Chapter 3: The Spark Beneath Ashes
The seasons passed, each one marking the slow expansion of my prison. From crib to floor, from crawling to stumbling steps, from gurgling noises to halting words. At four years old, I was a child in flesh, but inside I remained Dr. Kaito Ren: a man of equations, a strategist trapped inside small, fragile limbs.
The manor aged with me. What once looked faded now seemed weary, exhausted, worn thin by years of neglect. Summer sunlight filtered through cracked shutters, outlining constellations of dust motes that drifted lazily in the stagnant air. Stone walls sweated faint damp even in warmth, and mildew clung stubbornly to corners no lavender sachet could cleanse.
Yet outside, the gardens whispered another story. Wild roses tangled with weeds along paths of broken stone. Herbs sprang up in clusters, not from deliberate tending but from sheer stubbornness. Bees droned in the thick summer air, crows cawed from weathered rooftops, and grass forced its way between flagstones as if to remind us that the world beyond our failing house still thrived.
I often sat in the overgrown courtyard, my small legs dangling from a moss-spotted bench. I would listen to the hum of life, taste the air heavy with earth and pollen, and watch the green conquer where nobility had surrendered. The irony was not lost on me.
The Brothers
I was not alone.
The first of my brothers was Julien, six years my senior. At ten, he was all fire and noise, flinging his wooden blade about as though the air itself were an enemy. He trained daily under Sir Cedric, our aging knight, whose voice barked corrections that Lorien ignored more often than he obeyed.
"Again, lad!" Cedric roared one sweltering morning as Lorien charged at a straw dummy. "Use your feet! Gods, boy, if you forget your legs, you're already dead."
Lorien huffed, sweat soaking his tunic. He reset, tightened his grip, and swung again with all the subtlety of a hammer. His blade struck true , then rebounded as his footing slipped, sending him tumbling face-first into dirt. He cursed, muffled against the ground.
I winced, biting back the urge to shout corrections. His stance wasted energy, his grip bled strength, his strikes were too obvious. But I was four. If I spoke, they'd call it childish mimicry. So I swallowed my frustration, jaw tight. Knowledge without power remained the cruelest prison.
My second brother, Orion, was eight. Unlike Lorien's fire, Orion was a shadow—quiet, hesitant, often lost in books he did not fully understand. I sometimes found him in Father's library, lips moving silently as he traced words, eyes flitting nervously as though each page might reveal his inadequacy. He did not study for passion, but from fear ,fear of failing, of being dismissed, of being useless.
One winter evening, I found him hunched by the hearth, parchment trembling in his hands. He whispered syllables under his breath, clumsy and slow. Every time Father's footsteps echoed from the hall, Orion's body tensed, panic flashing across his face.
I recognized that look. I had seen it in graduate students drowning beneath equations too complex for them to grasp, eyes darting like trapped animals as they tried to hide their weakness.
I felt something for them both. Lorien, the reckless flame. Orion, the fearful ember. And me, the sickly third son, the cipher they scarcely noticed.
The Retainers
The household's rhythms became familiar, a clockwork of failing parts.
Sir Cedric remained the iron gear, gruff but dependable, his limp deepening with the damp. Yet still he barked orders, still he corrected swings, still he carried the dignity of a knight even as time eroded his body.
Marta, the steward, bore the weight of our decline with sharp words and sharper ledgers. I overheard her one afternoon, muttering to herself as her quill scraped parchment: "Two sacks short again. Three weeks until the Marquis's tithe. Gods save us from lords who think ink can grow grain." Her eyes would soften when they flicked toward me , then harden again, as though ashamed of the slip.
And Tomas, now fifteen, strutted like a rooster with cracked spurs. Taller, yes, but no less surly. He swept resentfully, cursed loudly, and whispered reckless gossip to kitchen maids. I lingered near him often, ears sharp.
"The Duke's men ride the south road," he bragged one evening. "Banners high, armor gleaming. Nothing like Cedric's rust heap." His spit hit the dirt. Marta cuffed him, but not before the detail seared into my mind. The world outside moved with banners and steel, while we rotted quietly behind stone.
Our servants dwindled to a handful , three maids, one cook, two stablehands. Enough to keep the manor breathing, no more. Their whispers were the pulse of the house, each complaint another reminder of decay.
Dinner at House Alistair
The dining hall echoed with absence. The oak table was long, carved with the falcon crest, scarred by decades of use. Once it might have hosted retainers and guests, but now it bore only our family and a few key servants.
Candles guttered in tarnished holders, shadows flickering across faded tapestries of falcons in flight. The smell of thin stew and roasted roots lingered ,humble food dressed in noble ritual.
Lorien tapped restless fingers against the table, his hands itching for a blade. Orion hunched beside Father, eyes downcast, shoulders folding inward. Mother smoothed wrinkles from the cloth with deliberate grace, her gaze soft but shadowed by worry.
Father lifted his goblet, ink still staining his fingers even at supper. His voice was quiet, almost brittle.
"To House Alistair," he said. "May we endure another season."
A somber toast. No cheer followed. Only the hollow clink of pottery.
Sir Cedric coughed. "Endure, aye. But endurance won't pay the Marquis's tithe." His words dropped heavy.
Marta's voice cut sharper. "The stores won't last winter if we tithe at current yields. The soil is exhausted, my lord. We plant the same fields year after year. What we need are solutions, not prayers."
The silence thickened. Father's jaw tightened. "Enough. We'll discuss later."
But I had already heard enough.
My gaze shifted to the rolled map beside him—parcels of land, scrawled fields. My mind flickered through memory: nitrogen cycles, crop rotations, soil renewal. Knowledge that had saved civilizations long before they forgot it.
My small hand reached clumsily for the map.
"Ren?" Father's brow furrowed, his tone softened with bemusement. "What is it, son?"
I unrolled it, palms pressing against a barren field. Then I pointed to the stew bowl, to the beans within, then back to the field. Rotate. Replace. Restore.
At first, silence.
Father chuckled faintly. "You want beans there, little one?" His smile was weary, indulgent, dismissive.
But Marta's eyes sharpened. She leaned closer, murmuring: "Rotation."
Father blinked. His gaze shifted between her and me. For the first time in years, something flickered in his expression ,something not worn, not weary. A spark.
Mother touched my hair gently, her whisper tender. "A seed of hope."
The table moved on Julien grumbling about training, Orion shrinking under Cedric's rough encouragement but I sat still, heart pounding. I had nudged the board. Moved the first piece.
Night's Reflection
That night, the manor slept beneath the moan of wind through cracked shutters. Moonlight traced pale lines across my chamber, catching on dust and faded tapestries.
I lay awake, small chest rising and falling, my mind alive. For the first time since awakening in this fragile body, I had shifted more than words or thoughts , I had shifted possibility.
Not with plasma containment fields or machines of steel. But with knowledge disguised as common sense.
House Alistair was a failing equation, its variables collapsing. Tonight, I had introduced a new one.
I curled my tiny fingers into fists, eyes fixed on the moonlight's silver path.
This house might be ash. But even in ash, sparks remain.
And I , I would make them burn.