Gathering Blue

Chapter 22 narrates the conversation between Kira and Christopher, as he explains what happened to him and why he never returned to the village. He tells her that he was not attacked by beasts—there are no beasts, just as Annabella said. He was attacked by someone in the hunting party, clubbed on the head from behind and then slashed in the face and left for dead. He tells her that it was probably because he was going to become a guardian and the others were jealous. When he woke up, he was in the Field, but that night strangers came and took him away, giving him medicine that dulled his pain and allowed him to sleep while they carried him for days to their village—a “village of healing” (228). Kira thinks to herself that she had never met anyone, besides Matt, who had ever wanted or knew how to heal someone else. 

During their conversation, Kira tells Christopher about being born with a twisted leg, and how her mother fought to keep her alive. She also tells him that Katrina is dead, which Matt has already told him. She asks him why he never came back to his wife and child, and he tells her that the blow to his head caused him to lose his memory.