Fragmented

"Where am I?" A very good question, with no one to answer him.

In the middle of what seems to be a clearing, a very haggard looking young man sits up to observe his surroundings.

His light olive colored skin, marked with apparent dirt and dried mud. Hanging of his body are very tattered brown shirt and pants, that are more rags than clothing. His eyes are a deep black, matching his messy, straight, dark brown hair.

He stands up and looks around to observe his very green surroundings.

From left to right, he sees a seemingly expansive forest. Right in front of him is a broken tree that lies on its side while still partially attached to the stump it used to be a part of. To his left, there are more trees but he concentrates his eyes on the very large mountain range to the distance.

"Agh!" The young man falls to the ground as an abrupt headache takes over him. Images flash in his head. Each one lasting only a moment before changing to another. Playing different sounds, each image evoking a headache stronger then the last.

No... Not images… Memories?

There's a memory of three figures. One seems to be a male, who is yelling at the other two figures. The man has what looks to be a full set of red plated armor and a black cape that drapes down behind him. There is a symbol of a red wyvern on the cape. The wyverns head chases its tail in a circle and within the circle is large symbol of what looks to be a flame. The flame itself is golden. Besides that, the man has a large sword strapped to his side.

The perspective of the memory moves closer to the head of the man, but, for some reason, the face is covered in mist.

With his visage obscured the man yells, "No! That is SUICIDE! The Howling Highlands are forbidden for a reason! You will not take ___. Too many have died to those ___ bastards! I will not stand wi-," the words come through slurred, cutting out at weird intervals.

Without getting a chance to hear what or who the other two figures are, the memory changes. This time he sees the sun light shining through trees unto a seemingly new cabin. The woods are not the same as the one the young man is in.

Instead, the trees here are white with red leaves all over the branches. The cabin is a small one and one could tell that there was a fire burning inside as there was an opening on top where smoke is coming out.

The memory changes again, but it is the same cabin in the woods. This time, however, it is night and the cabin is in shambles.

Strewn about the area are pieces of the cabin. "ROAR!" A great and loud beast can be heard as the perspective of the memory changes to view the night sky.

As the memory's perspective moves closer to the cabin, there's an unmistakable sound of a woman sobbing.

Suddenly, the perspective shifts to the sky.

"Whoosh!" The sound of great and mighty wings can be heard as a large shadow flies overhead into the sky. On the shadow, one can see a humanoid figure on the back of the mighty creature.

The memory changes again. But there is only black. It's a different black though. Not the color black but black as in pure darkness. As if there is an absence of any color. But a voice can be heard though.

"Kai!" A voice calls out. It's the sound of a girl.

She sounds young.

'Who is she calling out to?' The young man thinks and stops as he realizes that this is the first time he actually had any thoughts during the memories, despite the agonizing pain.

"Kai! Listen to me!" The voice calls out again.

"There isn't much time!"

'Was she talking to me?' The young man thinks.

"Run! Run and keep running until you get out of here! You hear me!" The voice says desperately.

Then as if the voice wasn't getting the answer she wanted, "By order of the ___ I decree, as princess of Xa__!"

There goes the garbled memory portion again, and the voice continues after a bit, "I release you of your contract!"

Then the darkness disappears. As if there is too much light all at once, the memory is full of pure white light. In that light, was a face of a girl. A girl that looked too young for the authority she carried in her voice.

She had black hair, that became white at the tips. Her dress was white and grey in color. It reached the ground. She couldn't have been more then girl just in her teens. Her blue eyes were gleaming with intelligence and determination.

Tears threatening to fall down her face as she stares at what the young man can only assume to be himself. It hurt somewhere inside the young man as he looked at the young girl.

"You are not a slave anymore." She smiles as she moves her hair behind her ears. Her slightly pointed ears being apparent now.

"They have already gotten in the gates," She says. "Th'rindel is not going to be able to hold the door much longer."

She lays her hand on his face. "When you get out there, please live on and see the world like you wanted to, okay?"

