Shame

Ruiz and Maria walked right next to each other through the mud. After everything that'd happened, Ruiz finally felt that he could stay. He'd been told multiple times that he could, but now he finally felt it. To him, it had just been "the farm where Jed and Maria live." As he walked down the road, he finally could say that he was going home.

That's what the farm was to him, now. It was home. Sadie, Mintberry, Jed, even señora Bea; they were his family now. He liked the idea that, had it been Sadie or Mint that had been taken, he'd drop everything and go after them without hesitation. Perhaps he loved them more than he had his own family.

"Do you think your dad's back yet?" asked Ruiz. "I don't know how long I was unconscious."

"Maybe?" shrugged Maria. "Y-you were out for th-three d-d-days."

"Three days, plus yesterday, plus the day you were taken, plus the day I came in. He's been gone for almost a week," Ruiz reasoned. "I don't know where your brother worked, but if it's two days of walking, he should be back, three days and he shouldn't be just yet."

"If he's not b-back yet, he won't b-be long."

"Either way, it's pretty clear why I haven't had a good opportunity to meet your brother."

"You might have b-been friends."

Ruiz might have placed his hoof on her shoulder, except that his hooves were covered in mud and her shoulders in bandages. Instead, he placed his head against her, gently nuzzling her shoulder. "If he's anything like the rest of your family, I think we might have."

As they rounded the bend, they looked to the farm, knowing that just past the trees, there would be a large house, a barn, a coop, and a windmill towering over all of it, with the corn and wheat ready for them to harvest and prepare for milling. Despite Ruiz insisting that she could rest and let him handle it, Maria had no intention of just sitting around and waiting for him to do everything. She wanted to help, but also, she didn't want him to suffer more than was necessary.

Unfortunately, there was no wheat to harvest. There was no corn. There wasn't so much as a house to live in. There was no barn, the coop was gone, and all of the crops were either torn up, mulched across the ground, or piled up in a big black heap. What greeted them was not a home, but a big black smear on the landscape, little more than soaked ash and charred wood.

Maria immediately broke into a sprint, running up to the remains of her home. Ruiz took an extra few minutes, having shorter legs and more detrimental injuries. About a dozen charred corpses were scattered around the place, almost all of which had wings and beaks. It wasn't particularly difficult to find the one with a missing claw, as he was right where Ruiz had left him, a spear through his chest. The skeleton on top of him was a hole through his skull, meaning neither of these had moved in a week. Whether Sadie has retrieved the arrow, or it had become mixed with the piles of ash, it was nowhere to be found.

Maria fell to her knees in front of the pile of char that used to be her house. She was beyond words at this point, and Ruiz knew exactly how she felt. Her family was gone, and there was nothing he could do to bring them back. There was very little he could do to comfort her, but he could think of at least two things.

"At least your father's not here," he smiled, wading into the rubble and tossing it aside. His goal in doing so was to find the bodies of Sadie and Mint, that he could bury them next to Cole. "This would have been a lot harder if he was here."

Maria looked at Ruiz as if he'd just dropped a string of offensive slurs. "What'd you just say?"

"I just meant that if your father had been around, it would have been more of a fight," answered Ruiz, pushing the bookshelf out of the way. It tumbled to the ground in a cloud of dust, shattering on impact. "But he probably wouldn't have survived the fire."

Maria was speechless as Ruiz tore apart the remains of the living room and dining room, fully coating himself in charcoal as he moved things around. Most of the upstairs was little more than ash, having been closer to the center of the fire, but there was half of a bed in the middle of the dining room table.

"What are you looking for?" asked Maria. "It's all ash!"

"I need to find your mother and sister," he answered, noticing that her stutter had disappeared. He hoped that meant that her fear was gone. It was, but it had been replaced with something else. "If their bodies aren't here, they'd be in the barn, or in the coop. I'll check there next, but they should be here."

He was actually hoping that he wouldn't find anything; that their bodies wouldn't be in the rubble at all because they'd left before anything had happened. If they were elsewhere, that was a good thing, probably. They had gone somewhere safe. There was the distinct possibility that they'd been abducted and taken somewhere, but he'd like to exhaust all of the other options, first. They went to stay with friends, or they'd cut across country into town, or they were camping nearby in some out-of-the way place. He wasn't ready to give up.

"It was you," said Maria flatly. "You did this."

Ruiz stopped digging and turned to Maria. "Señorita?"

"This is what my dad warned me about," she scowled, standing up. "He said that you were after me, and that you'd do everything you could to take me."

"Señorita..."

"You're glad my dad's gone, you seem dead set on showing me the bodies of my mother and sister, and with my home gone, you're all I have left. And that's exactly what you wanted."

As she picked up a piece of wood and raised it over her head, she approached. Ruiz stopped looking and backed away. "You misunderstand, señorita," he said, looking up at her. "I would nev--" he ducked as she swung the wood at him.

"And all of this time, I had this feeling of something wrong with you, that there was something dangerous about you, and that I should keep my distance! I should have trusted it!" She swung again, barely missing him.

"I only wanted to keep you safe, señorita. Please, I--"

"Oh, I know!" she shouted. "That's why you left my family to die!"

He knew he couldn't dodge forever. The next blow landed squarely on the side of his chest. The impact was enough to break the wooden stick, having been made brittle by the burning. As she tried to find a new one, he bolted as fast as he could, not stopping until he was sure she wasn't following him.

He was in tears by now. All he had wanted was to keep her spirits up. Her father was probably still alive. Her mother and sister may have escaped the blaze and the gryphons. Even if he had found them dead, he would have gladly set up a funeral service to honor their memory.

What hurt most of all was that she blamed him. Not because such a claim was unheard of, but because she had been so very keen on not blaming him before. He'd convinced himself that she was right about him not being responsible for his family's deaths. Now she blamed him for the deaths of her family, and the worst of it was, she was right. Sadie had wanted him to stay, to wait for Jed to come back. To keep her and Mint safe. He'd failed in doing so, and that's something that Jed would agree with.

He didn't want to hurt her anymore. That much, he knew for certain. He didn't want her to be in any more hardships. Even if she wouldn't believe it, he loved her. And right now, what was best for her was that he left. If he stayed, he would be a constant reminder of the fact that her home was destroyed. After all, it was all a result of his choice to leave the farm unprotected.

He couldn't go back to town; he'd just run into her again. She would have to go somewhere, and would likely end up bunking with Meteor. She was her best friend; she'd know what to do.

With one final look back at the plot of land where the farm used to be, Ruiz turned and headed north. Nothing remained for him here. The one good thing in his life, the mare who'd made his days worth living, was sickened by his presence. It was time to leave. If she ever forgave him, he would like to return, but at this point, it would just result in his death, which was far too lenient a fate for the likes of him.