Wheeling Gull Isle healed

for whenever <3

the island breathed and lived.

many faces filled it now, almost more than he could keep up with in a day. yet he trusted all of them to care for one another. there was only one he needed to think of with worries, but she laid in a cave. shielded from most of the others.

today he gathered bundles of lavender, fearing they soon might perish to the sudden cold. although he was hardly much of a gardener or naturalist by any means.

with one bundle made, he moved towards a place @Heda frequently slept. prepared to set up the gift there.

<3

their number was growing. mo would stay. the woman in the cave would stay. and now miseria, eager to learn.
heda had felt a stifled jealousy late the day before, that now his attentions would be more split. but she sat with it through the night and when the morning came, the sensation had gone away.
heda was secure in sweetharbor. bartholomew would not let her fall. 
her own den was at the tallest point of the island; a little green cave which protected her from the worst of the elements. it was near the first place she and he had camped. the scent of lavender came to her first; heda had fallen asleep and now she awoke, sleep-soft eyes warm as she went to welcome him.

he had not meant to wake her. aware that most of her work here was more physical than his own. even her own worshiping seemed to be done of the physical. a hunter, blessing the meals and gods. a guardian, protecting the flock upon the isle.

i can let you rest,

he whispered, setting the bundle of lavender near her. a warm look in his eyes.

and yet he did not remove himself, until she would tell him to.

she shook her head, sending bits of her bedding flitting to the ground: crushed daisies and sweet-scented sedges taken from the edge of the island. "no. stay." her smile strengthened and then split into a yawn; she stretched her limbs and went to sniff at what he had brought.
"are you gardening now, bartholomew?" heda asked him in a gentle tease. "it suits you if so." leader of a flock. cultivator of the land.

he felt bashful beneath her words.

he was a man of the spirit! yet he supposed that did not mean he could not tend to God's creations, could it? he let loose a small laugh. brief and warm.

i suppose i am. he admitted as he seated himself politely. wondering how the lavender may compliment the daisies. i did not wish for all the lavender to be lost in the coming cold days. although i am hardly one to know if i am doing it right. perhaps i will wait longer for the next bundle.

he only feared the snow, sweeping over the island and taking it all before he could act. even if fall had only just come.

his gaze fluttered towards something else. nearly a guaranteed sign by now of something being upon his mind, yet his tongue did not yet hold the words to speak them first.

heda sat near and gathered the flowers near, sorting slowly with reverent paws. "landwirtschaft. farming." that had been mahler's word. she marvelled that it did not hurt to say or to think of him. "i can help you bring more bundles."
when heda looked up it was to see the gravid silence on bartholomew's face. her golden eyes met his own; set in their silver markings, they invited him to say what was unsaid.

landwirtschaft.

the word was lost upon him, but she quickly clarified. farming. there was no reason for him to not farm, he was a man of tending. caring. it surely would not be hard to care for the earth as he did the creatures all around him.

he may have responded, had her look not pierced him. a summon of the words that lived in the back of his brain.

sweetharbor has grown quickly these last few weeks. it was not his first time observing the growth of the island. yet somehow it felt stronger now. more pronounced in the bustling bodies that made homes upon the isle.

does it feel like a home?

some part of him still feared her leaving, deciding it was all too much.

perhaps it showed in the softening of his gaze.

"it has." heda let her shoulders relax and her eyes travel out toward the sea. "i guess i wasn't expecting so many to join us." and for the first time she said us without thinking; a collective inside the growing ranks of sweetharbor.
maybe an othering of sorts, though she did not mean it.
"are you ready to lead so many?" heda asked, her sungold eyes moving to the gentle eyes, the soft curling fur which framed his face. "you are the one they came to hear, you know. you — tell us how to talk to god. teach us."

if he had a collar, he would be hot beneath it.

as it stood now, he roasted underneath seasalt curls. to lead so many, all who came to here him. missionary days felt behind him. now he would house a church, lead worships to God.

his gaze fluttered beneath even curled lashes! how did he manage to feel so boyish when everything he had worked for was placed before him?

God delivered.

i will learn if i am, won't i? the first crack to the man beneath his stoicism. some days i wonder if i will...wake up.

a dream.

he did not vocalize it fully.

heda studied bartholomew in that moment, truly watched him. 
he was afraid. she was not certain if she should commit to that perception of the man. but he was flesh and blood like anyone else. maybe he was.
heda reached to pat his paw with her own, pressing it softly. her eyes were filled with something beyond light: the first confidence of a woman growing into herself. "i have faith in you. i know that you can." she inhaled, a small wan smile curving her mouth. "this is the first place i've felt real."

you have been here from the start. you see so much, bring so much.

it was not lost on him, as he looked down upon her paw on his own. heda had been first. his whole goal had been tending to her, healing to her. now plenty of those in need came to the isle.

prepared to heal, prepared to learn.

i could see you as an advisor. but he did not press it upon her, he did not ask for her to support him so highly.

if she wished to continue to learn, to hunt, he found he would be content with that too. she was still so young! he could not burden her.

sheepishly, he turned his head away. gaze burning bright.

now it was heda's turn to blush, to feel heat spreading out across her collarbone. for a moment she could not find her voice. she wanted to argue with him, albeit gently, deny that she had brought anything aside for a mess he had to fix.
but he had, hadn't he? and heda knew if she said that, bartholomew would point out something like: it had been her choice to stay and to heal and to be taught.
she was surprised; it showed on her face. "but i'm — i don't know anything," heda laughed quietly. "what if i advised you to jump into the water or something?" another jest; heda hiding her want, her shock, below humour.

she laughed.

he did not find hurt. instead he found something familiar. an uncertainty shared between them. her words a joke, a jest. he found he could answer her very much the same.

then i would say you are giving a baptism.

for a moment his features morphed into something warmer and playful.

i could say the same thing, though. what if i advised anyone here to jump into the waters?

heda smirked. "we would do it, i think. you don't say anything without a reason." for a moment she was struck by her very own introspection. presently her mouth twitched and she put her head to one side for a moment. "what would i do as an advisor? hypothetically speaking."
heda continued the joke and yet her eyes cleared of it, touched instead by interest and the surprise she had hidden before.

perhaps he had built that reputation, but still he believed he was not without flaw. without mistakes or missteps. perhaps they did not see it.

but he knew.

hypothetically speaking, she asked.

you would help me when i need just that — advising. yet continue to do as you currently do. watch the island, spot those on our shores. you have an eye for those who may fit.

he had always wondered how heda reacted to new faces each time one showed.

her judgement mattered as much as his own, he realized.

heda expected there to be another reason. she was not sure why; he had never given her a chance to think he worked with ulterior motive. but so many had. and so many did. 
she quieted the thought. he trusted her and he wanted her to advise him, if she agreed. heda knew he would never press her, and the explanation that it was not so different comforted any other doubts about it.
"then yes," she said, glancing toward the man and squinting her eyes against the sun with a grin. "i can do that."

he was warm, lifted from his deep thought.

then when the time comes properly you will be advisor heda. he spoke with light and pride. not yet could he establish such a thing, but the state of the island left him to think soon.

bodies bustling, souls healing.

would you like to return to the lavender with me or shall i leave you to rest?

<3

heda felt herself enlivened; she gathered up the bundle and set it just inside the archway of her small den. "i'll come with you."
she would set off with him, pointing out some bird or another, and detailing on which part of the island they made their nests.
a good thing. a grand thing.