Andrew
“Is that what she told you?” Isabella asked. She sat upon the frame as she gazed out of the living room window, the wind beating on her short red hair and bright brown cloak. To Andrew, Isabella looked like a wild thing, with one boot upon the window frame and her longing gaze at the outside world. She looked like a trapped spirit. Someone who could taste the freeing winds but was now entrapped within the four walls of this room. She wanted nothing more than to be free to flow in the breeze once again.
“I don’t get it, but she said that you’d understand,” Andrew said. The two of them remained silent for a moment longer as the wind whirled through the room, causing the fire in the hearth to flutter. The cool air sucked all the warmth the hearth made. Gracie’s corpse was in the same place he’d left it, except now someone had placed a white sheet over her, masking Gracie from head to toe. Nobody else was in the room except him, Isabella, and her sister.
“Stupid,” Isabella mumbled under her breath.
“Who’s ‘stupid’?” Andrew asked carefully. Isabella simply turned her eyes back outside the window. With a hand held out, Andrew heard the approach of the horse-sized wolf as Isabella began stroking its main.
“Who else?” she said, her eyes focused on her horse sized wolf as she stroked it. “She’d fought me tooth and nail over what I should or should not do. Practically treated me like some child all my life, and it’s only when she dies one me that she decides to treat me as an equal?”
“That’s hardly fair,” Andrew said. Something within him was welling up, and it took all his self-control to keep it in check.
“‘Life ain’t fair,’ one of sis famous lessons,” Isabella said as she rolled her eyes up to the ceiling. Andrew was about to respond in anger until he heard Chase sob behind the door, quickly followed by footsteps running back into the kitchen. Chase had been listening in.
How long had he been standing here? The poor boy must have wanted to come in, and now…
Turning around, Andrew’s mouth opened as he whilst he tried wording himself in a way that kept’d his the anger that’s been boiling up inside himself ever since he started talking to Isabella.
“All she’d wished for was your safety… The first thing she asked me when I found her was if you-”
“-Thank you for being by Gracie in the end. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’d like a moment with my sister alone.” Andrew blinked. Something about her demeanour changed. Head spinning, Andrew left the room. Flynn and Sophie were already standing in wait for him by the kitchen entrance. Andrew could see the solemn faces on them, too.
“You sure you don’t want to come with us?” Andrew asked. Sophie gave a weak smile.
“After what I’ve done these last few days, I’m surprised I got here as quickly as I have,” Sophie said. Andrew understood they had been at knife’s edge for days now, not to mention that Sophie played a part in a great battle.
“We’re taking a ride on this Hector guy’s ship, right?” Flynn picked up. “Not like he can set sail without us if we are also going to be riding his carriage back to the village.”
“But…” Andrew looked away. He’d not yet apologised to these two for pushing them so hard to reach his hometown.
“Whatever is bothering you, we can talk about it later,” Flynn said. Andrew blinked. Was he that obvious? Or could it be that Sophie told him what she-
“-This is far from the end of our journey together,” Sophie said. A warm, knowing smile on her face. Andrew sighed. Nothing got past Sophie. But, despite that, he could not help but smile.
“I hope you were not going to leave without saying goodbye to us!” Iris’ voice came from the kitchen. As she walked in between Flynn and Sophie, she handed Andrew two small paper wrappings.
“Food for the journey. I made one for you and Natalie. I’m sure you’re starving after all you’ve been through,” she said, a chipper smile on her face.
“We ate ours already, if you're wondering,“ Flynn said with an amused grin. Althought Andrew was grateful, he hesitated.
“Thanks, but you did not have to-”
“I don’t want to hear it! All of you deserve a lot more than a sandwich. Just take it and go and be a hero to your mum.” That one hit home for Andrew in a way that he was not expecting. Trying to hide his swallow, Andrew took the food, which earned him a proud smile. Just then, her bright demeanour dimmed as somebody darkened the front door passage behinds them. It was a man of stout average build, a mess of blond hair, and a spear strapped to his back. His rising and falling chest told him that he’d ran here. Studying everyone in the hall, his eyes finally froze on Iris and his features lit up.
“Colt?” Iris whispered, her hands to her lips. Before he knew it, the husband ran in and swept her wife off her feet, holding her in a tight embrace. Chase came out of the kitchen soon after and leaped onto his father’s leg. Smiling at the scene, Andrew took one last look at Flynn and Sophie behind them.
“We’ll meet with you back at the village, ” Sophie said. With the sounds of joyful tears behind him, Andrew nodded farewell to Sophie and Flynn before he walked out of the house. Closing the door behind him, he was struck by the sounds of sobbing that leaked out of the open living room window. Its contrast to the happy tears felt like a sobering slap making Andrew freeze, his hand stuck on the door’s handle.
The giant wolf was resting by the window now. Its head rested atop its arms as it eyed him. Taking a real look at it now, Andrew recognised the slash that ran down one side of its eye.
That’s the wolf that almost killed me! Back in the forest, when he separated himself from Natalie and the others, he was almost killed by a giant wolf. Had it not been for the alpha king interference, Andrew may not even be standing here. He recalled how it was not only stopped by the alpha king but struck for still trying to eat him to dispute the alpha king’s interference. It seemed angered at the time. With this new information running through his mind, Andrew slowed his walking by the door now for a completely different reason.
