Raising a Hero

Chapter 49

I didn't stop walking until I reached the forest. By then the sun had set and the navy of night was just slurping up the last of gray evening. The trees seemed just as welcoming as they had been when I had first woken up here, though I doubted I could find that same patch of flawless, baby-soft grass. They weren't green anymore either, but a flecked portrait of the brown, yellow, and red of autumn. Even so, I stepped into the shade and looked anyways.

I should have gone to the temple, I thought too late. Because if I ever needed counsel from god, now would be the time.

I stopped at the first little clearing I found and knelt in the grass. I let my pink skirts pool around me, finally becoming aware of the fact that I was shivering. It wasn't summer anymore. I had done something stupid.

But I couldn't change that now. So, instead, I stuffed my hands into my armpits and tucked my face against my knees.

"Brother Nehcor," I murmured against them. "I'm sorry, but your wife's idea is ruining everything."

Dry leaves whispered and clattered in the breeze. The undergrowth protected me from most of the wind, but not all.

"I didn't need to be pretty. I wasn't looking for a husband. I just...I just wanted to be home, somewhere precious, with my babies again. That's all I wanted."

My eyes stung with tears too strong for them, which bubbled out like a stream. My dress grew wet.

"I just wanted to hold my baby. I just...I just wanted to hold him and make him happy and cherished and loved."

Unbidden, the image of my firstborn, still and gray within his blankets, rose up.

I clenched myself in tightly, hoping to keep all the parts of me wanting to tear apart and fly off in every direction all together. But since there was no one around, I had no reason to hold in the keening wail from leaving my mouth.

I was pathetic, running away like this. I was probably going to freeze to death out here. Forget what Gus might have been feeling when I ran off on him and told him not to follow, and when I screamed at him like that, what would happen to him if I died? No matter what he wanted me to be, to him I was all he had. He didn't trust Hal and Milly. Why did I run off like that? Why didn't I just tell him to shut his little crush up and move on? Why didn't I just insist I didn't like him like that and never would?
And as I thought that, I suddenly remembered the details of the man in my dream. He had been tall, strong, with silver hair and red eyes.

I had woken up to Gus next to me. Had Gus given me that dream with his magic? Could he do that? Or had I dreamed it on my own? And did it even matter? It was the most beautiful dream I could have imagined.

I don't know how long I cried there, bunched up into a ball and getting colder and colder, but eventually my tears ran dry and my skirts dotted with snot from where I'd used it to blow my nose. My eyes, throat, and stomach hurt from crying so hard.

"I should head back," I told my legs. "Or at least I should try to."

I was just getting to my feet when the cracking of twigs and dry bush leaves made me jump around.

Looking a bit more ragged for wear, with his blond hair hidden beneath a thick hat, was Priest Miurian. Though I almost didn't recognize him in his common man's clothes. The white priest robes really made him.

He looked just as surprised to see me as I was to see him.

"Miss Lillian? What are you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same."

He looked hesitant as he approached me. "I think I'm here for you. You're not dressed for being out here, and your eyes—what happened?"

Without asking, he took off his quilted jerkin and cloth coat and threw it over my shoulders. I welcomed the warmth of his body that came with it.