Nicolai remained awake until dawn.
He laid in his hammock recollecting his conversation with Dmitri. Their exchange was a long time in coming yet it left Nicolai wanting more, seeking a definitive end to the tension between them. They had managed to speak their minds, the both of them, while coming to no conclusive agreement whatsoever. Dmitri had managed to explain his absence and the reason for his departure, yet Nicolai still wondered how his motives had driven him away instead of closer to them. Nicolai, on the other hand, had stood his ground but remained flustered afterward. It was like he was a criminal pleading for mercy from an unforgiving judge. What did Dmitri expect from him? Nicolai asked himself. To take up arms and rush back to Chenia at the first sign of trouble? To rescue a country splintered by decades of border conflict and infighting? I can scarcely find regular work for my friends and I in Knight's Harbor, what could I do to aid the cause of Chenia?
From the day he and his stepfather saved him, Nicolai had always suspected that Dmitri's idealism led him to act a little off at times. As he recovered in their yurt, Nicolai could recall Dmitri actually instructing his stepfather on The Passages of Ada, an ancient manuscript passed down from the ages that told of the Prophets and the messages of Ada that they preached. Dmitri's stepfather would listen patiently and shrug when asked a question, yet Dmitri persisted to teach him even during his last days. His death and their journey to Sagemark were also unclear in Nicolai's mind, but he did remember the steady words that flowed from Dmitri like water from a spring. Dmitri's preaching continued right up to the day he disappeared.
The clatter of boots on wooden planks shook Nicolai from his daze. He leaned on his elbow to watch as the sailors hopped from their hammocks, half-awake as they threw off their night shirts and pulled on their long-sleeved wool parkas to protect them from the early morning cold. Nicolai turned to Dmitri's hammock to find it empty. He frowned. Not again, he told himself. Not another disappearance.
"What? What is it?"
Nicolai looked down the row of hammocks to find Petrov staring at him. Leo and Fyodor were nearly dressed as they tightened their belts. They too turned to Nicolai.
"Nothing," Nicolai replied. "It's nothing."
Petrov looked over his shoulder to also note that Dmitri's hammock was unoccupied. He turned back to Leo and Fyodor as if to say something. But he thought better of it.
As his mouth hung open, Leo and Fyodor stared at the two of them, before turning to each other.
"Maybe I should get some food for us," Fyodor said.
"Dmitri must be hungry too," Leo said a bit too loud, hinting at the person they were all thinking of at that moment. "I'll see if I can find him."
Leo and Fyodor left with the last of the crew. Petrov waited until the room was clear before addressing Nicolai again.
"You look disturbed. What's on your mind?"
"Dmitri," Nicolai started, "he . . ."
"What did he do?"
"He was singing. It was a familiar tune, I believe, some ode from the Old Country. Tell me, what do you know of the Shepherds?"
Petrov's eyes widened slightly.
"Shepherds?" Petrov replied. "Everyone who grew up learning of The Passages knows of the Shepherds."
"Yes, but The Passages last account of them was recorded around a hundred years ago. There is no mention of them in history since. Only . . ."
"Stories told in taverns or by old men on rooftops."
"Yes. Back in Chenia, your Uncle Tobin, did he speak of them?"
Petrov plopped his head back down into his hammock. He laid staring up at the ceiling as the sailors around them departed for the deck.
Nicolai stared at Petrov, cursing himself for bringing Tobin into the conversation.
"Yes, he did."
Nicolai snapped his head to look straight at Petrov. Petrov made a labored effort to sit up in his hammock to meet Nicolai's startled face.
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Leo found Dmitri sitting against the foremast as he stared at the open sea before him. He did not move or make a motion to acknowledge him even as Leo walked full circle around him. Leo, for his part, stood staring down at Dmitri for quite a while before kneeling down him.
"You been here long?" Leo asked.
"Since early morning," Dmitri replied.
"Have you slept?"
"No."
"The galley is near empty now with the crew awake. Only Petrov and Nicolai . . ."
"I'm not tired."
"I see."
Dmitri continued staring forward, not allowing his menial conversation with Petrov to break his watch.
"Whatever you said to Nicolai, it upset him."
Dmitri broke his attention to look at Leo. Through the genuine concern and worry that marred Leo's face, he also saw anger and frustration. He faced the cresting blue again just as Fyodor climbed the stairs up from the main deck with a handful of perogies. Dmitri extended his hand to Fyodor, who obliged by giving him one.
"Is it true?" Dmitri asked of Fyodor. "Is Nicolai upset?"
"I suppose so. He appears so cryptic, as if his mind is clouded."
Dmitri smirked.
"You find that amusing?" Fyodor asked.
"How much do we really know of each other, my friend?"
"Of each other, much. Of you, very little."
"And Nicolai?"
"What of him?" Leo interjects.
"When you reached Maricania, the four of you stuck together?"
"While you ran off."
"Yes, after I left. It has been some time now. Has Nicolai ever told you of his time in Chenia, of his family or where he came from?"
Leo and Fyodor looked at one another.
"All we know is that he was with you," Fyodor said. "After you disappeared, we didn't think of pressing the issue. It was too sensitive a subject."
"He never gave us a reason to ask about his past," Leo added. "Whenever we talked of the Old Country, he could relate. There was no reason to assume he was anything but one of us."
"So, you trust him?" Dmitri asked.
