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Following his fall in an attempt to claim a life he thought was rightfully his, Hytham of Alamut had been dead for three minutes and forty five seconds. It was all that was needed for the Wolf-Kissed to claim Kjotve’s life, and all that was needed for Basim to appear by his dead acolyte.
He had been dead. Fully so. He had not been breathing, his heart had not been beating, he should have been left as another body to be hauled back to the settlement at the end of the battle, but for some God forsaken reason, Basim Ibn Ishaq had still turned him on his back and pressed his palms against his chest in a desperate attempt to make the boy live again. Over and over and over while Eivor distracted Kjotve. Over and over and over as the victory cries rang into the night. Over and over and over, until the apprentice took his first breath once more. A boy reborn.
He was a madman for thinking he could kill Kjotve and survive; had he succeeded, Eivor would have slain him on the spot, but Basim was a madman for thinking that he could revive the dead, and yet he had succeeded.
He had been dead. Hytham of Syria, the little eagle, the acolyte of Master Rayhan and the apprentice of Master Basim, had been dead.
That was the thought that kept swirling in his probably-damaged brain when he woke up a day or so later, with the seer’s face peering curiously over his as he took another deep breath, wincing and writhing and uncomfortable and in pain, and with Basim sitting by his side as if he had always been there. It was the thought that swirled in his brain when they had told him that he was incredibly stupid for making that leap and incredibly lucky to be alive again, respectively.
Again. Not still.
Because he had been dead. No man continues to live when the heart stops beating, and the lungs stop breathing, and the blood stops flowing, so he must have been dead. But did he remember anything? The gates of an afterlife, a glimpse? Had he been worthy?
He realized quickly that he did not want to know the answer.
Hytham of Syria, hand in hand with Hytham of Baghdad, had been kind and gentle. They pulled their friends along the city streets and laughed brightly, smiled always, happiness and sunshine incarnate, even through the grief that made the entire world fall apart around them. Hytham of Alamut had grown strong and been an ambitious thing, he was eager and quick-witted, occasionally rebellious and incredibly strong-willed, he argued with his mentor and he seized opportunities as they were handed to him. Hytham, the guest of Fornburg, was quiet. Or, at least, that is what Basim said.
After he felt like he had scolded him enough, yelled at him enough, made him understand the severity of his actions, he had let his apprentice rest and he had observed him. The Hytham laying deathly still in his cot had been silent, for as strong-willed and quick-witted as Hytham of Alamut was, he was still a listener and a mute more than a talker. Yet, Hytham of Fornburg was eerily silent. Eyes gazing at nothing and everything, listening to what the few people around him said but never really replying, seemingly silent because he did not know how to speak. He did, obviously, because he knew that his tongue could move and that his vocal chords could still vibrate and that he could still talk, but it seemed like the majority of the interaction had him merely staring blankly at his two make-shift nurses, as they tried to get him to reply. He could. He knew how to. He was aware, yet he merely laid there, as if speaking had no use. He simply did not want to.
Now, Hytham, whichever one he was currently, the man that wandered around the settlement in England, did speak. And he walked, even if he limped, and he could use his fingers and grasp his own spoons and hold his own bowls as he ate whatever herby soup he had gotten that evening. He could do most of what Hytham of Syria and Hytham of Baghdad had done, but undeniably, he was no longer Hytham of Alamut, and he had yet to know where Hytham of Fornburg lived within him.
Basim seemed unnerved by him. Occasionally, he seemed to try to provoke him. In Norway, before his death, it had worked, because Hytham of Alamut held his beliefs and the traditions he followed with an iron grip, but now, Basim could speak freely with their hosts about anything, everything, things that Hytham of Alamut would have thought too private, too intimate for their creed to be shared to outsiders, and this Hytham didn’t even raise an eyebrow. He did not clench his teeth or his fists or tried to protest. His mentor no longer looked him in the eyes, either. While he might suspect it to be shame, Basim could no longer stand to watch those dull blue eyes where two lively, emotional mirrors once had been.
Was this man really his acolyte, still? After everything?
