Chapter 39
Dream
A shiver shot through him like lightning.
First it was just a tingling at the nape of his neck, but within a second it climbed up his back and tightened his shoulders.
Kaep went still, his breath held, not understanding where this icy stab came from.
His eyelids fluttered. He opened his eyes, disoriented, as if he'd just emerged from a dream he couldn't remember. He blinked once… twice… and again, trying to focus on what was above him.
The silent room barely moved, to the rhythm of the sleepers' breaths, crisscrossed by the crooked lines of the wooden ceiling. The joints looked damp, dark.
Slowly, Kaep raised his head. His neck ached; he'd been hunched over for too long. He looked up, following a droplet descending along one of the beams with his gaze.
He was still there, exactly where he had been all along.
The chair creaked faintly under his weight, his back sunk against the backrest, his feet planted on the floor. In front of him, the table was still in its place.
He hadn't moved. Or so he thought, until he noticed the tingling in his left hand.
He lifted it slowly, as if it weighed more than normal. He held it at face level, palm open, fingers tense.
He observed them for a moment. Each joint seemed alien, as if not fully responding to his will.
He closed his hand, feeling his knuckles crack dryly. Then he opened it again and repeated the movement.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
The faint sound of skin rubbing against skin mixed with his breathing. Something about that gesture—so simple, so mechanical—felt unsettling.
After the third movement, something changed in his face.
The rigidity broke and a smile, slow and contained, formed on his lips. It wasn't broad or tranquil; just a subtle curve that never quite defined itself as relief or strangeness.
He leaned forward. The wood creaked under the slight shift of weight.
He rested his right elbow on the table, settled his head on his closed fist, and let his cheek rest against it. The gesture seemed almost casual, but his eyes remained fixed on his other hand, the left one, suspended before him.
His fingers moved slightly, a faint tremor, almost imperceptible.
Kaep didn't look away. He kept observing himself with a calm that seemed out of place, as if trying to recognize something—a sensation, a memory, a certainty—within that hand.
And the smile remained there, still.
"Eighteen long years… and I finally could," he whispered.
The words came out almost voiceless, dragged between his teeth, as if he feared breaking the air by speaking them.
His cheek still rested on his closed fist, his posture motionless, almost lazy. But in his eyes there was something new, an intensity that contrasted with the stillness of his body.
His gaze remained fixed on his left hand. He didn't move it. He didn't touch it. He only observed it, with a mix of pride and wonder.
A muscle twitched at the corner of his lips, the smile stretched slightly, revealing a brief flash of teeth.
The silence surrounding him seemed to have thickened, as if the air itself awaited the next phrase, the next gesture.
But Kaep said nothing more.
He only breathed deeply, slowly, and let that smile—long, patient, unyielding—settle fully on his face.
Heh heh—he laughed softly, trying to contain the laughter as much as possible.
"And to think…" he murmured, letting the phrase drag a little before completing it, "that my younger self would be so determined to stab himself just to escape that space…"
The smile twisted slightly, becoming more weary than satisfied.
He leaned back slowly against the chair, the backrest creaking as if protesting the movement.
His shoulders dropped, releasing an old tension, and his eyes lifted toward the ceiling.
The wooden ceiling watched him in silence, the same one that had seen him wake up a few minutes earlier. The grain seemed to form twisted paths, routes that opened and closed upon themselves.
Kaep followed them with his gaze, remembering that "starry sky space" and the last expression of Kaep, as he was trapped, along with the last expression he had given him.
A shadow crossed his gaze, brief, like a thought he preferred not to touch again.
He exhaled.
"What an idiot," he whispered with a thread of laughter, not looking away from above.
But the smile didn't leave. If anything, it became quieter, more intimate.
… He remained silent, still looking at the ceiling, for several seconds.
…
"Kaep is no more…"
The thought emerged with the calm of an old certainty, not as a sudden idea.
"Back on this first day of my new self…" —he told himself— "or the second…?"
He blinked slowly, not looking away from the ceiling. The boundary between thought and voice had blurred; he didn't know if he had spoken aloud or only imagined it.
He felt a slight emptiness in his chest, a hollow where something that used to answer to that name once was.
Kaep
The sound seemed distant, alien, like the echo of someone who no longer existed.
He inhaled deeply, let the air fill his lungs, and for a moment allowed himself the sensation of being something else—newly formed, still nameless.
"This time I won't use that name anymore," he whispered.
"If I want to change something, I should start there… after all…" He lowered his head a little, now looking at the junction between the ceiling and the wall.
"I only have four… no, three years to change things."
The silence of the room enveloped him.
And in that silence, his consciousness breathed for the first time.
He crossed his arms, his gaze still fixed on the ceiling. The wood grain continued to draw irregular paths.
A memory filtered through those lines, blurry at first.
The sound of a voice calling him.
«—Eilor… sorry, Kaep—»
it had said then, confusing his name.
"Uncle…" he whispered, reinforcing the smile, but unlike his lips, his eyes sharpened.
"I will find you and save you," he said, closing his eyes.
The scene dissolved as quickly as it had arrived, but the echo of the mistaken name remained floating, persistent, in his head.
"Ei… lor…" he repeated silently, testing the sound, feeling how it fit—too well, or perhaps it was just the dream.
With his eyes still closed, he let out a slow, almost satisfied smile.
"Unlike you, Kaep…" he murmured, "I don't have to worry about sleeping."
The phrase floated in the air, soft, weightless, as if it didn't need anyone to hear it.
