The little boy again grabbed her hands, making sure to be extra careful this time, and gently guided her back to the little hut where she had just escaped from all the while taking concerned glances at her. Carmen soon awoke from her stupor, but now she was confused, well more guilty than anything else. Even though she had just taken over the original owner's body and had no direct link to the scrawny little boy before her looking at her as if she were his whole world, she had the memories that they shared and even felt the emotions clear as day as soon as he appeared before her eyes.
Waking up in a new body and in a whole new world where everything was largely unfamiliar, and with memories of the original owner's destiny greatly scared her out of her wits, she had only thought about escaping as far away and as quickly as possible without making any plans for her future. After her little epiphany and returning back to her starting point, she finally calmed down and took the chance to let her new reality sink in.
Carmen closed her eyes, unable to bare the weight the little boy's gaze and tried taking deep breaths as she sat on the make-shift bed she had woken up, but the air was stale and instead made her chest feel heavy. Feeling a bit tormented, she let out a heavy sigh in frustration and lifted her hands to pull on the ends of her heavily matted hair. Seeing the dirty and greasy hair, she was further disgusted at the living conditions of such young children and even more motivated to leave that place.
While distracted in her lament at the dire conditions of her immediate environment, little Kazu came up to her with a ladle of brown liquid she knew from her new memories, was what they usually drank to quench their thirst- mud water.
"Here, sister. Drink some water, you'll feel better." His eyes stared into her soul, and knowing they had no better alternative, she sheepishly took the ladle from his hand. With the thought that it hadn't killed them yet and that she had handled much worse in her last life before she became a little rich woman with refined tastes, she poured all the liquid in her mouth.
As she struggled to swallow it all in one gulp, her face scrunched up as if she had eaten a sour fruit she swore to the heavens, 'I will definitely not continue living like this. If I did it once before, I can surely do it again and it would take even less time since I have all the memories and experience from my last life." As soon as it went down her esophagus, it all threatened to come right back up, but after gulping down a mouthful of stale air she ended up burping with a shiver running down her spine.
She looked up to still find the boy still attentively looking at her. Awkwardly she tried to find something to say to him, "Thank you, I feel a little better now." Her voice was so weak like it took half the life she had just gotten back to tell the biggest lie she's had to tell in both her lives combined.
Little Kazu look back towards the door that was no longer barely hanging on its hinges, "I'm sorry, sister. I locked the door so no one would bother you while I was out. I didn't know you would wake up before I came back." He said as he walked towards the pieces of the broken door and lifted it up, leaning it on the outside of the hut.
"It's okay. I didn't really mean to break the door down; I just wanted to get out." Carmen noticed that even though Kazu didn't speak much he was rather well-spoken compared to other kids their age, she wrote it off as it being an effect of how they've been growing, since they had to mature faster compared to other kids.
She couldn't help but stand and awkwardly wring her fingers out of habit.
"You continue to rest. I'll go boil the medicine for you." Before she could stop him, he had already run away to make medicine with no doubt the mud water she had just drank after somewhat cleaning up the yard.
Heeding his advice, she sat back down and tried to think of how she could escape from the palace.
Carmen now realized that with it being a palace, the entrances and exits would be heavily guarded by armed guards, not to mention she was in the cold palace. She would have to figure out how to get out of their before she could even dream of seeing the exit of the palace. She released yet another heavy sigh out of frustration while pulling at her hair.
'And what about Kazu?' she suddenly thought.
If she left with him, wouldn't that change his fate? She only wanted to change her own fate because only a tragedy was instore for her in the future if she stayed in the palace, but she didn't want to change the whole trajectory of the world she was now living in or deny the people a great ruler. But, then again, she couldn't just leave him in the palace alone he would certainly die soon after as he had only survived because of the original owner taking all the shots intended for him.
'And... what if I did manage to leave? Then what? Would I starve to death, or freeze to death owning only these rags on my back?' Carmen again thought.
With a scrunched face as she brushed her nose with her right index finger as she looked around her immediate surroundings, she thought back to her first life and remembered her humble beginnings that were like a million light years away.
'This is actually better, though not by much it is a proper roof to shield from wind and rain. Much more than what I started out with before. Just a little bit longer, I just have to endure this a little bit longer.'
She sat there and racked her mind for ways she could change her situation quickly but also not too noticeably. Afterall, who ever got rich by putting all their eggs in one basket? No one. She knew that in order to really save enough money to at least bribe some servants she had to try multiple things and grow whichever ones proved more fruitful through much trial and error.
Soon little Kazu returned with the same ladle, this time it contained a steaming concoction, she knew was brewed from wild herbs that were generally good for lowering fevers.
"Here, sister." He offered with both hands outstretched. "Your medicine."
Looking at the steam rising from the concoction right before her face she felt a little less suffocated with the smell of the herbs wafting into her nostrils making her feel a bit lighter like a weight was being lifted from her chest. Even so she still couldn't help feeling a bit unwilling to drink it clearly remembering the taste of the muddy water, knowing that it must have been used to brew all the herbs into medicine. But Kazu's gaze, still trained on her, compelled her to gently take the ladle from his hands.
'Just a little bit longer, I just have to endure this a little bit longer.' She murmured these words in her mind as a silent comfort and again closed her eyes and threw everything in her mouth and tried to swallow it all in one big gulp, but she forgot it was still piping hot and almost choked and even scalded her legs a little through her little potato sack dress, a surprised scream escaped her lips.
"Sister!" Kazu shouted in shock. He unconsciously tried using his own hands to wipe at where she accidentally spat the medicine on herself.
"Stop, I'm alright. You'll burn yourself," she said as she tried pushing his hands away from the mess she had created within the mess they were already in.
"But- but you'll get burned!" Kazu cried out loud, Carmen was shocked to see this.
Though he was technically still a child, with her clear memories, Carmen had not really been seeing him as a child but as the future ruler of an empire and had not fully understood that may be who he becomes in the future but in their present time he was still just a little boy. A little boy who saw his big sister as the center of the universe because only she truly loved and cared for him, inside the cold palace walls only she took care of him when he was sick, played with him when he was lonely, and protected him whenever he was being bullied.
Carmen, almost instinctively, reached out a hand and patted his head as he knelt before her and cried with big tear drops rolling down his cheeks. She had always had a soft spot for young children and seeing him cry so much made her heart ache.
"There, there. It's alright. I'm okay. See I didn't get burned." She lifted her potato sack dress just a little above her knee and showed him that the hot liquid hadn't managed to seep through to burn her skin.
Seeing that she wasn't burned, he sniffled and wiped his face with his hands, but he did not move away from the hand patting his head.
With a smile, she lifted his face to look at her, "One day, we'll definitely live a much better life. You and me, together. But we'll have to work really, really hard. Do you want to help me build our future home?"
Those words, she was quite unaware of just how much they had impacted little Kazu. Though all he knew was that little hut and his big sister who always took care of him and most times he was content, but he too wanted to live in a house without mud and have his big sister dress in pretty dresses like the other little girls he's seen.
As two pairs of eyes stared into each other, little Kazu nodded his head with a hum. "I will," he promised.
Carmen perhaps out of habit raised her pinky, little Kazu eyed it weirdly unsure of what to do.
"When making a promise, you have to connect pinkies for it to really count. You do it like this," she took his right hand and raised his right pinky finger to wrap around her left pinky finger, then shook it thrice before connecting their thumbs to seal the deal. "Now, you can't break your promise," she said as if coaxing a child forgetting that she was now also child.