You Feel Like Home

Her comforting gesture helped, though he couldn’t fathom why he felt so giddy about the touch. He smiled sadly down at her as she spoke. He’d only known a little of what she’d been going through when she’d found her mother’s grave. He had seen his grandmother peacefully pass on, falling into a deep, never ending sleep. It had left him with a sense of awe, and somehow, he knew his grandmother was up there somewhere. But it had been Erani’s time to go. She’d lived a long, full life. His mother had been a different case altogether.

She had died from an unstoppable cancer. If they had caught and diagnosed it at an early stage, they could have swerved it, killed it off and made Surreal well again, but by the time they had realized that it was serious, and set off to find help, it had already been too late. Now both his parents were gone. Thus far, he’d been consoling himself that they were no longer in pain, no longer had to worry. He’d been bearing the heartache alone, his siblings having seemingly distanced themselves to grieve in their own ways, and Kavdaya, perhaps, bore the deepest agony of them all. A healer invested a great deal of themselves into the care of their patients, and losing a patient was as good as an antler tine to the heart. They felt it just as strongly as the family, and they also felt the overwhelming guilt of ‘What If?’.

His mind drifted slightly until her voice and her sudden slowing caught him back and he slowed to a stop to look down at her, nodding as he recalled what she’d said. “I’d say so.” He answered, before he silenced himself and listened to her earnest words. As she spoke, a soft smile replaced the pensive look he’d been carrying on his features, and unbeknownst to him, those fathomless sapphires had warmed into pools of rich blue. “I missed you, too.” There was complete honesty in those words, and a warmth that went just a little deeper than friendship.

He smiled a little more widely as he cocked his head, thinking. “I definitely could use the help with patrols, and I’d truly enjoy spending time together, Solveiga. Whether it’s patrolling, or helping you gather herbs, or just walking… Or sitting. I’d truly love it.” His deep baritone voice rumbled with a soft chuckle as his head dropped to nudge his nose against her cheek. “And I think I owe you a few lessons in fighting, and a spar or two.” That trademark grin flashed across his face as his tail gave a hearty wag, before his haunches dropped with a pleasant thump to the ground, that tail flopping cheerily to the earth a second later.

“Why don’t you tell me of your travels?” He suggested, ears perked with interest as his head cocked.