The first thing the boy noticed was the color white. It was everywhere—the ceiling, the walls, the stiff sheets covering him. The next thing he noticed was the smell, sharp and clean like a hospital. Then, he heard a sound: a steady beep… beep… beep… from a machine nearby.
He blinked, and his eyelids felt as heavy as stones. When he tried to sit up, a dull pain throbbed in his head. He reached up and felt a soft bandage wrapped around his forehead. He knew what a bandage was. He knew he was in a hospital.
But he didn't know his own name.
The thought wasn't scary, not at first. It was just a slow, empty feeling. He looked down at his small hands, pale against the white sheets, and they didn't feel like his own. He searched his mind for anything—a name, a face, his mom's smile, his dad's voice, what his favorite food was.
There was nothing. Only the white room, the beeping machine, and a giant, empty hole where his memories should have been.
A nurse with a kind face walked in quietly. Her eyes widened in worry when she saw he was awake.
"Oh, you're awake," she said softly. "You gave us quite a scare. How are you feeling?"
He tried to answer, but his throat felt tight. What could he say? I feel empty, like a book with all its pages torn out.
"Can you tell me your name?" the nurse asked gently.
He shook his head, which made the pain in it pulse.
"What about your parents? Do you know where they are?"
He shook his head again. The empty feeling was growing bigger, filling up his chest. He felt a single, hot tear roll down his cheek. He wasn't sad. He was terrified of being so completely lost.
His fingers brushed against something cool and metal on his chest. It was a small, smooth locket on a silver chain. On its surface, one name was beautifully carved: Kaelen.
He grabbed it, his fingers closing tightly around the metal. It was the only real thing in the whole world.
"Kaelen," he whispered. The name felt strange on his tongue, but it was his. It was all he had.
Weeks turned into a month, but nobody came to the hospital for the boy named Kaelen. The police couldn't find any record of him. It was like he was a ghost; a five-year-old boy who had just appeared out of nowhere with a bump on his head and no past.
Eventually, Kaelen was sent from the hospital to St. Jude's Orphanage. It was a large, sad-looking brick building on a quiet street in London.
Life there was run by bells and schedules. The head of the orphanage, Mrs. Gable, was a strict woman. She wasn't mean, just business-like. To her, the children were a job, and that was all.
Kaelen learned to be quiet. He learned to be invisible. He ate what he was given, made his bed so perfectly you couldn't see a wrinkle, and never, ever caused trouble. He was like a shadow.
He watched the other kids, learning how they worked. He saw how they made friends and enemies, and how the bigger boys were always in charge. He saw that kids were kind only to get something, and they were mean to show they were strong. He watched it all, but he never joined in.
For two years, he lived this grey life. His locket was always hidden under his shirt, his only secret. He was kind, in a quiet way. Sometimes he would leave his dessert for a younger, crying kid. But it was the kindness of someone who felt hollow inside.
Then, he met Elara.
She was a year younger than him, with messy brown hair and eyes so big they seemed to see everything. While other kids ran and shouted, she would sit by herself, drawing pictures in the dirt and whispering stories to herself. Like Kaelen, she was an outsider.
One day, she walked right up to him and sat down. Without a word, she held out a small cookie.
He looked at the cookie, then at her. She wasn't asking for anything. She was just being nice. He slowly took it, and their fingers touched. It was the first kind touch he'd felt in two years.
That small moment changed something inside him. They started to talk. Well, she talked, and he listened. She told him stories about magical places, and he told her about the big, empty space where his memory should be. She didn't feel sorry for him; she just listened, as if he were a character in one of her stories.
Elara became his whole world. Her laughter was the only happy sound he ever heard. He started to care about someone. He finally had someone to protect.
He first realized he was different a few months later. An older boy named Mark, who liked to push the other kids around, snatched a drawing from Elara's hands.
"What is this junk?" Mark sneered, holding it high above her head.
Elara started to cry. Kaelen felt a hot, angry feeling he'd never felt before. He just stared at Mark, his hands clenched into tight fists, and wished with all his might that the bully would just fall over.
Suddenly, Mark's shoelaces, which had been tied, twisted themselves together in a tight, impossible knot. He yelled in surprise and toppled right to the ground. The drawing flew out of his hand.
Kaelen calmly walked over, picked up the drawing, and gave it back to Elara. Mark scrambled to his feet, angrily blaming his own feet, and stomped away. Kaelen looked at his hands. He didn't know what had just happened, but he knew he liked the feeling it gave him.
Power. The power to protect what was important to him.
More years passed. Strange things kept happening, but they always happened around Elara. If she scraped her knee, it seemed to heal faster than it should. A toy she had lost would suddenly show up under her pillow. He even learned how to do things on purpose. He learned how to change his black hair to blond, just for a few minutes, because she laughed and said it looked funny. It was their secret game.
He still had no past, but now he had a present with Elara. He could imagine a future with her.
He was ten years old now. He had become very smart and watchful. He saw how everything in the orphanage worked. One afternoon, he watched from a window as Mark and his friends cornered a new, small boy and stole his lunch.
Kaelen didn't do anything. He just watched. Elara was safe, and that's all that mattered to him. But as he saw the bullies push the little boy down, a cold, clear thought formed in his head.
Kindness is a weakness. The boy is crying because he is kind and weak. Mark is laughing because he is mean and strong.
The world wasn't a fairy tale, like in Elara's stories. It was a world of hunters and the hunted. And he knew, with a certainty that chilled him, which one he had to be to keep Elara safe.
He looked at the bullies, studying their faces and the way they stood. He wasn't just watching them anymore. He was studying his enemy.
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