The sounds struck him next. The whoosh of lungs exhaling, a flutter of bird feathers on the wind. The buzz of a fly and the laughter of the women gardening outside.

Bastiaan squeezed his eyes closed, breathing deeply through the return. When he opened them again, the boy was staring at him. Earth-brown eyes set in a tanned face. Messy black hair ruffled by the breeze floating through the window.

He looked Bastiaan up and down, then slid cautiously off his stool. “Welcome back, sir.” He reached for the straps of Bastiaan’s pack. Bastiaan flinched but wasn’t sure why.

The boy slowed his movements as though approaching a beaten stray. He slid the pack from Bastiaan’s shoulders, then set it on the ground next to a set of stairs that spiraled upward in the center of the room. Then the boy withdrew a small leather book from inside his coat. He flipped it open, then dipped a pen nib into a jar of ink on the table. “How long were you gone?”

Bastiaan stared at him.

The boy waited one, two, three breaths. “What’s your name?”

“Bastiaan Duur.”

The boy made a mark on the page. This moment felt familiar, as though Bastiaan had lived it before.

“What’s my name?” The boy’s pen was poised over the book, ready to mark Bastiaan’s answer, as though this question were merely standard and not actually effortful.

But Bastiaan couldn’t answer it.

The pause lengthened. The patient cheer slipped from the boy’s face as slow confusion took its place, then gradually morphed into horror and then hurt.

Bastiaan broke from his stupor. Something inside him knew that to fail to answer this question would result in damage even his Talent couldn’t repair.

The boy opened his mouth, but Bastiaan held up a hand. “Wait.”

He clamped his lips shut, hope creeping into his wide eyes. Bastiaan took in his small form, gangly limbs, mussed hair, and chin lifted in an attempt to keep his emotions in check and present himself as a man.

Bastiaan’s emotions remembered him before his mind did. Somehow he knew the boy was ten years of age. He knew he loved the boy as a son, even though less than ten years separated them—well, ten years according to the Aging. But if he loved him so deeply, how could he forget his name?

“It’s okay, Bastiaan,” the lad said in a small voice. “You said this might happen. This is why I ask the questions.”

“No,” Bastiaan said roughly. “It hasn’t happened.” Not yet. He closed his eyes and sifted through old memories, pushing himself back to the origin—seeing the boy on the banks of an icy canal, so small Bastiaan almost mistook him for a stump. Fingers black with frostbite yet still holding up a whetstone and flask of oil, saying in a weak voice, “Can I sharpen your skates, sir?”