Unraveled Homecoming

by J. L. Shelton

  “You’ve just been feeding him better than I ever was,” replied Garin, trying to lighten the mood.

  There was only a momentary victory with that attempt. His father-in-law wearily smiled for a second before he frowned. “Wish I knew what the lad ate this morning then. He’s been very inattentive. I had to call his name multiple times to get any response out of him, and had to do so more than once.” The concern that sounded like anger came through when he pointed down the path. “Then he just suddenly drops his tools and runs for the hills after the last time it happened. I’m not sure what’s wrong with him!”

  But Garin was sure, though he couldn’t voice the problem aloud. It seemed likely that some new memories had emerged, and uncomfortable ones by the sound of things. His father-in-law looked to be at his wit’s end. Turning his gaze towards the woods in the back, all Garin could think was that his young cousin shouldn’t be facing these things alone.

  “If you want me to, sir,” he offered. “I’ll go try talking some sense into him.”

  Lord Gregory’s relief was undeniable. “Thank you, lad. The thought of hunting those woods for him made my knees ache.”

  “We’ve only one more stall to go anyways,” said Emory with a resigned sigh. “I should be fine finishing this up.”

  “You sure, lad?” asked Lord Gregory. “I could send Bran or Selina to help.”

  At the mention of the girl’s name, any fatigue the youth had disappeared. There was only nervousness in its place. “No. No. I can handle this just fine. Alone and by myself.”

  Garin didn’t press his brother about this new attitude towards Selina; neither did Lord Gregory. There was a story behind this, no doubt, but Garin would discover that later. Right now, he had to go rescue a young man from himself.

  ***

  It took about half an hour to find Dougal hidden deep within a small clearing. Garin paused before approaching the black-haired youth, watching a scene that nearly sent a chill down his spine. As the kid kept bending down, picking up any rock his hand found, and hurling the projectiles violently at the closest tree trunk, it felt like he was watching himself through a hole in time.

  “I know you’re there,” Dougal finally snarled as the next rock he shot at the tree ricocheted hard after impact. “I’ll come back when I’m good and ready!”

  “I’m not here to drag you back,” said Garin as he took a few steps forward. The kid ignored him, bending down to search for another stone. “Just trying to figure out what’s wrong, see if you needed to talk.”

  Dougal lifted his head, and his hazel eyes were narrowed with anger. “And then what? You’ll keep lying to me because you believe doing that will protect me!? Thanks, but no thanks!”

  Garin knew better than to contradict the truth. Instead, he copied Dougal and bent over. It didn’t take long for him to find a hefty rock, which he swiftly hurled at the same tree. Despite the fact that he hadn’t put much force behind his throw, the whole trunk still shuddered at the strike.

  That action elicited a growl of indignation from Dougal. “What are you doing?”

  “Not lying to you,” answered Garin in a casual tone while he chose another rock.

  This time there was a sharp cracking sound as a chunk of the bark flew off after the projectile struck! Sneaking a peek at Dougal, he could see that the kid was trying hard not to show that he was impressed. The next stone Garin retrieved was a little smaller, and he tossed it lightly to Dougal. Though surprised, the youth caught it readily with one hand.

  Stretching his arm out towards the tree, Garin said, “Your turn.”

  ***

  Their throwing match continued for quite some time, and lasted beyond the part for which Garin had been waiting. Dougal was starting to have fun and smiling at this kind of friendly competition. Truth be told, Garin was enjoying it too.

  The youth finally voiced a question after the rock he had thrown caused the whole tree to shudder. “So why were you the one to come find me and not him?”

  The venom in that last word hadn’t been lost on Garin, and it answered much in his mind. “Because I had a lot of anger towards the man who eventually claimed to be my father.”

  “Baron Von Bos?”

  “No,” said Garin as he hurled a stone against the trunk. His anger at this painful confirmation that his young cousin still couldn’t remember him had caused him to use enough force that the rock loudly ricocheted to the left and disappeared completely from sight. “King Easton.”