Andrew thought that if he’d even met that one alone once again without the Alpha king present, it would try to get its revenge. It just watched him now, its yellow eyes uninterested, before yawning and turning its head to one side to rest. Relaxing, Andrew carefully made his way down the steps and onto the beaten path towards the wheat fields.
Sure that the wolf wouldn’t chase him, Andrew faded off into the tall wheat. That confidence faded as he walked deeper into the field. What if it waited for him to let his guard down and attacked him now? As stupid as that thought was, it followed him like an unpleasant stench.
~#~
Natalie was waiting, sitting right where he’d last seen her. Seeing him, she got up and approached. Her face became puzzled as she looked at him.
“What is it?” she asked. It was only then that Andrew realised that he’d been looking at the wheat field behind him.
“Nothing.” Still keeping his eyes on the wheat fields, Andrew handed Natalie one of the paper wrappings. He was being stupid. If it was going to attack him, it would have done so the moment it made its way to the farmhouse. It was obvious that Isabella had tamed it.
But even so, how is that possible? Such a contrast in behaviour. Changed by such a prickly girl. As he let that thought sink in, however, he chuckled to himself.
“Then again, that makes a lot more sense than I realised.” Andrew mumbled to himself.
“Andrew?” Natalie was looking at him, her head tilted, to which he shook his own in response.
“It’s nothing, honest,” he said with a faint smile. “Let’s get out of here.”
~#~
They’d passed through Progmanfest gates to the buzz of people cheering, celebrating, and dancing with each other along the street. Pockets of people passing through the street carrying baskets of clothes and provisions. As a large trail of horses and carts tried to push through the traffic of men, women, and children who bustled about. Andrew could almost feel the collective sigh from all the men and women-half of which dawned light armour and weapons, clear signs of walking among those who were out there in battle. If it did not hit him before, then it did now. The battle was over, the Famine fissure was gone, and the living celebrated with drinks, dancing, kind words, and songs.
“Looks like the people are in good spirits,” Andrew said, his eyes followed a group of hunters who carried a man over their heads in gales of laughter. He turned to Natalie to see her response. She didn’t look so content. Her eyes turned a hue of purple as she gazed upon something beyond the sights and sounds, beyond the buildings and pillars of civilization.
“Not everyone,” she mumbled. That silenced Andrew. Although he knew what she said was true, Andrew wished that he could live in the illusion for a bit longer. Instead, he looked at Natalie’s distant gaze intensively.
“What do you see?” he asked. If he could not see it, then he wanted to at least hear what she saw. Her eyes tightened. He could almost feel her growing isolation.
The more she used these powers, the more…
“There’s a group of people leaving the village. They are carrying corpses. It must be the knights who were killed in battle.” She said. Andrew nodded.
“It seems like not all it quite ready to forget what just happened, even if it was for a moment,” Andrew said. Reminding him that Natalie has yet to know who it was that orchestrated this bothered him. “To each their own, but between me and you, this is not how I’d spend my afternoon,”
He contemplated on whether he should tell her now. Between that and watching everyone around him celebrate, along with there being a mass funeral taking place, left Andrew feeling at odds with everything.
“I’m no better than everyone here…” she said, her voice low and raspy.
“That’s not true!” Andrew said it before he’d realised it. Blinking, Andrew realised that Natalie was not looking up at him. A small smattering of people who were walking by had stopped talking among themselves to look back at them.
Cycles above, was I shouting that loud? Natalie looked at him expectantly now. He’d got her attention. Now he needed to frame his next words very carefully. Natalie was the kind of girl who did not look away from the horrors of this world. She hated people who turned a blind eye to the injustices when it fell on their doorstep. She was cold to people who made excuses. But that doesn’t mean that she was immune to the harsh realities of this world, nor was she immune to her own harsh judgment.
“Everyone has their way of coping with hard times. Some people look away from it. Others face it. But no matter where they start, nobody remains there forever. Call it the cycle, the ebb and flow of time, or just life itself. Nobody can remain stagnant forever. Even if they wished to, they would probably go crazy first. If you tried to stay stagnant forever, like then it would not be a stretch to even question calling such a person human anymore.” Natalie looked at him, her every facial feature an unreadable mask save for her wide, hopeful eyes. In his efforts to console her, he worried that he’d come off wiser than he really was. And as such, the pressure to finish his sentence mounted.
Unsure of how to meet her expectations, Andrew closed his eyes, blocking out her expected gaze to regain focus. “All I’m saying is that just because you’re not yet ready to face something difficult doesn’t make you a bad person, it just means that you are a human doing the best you can.” Natalie seemed to let out a slow silent breath to that. Eyes closed and demeanour composted, she turned to the road to look onward before walking in assured strides.
“I guess that’s true,” she said. Hearing her sigh made Andrew sigh, too. Before looking onwards at the hustle and bustle of the town, he groaned.
“Cycles, I hope it’s true,” he sniffed. “Because there sure hell are a few things I’m slacking in.”
Like protecting you for one… if he was going to tell her about who caused all this, then he had to do it soon. Just as he was about to force the words out, Andrew saw a determined gaze in her eyes as she looked down the street.
“There is something that even I’m able to face right now,”
