Nicholas was floating through mist. He could see and understand nothing other than soft rainbow lights surrounded him. His mind wandered: his thoughts unconnected, just random feelings or images.
At times he felt warm, but the overriding feeling was the knowledge that his body felt no pain: he couldn’t understand that; he should hurt. Of course it went without saying that he knew that he was dead, and in death one was relieved of mortal pain.
He couldn’t remember why he should hurt, his mind had blocked out great sections of what he had known. But he knew in the most detached sort of way that he had been beaten. He remembered that it was severe: but mostly he knew that he was dead.
Nicholas recounted finding his family. There was no grief, and he went over the dreadful scene as if he was a stranger watching a tragic drama unfold. Something was wrong with what had happened: not just because it had, but something else; something he did not understand; something he had missed, or overlooked. He was trapped in a loop of despair as again and again his mind saw and refused to accept the horror of the event, only the methodical, repeated, step-by-step search of facts. He was tired; try as he may the puzzle remained, and eventually the blackness returned. Later, or it could have even been before; there were other dreams. He was laid upon a table, and again that warm feeling. An old man with bushy eyebrows, dressed in loose red garments held his arm behind Nicholas’s shoulders to support him, the other hand holding a small vessel containing a thick yellow liquid. ‘No questions, just drink’ he had been told. Nicholas did as he was bid. While he drank his eyes wandered about him.
The room was small and brightly lit from a source he could not locate. Strange articles of furniture stood against one wall; upon these paintings and scripts that appeared to change at the old man’s word: and at one time a voice answered out of the air itself. Once again Nicholas drifted to sleep. This time it was deep with no dreams.
When Nicholas woke it was not gradually. There was a breeze across his face and his mind was instantly awake; his body lay prone but his eyes opened. Above him the stars shone, and under him he could feel the soft cushion of grass and fern. Moving his eyes he could see that he was at the base of a rock face, and a few meters away was the entrance to a small cave.
A fire had been lit off to his left, the wisp of smoke being drawn skyward in the light wind that was clearing the remnants of dispersing mist.
Neither moon was visible, but judging by the pattern of stars that he could see, it would be just before daybreak. As if in answer to his thought, he caught sight of the first pale streaks of dawn breaking into the blackness.
Nicholas moved expecting pain, but felt none. Limb by limb he tested his body. He felt good, very good; in fact he had seldom felt better. He cautiously raised his arms, and looked at his hands for the cuts and slashes of the chase, but there were none. He felt at his head for the bruises, and lumps, but again these too had gone.
Looking down the tunic, and cloak bore none of the rips and tears from his running through the forest. They felt crisp and clean, as if but at that moment they had been taken from his mothers washing basket. The thought brought the horror rushing back and suddenly the scene at the house confronted him. “Oh God let it all have been some terrible nightmare,” he cried out loud as he sat bolt upright in shock.
“I am truly sorry…” The solemn voice came from his side, and he turned towards it. “A nightmare it was not. You have only cold reality to comfort you now.”
A man was sitting quietly just inside the mouth of the cave.
Nicholas felt tears in eyes. “No… it can’t be…” and he clasped his hands to his face in misery. He sobbed, as he had never done before.
At long last his eyes could weep no more and Nicholas turned to look at the stranger. The man was turned partly away; gazing into the fire, giving Nicholas the privacy that his grief required. “Where am I?” He said, his voice trembling.
The man turned; his expression was blank: it was not the occasion for even a hint of a smile, but his voice was sympathetic. “You are at what I believe you call Henderson’s draw.”
Nicholas knew of the place. “If I am, it is beyond the forest?”
“It is, and you are.”
“How did I get here? I remember…”
The man rose up. “Whatever you remember is probably what happened.”
“Then I remember I should be dead?” said Nicholas coldly “…And I wish that it was that way, for what I do remember is to be burdened with such grief that I cannot bear.”
The man came closer to him and sat on an old stump. “You have made a journey that few men return from: you have been to deaths door, and yet you can still look out of that past to the future: think on that?”
“Journey; future: what future? If you are my savior then I am not sure I feel gratitude.”
The man seemed unperturbed by the harsh reply, and reached down close to Nicholas to pick up a small beaker. “Anguish and grief, I cannot help you with. That is a burden you must carry alone, but you must not let it cloud your judgment. Here drink this; you are still far from mended.”