Story The Garden

St. Clover

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The old house, with its wildly overgrown garden, was silent, secretive, and patient. It waited, as it always had, for decades in hopes someone would come along and give it purpose again. Purpose beyond playing host to the families of mice and raccoons that called its cellar and rafters home. It had a history to it, woven into its well-worn floors and faded wallpaper, its cracked and dry fountain, and most of all into the once vibrant garden, now filled with weeds and wild shrubs. But none of that mattered anymore, not since the old family left. Who they had been, and why they had left was a mystery to most folk of today. No one could recall the faces of the elderly couple that had built the house virtually by hand, or the voices of their grandchildren, six in number, that filled the halls with their laughter.

No one, at least, save for the last living friend the old couple had before their passing.

Countess Greyscale walked along the stone pathway, leading in from the squealing hinged gate. Her footsteps were quiet in the warm spring air, soft clicks of silver claws on well-worn granite stepping stones. The yellow sun dress she wore fluttered as a cool breeze blew through the garden, sending ripples through the dense grass and weeds all around her. In the distance the gate squealed mournfully, crying out for help its hinges desperately required. It would get help soon, she thought to herself.

She continued her way through the garden towards the center, where the fountain stood. Along the way, she passed by the old gazebo, where the distant sounds of laughter replayed in her mind. She'd spent countless afternoons there in her youth, playing with the old couple's grandchildren. Even now she could see them all gathered around the family pet, brushing and combing its shaggy fur and giving it more love than some people ever got in their lives.

More memories came to life as she found herself strolling by the hedge maze the walkway curved around, a once well-maintained network of bushes now reduced to a half-dead shell of its former self. Greyscale found her eyes lingering on it as she passed by, seeing her younger self peeking out from the top of the far wall of the maze. She'd always cheated whenever they played tag in there, something she never once apologized for. How was it her fault her friends weren't born with wings?

She smiled sadly at that memory, which prompted her feet to move quickly along the path.

Her destination came into view soon enough, through an iron arch once decorated with several brilliantly colored roses that curled their way up its pristine form. Now, even the roses had faded away into the world of memories. Not for long, the Countess reminded herself as she walked under the archway and into the center of the garden.

Transitioning from granite to once finely polished, now faded and cracked, marble, the walkway spread out into an expansive courtyard dominated in the center by a fountain bearing the statue of a mighty dragon rearing up on its hind legs. Water once poured from the dragon's mouth, falling down into a bowl filled with silver coins before spilling out into the spring beneath it. The statue had been a gift, the elderly couple's tribute to their once closest friend. A friend that they in their time, and now in today, the Countess missed dearly.

She made her way over to the fountain and stood before the mighty stone dragon, hidden by the shadow it cast in the early evening sun. Her eyes traced a line from the bowl upwards, following the imaginary trail of water up to its barely opened mouth. The wind had ceased its blowing, giving the garden the moment of silence it was owed. A moment for the memory of the old couple, who sat buried beneath their favorite tree in the gardens for nearly close to three centuries now. For their grandchildren, who rested in their own family crypt just beyond the garden walls, along with their children, and their children's children.

And for her father, who even now watched over his only child nearly two centuries later with eyes of stone.

For the first time in almost fifty years, the Countess felt tears rolling down her cheeks. She couldn't help it. Her emotions were something she kept in check in front of others, the image she had built over the centuries a necessary mask to keep herself distanced from the public. To anyone but her closest friends, she was the calm, stoic, always in control Countess Emma Von Greyscale, heiress to one of the richest estates outside of the Dragon Empire of Tel'Nar.

But this place reminded her that she wasn't just the famous Countess Greyscale. Before the politics, before the inheritance, before the worries of nobility and the stresses of the modern era, before all of it, she was just Emma Greyscale.

And Emma Greyscale was just a girl who dearly wished to see her friends once more, to tell them how much she missed them, and to apologize for not being there in their final days.

Looking into the dragon's eyes, Emma felt the sickening guilt rise up in her throat like a sort of bile. She blamed herself for not coming back here sooner. She'd had ample time to over the years, more than enough chances to slip away for awhile and see the what had become of the place. Who knows, she thought bitterly, if she hadn't put it off for so long, she might have seen her friends one last time before they passed away. She tried to find excuses, reasons for all but abandoning her childhood compatriots after their last meeting, shortly after their grandparent's death. But nothing came to mind. Nothing could ease the pain she felt growing in her chest, because she knew that's what she had done.