"Yes," Leo said flatly. His stare at Dmitri was unblinking. He looked straight into Dmitri's dark brown eyes, not in search of any malice of deception, but rather as a complimentary statement of his conviction.
Dmitri raised his head to meet Fyodor's gaze. Although less stern, it carried with it the implication that he agreed with Leo's declaration.
"It was never my intention to disturb Nicolai," Dmitri said as he rose to his feet. "I merely wanted him to recollect his past, to remember what he left, so that when we arrive there, he'll be able to recall that which he needs."
"Which is what?" Leo asked.
"A number of things. His confidence. His self-esteem. His very soul. It's one thing to persevere through the obstacles of the past, it is another to forget or discard it altogether. Do either of you recall the entries of the First Days of The Passages?"
Both of them shook their heads.
"They are a bit dry and the syntax is too formal for my tastes, but they are nonetheless insightful. They tell of how Ada sent his Messengers down to the Land as mortals to defeat the Soldiers of Carnage, those men who had discovered the power of metallurgy and rather than use it to build the foundations of Chenia and other societies, decided to craft weapons with the sole intention of enslaving their neighbors. The Messengers, with their own weapons of white and black steel, defeated the Soldiers, but in doing so, released their souls into the afterlife, where their spirits continued their quest of annihilation against the other spirits of the Land. To prevent this otherworldly onslaught, the Messengers resolved to rid the Soldiers of their evil desires by destroying their commitment to their cause. The Messengers corralled the army of Soldiers into the Netherworld, where their past was annihilated, their memories wiped clean. The Netherworld became the birthplace of amnesia, where men's souls wander aimlessly with no passion, no identity, just bare resemblances of the powerful spirits and bodies they once were. The Netherworld gained a new name in the entries of The Passages that followed: Hell.
"The reason you know nothing of Nicolai's past is because he cannot recall it. He is a Soldier of Carnage, a soul with no memory, only rather than wandering through the Netherworld, he remains on the Land. Now, he finds himself on a ship headed toward Chenia for a cause he can only identify through his acquaintances, unable to realize how he is tied to our struggle or why he is mysteriously drawn to fight for it. He has a series of blurred memories at best of Chenia. For him the Motherland is a fleeting dream, an epiphany just out of grasp, a longing for a familial past. Until he is able to rediscover his past and what this country means to him, he will always be half-committed to a cause of freedom, torn between helping us and our brethren in our hour of need and returning to Maricania where he had the security of a monotonous yet stable livelihood, a life in which he knew his place and nothing else.
"Look at other such similar people we have seen in Maricania who have attempted to forget their past, to distance themselves from their memories. How many drunks and criminals have been born out of the swarm of refugees that have crowded Maricanian harbors and ports? Have many old women and men cling to their memories as parents to children, with little of that same passion toward the present or the future? Even those of us who have risen through the ranks to thrive in a foreign land still harbor a touch of nostalgia for the Motherland. The past, whether we choose to accept it or not, forges who we are as a people.
"You have to ask yourselves a serious question: how long can a man remain disconnected from his past before he must face it? Consider the dire consequences of remaining oblivious to one's memories. You may find that answer soon enough. For when Nicolai arrives in Sagemark, he will find a world that knows him better than he knows himself. The green eyes and chiseled face of the son of a Shepherd will not go unnoticed. The refugees of Knight's Harbor may have glazed over Nicolai, but the Chenians of Sagemark will know better.
"You say I was harsh, even cruel, to prod Nicolai to remember his past. I merely asked him to consider his muddled memories and dreams not as a thorn in his side but as a spirit to be released and realized. I challenged him to search the dark crevices and undiscovered confines of his mind, here, at night on this ship where he could have privacy, rather than allow him to confront his past in the rough streets and dark alleyways of Sagemark. We'll all face some tough characters in that city, but Nicolai will also have to face demons neither he nor us know much about.
"You may continue to judge me for leaving you at Casis and for last night. I will accept such criticism. But I will not apologize for doing what I felt necessary to prepare Nicolai for the past he will face. As his friends I hope that you will come to appreciate that."
Leo and Fyodor looked down at the wooden planks of the ship's deck. They did so not out of shame, for they felt none, but due to the fact that a sliver of truth resonated with them from Dmitri's words. Their contemplation was only broken by a set of familiar voices.
"What's the matter?" Petrov asked.
"You two seem lost," Nicolai said.
Fyodor and Leo looked up to find Nicolai and Petrov before them. Dmitri sat against the foremast, just as he did when Leo first found him on deck, with no change in his demeanor to hint at the conversation he had just finished. Nicolai looked from his three friends down to Dmitri.
"You're certainly a man who can make others think, aren't you?" Nicolai asked.
"I strive to point out the very obvious, Nicolai. What people happen to think about it is entirely up to them."
"And what of you. You seem to know what we think. Now we want to know what you think."
"You four really want to know?"
They nodded.
"Very well," Dmitri said as he stood to stretch on his feet. "I think the four of you know nothing of sailing. If you did, you would have realized that the trade wind picked up a bit last night and that the Maricanian Stream is a bit faster this season."
Dmitri strode to the front of the ship until he reached the rail. He stopped to stare down at the whitewater that crashed upon the ship's stem before jumping onto the bowsprit where he squatted, looking ahead. Nicolai and the others trailed behind, remaining on the deck to admire the gleaming band of green, brown and white on the horizon: the port city of Sagemark, former capital of Chenia.74Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5IjDOcgooq