As blurry as the time between his death and the settlement was, he still had a certain grasp on himself. He could still observe. He was not mindless, he did not need to be told that he was not the same anymore. And even if he did, Basim and SIgurd had departed soon after their arrival in the newly-named Ravensthorpe, and none of the other Norsemen had known him well enough to find anything odd with the revenant that haunted the bureau. Besides his robes, his skin, his accent, he was just another man who was welcomed into their midst and one they only now had time to get to learn. While recovering, Hytham of Ravensthorpe had all the time in the world to figure out what he had lost in his own death, and he could observe it with the same disinterest.
For one, little excited him now. Perhaps that should be a good thing, after all, he could still remember his mentor’s snide comments about being too expressive, too emotional, too much. The few possessions he owned no longer brought him any comfort. He had been momentarily happy by the completion of his very own bureau, but it stretched no further than relief that he finally had a proper roof over his head and solid planks under his feet after weeks at sea and weeks in a tent, as if finally finding a way to stop the nausea that followed him. Flicking his hidden blade elicited no heightened pulse and stabbing the training-dummies outside of his cabin no longer made him giddy with glee. He found himself struggling to even press out a smile during conversations that normally - formerly - would have delighted him. But they still did, did they not? He couldn’t deny that the jokes the Norsemen told were funny, even if some were crude, and he had always loved to share and talk of his interests with others, yet conversations that would have delighted him, kept him talking and talking until the night turned into dawn, withered quicker than he could bring himself to notice, to care about. He was tired.
But he was still devoted. At the very least, that is what he told himself. Just a test he would pass in no time, even when his time in prayer no longer sent a familiar warmth throughout his body or when an added clue to the whereabouts of the Order no longer made his heart beat with the need for vengeance. He still prayed, did he not? And he still tracked down the Order, was that not enough?
Was this what Basim had felt? Was this the sensation that had seeded the mistrust between him and the Brotherhood?
It was not merely his mind that had changed. When he bathed, he still saw the consequences of his death. His skin was pale - was it the lack of sun? - and the bruising even more so, the blood clearly pumping and his veins not yet being fully healed. He was thin, as if his very body had eaten itself in an attempt to stay alive during those three minutes and forty five seconds and every moment since. The dark circles under his eyes clung to the dull mirrors of his soul and the multiple bumps in his chest, where his ribs had been broken and unable to set, was a revolting reminder of the damage his body had taken. Yet his hair still grew, so was that not a sign that he was not merely a corpse? Even as he washed himself, he still felt his own touch and the cold water and he felt the scissors as he trimmed the hair on his head. Was he not alive? Was this not enough proof?
He would have kept himself busy, Hytham of Alamut. He would be training, regaining strength in his muscles, he would be throwing himself off of cliffs and landing in soft piles of leaves to remember what it felt like to fly. He would have sorted his shelf of scrolls and he would itch to get back out on the field to hunt their enemies down personally, let his blade taste their blood as he watched the light fade from their eyes. Hytham still did things, but truly, how much could he do? He only had so many clues, so many opportunities, he knew as well that his body may not be as lucky with another failure, another mistake. He didn’t care for death, he did not fear it - what was it to fear when it was just like closing his eyes, something he had already experienced? - but somewhere, did Basim’s warnings not ring in his head?
Hytham of Ravensthorpe spent his days mindlessly scribbling on wax tablets and waiting for the Wolf-Kissed to return. Because, somehow, they had come to an agreement. Somehow, for some reason, Eivor had agreed to hunt the Order - or had he offered? Hytham of Alamut would have remembered. Hytham of Ravensthorpe did not.
It was the heavy footsteps on his porch that made him pause. Speak of the Devil.
The Wolf-Kissed presented the medallions and gave him the run-down of his adventures with a humility Hytham of Fornburg had yet to see in most vikings, yet his journeys had been a success, and so he cared not for the way they were told. Eivor did his duties, and he fought battles that were not his and claimed lives for which he had no personal vendetta. And so it was only right, after all, to present a gift of his own, a tool. This time it was a matter of worth, and Eivor was undeniably worthy. And perhaps, somewhere, Hytham of Alamut had a will that had survived and remained buried and clawed within the Hytham that still lived. Perhaps this was a way to burn again.
