Wapun Meadow and I've got one foot in the door

while it is not the first time in his life dolce has wrangled with grief, it is the worst. a man once so steadfast and hard-working, now struggling to find the energy to leave his home. their home. rala had never strayed from his mind—not as he made the lonely journey back to bearclaw, not as he slept in the den they built together alone. 

there wasn't a moment that went by where her lovely memory was not haunting him. 

but the world keeps spinning, even as his feels like it's been standing still. it would not wait for him. and so he picked himself back up and got to work; the only thing he could do that wouldn't make him feel so numb. 

his morning patrol was quiet. uneventful, which was supposed to be a good thing. but the silence ate away at him; he could still hear rala's voice. sweet and steady and calling for him. pleading for him. whispering in his mind, taunting him with the fact that he could not find her. 

that he had let her down. broken the promise he'd made to be there for her through weather and storm. 

a different melody reached him, piercing through his heartache. a soft, enchanting melody. his heart lurches, and he's moving towards the song on a bated breath.

but it is not his wife. a pretty little thing, bathed in light and surrounded by birds that seemed as if they were talking to her. he steeled himself with a breath, lingered for a moment out of view until her song had ended. it didn't feel right to interrupt something so delicate. 

"mornin', miss." he rumbled as he revealed himself. hoping she didn't scare. "that was a fine song."