We came to that magnificent wall of red and white roses.
"Before you answer…" He pulled back the veil of roses, to reveal a stone tombstone with the name Meryl Stryfe and two dates. I leaned down on my knees and sat on my ankles to examine it. The only ornamentation on the simple block of stone was pale moss crawling up the sides.
"She worked for years, wading through paperwork and red tape to ensure that this land would never be claimed by anyone besides our family. She helped us lay brick and tile, did plumbing and helped construct the outer wall when she was the human equivalent of 8 months pregnant. While early days are always hard, your life here, even with its advantages will be no easier.
"Trouble has always found us like sand flies find honey. If there is an angry man outside our walls an angry mob will follow. If there is a bandit looking for a tribute we will not give, his clan cannot be far behind. The days there are no bullets flying, there will stone cold silence that has driven others mad in a matter of weeks. If you need to leave this place, you will only do so with my brother. You will be treated with a mixture of suspicion, forced politeness and disgust no matter how far away from our homestead you both stray. You may have experienced some of this tracking my brother down, but once you commit yourself to us, you will experience it for the rest of your life. This is the price that humans… any humans, pay for traveling with our clan. Most consider it quite steep."
I ran my fingertips with brief reverence over the cool stone before standing up. I looked around the quiet garden, up at the blazing hot sun that was turning everything beyond these walls further and further into desert.
"It won't be a problem."
"You seem certain."
I realized, for the first time in my life, I was. "I walked back into hell to find Vash again, I can handle a little inconvenience."
He smiled. "Good."
"Knives." Vash said angry with a shaking voice.
Knives and I both turned and looked. Vash was still dressed in his PJs, his hair down and sticking out in different directions. His eyes showed pin-point pupils. There was a blanket wrapped around his shoulders.
Knives leaned in and pressed his forehead against his brother's. "Shh…" he murmured.
"I meant it…" Vash murmured, "I meant every word."
"It's all right." He looked at me. "Chapel, take his hands."
I held out my open palms, and Vash forced his fists open, letting the blanket slip off his shoulders. His real hand was shaking and felt cold to the touch. Knives' hand pressed against the back of my head and pressed my forehead where his and Vash's met. It was odd as hell looking at everyone close up like that, eyeball to eyeball. Knives and Vash had the clearest color in both their eyes. They looked like twins this close. You'd never see it from a distance.
"My terms still aren't a problem, are they Chapel?'"
"No."
"Good. And you, Brother?"
"Of… Of course not."
"Mmm." Knives muttered. He placed a hand against the back of both of our heads, and pulled away, while he held us together touching forehead to forehead.
He closed his eyes briefly, and then released us. "There. Now get the hell off my property."
He walked, back straight as an arrow, into the house, happily whistling something that sounded like the old colonist song 'Sound Life.' Vash was still looking at our hands, where they hovered clasped together.
As the screen door on Knives' porch swung close Vash finally looked up at me. Tears were pouring down his face.
"You're sure?' he asked
"I've made my decision." The finality of those words rung true. This was it. This was what I wanted. "Should we… maybe… move?" I asked, sure but not really sure about what had just happened with Knives. Vash broke down laughing as he began pulling us back to the section of the courtyard in front of his house.
We ended up in a pile in front of his steps, rolling on the ground unable to stop laughing about a morbid joke that had never been voiced.
In that moment, somewhere in the back of my mind the final breath of a man in great agony sounded alone in a quiet holy place. An old life gone with nothing lost but the pain he never knew he could stop carrying.
THE END
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