Eivor had questions, of course he did. And Hytham answered them, even if none of the answers or any part of the conversation seemed to be filed in any long-term memory. Did he not deem it important, or did his body operate by itself? He wasn’t sure. But he was sure that they boarded a small boat and that Eivor sat down patiently as he hauled them across the river, and he was sure of the pain in his chest and the bumps in his ribs and the exhaustion already veiling his mind. And he was sure that they walked up the cliff on the other side of the river, and he was sure that, for the first time in weeks - months? - a smile tugged on his lips, and he winked, and before either mind or body knew it, he ran, and threw himself off of the cliff overlooking Ravensthorpe.
For the first few seconds, he felt nauseous. The wind rushing past him and his gravity plummeting towards the earth and a certain demise, for the first time in months he remembered his death. But as the muscle memory kicked in, as his body turned and angled as gracefully - although not as painlessly - as it always had, Hytham of Alamut took his last breath, and Hytham of Ravensthorpe landed in the pile of leaves. Alive.
To his surprise, he laughed. He smiled, and for a moment, he forgot about the vikingr on the cliff above him. Yet he yelled, called for him, expecting to have only heard the sickening crush of a body against gravity and rocks, and yet he heard laughter.
“You see?” Hytham called back, “my faith proved stronger than my fear!”
And had it not?
Was it faith, then? Or was it something else entirely? Had the acolyte of Alamut survived and torn out of the cage that kept him confined in the body of the guest of Fornburg? Or was it instead a moment of clarity after weeks of fog? Was it God, was it life, was it fate, was it him?
Whatever it was, it remained, even as he watched Eivor take the leap, even as he heard him land with a soft ‘oomph!’ in the pile, even as Eivor jumped up while laughing like a madman from all the adrenaline, even then, it remained, in his chest, a warmth he had not felt for so long - since his death? Since Constantinople, Alamut, Baghdad, Syria? - a warmth that seemed to spread throughout the cold corpse he had been, the ghost that had haunted Ravensthorpe in silence and pain and dispassion.
He did not describe it with words. Instead, he seemed to merely realize the notion, as he hauled them back across the river, the same meaningless conversation playing out again. He was no longer Hytham of Alamut, just as he was no longer Hytham of Syria, or Hytham of Baghdad. All three were dead, perhaps even before his heart had stopped beating and his lungs had stopped breathing. But the guest of Fornburg needn’t be the only version of him, now. Perhaps Hytham of Ravensthorpe could be more than a ghost, a man who had died and a man who lived again.
“I feel as if I have seen a new side of you, Hytham.” Eivor spoke, following in his steps as he returned to the bureau. The first words that seemed to actually make an impression on him. “I cannot recall seeing you so... So lively.”
Since Fornburg remained unsaid but understood, for anger was still lively and passionate and devoted. Their first meeting had left a taste in their mouths that was no longer bitter, but uncertain. And he knew as well as anyone that Hytham had not been that man for a long time, however short the months were and however lazily time passed.
“When I was a boy,” he said, “and I first took the leap, I felt as though I had been born again when I hit the ground.”
He saw from the corner of his eye how Eivor observed him, tilted his head only slightly as they walked together.
“Do you feel the same sensation, now, then?”
Eivor followed him with a certain eagerness. Hytham of Syria and Hytham of Baghdad would have grasped his hand and pulled him along with him. Hytham of Alamut would have been exasperated, but certainly preened over the attention he got. Hytham of Fornburg would have been annoyed or entirely uncaring, hastening his steps away from the vikingr. Hytham of Ravensthorpe slowed his steps, and even now, a soft smile tugged on his lips.
“Yes.”
He didn’t think Eivor truly understood the implication of what he said. Or perhaps he did. Perhaps he had watched the shell he was from afar and wondered how long until the soul left the cracks that remained since his death, how long it would take until even the shell would be left to wither and die in that dusty bureau, perhaps he understood the severity of dying and living better than anyone who hadn’t lived through it. Perhaps he simply understood.
Following his fall in an attempt to reclaim the life that was rightfully his, Hytham of Alamut had been dead for three months and forty five days. And in his wake, Hytham of Ravensthorpe lived.