((Links with Kan-yu.))
Almost home. The words reverberated around Dominic's unfeeling mind as he drove his battered Jeep around past the walls of Rhy'Din city. He had no need to drive through Rhy'Din, not today. His destination was graven in his mind - Maple Grove, and answers more satisfying than the brief message he had received only days ago.
Had it truly only been two days ago' The courier who had brought the message had travelled the standard journey, taking three days to deliver his bombshell of grief and pain to the professor. Dominic, by contrast, had taken a faster route, refusing to sleep until it became absolutely necessary, cutting hours from his journey. He would not be expected until tomorrow at the earliest, but he had to know.
He had to know what had happened.
The message, written in the familiar rounded hand of his cousin, Caroline, was still crumpled in his back pocket. It didn't need to be there. Dominic had read it so many times that first day of travelling that the words were engraved on his heart and mind, each memory of them like a knife stabbing into him.
Dom,
You need to come home. I have no words to say how sorry I am to have to tell you that Gwen has been killed in an attack on the Guild. Please don't do anything stupid; we're working on getting our revenge.
Caroline.
Gwen ....his beautiful, lively Gwen ....his wife for almost ten years, through rain and shine, through good and bad, was gone. He couldn't believe it; wouldn't believe it, not until he saw her body or heard the words from Caroline's own lips, watched the familiar softness of his cousin's eyes fill with tears for him.
It couldn't be true. But why would Caroline send such a message if it wasn't' She wasn't cruel at heart, it wasn't her style to lie in order to get him home. She was like Ollie and Jon and Gigi; they'd never resented his freedom to come and go as he pleased, encouraged him to take the job at the museum precisely so he could travel and do what he loved so well.
Yet if it was true, then he was the reason Gwen was dead. So selfish as to continue on his journeys after the accident .....No. He wasn't going to lie to himself any longer.
It had been no accident that had taken his beloved wife's power to walk from her. It had been his desire for a child. He had ignored the warnings from the doctors, and though Gwen had agreed with him, the weight of guilt for what happened fell squarely on his shoulders. She had carried their first child to term, but the birth had been too much. The babe had rested too long on the delicate curve of her lower spine, too big to pass safely through her hips ....already dead when they delivered it by C-section. And because of his pride, his insistence that they have children, from that day Gwen had never taken another step.
And now she was gone. He had left her behind to go off on his adventures, telling himself that she had agreed with him, that she wanted him to go. If only he had been here, perhaps she would not have been working with the Guild at all. If he had stayed, there would have been no need for her to visit any of the holdings. She would still be alive, waiting for him to get back from his normal nine-to-five job at the museum.
The gates of the Maple Grove compound came into sight. Someone must have seen him coming, for they were opening as he drove through, for once not needing to give his name to the guards on duty in order to be let into his own home. The Jeep rumbled along the little lanes cut through Humphrey's cultured wilderness, seeking out the familiar lines of Ash Cottage through the trees.
As he drew up, he had a brief surge of hope. Nothing looked any different. The lights were on in the little house, there was sign of movement, of life within. Leaving his bag in the car, he ran up to the front door, shouting his wife's name in desperate hope as he slammed through the door and into the hallway beyond.
She should have been there. She should have been coming to meet him, steering her chair easily through the widened doorway of the study or the living room to greet him there in the hallway. It should have been Gwen. Not his mother, walking slowly, her face pale with grief and distress, opening her arms without a word to her newly widowed son.
The hope crashed down around him, replaced with the keenness of fury and sorrow. His lips moved soundlessly for a moment, before releasing their howl of deep, heart-wrenching grief. Stumbling forward, Dominic fell to his knees in his mother's arms, holding on tightly as tears began to flow, hot and merciless in their flood.
Gwen was gone.
Almost home. The words reverberated around Dominic's unfeeling mind as he drove his battered Jeep around past the walls of Rhy'Din city. He had no need to drive through Rhy'Din, not today. His destination was graven in his mind - Maple Grove, and answers more satisfying than the brief message he had received only days ago.
Had it truly only been two days ago' The courier who had brought the message had travelled the standard journey, taking three days to deliver his bombshell of grief and pain to the professor. Dominic, by contrast, had taken a faster route, refusing to sleep until it became absolutely necessary, cutting hours from his journey. He would not be expected until tomorrow at the earliest, but he had to know.
He had to know what had happened.
The message, written in the familiar rounded hand of his cousin, Caroline, was still crumpled in his back pocket. It didn't need to be there. Dominic had read it so many times that first day of travelling that the words were engraved on his heart and mind, each memory of them like a knife stabbing into him.
Dom,
You need to come home. I have no words to say how sorry I am to have to tell you that Gwen has been killed in an attack on the Guild. Please don't do anything stupid; we're working on getting our revenge.
Caroline.
Gwen ....his beautiful, lively Gwen ....his wife for almost ten years, through rain and shine, through good and bad, was gone. He couldn't believe it; wouldn't believe it, not until he saw her body or heard the words from Caroline's own lips, watched the familiar softness of his cousin's eyes fill with tears for him.
It couldn't be true. But why would Caroline send such a message if it wasn't' She wasn't cruel at heart, it wasn't her style to lie in order to get him home. She was like Ollie and Jon and Gigi; they'd never resented his freedom to come and go as he pleased, encouraged him to take the job at the museum precisely so he could travel and do what he loved so well.
Yet if it was true, then he was the reason Gwen was dead. So selfish as to continue on his journeys after the accident .....No. He wasn't going to lie to himself any longer.
It had been no accident that had taken his beloved wife's power to walk from her. It had been his desire for a child. He had ignored the warnings from the doctors, and though Gwen had agreed with him, the weight of guilt for what happened fell squarely on his shoulders. She had carried their first child to term, but the birth had been too much. The babe had rested too long on the delicate curve of her lower spine, too big to pass safely through her hips ....already dead when they delivered it by C-section. And because of his pride, his insistence that they have children, from that day Gwen had never taken another step.
And now she was gone. He had left her behind to go off on his adventures, telling himself that she had agreed with him, that she wanted him to go. If only he had been here, perhaps she would not have been working with the Guild at all. If he had stayed, there would have been no need for her to visit any of the holdings. She would still be alive, waiting for him to get back from his normal nine-to-five job at the museum.
The gates of the Maple Grove compound came into sight. Someone must have seen him coming, for they were opening as he drove through, for once not needing to give his name to the guards on duty in order to be let into his own home. The Jeep rumbled along the little lanes cut through Humphrey's cultured wilderness, seeking out the familiar lines of Ash Cottage through the trees.
As he drew up, he had a brief surge of hope. Nothing looked any different. The lights were on in the little house, there was sign of movement, of life within. Leaving his bag in the car, he ran up to the front door, shouting his wife's name in desperate hope as he slammed through the door and into the hallway beyond.
She should have been there. She should have been coming to meet him, steering her chair easily through the widened doorway of the study or the living room to greet him there in the hallway. It should have been Gwen. Not his mother, walking slowly, her face pale with grief and distress, opening her arms without a word to her newly widowed son.
The hope crashed down around him, replaced with the keenness of fury and sorrow. His lips moved soundlessly for a moment, before releasing their howl of deep, heart-wrenching grief. Stumbling forward, Dominic fell to his knees in his mother's arms, holding on tightly as tears began to flow, hot and merciless in their flood.
Gwen was gone.