Timeless Two

8

Grey stops and stares as he finally understands what the words had meant. Sister buried next to her brother. Grey's father her mother, they were cousins. Now he understands.

"Let's go. There is still time to find his grave and recover him tonight," Ari says despondently. "The terrain is rough we won't be able to take the chair.

"I'll carry you," Grey says. Ari nods without looking at him.

"Go outside. The fastest way to the back is if we go to the bottom floor where we stepped on the elevator and take the hall immediately to the left. Go straight until it turns left. Take the first door, you'll see that it leads to the garden. There is a garden gate that will take us to the back wall." Ari gives her instructions in a leaden voice even as they are moving.

"Father said once that he had a little sister that was kidnapped and never found. I think that's part of why he came here was to look for her." Grey says trying to make conversation, not liking the awkward silence that had fallen.

"What was her name? Father never told me." Ari asks desperately holding back her tears.

"Annabelle, I believe. He said that his parents were surprised to find themselves having another child when Krista their oldest was already expecting. They liked the name Anna that Krista named her baby that they used it for their baby when she came."

"Gerren told me once that Grandma died of a broken heart when they couldn't find Annabelle, and grandpa when grandma died." Anna says somberly.

"My mother was young when she became Lady of the land. It was hard for her. Jaylen was more liked, and she felt that the people preferred her. But Jaylen only laughed at her fears and told her that she was going to be a doctor and had no desire to deal with everyone bringing them her troubles. Just the sick ones."

"My father had promised grandma that he would find Annabelle. I guess he did but it didn't do either of them any good." Grey says sadly.

They come to the gate and Grey opens it. The rusty gate groans as if in anguish at moving. Grey is sweating by the time he's done. It's been some time since that gate has been opened.

Anna pushes the chair through the gate and is able to push it a little further but then the trail ends and the terrain is too rocky.

Grey says, "Right. Up we go." And lifts Ari up in his arms. She tries to not like how she feels there but she can't help it.

"You'll have to go round the back now. Once there look for a rose bush. That marks my mother's grave. Dad got sentimental one year and planted it." Ari is starting to get very bitter and so she stops talking altogether.

Right now she really hates her father, more now than ever before. And the bitch queen, she knew who her human family was and knew that they were the ones attacking. That's why she didn't just have her killed like the slaves. She wanted Ari to kill her own family.

Grey comes to the rose bush. "This is my mothers grave so that means your father would be buried here." Ari has Grey put her down and Ari marks out the grave. It's not too hard since the grave had fallen inward when the body decomposed. The Aelven didn't waste time or money on coffins or concrete vaults when they buried their slaves.

Grey nods and radios Taren to bring some men and shovels and the casket they had brought just in case. That reminds Grey, "Why would you think Taren is my brother?" he asks Ari.

Ari shrugs. "Things are different in this reality than in the one you call your dream. In that one Taren was the bastard offspring of your father. If he isn't here I'm sorry to have brought it up."

"We'll take your mother home with us and give her a proper burial." Anna says impulsively. "We only have one casket but there will be a lot of room since they will be just skeletons she can share the casket." Anna will somehow divide the casket so the bones won't get mixed up.

"That's nice Anna. I think she would like that." Ari says with tears in her eyes.

"We'll take you home with us as well." Anna promises. "We won't let your bones stay here."

Ari tries to smile through her tears. "Grey I'm too heavy for you to keep carrying me, you should let me down. Mother won't mind if I sit on her grave. At least she never has before when I came out here to cry." It's one of the places the Aelven won't follow her, they believe the humans that are buried there haunt that area. And perhaps they do, for she has felt comforted as she cried out here on more than one occasion.

"Anna you should get a forensic anthropologist out here and see if you can't reunite some of these other poor people with their loved ones." Ari suggests. She thinks that it's forensic anthropologists that can help.

"I'll do my best to reunite the lost with the living Ari." Anna says. Ari signing the land to her will help the fact that she's one of two or three living relatives is an even stronger help in her keeping the land that Ari is giving her.

Ari finds herself slipping into sleep as the soldiers dig the nearby grave. She dreams that a woman is holding her and smiling at her. She is happy to be going home to her family once more.

Ari doesn't wake up when Grey bends down and lifts her up. He doesn't like how her strength seems to be going so fast. He didn't think the poison would work this fast. Anna assures him that she will stay to oversee the second recovery.

Grey cradles her to him until they get to the wheelchair. Then he reluctantly sets her down in the chair. He's afraid that the bouncing of the terrain will wake her but it doesn't and then he's worried by what that means.

He returns to his tent and orders two meals and an air mattress. He wants to make Ari as comfortable as possible. The guards salute and keep their smirks to themselves. They radio for the things the general asked for.

The general meantime washes up after helping excavate his father's grave he's rather sweaty and dirty. He gives himself a small spit bath but doesn't have the water for a full spit bath. He's not dressed therefore when his door opens and Sheila blows in.

Immediately Grey gets angry, but before he can say anything Sheila goes up to him and kisses him. Grey reacts to her kisses but pushes her away from him. "Get out of here Sheila." Grey is furious that his guards had let her in.

A knock comes and Grey answers. The two soldiers carrying food set the food down as fast as they can and leave. They don't know why Grey is so angry but they don't want to be around when he blows his top.

Before Grey can start chewing out the guards another soldier comes up with the requested air mattress. The soldier sets it up and the sound of the automatic pump makes talking impossible for some time.