For some reason, no matter how hard the young man wanted to say something in the memory, or even do something, the young man can feel that the him in the memory was too weak to do anything.

"…Please remember me also." The girl says quietly as she looks down then back up to him. There's a smile on her face as tears fall down her face. "I know this is selfish of me, but I can't help it."

Then he feels her hands on his chest. That's when he notices that he is sitting on something.

He knew it to be a ledge. As the perspective shifts to look down behind him, the blinding white light is still there but it clears up just a little to see a river below him.

As the perspective shifts back, the young man can feel a push on his chest as he looks at the face of the girl for what he knew would be the last time. As she pushes him over the ledge, he hears her say with a crack in her voice, "Goodbye, elder brother." He knew the last words were not in common tongue though. She had said it in Elvish.

Then the memory ends. The young man screams out, coming from the memory,

"Amara!" His right hand is lifted up to the sky, as if he is trying to grasp at the princess to come with him. In that single cry, a bolt of fire comes out of his hand, straight into the sky.

As the man looks down back at his hand, in confusion.

Tears streaming down his face, he looks at his hand and knows exactly what had happened.

Along with those fragmented memories that he experienced he could gather the term for what he did. "Magic?" He questions himself.

Calming down from the sudden hit of memories and fragmented knowledge, he organizes his thoughts.

He knows he learned magic. Not a lot, but he knows that he did learn it but not how or who he learned it from. "Was it her?" The young man thinks.

From what he gathered, the young girl in the memory was definitely someone significant to him. She called him elder brother. But why is an elder brother a slave instead of a prince?

He reaches and touches his ears. They felt round. Why are her ears slightly pointed? The answer comes to him also, seconds later as he tries to recall it. "Half-elf?" He says out loud. So, she's part human and part elf.

It feels so strange to the young man. He has knowledge of what's around him, such as how he knows that the tree over there in front of him is actually a dead pine tree. But how does he know it's called a pine tree?

It's like he can recall the information about everything but he doesn't know why he knows it.

"What happened to me?" The young man wonders. Why were his clothes dry, if the princess pushed him into a river? Why does her name, Amara, stick with him so much? Were they really brother and sister? How did he end up here? What other magic do I know?

"Damnit." The young man mutters as he pinches his forehead. He could feel another headache coming, but this time it's simply from thinking too much.

"Why can't I at least recall where the hell I am?" He states frustratedly. "Am I on a continent? If so which one? Is there even more than one?"

So many questions the young man has but no answers. 'Is it because I never learned about it from before? What were those other memories?' Then he stops altogether.

"She called me Kai." The young man says as he looks down at the ground where he sees that he is barefooted.

"That's the name she called out." Carving that deep inside his brain, he mutters the name over and over.

He felt in his bones how important that girl was to him. Since she called him that and elder brother, then that will be what he goes by, at least until he can remember fully.

"I swear to the gods, that I will find you." He promises as he looks up. Seconds later, another question comes up. 'Gods? There are too many questions that I can not answer myself.' Kai thinks to himself.

He looks to the mountain range in his sight. Right there he could see the sun behind the mountain range. It seemed to be rising from it.

"Guess that's east then." Seeing that it is still early in the day, Kai looks around. Observing the fact that he doesn't even know where he is at, he looks at the mountain range.

'If I'm lucky, maybe I'll be able to find a town on the way to the mountain. Hopefully I don't run into goblins, hehe… wait… what the hell are goblins?' Kai sighs. Too many questions indeed.

Kai's hand comes up and the familiar feeling of verbal cues and somatic gestures comes to mind of how to do the only spell he remembers so far.

'Firebolt won't do much towards a group, especially since I'm alone,' he states to himself as he remembers the name of the spell he learned in the past.

As he heads towards the mountain to the distance, he thinks to himself, 'I couldn't just forget my past, but I had to forget every means I knew of how to defend myself.' In practice he runs through simulations of when or how to use the spell when he hears, "Awooo!" The howl of a wolf can be heard in the distance. It didn't sound far.

'Wolves… great,' Kai sighs as he looks up to the sky, 'and here I was worrying about goblins.'