Before I Knew It
When he opened his eyes in the cabin, the first thing he heard was birdsong.
A sound he had never once heard in the capital.
He had always woken to the clash of metal and the tramp of feet—or the urgent rush of reports.
Cayen sat up.
"It's nice not having anyone around to shove Gansei at me first thing."
The mutter came out on its own. It wasn't a gloomy tone. Just something like a morning greeting.
He rose from the bed and stretched. His body protested in every joint, bones cracking loudly. Only lately had he begun to listen to the sounds his own body made.
After a thorough stretch he went straight to the kitchen and put water on to boil. Back at the family estate a servant would have handled it with a look of pure annoyance. Now he was entirely alone.
Given how that maid found everything a hassle, I figured this would be a pain too.
Strangely, it wasn't.
While the water came to a boil Cayen gazed out the window. Warm morning light broke through the leaves and spilled inside.
Breakfast was simple—bread and soup. The table held nothing fancy, yet every swallow felt strangely peaceful.
Afterward he stepped into the yard, settled into the newly bought rocking chair, and rocked. Creak, creak, creak…
After a long while of that he suddenly grew bored.
Maybe I should try something.
At once he found an old hammer and saw in the shed—tools the previous owner must have left behind. Meaning to fix one of the crooked fence posts in the yard, he began fitting boards this way and that.
"Hnnngh… not like this."
Hands that had once handled a sword so well on the battlefield could not drive a single nail straight. Staring at the crooked nail, Cayen let out a hollow laugh.
"Heh. If this counts as talent, then it's talent."
He wrestled with it half the day and finally settled for roughly securing the board before dusting off his hands. When he straightened, a tight ache clenched instantly beneath his sternum.
"Cough—cough—ptui."
A few light coughs. A faint stain of blood showed on the handkerchief. He folded it with practiced ease and put it away.
Here we go again, acting up…
Without a flicker of agitation he returned to the rocking chair and reclined. Cayen began coughing up blood once more. Sitting there spitting blood into the chair, he felt as if a snake were writhing in his gut.
Worn out, when evening came he filled his stomach in the kitchen with the soup he had roughly boiled that morning. His cooking was pathetic, but it did not matter. After all, there was no one left to complain.
He finished the meal, lay down on the wooden platform, and looked at the sky. The sunset was spreading red. He could see the fence he had fixed that day standing—however crookedly.
"Eh… well… it's standing, at least, sort of."
A small sense of accomplishment bloomed. It left him tingling with pride, as if he had become the world's greatest carpenter. It was a kind of fulfillment he had never felt in his life.
In the family only perfect results had ever been recognized. The slightest deviation brought reprimand. Here no one evaluated him. It was all right to be crooked.
"Yeah… to be able to do this even now—where else could I?"
The quiet murmur drifted across the yard. The owls nearby seemed to agree.
That even with a dying body he could smile at something so trivial—it wasn't bad, Cayen seemed to say, calmly.