A boy who had grown into an angry, bitter man.
Was it any wonder he was so harsh? How could anyone expect him to be otherwise when all he'd ever been shown was contempt?
"I warned you," M'Adoc said as he rejoined her. "That is why even the Skoti refuse to visit his dreams. All things considered, that is one of his milder memories."
"I don't understand how he survived," she whispered, trying to make sense of it. "Why didn't he kill himself?"
M'Adoc eyed her carefully. "Only Zarek can answer that."
He handed her a small vial.
Astrid stared at the dark red liquid that bore a strong resemblance to blood. Idios. It was a rare serum that was made by the Oneroi that could enable them or someone else, for a very short period of time, to become one with a dreamer.
It could be used in dreams to guide and direct, to allow one sleeper to experience another person's life so that he could better understand it.
Only three of the Oneroi possessed it. M'Adoc, M'Ordant, and D'Alerian. They most often used it with humans to dispense understanding and compassion.
One sip and she could become Zarek in his dreams. She would have total understanding of him.
She would be him.
And she would feel all of his emotions...
It was a huge step to take. Deep down she knew that if she took it, she would never be the same.
Then again, she might find there was nothing more to Zarek than rage and hatred. He might very well be the animal the others accused him of being.
One sip and she would know the truth...
Astrid removed the stopper and drank from the vial.
She didn't know what Zarek was dreaming about now, she only hoped he'd moved forward out of the dream she had just witnessed.
He had.
Zarek was now at the age of fourteen.
At first, Astrid thought her own blindness had returned until she realized that she was "seeing" through Zarek's eyes. Or eye, rather. The entire left side of her face hurt every time she tried to blink. A scar had fused the lid to his cheek, making the muscles in his face ache.
His right eye, while somewhat operable, had a strange haze over it similar to a cataract and it took her several minutes before his memories became hers and she understood what had happened.
He'd been beaten so badly two years before by a soldier in the marketplace that the lining of the cornea of his right eye had been severely damaged. His left eye had been blinded several years before that by another beating at the hands of his brother Valerius.
Zarek wasn't capable of seeing much more than shadows and blurs.
Not that he cared. At least this way, he didn't have to see his own reflection.
Nor was he bothered anymore by people's scornful looks.
Zarek shuffled across an old, crowded street in the marketplace. His right leg was stiff, barely able to bend from all the times it had been broken and not set.
Because of that, it was somewhat shorter than his left leg. His was a jarring gait that caused him to not move as swiftly as most people. His right arm was much the same way. He had little or no movement in it and his right hand was virtually useless.
In his good left hand, he clutched three quadrans. Coins that were worthless to most Romans, but they were precious to him.
Valerius had been angry at Marius and had slung Marius's purse out the window. Marius had forced another slave to pick the coins up, but three quadrans had gone uncollected. The only reason he had known about them was because they had hit him in the back.
Zarek should have surrendered the coins, but had he tried, Marius would have beaten him for it. The eldest of his brothers couldn't stand the sight of him and Zarek had learned long ago to stay as far from Marius as he could.