Before:

     Trevor sat on the floor next to his cot, legs outstretched.

​     He had the bandage off his leg. He used a washcloth to soak the wound. With each passing second, the pain lessened, lessened...

     Myveth, the eldest daughter, sat on a stool across from him.

     "Brokar?" Myveth asked.

     Trevor nodded.

     Myveth removed a long, thin pipe from a shelf nearby. She filled the pipe with brokar, then used a candle to fire the brokar up.

     Myveth took the brokar into her lungs, then exhaled until the smoke enveloped both her and Trevor. 

     The brokar didn't rise to the ceiling and dissipate the way smoke usually did. Instead, it clung to the bodies of Trevor and Myveth like an aura.

     Something within Trevor's inner being grinned.

     "Thank you," he said.

     "Thank you," she mimicked,

     Myveth took in, then exhaled, brokar until the pipe emptied and the cloud that enveloped them got so strong as to make Trevor's eyes sting. 

     Trevor babbled.

     "You know, the crazy thing," he said, "is that I can't say I even remember the old Trevor anymore, the boy who grew up in Seatrailia and who loved sports and...Sometimes memories wash over me like a waterfall, but for the most part...but you know what else? It's getting harder for me to remember the Trevor I was before I came here. I'm starting to forget my four years with the Azure. I'm talking memories now, not training, training that got drilled into me, but...I think of myself now as someone who always had and will always have a shitty leg and will always limp. It starts to get to me, but then I think of you and your sisters and your mother, and that always calms me down."

     Myveth looked ready to cry, as usual. 

     He went to touch her cheek, but then he remembered these women didn't like to be touched and withdrew his hand. 

     A tear formed in Myveth's eye, then rolled down her cheek.

     In his mind, Trevor sighed. He knew her crying had nothing to do with him, she cried all the time, but still...

     Maybe because they sat so close together, or maybe because they seemed to be connecting on some sort of emotional level even though they didn't understand a word the other said, but Trevor himself grew sad.

     They both reached out until Trevor felt the warmth of Myveth's palm so very close to his...

     but they didn't touch.

     Tears flooded from Myveth's eyes.

     Trevor touched one of them with the tip of a finger.

​     You're crying for both of us, was the message he wanted to convey there, although he doubted he succeeded. 

CONTINUE