The Lands of Ralosia & Ranuulo- Short Story Collection

~Charred Chest Chapter 3 - No Regret~

~Chapter 3- No regret~

Razan felt Veena's judgmental eyes on him the rest of the night. Whenever she'd look in his general direction they'd sharpen for a moment, before softening when she spoke to the others ... did he know her from somewhere? She clearly recognized him.

After the boys had finished playing with the pups, Veena caught up with Aero inside. There was some chitchat about all that happened since they last saw each other. Razan was quiet as everyone else talked. He was certain she didn't want to talk to him anyways.

... Where did she remember him from? He'd passed through this area so many times in the past, it could be anything.

There was no indication that she would call the authorities on them. Even if she did, Razan and Lucar's bounties had just been cleared by their sons. They were free men now.

When night drew near, Veena walked them all to her guesthouse, a decent sized building with a few beds inside.

"Tomorrow we can help with building those new pens for those pups." Lucar said before stepping inside.

Veena smiled sweetly, "I'd appreciate that. All of you have a good night."

She petted Hopper one more time before she headed back to the house. Her eyes briefly made eye contact with Razan's, and a certain harshness filled them. Not necessarily anger, more so distrust. With that she returned to her home.

The family entered the guesthouse, and Hopper peered inside at them. The dog was too big to fit through the door.

"I'm going to stay outside with Hopper tonight." Aero said before stepping inside.

"Suit yourself."

Lucar sat one of the beds, ran a hand across the talon shaped scar across his brow and looked at Razan, "Ok, what did you do?"

"Nothing!" Razan snapped.

Before Aero could step outside he asked, "What's going on?"

"That Veena woman was staring daggers at your dad all night." Lucar asserted.

Aero placed a hand on his hip, "Really? I didn't notice."

"Of course, you wouldn't notice, Aero." Lucar's son, Jirro, commented as he sat on one of the beds, "Was she upset at you... for something you did when you used to be a Sky Bandit?"

Razan folded his arms and put his back to the wall, "Probably..."

"You don't even remember what you did?" Aero asked unevenly.

Razan didn't answer.

Lucar began to pace around the guest house, "I'm trying to remember what we've done in this area. Everything I can think of is when we were pretty young."

Razan's eyes widened. He remembered an occasion when he was thirteen years-old when he hatched a plan to sneak in some lady's house to steal this interesting looking chest. As soon as he knew that she worked with animals, he came up with an idea to trick her with his crow.

He sighed, "I remember... I snuck into her house and stole this big chest from her."

Lucar perked up, "I remember that! You brought a big ol' chest around one time and you couldn't even open it."

"Could we go find it?" Jirro asked.

"Yeah!" Aero seconded, "We could find it and make it up to her."

Razan shook his head, "I can't go trying to make amends with every person I wronged in the past. Besides, I found that chest before you were even born. It's long gone now."