The image of Arman falling down the cliff shot up with a thump. Kalakia remembered how Arman’s hair felt as he clutched it and mercilessly dragged the young boy to the edge and tossed him over. He heard Arman’s dreadful scream echoing over the valley.
“I disappointed you,” he replied.
“You did,” she said. “And I have forgiven you. I did so long ago.”
Kalakia recalled his mother’s anguish when news came that her son had committed murder. She had wept, continuously shaking her head and repeatedly whispering ‘no,’ refusing to accept it, until his father led him out the door. She had been too weak to follow them, crippled by shock and grief. Her scream from inside the house had been the last thing Kalakia heard before his father forced him into the backseat of their car.
“Do you know why I forgave you?” she asked.
“No,” said Kalakia.
“Because I finally understood something. You did not choose the path you took. Your future was already written.”
Kalakia felt the fog of sorrow come over him. He knew what she meant. Sensing the shift, his mother reached over and placed her hand on his cheek as though he were still that boy.
“You carried the burden for all of us,” she continued. “Your father was too distracted, your brother as well. For them, reputation was everything. They were not interested in the truth. It was too painful to face.”
Kalakia listened carefully, mesmerised by his mother's insight.
“But you were different. You accepted who you were,” said his mother. “My little warrior,” she added with a tender smile.
Kalakia blinked and nodded.
“You have reflected on this for a long time,” he said.
“I had a lot of time to think after your father died. Are you still angry with him for sending you away?”
Kalakia’s jaw shut tight. He nodded.
“He also had no choice,” she said.
“He only cared about what others thought of him.”
“True, but it was more complicated than that. He loved you.”
“Did he? After Kraas went away, he barely spoke to me. The whole town looked down on us, and he would have fallen to his knees for them to accept him. Even when Kraas joined the armed forces, they still mocked us. Nothing we did was going to wash away the shame of who we were. We remained gypsies to them. Uncultured and uncivilised. Filth, and nothing more.”
“Your father could not help who he was. Just like you could not.”
“I defended our honour. What did he do? He disowned me for it.”
“He sent you away to protect you. They were going to kill you.”
“You believe I could not have defended myself? He underestimated me, and worse still, he underestimated himself. He always did. Do you know what Arman said before I killed him? ‘Your family are a pack of dogs, trying to walk on two feet like humans.’ You do not reason with such people; you humble them with force. It was then I realised my father’s way would not work. Men respect only strength and power.”
“You’ve had the rage of a lion, ever since you were a little boy. And you’ve always been stubborn, even more than your father. Nobody could convince you to see things differently.”
“Idealists. My father and Kraas.”
Kalakia’s mother gave a weary smile.
“I pray one day you’ll understand,” she said.
“I did not come to talk about them. I came to protect you from what is to come.”
His mother’s tenderness faded before his eyes, and her face turned hard. She lifted her chin and intensified her stare.
“Do you think I would need your help after all these years?” she said.
Kalakia smiled and shook his head.
“Every lion was birthed by a lioness,” he said.
“And don’t you forget it,” she snapped back before standing up. “Will you stay for lunch?”
Kalakia checked the time.
“I will,” he said.
“Good, I’ll get started right away,” she said before going into the kitchen.
Kalakia leaned back on the couch and gazed into space, thinking again about the day he murdered Arman. His father’s furious response. The fistfight which almost broke out between him and his father. The frantic drive to the train station to escape Arman’s family. The tight knot in his chest which he felt in exile every morning since that day.
Now Kraas was dead, and Kalakia’s life was under threat. The League was at war. With mayhem all around, Kalakia sensed his mortality for the first time in decades. With it came an irresistible craving to return home and revisit his past. To see his mother, and make sure she remained out of Stirner’s reach. The coming war would descend like the plague, and nothing would be the same once the dust settled. Above all, Kalakia had to admit; he came to visit because he craved the comfort that only home offered. He hoped it would inject him with the strength to face what was ahead.
He closed his eyes. The symphony of birds chirping came through from outside. He could hear his mother rattling around in the kitchen, just like when he was a boy. His father would be in his reading chair, Kraas would be out somewhere plotting his next scheme.
A knock on the door interrupted Kalakia’s nostalgia. He tilted his head. Francois. He went over to the front door and opened it.
“Stirner’s people made contact,” said Francois immediately. “He wants to speak with you.”
The pitch-black had swallowed them whole. Shirvan’s erratic breathing followed Brunswick from behind, the resonance of their shuffling feet on the tunnel interior amplifying each step. Brunswick’s stomach growled, while a sharp pain throbbed in her thigh. She knew where the tunnel led, but that barely made walking in total darkness any less unsettling.
It was six kilometres from the emergency facility to the tunnel opening. They would only know they had reached their destination when they saw the light coming through the cracks of the entrance. Until then, they would have to carry on through the abyss with barely a sense of time or space.
“How long do you think it’s been?” whispered Shirvan from behind.
They had
