Breeze on a Journey

Prologue
She wasn’t sure how long she fell but she knew when she hit the bottom. She lay still, paralyzed by the intensity of the pain permeating through her body and into her soul. The cold, stone floor gave nothing on impact. Her body absorbed it all. The pain slicing through her head eradicated rational thought. She blinked, but her pupils did not dilate. The blackness around her was so complete, she could not tell where it ended and she began. There was no boundary between her and it.
A moan escaped her lips but she knew she was speaking only to herself in the dark abyss of this pit when she murmured, “I hurt.”
“Yes, it will do that to you.”
If she had the ability, she would have been startled but as it was she could only lie still and wonder who else could possibly be down here in the deepest hole she could ever imagine. Her eyes searched uselessly in the dark for the sound of the voice. Suddenly, she saw him.
A man, dressed in linen pants, a loose green shirt with rolled-up sleeves and a brown leather vest was perched comfortably on a rock a few feet away with one leg drawn up and his arm resting on his knee. She wondered how she could see him in this intense darkness. There was no light shining from above or from his face like how she imagined an angel would be. She could simply see him. He had long steel gray hair streaked with silver which was pulled back by a leather strap at his neck. He was lean, but his sinewy forearms and calloused hands showed that he did not lack strength. Deep lines were etched around his mouth and eyes, maybe from worry or laughing or both. Beneath his strongly pronounced nose, his lips turned up softly at the corners. A keen sharpness to his eyes made her look away for fear he would know her whole story with just a moment’s gaze.
“What will do that to you?” she asked, coming to herself and remembering his comment.
“The truth.”
“What about the truth?”
“It will do that to you.”