  He waited for Dougal to take a turn, but the boy just stood there with shock on his face. “So you’re a bastard too?”

  “Through and through,” said Garin with a sad chuckle.

  “But…” Dougal furrowed his brow, looking lost. “But you’re a lord with titles and everything!”

  “Only because my father let me keep my foster parents’ name after the baron found more than one loophole to allow me to attain my current station. And you’ll have a lordship too if Mattie has anything to say about it. Our situations could have been vastly different, so we’re luckier than most.”

  “I don’t feel lucky right now,” grumbled Dougal as he unceremoniously plopped down to the ground. After crossing his legs, he placed his elbows on his knees so he could bury his face in his hands. The action caused the remaining words to be an angry muffle, “This is too confusing!”

  “It is,” agreed Garin as he sat down next to the kid.

  The young growl was deep. “I know why I had to be kept a secret, but it pisses me off that it happened at all!”

  Garin understood that all too well. “No matter how good the reasons for him to have kept his distance, it still hurts like hell that your father never wanted you, never wanted to know you.”

  Dougal dropped his hands and clenched them into fists before snarling, “Never wanted you to know him. At least, not until it was convenient for him.”

  Garin stared at the kid for a second. This boy was still a younger version of himself, maybe more so without all the memories of similar conversations they have had in the past. The sigh about their absences couldn’t be helped before he said, “It can make you want to lash out at everybody and everything.”

  “But I don’t want to do that!” shouted Dougal as he punched the dirt next to him. “You obviously got over it. What helped you?”

  “I never really got over it,” Garin admitted. “But I did have help learning to accept the way things were and to control my anger.”

  “What was it?”

  “It was a ‘who’, actually. It was your father.”

  Garin gave Dougal a sidelong glance, watching everything from doubt to anger dance across the youth’s face. Finally, disbelief settled in. “My father?”

  Garin nodded. “Believe it or not, Lord Gregory’s a good man. You have an advantage I never did. Your father will be bending himself over backwards for you, trying until the end of forever to make up for what happened. Unlike my father who just considered giving me up as part and parcel for the course.”

  The kid was silent for a moment, obvious mulling over what had been said. Soon he tentatively asked, “Did you ever tell your father how your felt?”

  Garin closed his eyes and couldn’t help the smirk that formed. “Oh, yeah. He knows full well.”

  “How did that go for you?”

  “Considering I’m the only man in the kingdom to ever get away with giving the king a black eye,” he said with a chuckle. “As well as could be expected.”

  The youth loudly gasped. “You didn’t!”

  “Punched him right in the face,” said Garin, opening his eyes at last. The kid was leaning in close, excitement and disbelief warring in his expression. “Multiple times.”

  Dougal let loose a sharp bark of a laugh before covering it up with a hand. A large grin was still on his face when he removed it and said, “I don’t want to do anything that drastic. I just want him to talk to me, to have it out there in the open between us.”

  “Then just t
ell him you want a long and private talk, away from everyone else,” said Garin matter-of-factly. “Though you will most likely have to be the one to start the conversation. As you said, he thinks he’s protecting you by keeping silent.”

  Dougal nodded as he stood up, a new rock in his hand. He rolled it in his hands for a moment before flinging it at the tree. The stone shattered into a million pieces as a large splinter of wood fell off the trunk. Garin couldn’t help but be impressed.

  A shit-eaten grin was on the boy’s face when he said, “Now I think I’m ready to go back.”

  Chapter 28

  “Is all this really necessary!?” Mattie demanded when Agnes Trygonne wrapped a measuring tape about her hips.

  “If you don’t want to wear only burlap sacks throughout your whole pregnancy, yes!” snapped the old woman as she looked up and glared.

  “The sisters’ work is already paid for, Mattie,” said Belladonna as she began brewing some tea. Her sundress today was bright pink, as was the ribbon in her hair. The color clashed horribly with her white-streaked, auburn locks. “Let Agnes finish.”

