Slowly, Dwain fell back into his seat.
Astral continued: “I promised to take care of you children, but I was not … I was not strong enough to face my true responsibility as a guardian. I should have tried harder, dug around more, see what could be truly seen, but … when you live alone for so long … you forget the ways of the world. How to … how to submerge yourself in existential waters that are … that are not your own.”
“Astral—”
“Let me finish. This is important. What I am trying to say is – is that … Altus has fallen, but as far as anybody could know, you may have loved ones still out there in the world somewhere.”
Dwain stared at him in silence.
Astral wiped away tears. “I had no right to shelter you from that possibility. And I shall die with the fear that it may be too late for either of you to ever know for sure. If you enlist, there’s a chance you will see the world – a chance you may find that which was taken from you, Dwain Spikeclaw.”
Dwain was taken aback by this. “Astral…”
Astral waved him off and continued. “You are my … my son, and even though I do not fully understand, I respect that this is what you feel you must do to feel whole. No ponies shall be purchased. I entrust Phalanx in your care for the journey to Warminister.”
“…What?”
“He will return on his own – he’s done it before – many, many, times. Both Regina and I are grateful for everything you’ve done for us and the Hollow. But now it is time for you to find your own way. It is the least I can do in thanks for all that you have provided us here.”
Dwain nodded and said nothing.
Astral reached across the table and placed a gentle hoof upon his paw. Dwain flinched – but did not pull away.
“No matter where you go in life,” said Astral, “No matter how many seasons pass … you will always be welcomed here. As long as I breathe, this Hollow – as much as you despise it – will never shun you away.”
25. A Garden of Untold Truths
Grass rustled underfoot as Regina heard Dwain stride careful steps across the Hollow, towards her. Regina ignored him where she knelt brooding at the edge of the vegetable garden. She kept a firm gaze upon sweet-smelling orchids basking in the light of the mother moon.
“Can I sit?”
Regina steeled herself, closed her eyes tight, with a tight jerk of her head. A sigh escaped her lips, an aching rumble from the heart, so filled with pain and confusion, that she didn’t know how to respond, despite the fact that her mind was abuzz with a thousand different words, phrases, curses, hexes, questions, pleas…
“Reggie…”
“I don’t understand,” she said, cutting him off. “Why must you throw away everything we have worked so hard to build here in the Hollow?”
“I ain’t throwing nothing away, yeah,” said Dwain.
“You promised!” she said, throwing a glare at him. “You promised – our bond, unbroken! Do you remember, when we were kits? The pact we made? To never leave each other astray? That no matter what happened, nothing would unbind what we have…?”
Regina sniffled. When Dwain didn’t reply, she dipped her chin, wiping her nose.
Dwain shuffled forward, sat down with a heavy thump across from her, with the orchids between them. She refused to acknowledge him. All that there was flowing through her was a hurricane of disappointment, her own sense of personal loss.
He sighed. “Reggie – we were made to suffer a great loss. Altus fell because we were too weak to defend ourselves.”
But the mention of Altus Village caused something in her heart to pang icy. She didn’t want to look at him, didn’t even want to have his hedgehog scent in her nostrils. Despite herself, Regina turned her attention away from the orchids, found Dwain gazing upon the garden as he continued to speak.
“Imagine if … if this Alliance had come to our aid! Altus would stand today, and our families, our friends … Reggie, do ye remember the Harvest? How important it was to us back then?”
“Back then, yes – but now…?” Regina shook her head. “Dwain, I am a different mammal now. And so are you.”
Dwain closed his eyes for a moment, nodded. He reached around the orchids and nudged Regina’s paws with his digit tips. Despite her anger for him, the simple graze was electric. She flinched, pulled away.
“Everything I want and need, the sense of peace that I so desire, all of that is right here where I sit,” she told him slowly. “This garden – my flowers … you.”
Dwain clasped her paws in his, igniting an icy shiver up both her arms. She glared at him, lips pursed. She pulled her digits free from his. “Don’t touch me.”
