Lush
The boy was curled on the ground when he found him. He looked to be around fourteen years of age. The stranger walked across the dry dirt, taking in the scene. The earth was still cool beneath his feet, but the sun was rising and soon the heat would be unbearable.
The stranger paused for a moment and examined everything with care before approaching the boy. He knelt beside him in the sand, careful not to touch him. The boy was naked.
He kept his eyes on the boy’s face, not saying a word.
“I don’t know what happened,” the boy said eventually, as the sun crept over the distant mountains. “I don’t . . . I don’t think I know who I am.”
He raised his eyes, to meet the stranger’s silver gaze. There was panic in his dirt-smudged face, but he was trying to keep it under control.
“It’s okay,” the stranger said. “I do.”
The boy’s eyes dropped, his face twitching slightly, in pain, in memory. “He sent me away,” he murmured. “My . . . my father sent me away. Why did he do that? Was it because I—“
“No,” the stranger interrupted firmly, but kept his tone gentle. “Not for that.”
He looked away from the boy, at the scorch marks a few yards beyond. A fire had burned there. A fire so hot, the sand beneath had melted into glass. He glanced around at the empty desert landscape. There was no sign of life, no fuel closer than the mountains. And no amount of wood could heat a fire that hot, not in the open like this. The boy uncurled a little, drawing the stranger’s gaze again.
“Then it must be . . . because of this,” the boy said, dropping his arms from where they’d been hugging his chest.
Breath hissed out through the stranger’s teeth, in shock, in sympathy. Across the boy’s chest was a set of marking, the skin reddened and blistered painfully. But more than that, the marks glowed and flickered beneath his skin, as if the fire still burned.
“What happened?” the stranger asked.
The boy swallowed hard. “She reached into the fire,” he said haltingly. The mere memory was agony. “She pulled out a flame. It didn’t burn her, but she shaped it into a rune and pressed it into my chest.”
He glanced down at himself. The panic flared for a moment. “It’s still burning isn’t it? It’s burning under my skin.”
His face twisted and he turned away, hiding his expression from the stranger, who cursed under his breath.
“The runes of fire,” the stranger murmured, after a moment. He let out a sigh.
The boy heard him, turned to look up at him. “You know them? What does it mean?”
The stranger shook his head. “I’m not sure,” he said.
The boy laughed suddenly, painfully. There was no humor in the sound. “I have lost everything,” he said. “My father doesn’t know me. I don’t even know myself. If no one remembers my name, do I even exist any more?”
The stranger focused on him, suddenly intent. He reached out, grabbed the boy’s hand, squeezed it hard. “I know your name.” he said. “And I will never forget it. That is a promise.”
The boy looked up at him, frowning slightly. “Do I know you?”
“No. But I know you. This will be hard, but you have to survive. You have to keep going.”
“But no one knows me any more. No one remembers me.”
“Then you must make them remember.”
The boy’s frowned deeply. “How?” he asked.
“You will find a way,” the stranger promised. He glanced around, to the mountains, then to the south where the great oasis lay several days’ ride away. The boy had no horse. The stranger grimaced.
“There is little I can do for you, I’m afraid,” he murmured. But he pulled a small pouch of ointment from the pack he carried and gently dabbed it on the burns.
The boy watched him bemusedly. “It will not make a difference,” he said.
The stranger smiled a little at that. “No, but it makes me feel better. Maybe you, too.”
“You are going to leave me.” It was not a question.
The stranger hesitated. “I cannot stay.”
The boy mimicked his earlier actions, looking to the north. “I will head south,” he decided. “There is nothing left to the north for me.”
“Nothing for now,” the stranger corrected him. “In time, there may be.”
The boy seemed to be recovering. He sat up, and faced the stranger. “Why do you come here?” he asked. “Why do you care, when my own family has abandoned me?”
“I wish I could tell you.” The stranger answered, handing him a waterskin. “There are things even I do not know. And I must be going soon.”
The boy took a careful sip of water. He knew he would have to conserve it. “I am glad you came,” he said. “Though it would have been easier to just die here.”
The stranger’s smile was sad. “That is not really a possibility, is it?”
The boy sighed, setting the waterskin aside. “How can you know so much about me?” he asked.
The stranger just shook his head. “I can’t tell you much,” he said. “I don’t know much, and it’s not safe to tell you all—for either of us. But I can tell you this much.”
“What?” the boy asked, when he stopped.
The stranger bent close and breathed it into his ear, barely audible over the rising wind. “Your name is Derek Kasey T’llira Manday of Aries. Never forget that.”
The boy closed his eyes for a moment, his lips moving silently as he repeated his name. When he opened them, the stranger had vanished.
The boy took another cautious sip of water, then rose and headed south, where the lush gardens of the great oasis beckoned, an impossible distance to go on foot. But dying was not an option, and he was stubborn to his core.
Three days later, one of the Kashmanyte’s desert patrols found him, sun-burnt and raving in the heat. They took him up and brought him home to the desert ruler’s palace, where the Kashmanyte took him in and nursed him back to health.
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