  Not without a grumble and an eye roll, Mattie wasn’t! This was the last thing she had expected when she had arrived at the cottage. Since Belladonna’s house was on the far side of the duchy, Firestorm and Mattie had raced to get here before midday. Luckily, the fenced-in land had a creek running through it. After leaving the chestnut to drink her fill, Mattie had hurried into the thatched-roof structure.

  The stone house was mainly everything stuffed into one humungous room, with a door leading into a bedroom that seemed to have been attached as an afterthought. Her great-grandmother, Mattie had been expecting. The gnarled and grumpy half of the seamstress team from Crosshawk, she had not.

  The white-haired woman made an angry tsk-like noise after she had tightened the thin strap and read the number beneath her thumb. “Either you’ve been eating like there’s no tomorrow, or you’re well into your fourth month.”

  “And how could you possibly know that?” Mattie asked with a growl, feeling like a cow since neither of those assumptions was true.

  “Been making pregnant women more comfortable for far too long not to recognize the various stages, “she said frankly while adjusting the black bandana on her head that was keeping the white mane out of her face. Then she released the tape so she could jot something down in a notebook she had pulled out of the pocket of her dress.

  “The sisters have actually been known to alert the midwives that something might be amiss with a pregnancy,” commented Belladonna as she took three cups from an open shelf. “They have been a blessing, helping to save many unborn lives.”

  Agnes didn’t respond to that exaltation and just wrapped the tape about the younger woman’s waist. Though Mattie’s impatience was beginning to soar, she held still as she was measured there and a few other places. Finally the process was done, and she swiftly sat down at the small nearby table in a huff.

  “Now can we get to the business that brought me here in the first place?”

  Belladonna shook her head, smiling at the attitude. “Lunch before magic.”

  “Fangs of the cub came from the lioness with this one,” chuckled Agnes after Mattie had released a growl of frustration.

  “Which is why we need your help,” said Belladonna while she produced a loaf of bread from the counter behind her. She started to slice it when she continued, “You’re the most powerful Soul Walker in our family, and those blocks are surprisingly strong.”

  “I know,” said Agnes with a snarl as she finally took a seat across from Mattie. After throwing the pillow that had been against its back into the far corner, a gnarled finger was soon pointing at the younger woman, “You should have listened to me when I told you that we needed to fix this!”

  Leaning closer to her, Mattie hissed, “You should have told me why!”

  “Mattie, she couldn’t have known about the possible harm to the baby,” reprimanded Belladonna. “I wasn’t even sure myself until I had arrived at the estate.”

  “But the fact you arrived in the nick of time tells me that all of you knew that it could happen! Damn it; she should have mentioned something to my husband from the start! This sure as hell wasn’t the time for any of you to be protective about our so-called family secrets.”

  Belladonna’s mouth became a thin line. She took a deep breath and chose to ignore the enraged comments. Her concentration was now on her pantry, into which she disappeared rather quickly.

  “We didn’t know you were pregnant until after your return,” grumbled Agnes after Mattie glared at the ceiling for too long. “If we had, we would’ve tied you down or placed you in a sack instead of letting you run away to the North.”

  She opened her mouth, but Belladonna was the one to say the retort, “Nobody lets Mattie do anything. It has to be her idea or none at all.”

  Mattie’s glare was now reserved for the woman who was holding a platter upon which was a small slab of her famous honeyloaf. She just ignored her great-granddaughter again, turning her focus on making sure the slices of the treat were nice and thick. A delicious aroma came from her special mixture of honey, berries, and oats. And the scent caused Mattie’s stomach to loudly grumble with a sharp hunger.

  Agnes chortled. “And that distracting sound is exactly why we’re eating lunch first.”

  Unsure whether or not she wanted this cranky woman in her mind, Mattie groused, “Gram, why can’t you be the one to help me?”