“Reggie … I feel the same.”
The anger in her heart started to die, replaced with that of sadness. Regina fought to keep fresh tears at bay; one escaped, rolling down the soft fur of her cheek. “Dwain – don’t go to Warminister. You may go wherever you must in the world, but I beg you…”
Dwain shook his head. “I must, yeah. Me heart tells me no other. If’n I can do anything in me power to keep … to keep you safe … then I must ride to Warminister.”
“You don’t need to keep me safe!” Regina exclaimed. “I am not the frail and frightened skunk kit who fell into the tavern cellar all those years ago! There is so much sadness in you still, and I don’t know how taking up the mantle of an Alliance Peace Officer will help alleviate that! The peace in which you seek must come from within!”
“There is strength in your soul that is so much greater than mine,” Dwain said with eyes averted.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
Dwain rose to a stand and went over to the perimeter fence that saw out into the forest. He leaned his elbows against the top rail and let out a heavy sigh. “Only Astral knows this – and it is only because he can see everything in a person’s heart, yeah.”
Regina blinked slowly, watched him rake paw digits through his head spines while he collected necessary thoughts – and courage.
“Do ye remember when we were kits, yeah, lost in the forest after we escaped the Scythe and Stone?”
“Of course I do.”
“We climbed the blood hills – y’were so afraid ter ride me back b’cos of me spines – but I asked ye … I asked ye to trust me. I needed ye to trust me, because I vowed that we both would find a road to Keeto Town, together.”
“I fell asleep upon your spines.” A soft smile sprouted across Regina’s lips. “You carried us up, and up, and up, despite how badly injured you were. I still don’t know how you did it. But I knew we wouldn’t fall back down, because I knew the determination in your soul would follow the wind to where we needed to go.”
“That’s right,” said Dwain. He gazed with deep eyes into the darkness of the forest before him. “And then … ye woke up alone.”
Regina’s smile slowly faded.
“I lied to ye,” Dwain said. He let out a heavy sigh and squinted out into the nothingness beyond the reach of his eyesight. “I lied about why I left ye there alone in the culvert.”
Regina unfolded herself from the garden and rose to an unsteady stand. She went over to Dwain and reached to touch his shoulder.
“No.” He flinched away from her.
Regina protested. “Dwain – what are … what do you mean? You said you went to go forage for our trip to Keeto Town. That’s why you left me alone in the culvert.”
Dwain shook his head, eyes closed.
“I don’t understand.”
Dwain pushed away from the fence and paced about a patch of grass for a time. He returned a moment later, caressing his face between his paws.
Regina furrowed her brow at him. “Dwain – what is it? Please, if it’s something that weighs on your heart, tell me!”
“I can’t,” he said. “I want to, but – it’s just – Reggie – yer so much stronger than I am. Everything that has happened to us … yer right. Yer not the frail and tortured skunk kit I met in that cella
r all those years ago, yeah. Master Astral says I am wise in self awareness and observation … but I am so angry – always so angry – and it’s all to do with what we endured. What our families endured…”
“Dwain, please…” Regina drew up beside him, touched his shoulder gently. “Please, don’t shut me out. You’re right – we’ve been through so much together. You could have left the Hollow at any time, but you remained, for whatever reason, you remained all these years with us. And that must account for something, right?”
Dwain nodded.
Regina gazed up into sorrowful hedgehog eyes. “Where did you go when you left me in the culvert?”
Dwain took in a deep breath and folded his elbows across the perimeter fence railing. He sighed and closed his eyes, shook his head slowly.
“I went to die,” he admitted.
Regina blinked, shifted her weight away from him slightly. “…What?”
