Blood & Bone [Book Three of The City of Eternity Series] [✔]

3.9: Submerged

The sun had dipped beyond the horizon, the vibrant hues of purple and blue being consumed by a cumbersome night but that heaviness was merely another shadow weighing me to the ground. Not being pulled under completely was all I could hope for as I lay in the soft patch of earth just beyond the back patio. The dip in our lawn owing to our late afternoon basks in the sun, a blanket placed and strained eyes watching the earth move before us, shielded from the waves of sunlight by the old tree Dhana had adoringly named 'Betsy'.

A pounding headache was clawing at the right side of my head, settled deep in my skull and refused to budge. Despite this unhindered pain, I restrained a shallow hope of peace, a lingering desire for calm as I curled up amongst the dead carnations.

I couldn't blame the wolf for doing the same, hiding in the depths behind wire and chains, entangling itself with its own limbs in an effort to be as small as possible. Its teeth dug into the flesh of its leg and swallowed back the disparity. When sleep came to claim it, only then could I be embraced by the peace I desperately craved.

The air was cold and biting at my flesh but I refused to enter my home. It was now a hollow shell, and while Dhana's friends had done their best to bandage the damage, the memory still remained.

I couldn't allow myself to forget that I had allowed my wife to dance with danger the night before. I had allowed my wife to break down her mental and physical health for me and others. I had carried her to her death. How could I allow her to go with me? How did I drag her from our nest and expect anything but empty hands?

I had to admit to myself the frank truth. It was not over. My desperation for normality was just a thin veneer to reality. I had lost my wife. This was not a cruel trick played by my subconscious, rather it was a hardened fact.

A fact that was so earth-shattering that it left me basking in the dirt rather than facing it head-on. When I first approached our abode, my trembling limbs had taken me around the side to the back, half-mindedly avoiding the inevitable. I nearly tripped on the old paving stones that ran around the shrubbery and stacked precariously near the patio, the moss shielding them amongst the grass. Even so, those same trembling limbs had stumbled up the porch stairs and shaken against the cold handle of the door. I retreated as the metal warmed against my skin.

It was clear from the first moment I'd have to swallow back my fear and step inside, but lying outside was enough of a comfort that ignoring the cold lasted far longer than it once would. It was only when my fingers began to lose colour that I stumbled back up the patio.

I didn't regret taking the first step inside. Our home smelt just like that - home. It was a subtle ginger scent with hearty hints of vanilla and caramel. It was unmistakably Dhana in a way, while her scent was warmer and denser, she had built our home similarly; mixing with that cinnamon and orange I loved so dearly.

That love, of course, created what was now a harrowing ordeal. While it did smell like home, it looked nothing like it once had. With torn-apart furniture removed it was now more hollow, memories that were once etched into fabric ripped away with nothing remaining. It didn't take much to see what Inas had failed to resurrect; large gashes on the walls that ripped through picture frames tore through the carpet in the hall and left glass shards embedded deep in the rugs. Our home had been destroyed, only a house lay in its wake, pleading desperately for something it knew.