  Belladonna stopped her food preparations and gave Mattie a sorrowful look. “I’m not a true Soul Walker, child,” she said with a weary sigh. “Neither was your mother, truth be told. That’s why her attempts at helping you then are harming you now.”

  Agnes’ muttered, “That woman wouldn’t listen to anyone either.” was lost under the blunt force of shock! How in the hell was this possible? All signs had pointed to Annabelle Hawksthorne having been a Soul Walker. So if she wasn’t that, then what in the hell was she?

  Mattie must have said that last part out loud because her great-grandmother replied, “She was like me, a blended spirit as it were.”

  “With just enough talent and stubbornness to get into a shitload of trouble,” snarked Agnes. “Happens sometimes, especially if there was a Caller in the line somewhere.”

  Mattie’s hands protectively covered her belly at that news. What did this mean for her daughter? “Why would a Caller make any difference?”

  Agnes gave Belladonna a pointed look, and the auburn-and-white-haired woman began to rub her forehead as if she had a headache. “I had hoped to wait before explaining this.”

  “Until when?” snapped the seamstress angrily. “The end of the world!? Considering who the father of her child is, go ahead and get it over with!”

  Mattie tried to curl up into a ball as the two glared at each other. The air in the room was becoming heavy with the promise of power—an enormous amount of power! Her ears began to ring, causing a wave of dizziness. The tension rose to the point that she thought it would snap hard enough to level the house to the ground.

  Thankfully, Belladonna was the one who started to calm down first. Covering her face with her hands, The Eldest began to take deep, regulated breaths. Soon the room stopped spinning, and the air pressure fell to normal levels.

  Belladonna then crossed her arms and shook her head. “You really do try my patience sometimes, granddaughter,” she said with obvious frustration.

  “We’re pretty much even in that regard then,” said Agnes with a smirk.

  It pained Mattie that her voice came out like a squeak. “Maybe we should just go ahead and have lunch first.”

  “No,” said Belladonna with a sigh. “Agnes is right. You need to know this, in case any of your descendants end up with a balance of both powers.”

  Mattie couldn’t help but be dumbfounded. “That’s possible?”

  “Of course it is!” declared Agnes as if amazed the younger woman had even asked such a q
uestion. “They connect to the same source, after all!”

  Racking her brain, Mattie thought of what each of power could do. Her spirit transported into another’s mind after the magic tagged itself onto the soul within. Garin’s reached beyond this plane to connect with and bring back a soul that belonged to someone who had perished. Agnes was right; Mattie and Garin were two sides of the same coin. One was able to touch the living, while the other was able to reach out to the dead.

  Mattie’s head then ached as she imagined what might happen when a person could do both. The first question that came to her rattled mind was then blurted out, “Why was I always led to believe that she was a Soul Walker?”

  Belladonna’s emerald eyes had tears in them. “Because what she was, what I am, is considered an abomination by the elves.”

  “Why?”

  “They are known as Soul Benders,” answered Agnes matter-of-factly. “Their ability to manipulate the minds of others has always been a source of fear. Many families, knowing that their offspring could be killed for just being alive, learned that teaching such a child heavily in their Soul Walking skills helped keep the Bending aspect hidden.”

  “Which is why I was lucky my father was a true Soul Walker and not a Soul Bender like his sister had been,” said Belladonna with a sad tone to her voice. “My poor human mother had a hard enough time with me as it was.”

  “So where in the hell did the Caller portion come from?”

  “His mother. She, unfortunately, died during the first famine in Crosshawk. They had tried to keep her from traveling because she always had some health issues, but after she had seen what Iantha had done to their king—she knew her life would have been forfeit anyways if she had stayed in Arduenna.”

  Mattie didn’t bother to ask Belladonna why the information about Cambyses had never been shared. The answer to keeping that explosive topic secret was obvious. But why had she never been told any of this about her mother? Granted, Mattie hadn’t had this much contact with Belladonna since she was ten years old. Still, she couldn’t help but feel like she had been fed a lie yet again!