The Heartless
Chapter XVII: INTERLUDE TWO

By the time I broke through to the other side of the forest, I had worried my bottom lip into a bruised and bleeding mess, and the overgrown brambles had left angry scratches on my arms and legs. It had been a while since I’d had anything to eat or drink, and even longer still since I’d seen another person. For days as I traveled, thoughts of Swallow’s Point occupied my every waking moment. I was certain that Basil was dead, and that his final memories would be of me running away and leaving him behind.

Maybe he could have come with me, I thought. Maybe I could have saved the both of us. But it was too late for that now, and I spent every fleeting spare thought trying to convince myself that I had done what was right.

Past the brink of exhaustion, I dragged myself up the hill in front of me, past an impressively big oak tree and an old, rusty gate. At the crest of the hill, I reached a small, run-down cottage. A dirt road stretched out beyond the house, leading to a cluster of other stout buildings with stone facades and tiny gardens.

Putting an end to the consecutive worst days of my life, I knocked on the door.

And then I knocked again.

And then I knocked some more.

“Hello?” I called desperately. “Can you help me?”

I waited, but no one came to the door. It seemed like no one was home, so I turned and was about to keep walking down the road when the door opened—just a crack at first, and then wider, to reveal a bearded old man with a stony frown. He looked me up and down once, and the frown deepened considerably.

“Excuse me,” I said meekly, taking a tiny step backward. “M-My parents said I’d be safe here. My name’s Ace, and I think the whole world hates me.”

“Your parents sent you?” the old man asked. He had a gruff but non-aggressive voice to match his demeanor.

I shook my head.

“I had to run away,” I clarified vaguely. “Everyone was going to replace out that I’m Heartless.” I startled at my own words. “I’m Heartless,” I repeated. I’d never said it out loud before, not even to Basil or my parents. It had always just been an unspoken truth.

The old man paused for a moment, and then he opened the door all the way and stepped aside. “My name is Bertrand,” he said. “Come inside. You look like you could use a good meal.”

With that, I stepped across the threshold and into the next seven years of my life.

The inside of Bertrand’s house was humble, somewhat in poor shape in comparison to my family home in Swallow’s Point. There was a wood burning stove and a wash basin, and an old rickety wooden table in the center of the room that looked as though it barely saw any use. There was a cot on the far side of the room, where Bertrand instructed me to sit and rest while he fixed me something to eat. Once I had some soup and bread in my stomach and a tall drink of water, Bertrand disappeared into a room at the back of the house and returned moments later with an array of bottles, a small cloth, and a basin of water. Then he pulled up one of the dining chairs in front of me and wet the cloth before tending gingerly to my cuts and scrapes. Other than occasionally instructing me to move one way or the other, he worked wordlessly, and I sat quietly as he did so.

“What did you do to your lip?” he eventually asked, dabbing at a particularly nasty cut on my arm with liquid from one of the little bottles.

“I was biting it too much,” I explained.

Bertrand hummed and advised, “You should avoid making a habit of that.”

I didn’t respond.

“What’s in the bottles?” I asked instead.

“I’m a potion master,” Bertrand answered. “It’s useful for healing.”

“Do you help heal the other people in the village?” I wondered. After all, the best doctor in Swallow’s Point was a potion master by trade.

“Sometimes,” was Bertrand’s reply. “But they have mostly stopped asking, as I have become very busy. I am looking for a way to reverse the curse.”

“Really?” I exclaimed, lighting up. “That’s amazing!”

Bertrand chuckled somberly and didn’t say anything more on the matter. He rinsed the cloth in the basin of water, which was now growing murky. Then, he applied one of the other liquids to it and held it out to me.

“Hold this to your lip,” he instructed. When I hesitated, he explained, “It’s yarrow and chamomile. It should help with the bruising, and the chamomile may help you sleep.” He sat there for a moment and waited for me to do as he indicated before he stood and gathered up the bottles to return to their proper place.

“You should rest,” he suggested. “It seems you’ve had a difficult journey.”

I nodded and lay down on the cot. Bertrand seemed satisfied and disappeared into the back room. The cot was admittedly not very comfortable, but after all that I’d been through, it may as well have been the softest mattress in the world.

“Thank you,” I called softly after him, but he was already gone.