His lips remained curved, serene, while his breathing became more regular.
"Time for a good rest…" he continued, almost humorously, "I'll need strength to find my uncle… and Bairon."
As his breathing slowed, his body remained motionless.
He remained seated, arms crossed over his chest, legs apart, his weight sunk against the chair back.
A faint buzz began to vibrate in the air, so subtle it was barely distinguishable from the silence.
Then, something sparked.
Small orange lightning bolts traced the surface of his forearms—brief filaments of light that ignited and extinguished in a matter of seconds—as if energy sought an exit, but he kept it contained.
The discharges danced, fleeting, sinking back under his skin with a dry flicker.
Each one seemed to leave a barely visible mark, a luminous line that faded slowly before extinguishing.
His face remained tranquil. Not a muscle moved.
And so he remained, suspended between silence and the electric pulse.
Little by little, the weight of sleep began to gain ground.
At first it was just a slight heaviness in his eyelids, a warm sensation spreading from his nape to his shoulders. Then, that silent tide dragged the rest of his body, loosening the muscles, silencing the buzz.
For the first time in over thirty hours, sleep reached him.
His breathing grew slower. The orange lightning on his arms dissipated completely, leaving only a residual glow beneath the skin.
And there, in that space between consciousness and nothingness, something ignited.
A strange lucidity.
And with it, a memory…
Hazy at first, just an image trying to recompose itself among the shadows.
Kaep immersed himself in that memory with the calm of someone who knows exactly what they are about to find.
***
Walking among the uniformed men on the wooden gangway—sturdier than it looked, creaking softly under his boots—his uncle caught up to Kaep. The smell of sea salt mixed with the oiled metal of the weapons the soldiers carried. Seeing that Kaep hadn't noticed him, he placed a hand on his shoulder, firm but not rough.
Kaep turned without stopping. He smiled… but his expression failed to hide the avalanche of emotions overwhelming him. The corner of his lips trembled and his eyes shone with a mix of anxiety and something deeper.
His uncle noticed immediately, frowning slightly.
---
Just before they turned onto the gangway leading aboard, his uncle pulled him aside with a controlled push, strong enough to make him step back.
The impact surprised Kaep. His breath escaped in a short gasp as he stumbled, his heels hitting the damp wood.
The movement was quick, but enough for a couple of soldiers in the group to turn toward them. One even instinctively reached out a hand, without intervening.
The sound of boots on the platform halted for an instant. The atmosphere, which until then had been full of voices, brief laughs, and scattered orders, condensed into a mute tension.
The wind from the river carried the smell of salt, and the creaking of the gangway became the only perceptible noise.
Kaep looked up immediately, his breath still ragged. His expression was more bewildered than angry.
His uncle watched him in silence, his brow slightly furrowed, with a strange mix of severity and restraint. There was something in his gaze that didn't belong to the moment: a sudden intensity, almost analytical, as if he were verifying something.
Before Kaep could understand, his Uncle waved his right hand, up and then down, stopping in a thumbs-up gesture with his fingers closed. Along with a softer expression.
Then, a hand came to rest on the uncle's shoulder.
It was rough, hard like old leather.
"Family matter," he said, without changing his tone.
The phrase was so calm it was disorienting. The tense looks that had gathered around them hesitated for a second. Some lowered their guard, others exchanged doubtful glances. But the pressure in the air didn't completely disappear.
Kaep noticed the looks. Some full of confusion, others of discomfort. He saw how a couple of comrades murmured to each other, leaning in slightly.
One of them made a move to step forward, but his companion grabbed him by the forearm, shaking his head with a subtle movement. The gesture repeated further away, in another nearby group: small nods, brief whispers that said without words, 'leave them, it's nothing serious.'
Even so, the fragile atmosphere of joy that had filled the dock moments before, after the farewells with their families, cracked.
The laughter hung suspended, footsteps slowed, and the general murmur adopted a lower tone, as if everyone were listening without meaning to.
His uncle took a deep breath, not moving from Kaep's side.
His expression changed slightly: a weary grimace sketched at the corner of his mouth.
"Seems I stirred things up a bit," he said with a crooked smile, forcing a lightness that found no echo in the atmosphere.
Some laughed out of politeness, others averted their gaze, preferring to resume their march. But the tension didn't fully dissipate. It remained floating, clinging to the air.
His uncle turned to Kaep. He took a step forward, bringing them to the same height with a few centimeters difference. The wood creaked under his weight.
He placed both hands on his shoulders and looked him straight in the eyes.
"Are you alright?" he asked, not losing his low tone, though his voice now had a different edge, kinder and concerned.
Kaep, still surprised by how things had escalated, glanced away toward the water for a moment, as if seeking an answer there.
The trembling reflection of the sky on the surface hypnotized him for a few seconds: broken smudges of light, moving with the current. It seemed impossible that such a simple gesture—a push without real force—had completely changed the atmosphere.
Only when his uncle repeated the question did he react.
"Ah... yes, yes, I am." His voice came out a bit higher than he intended, as if trying to compensate for the silence surrounding them.
His uncle watched him with a hint of irony.
"Hmm. Seems what happened back there cheered you up," he said, giving him a pat on the back.
The blow resonated softly, but it sounded more like relief than affection. "Though I didn't expect it to escalate like this."
Kaep let out a short laugh. Now with a clearer mind—"Right? So now what? Everyone's moving again… do we follow?" he replied, nodding forward.