Soul Storm: Part 1 - The Connecting Flame

REUNION...

He started down the ravine wall. "Are you all right?" he called before he leapt and somersaulted over the river, landing just a few feet away from the dead animal. He turned, now able to focus clearly on the youth.

Small in stature, but still tall enough to reach Thaddeus' shoulder, the youth was frail and thin, yet in spite of his flushed face and skin, he was very comely. In fact, with a healthy complexion he would be considered beautiful. His eyes were round and the color of a clear spring sky, though at that moment, they were glassy from illness. His strong jaw smoothed down into a round chin. His nose was small and straight. And his lips, though full and shapely, were also pale and dry, the symptoms of sickness clearly evident.

Thaddeus then saw the stone around the youth's neck and his heart almost stopped. He hitched a breath as the knowledge came at him from all corners of his mind. Memories, desire, hope long forgotten; all of those things culminated and mingled with the rising joy within his being as he locked eyes with the youth, uncertain he could accept, yet uncertain he could not accept what he knew to be true. "Stephen?" he whispered, unable to give any more strength to his voice.

But Thaddeus had no time to rejoice in this glorious revelation. Stephen's weary eyes rolled back into his head and his body buckled. Thaddeus caught him around the waist and eased him down, cradling him in his arms.

"By Enreak, what is going on?"

He noticed the stone, now encased in gold, hanging from a leather thong around Stephen's neck. He carefully ran his fingers over it, the smooth, oblong surface echoing traces of memory in his mind.

"Stephen," he whispered, his voice choking under the strain of the emotion that fought with his reason. Stephen could not be alive, but here he was, in Thaddeus' arms. And he had held onto the stone, onto the memory of a rebellious youth who had saved him on that fateful day.

"Stephen, Stephen, Stephen." Thaddeus brushed the tips of his calloused fingers over the stone, worn by Stephen as though it were some type of medal or, even still, an amulet of protection, just as Thaddeus had told him it would be. "Stephen, is this how you survived...by holding onto my memory, just as I have survived by holding onto yours?"

Unconsciously, he pulled the youth tighter into his embrace and lowered his lips to Stephen's ear, whispering; "Is this a dream?"

But in a shattering moment, something happened to turn the dream into a nightmare. Thaddeus felt the chill of cold steel against his cheek, and heard the sound of a hard-edged voice full of violent warning, "Release His Highness now, Marked One, or I will lay claim to the legend of being your executioner."