Fires of Prophecy_ Book Two of the Morcyth Saga - Brian Pratt [93]
“Don’t leave me!” he cries as he starts to sob.
“Silly boy,” she says as she looks into his eyes. “I’ll never leave you. I love you.”
“I love you too,” he says to her. A tear falls from his face onto hers.
“Maybe tomorrow,” she says as her voice begins to grow faint, “we can dance again.” And then she smiles as he kisses her on the forehead. She closes her eyes as her body relaxes in death.
“Cassie!” Tinok cries as he gently shakes her as if she was just sleeping, “Oh my god, Cassie!” He then holds her tight to his chest as sobs rack his body. He just sits there holding her as he rocks back and forth.
His head snaps up as he looks to James with red, tear filled eyes, “You can save her, can’t you?”
Shaking his head as his own tears fall, he says sadly, “Some things I’m unable to do.”
“But…” and then he starts sobbing all over again.
Everyone leaves Tinok alone in his time of grief. Each in their own way cared for Cassie and her passing has touched each of them deeply. While Tinok mourns the loss of his beloved, the others go through the grisly process of removing the dead from the camp. James and Jiron go through all the dead bodies and collect what money they can.
“I think they were just bandits, out looking to rob us,” Jiron says.
“It looks that way,” agrees James. Then he gestures over to Tinok, “Think he’ll be okay?”
“I don’t know,” Jiron says, “he really cared for her.”
By this time, Yorn and the others have wrapped Qynn in a blanket. As they pick him up, he says to Jiron, “We’re going to go bury him out in the desert.”
Nodding, he replies, “Just a second and I’ll come with you.”
He was about to go over to Tinok when he all of a sudden stands up, holding Cassie in his arms. Without a word, he begins to carry her out to the desert. When he sees Jiron coming toward him, he just shakes his head and then is soon lost in the dark as he takes his beloved out into the desert to bury her.
“Alright,” he says to Yorn as he joins them, “let’s go.”
James watches as they carry Qynn out to be buried, taking a different direction than Tinok so as not to intrude upon him.
James and the rest remain in the camp and wait for the others to return. No one feels like talking, each is lost in their own reflections.
In a little bit, Jiron and the others return from burying Qynn. He looks around and asks, “Tinok hasn’t returned yet?”
“No,” Delia replies.
He turns and looks out toward where he disappeared into the night with Cassie, worried for his friend. An hour later, Tinok comes back to camp. Eyes red and swollen from crying, and covered in dirt from where he dug her grave, he looks a pitiful sight. The necklace he had recently given her hangs around his neck. His knives are caked with dirt, obviously what he used to dig her grave. That above everything else gives Jiron cause to worry for his friend. Nothing has ever before meant more to him than his knives and for him to not have cleaned them cannot bode well.
He sits near the fire and stares vacantly into the flames. They try to engage him in conversation, telling him of their sorrow for his loss, but he doesn’t respond. Eventually he just goes over to his bedroll and falls asleep.
The others stay up for a little longer, discussing their worries for Tinok and the loss of their friends. But soon they all grow tired once again and one by one, drift off to sleep.
In the morning, Tinok is gone.
Chapter Seventeen
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“What do you mean he’s gone?” Jiron exclaims after James gives him the news of Tinok’s disappearance.
“He’s gone,” James tells him again. “Sometime last night, he must’ve saddled a horse and taken off.”
“And no one heard him?” he asks, looking around at everyone.
They all shake their heads indicating they hadn’t.
“We must go after him!” he says.
“No, we shouldn’t,” Delia tells him. She grabs him by the arm and stares him straight in the eye as she continues. “With the wagons we will never be able to catch up with him. And if we abandon them, we lose the reason we’re