07-25-2016, 09:21 AM
I don’t think Echo Trails has been this quiet since the day we moved in. But Ryss has been feeling restless, and no one’s about to let her wander on her own while she’d pregnant. And once Halo heard there was an adventure in the works, things sort of...snowballed. As they tend to do around our feisty little Halo-girl.
I fully intended to join in the excursion, but at the last second something has me holding back. Eyes unfocused, head tilted trying to catch the sound of a whisper just out of reach, I tell the others to go on. Pazuzu is more than strong enough to protect them from anything that might happen, and for once I don’t feel foreboding itching beneath my skin. So I watch as my family disappears into the trees, trusting that they will all come back to me safely and soon.
I’m still staring into the trees where they vanished when I hear footsteps approaching. My ear flicks back to take in the sound, and before I even turn to look a smile is starting at the corner of my lips. It has been years, an eternity almost, but I know the rhythm and cadence of his footfalls, and I can feel the bond between us thrumming in my chest as he draws near.
Tiernan.
When I turn to look at him, he’s standing in the light that filters down through bare trees, and the smile on his face coaxes mine into a matching one. Before he’s even done speaking I’m closing the distance between our bodies, leaning into him, dragging him into a hug. “God, it’s good to see you, Tiernan.” The last time I had, I was drowning in grief and sorrow. In the depths of my despair, I left everyone I loved behind, and I lost track of too many during those dark years.
“Oh, honey, so much.” I pull back to look into rich brown eyes lit up with the force of his smile. A smile that has the last lingering hints of tension melting away, one that has almost never failed to draw an answering one out of me. “How have you been, darling? I’m sorry it’s been so long.”
I fully intended to join in the excursion, but at the last second something has me holding back. Eyes unfocused, head tilted trying to catch the sound of a whisper just out of reach, I tell the others to go on. Pazuzu is more than strong enough to protect them from anything that might happen, and for once I don’t feel foreboding itching beneath my skin. So I watch as my family disappears into the trees, trusting that they will all come back to me safely and soon.
I’m still staring into the trees where they vanished when I hear footsteps approaching. My ear flicks back to take in the sound, and before I even turn to look a smile is starting at the corner of my lips. It has been years, an eternity almost, but I know the rhythm and cadence of his footfalls, and I can feel the bond between us thrumming in my chest as he draws near.
Tiernan.
When I turn to look at him, he’s standing in the light that filters down through bare trees, and the smile on his face coaxes mine into a matching one. Before he’s even done speaking I’m closing the distance between our bodies, leaning into him, dragging him into a hug. “God, it’s good to see you, Tiernan.” The last time I had, I was drowning in grief and sorrow. In the depths of my despair, I left everyone I loved behind, and I lost track of too many during those dark years.
“Oh, honey, so much.” I pull back to look into rich brown eyes lit up with the force of his smile. A smile that has the last lingering hints of tension melting away, one that has almost never failed to draw an answering one out of me. “How have you been, darling? I’m sorry it’s been so long.”