathly silent then, "no, you don't get to know," The boy said. Footsteps thudded against the floor. I darted for the tree trunk. Nareem exited the room and left quietly down the stairs.

I wavered between approaching Lance and leaving altogether. But I knew only one option was possible, leaving, beacuse his cell was locked and he wouldn't have taken food from me, not after that. So I returned down stairs quietly, my chest heavy with this newfound knowledge.

"What are you doing here?"

I froze in my steps. I raised my head to meet the hazel eyes of Xon.

But before I could speak, a dark figure appeared at the door, behind him.

"December, are you done?" Brise asked. Xon bristled at her voice.

"Done?" I repeated. Her stony gaze forced me to say, "yes, I'm done."

Brise passed him and met me at the foot of the stairs. She grabbed my arm, sinking her nails into my skin as she pulled me forward, sneering.

"Done with what?" Xon asked and we froze in place. His gaze icy cold, he eyed Brise. "What was your sister doing here?"