39 Grief And Guil

Raven looked a trifle down for half the night as they rode, and it worried Dawn as it was not normal for the usually chipper fellow. But his spirits slowly lifted, relieving her worried soul.

The dragons were no longer to be seen, and Dawn was glad for that. It had made her incredibly nervous for the territorial display to be so close. Even if it had been at least a half day's ride away it was still too close for her. She rather hoped that she would never see a dragon up closer than that.

Luckily, the dragons had ignored their presence and might not have even noticed them. At most they would have been dots to the giant lizards.

The night was a blur of cracked ground, blowing loose sand, and the sound of hoof beats when the ground was hard.

When the sun began to rise though, Dawn smiled when she saw green on the horizon. They would be able to make it out when night fell again. She felt relieved.

Everyone was. They were sick and tired of the barren desert that seemed so devoid of life. Of course, it really was not devoid of life they just did not see any.

Raven carried Rex down as the others began to set up camp. Dawn watched as the other kids all came over and surrounded their beloved blind man. Thorn took hold of his hand and led him over to the large rock they were camping near to, chattering all the while. Raven looked all too happy to being led away by a child and had a brilliant smile on his face.

Dawn took care of her griffon who had a fine sheen of dust on him from the desert. She would have cleaned it off but there was no point, not while they were still inn this dry land.

Everyone was covered in dust really, and it gave a grim look to the entire party. For most people it was just being covered in dirt, but Kion was having a rough time as he was constantly sneezing. Apparently, the young knight had very bad allergies and breathing in a dusty air had set them off. He covered his nose with a cloth but it did very little to help.

Dawn retired immediately after eating something, as she was exhausted. But she could not fall asleep immediately.

Even though it had been a while since she had lost her husband, she was still not used to not having him pressing against her back as she tried to fall asleep. During the day, she could almost pretend to be fine, but at night the loss was felt all the more keenly. She missed him, even him waking her up in the middle of the night when he had stayed up later than her due to duties. She had never admitted it to him but she really only half dozed when he was not there as a part of her waited for him.

Remembering the warmth of having a husband quietly enter the room as he tried his best not to wake her up made her feel like she really had been blessed in her marriage to him. He would tiptoe in and get changed into a loose-fitting shirt, crawl in next to her, dragging her gently closer and pressing a kiss to her temple. She missed that. There had been something so nice about it, even if she had never admitted it.

It was really her fault that Arrion had died. Her hurtful words had distracted him, allowing those men to sneak up on him. Usually Arrion would have noticed such a thing, but… The guilt was eating at her. And she could not talk about it. The only person she really had to confide in was Raven and she did not want to admit to her friend just how terrible of a wife she had been.

Of course, she knew that there was no way she could have known, but she still could not shake that terrible feeling of guilt. She hoped though that because she had been crying so hard that he had heard and that he realized that she actually did care about him at least, even if it was the last thing he knew. Since she would never be able to tell him, she could only hope that he could read between the lines.

She kept her eyes closed the entire time she was thinking of him and wishing that there was some way to bring him back. But while there were legends of priests and prophets who could bring back the dead, none of them were left – if they had ever existed.

Eventually the queen managed to fall asleep, though her dreams were torturous memories. And though she fell asleep she did not sleep well at all.