“Somehow ye came out of the massacre, unscathed,” said Dwain. “And there I lay in the corner of the cellar of the Scythe and Stone, buried under so much anguish – grievous wounds ye didn’t know about, that I was sure had become infected – and unable to budge open that door out into the tunnel into the blood hills. I was sure I was the only one left alive in the village, yeah. And there I sat slumped in that cellar, near drained of all the life in me veins. I was down there in the darkness, waitin’ for the spirits of me family to come and take me away with them – but then it was you who drew from the shadows, yeah.”
Dwain sighed.
“I promised ye things I didn’t think I could uphold,” he continued. “No idea how I made it outta that tunnel with ye, and especially so up those hills. But after we climbed to the top, I had nothin’ left in me, Reggie.”
He swallowed hard, continued.
“I didn’t even know where we would have found a road. I’ll be honest with you, I thought maybe we’d die after we got to the top of the hill – eaten by mad-struck mammals or even found by the canines who had slaughtered our families. But I followed the wind in any case, and after some time, I found that dried up old stream – nearly fell into it, actually. I’m surprised you remained asleep the whole time.”
Regina eyed him in silence as he spoke.
Dwain shook his head. “I did stay with ye for a little bit, to warm up inside that hollowed out log. But I was so cold. And the colder I got, a fearful thought nagged me all the more. I sat there with you restin’ amidst those sycamore leaves and – and I kept fearin’ that I’d fall asleep and never wake up. And there you’d rouse to find me—”
Regina caressed his arm gently. “Dwain…”
His shoulders sagged beneath her touch. “I didn’t go to forage. I didn’t go to find help. … I didn’t want ye to wake up to yet another familiar corpse.”
He let out a deep exhale.
“Go on,” Regina urged him. “It’s all right…”
“I knew the wind led us to a road. No idea where it would have went to, but I knew ye were stronger than me – knew that ye would muster the courage that brewed in yer belly – that helped ye to somehow survive Altus – that it would get ye movin’ along that road, unbothered because of yer scent, and ye’d eventually find Keeto Town.”
Regina gazed up at him with sad eyes.
Dwain dropped his chin into his elbows. “That’s why I left ye alone there. And I’m sore that I lied to you about it – but it was for yer own good ‘til up to now.”
They stood in silence for a long while then, contemplating the reality of their bond together. When Regina finally spoke, she uttered words Dwain did not at all expect.
“I wouldn’t have judged you for that.” She drew against to him, caressed the roughness of the back of his leather tunic, where stifled spines dared to rip through. “I don’t judge you for it. And it doesn’t even matter now – because we’re here together, thanks to Master Astral. He found you, and you told him where to find me. And that’s what’s important. Us – right here – in this very moment.”
Dwain shook his head no.
“I am weak, Reggie,” he said. “I don’t expect ye to understand. The trek to Warminister … it’s just something I gotta do – for meself. I crave no honour, nor do I crave glory. The strength within ye has bloomed through yer need to care for others – the garden, the medicines ye produce and sell at the markets…”
Regina nodded. “But I do understand. You would be doing the same if you joined the Alliance, right? Helping others in need – that’s what has driven you this whole time.”
Dwain chuckled. “The Hollow is a pristine property, a direct result of this.”
Regina squeezed the back of his paw with gentle affirmation.
“I honour your decision,” she whispered, “and the honesty it has cultivated between us.”
Dwain gave a solemn nod. He drew in a deep breath and rose upright from the fence. Regina started to say something else, but he turned, took her by the arms, and drew her little body into his envelopment. They gazed deeply into each other’s eyes.
“I love ye, Regina Lepue,” Dwain whispered.
Regina swallowed hard, her face hot with anticipation. And then in a single electric moment, their bodies merged into an eternal kiss beneath the radiant fullness of the mother moon.
“I love you, Dwain Spikeclaw,” she breathed. “With all my soul…”
26. Parting Ways
As the days drew closer to the inevitable, Regina and Dwain spent much time together locked at the elbows, inseparable as they had ever been, even since kithood. When the days were hot, they went for long walks in the forest, where they picnicked by whatever streams could be found. When the evenings were cool, they lay in each others arms under the safe glow of barn loft lamplight, where they shared memories, hopes, secrets, fears, and kisses. In the mornings between days and evenings, Dwain took great care to show Regina how to properly maintain all that made the Hollow stand: weathering and mending the fences, the cabin, and the barn; wood-cutting and carting; providing regular maintenance to the wagon cart; as well as how to abide the demands of Phalanx Andromedon. These were all responsibilities that Regina yearned to fully grasp before his absence was to come. As Dwain taught her, she was eager to learn.
In this time, a definite youthful energy charged between the both of them, not seen since Regina and Dwain first arrived in Astral’s care. It was a charge of energy that even seemed to revitalize Astral to some degree. He began to leave the sanctuary of his study in favour of short walks around the property. In a brash decision doled out by dumbfounded clarity of self-aware obviousness, he partook in acts of self care: indulging in nightly elixirs and salt baths meant for Keeto Town’s marketplace, sold as cures for sore muscles and general aches and pains.
As a parting gift, Dwain presented Astral with something the old wizard both detested, but stoutly needed in his study: a small and sturdy cot, for long nights of steadfast research.
With Dwain and Regina spending as much of most days together before the eventual drew upon the Hollow and changed life for them forever, Astral found that the slightly-neglected chores around the cabin had fallen into his stead. But it was a blessing in many ways, for Astral soon cultivated a rekindled joy in simple meal-making and potions-brewing that had been lost in the time he had grown old and frail.
As the final days rolled on, Regina felt a deeper connection with both Dwain and Astral. And as they all sat around the supper table those nights, ushering in on decadent meals, and everlasting laughter and jovial conversation – it became clear to Regina that the bonds of family she and Dwain and even Astral had yearned for all these years – those bonds were not forged and tempered from simple bloodlines –No, they were forged and tempered, instead, through what was made from mammals who dedicated themselves unconditionally to each other. Mammals who had been through hell and back together. Mammals who had seen and done things together no other mammal could ever fathom or tolerate.
The Hollow may be our home, but thi
s is my family – and family is an unbreakable thing, beyond time and space, Regina came to realize. The Hollow is a temporary place for all of us, our spirits, but the bonds of family stay true no matter where in the world we decide to go. And no matter how far apart our hearts travel from each other, this bond will never, ever, crack. Family – true family – the sense of such a thing is like home, in and of itself.
Family will always be there for you, for each other, everyone.
No matter how far you go.
~
The night before Dwain was to depart, Regina dreamt of moonlit mountains, and a darkness that engulfed the very lands beyond the stretch of the Gabriel Sea. She dreamt of flames amidst city streets and of horned monsters made of emerald steel. She dreamt of four gemstones that shattered into whipping winds that wailed with the anguish of a thousand distraught souls. She dreamt of steam and iron, of sunless days and moonless nights. She dreamt of fiery, yellow-eyed, canines with faces void of mammality and ferality. She dreamt of her own death – alone, but with eyes all upon her – a swift knife stroke – voices, chanting – her very blood, spilt upon dunes of Men. She dreamt of the Eye of the Goddess – an eclipse awakening over a cracked and ruined world. And with the Eye came Vida’s very destruction.
Regina didn’t mention this dream to anyone the following morning. But the vivid images, the pieces all like a jigsaw puzzle’s pieces – they remained for a time, confused and frightened her all the same. The dream made no sense to Regina, but in the deepest pit of her stomach, she dreaded what the dream might have meant. What may come in her very future.
But that morning, while gazing deep into Dwain’s eyes, seeing both worry and excitement there, partaking in discussions of alchemical devices with Astral during breakfast, that was all she needed to forget such haunting and uncertain visions of a subconscious dreamer. There was only here, this very moment. The certain truth of now. Family. There was Dwain’s departure, and Regina needed to focus on that.
The Book of Wind: (The Quest for the Crystals #1) Page 19