She'd allowed herself to forget about them, abandoning much of her old life after taking her father's place as head of the Greyscale Estate.

Wandering around to the far side of the courtyard, to a bench she sat in often during her visits to the garden, she wondered if that was why she had really come back. If purchasing this place and setting about restoring it was really just an attempt at trying to make amends for her negligence. A quiet sigh escaped her lips as she sat herself down onto the bench, curling her tail around her feet and wrapping her wings around herself. She felt cold and alone. Even the warm sun didn't help now.

Emma sat there in the garden for nearly an hour before moving. Sadness and guilt rooted her in place like heavy chains, weighing her down and sapping any strength she had to move. She would have stayed that way for all eternity had it not been for a distant thunderclap that filled the air without warning, coming from the far side of the garden. She was so startled she nearly fell off of the bench, scrambling to grab hold of its side as she tried to figure out what was going on.

Her heart was racing and her breath quickened as her silver eyes scanned the courtyard, looking for anything that might have tried taking advantage of her moment of weakness. She had many enemies, and despite her reputation, some were bold enough to try their hand at taking her life on occasion. She saw nothing at first, then, just as she began to stand up, something caught her attention.

Her father began to drool water from his snout for the first time in over a hundred years.

She stared long and hard at the statue as it continued to spit up water into its bowl, gradually filling it back up. Confusion filled her mind as she tried to form a reason why this was happening, and how it connected to the mysterious explosion in the distance. It wasn't until she heard distinct coughing that she understood what'd happened.

On the far side of the courtyard, a pair of youngsters appeared from one of the other three entrances to the garden's center. Both of them, a boy and a girl, were covered in a black layer of something that clung to their skin and scales like mud. The girl carried a wrench in her hand, which was bent and scorched at its head. She coughed and shook her head, sending a cloud of dust from her fiery red hair. In many ways, she resembled Emma, her forearms and legs covered with scales and ending in claws, and a tail swishing idly behind her. Her outfit set her apart, however. A mithril crop top and work shorts sporting a tool belt marked her as the source of the explosion.

And the boy, a head taller than her and dressed in a ridiculously gaudy mid-eastern robe and golden anklets, was her accomplice. He carried a scorched toolbox in his claws, and a tiny flame still burned on one of his horns, his exasperated expression matching the thoughts surely running through his head.

"What was that?" Emma found herself yelling over to them, finding her voice at last.

"We kinda-" the girl began to say, pausing to cough up a cloud of black smoke. "-Oh gods, had a little problem with the pump house's main engine! Nothing to worry about, though, we got it fixed!"

"You call hitting it till it blows up in our faces getting it fixed?" the boy beside her grunted, scowling.

"Percussive maintenance."

Emma's shoulders slumped at their explanation, feeling all the worry drain from her along with her will to fight. She flopped back onto the bench. The pair joined a moment later, with the girl dropping down beside her while the boy threw the toolbox on the ground and crashed onto the armrest.

"You two are going to be the death of me one of these days," Emma found herself saying as she pinched the bridge of her nose, clenching her eyes shut. She desperately wished they'd left her to her penance, it was so much easier to deal with.

The girl, Sparks, merely shrugged at the prediction. "Not much I can do about that. After all, you're the one that sought us out, remember?"

Something she was now regretting. "Yes, yes I know. But that's only because I didn't trust the restoration of this property... Home, to anyone else. You two were the best I could find, and the only ones I know for a fact will treat this place with the care it deserves."

The boy, Zefel, crossed his arms and surveyed the courtyard. He whistled when he saw the statue of her father, nodding in appreciation. "This sure was a beauty in its heyday," he remarked. "Marble flooring, bushes are arranged down to the centimeter, even the pump house was sturdier than normal. The main house was filled with oak and there's silver just about everywhere. Crystal glass panes, gold doorknobs, an ivory chess board in the parlor..." He hummed to himself at the thought of the sheer value of the contents of the ground, and the prestige of the house as a whole.

Despite her best efforts to return to her prior disposition, Emma found herself chuckling at the boy's antics. She looked up at the fountain and into her father's eyes. She wondered what he would think of her now. Employing a pair of red half dragons at the cost of a small fortune to help restore her old childhood haunt. Would he approve? She wasn't sure he would entirely, but she knew he would've gone along with it anyway. He always knew she had a mind for wise business decisions. Even if those decisions were purely selfish, just like a dragon's.

She smiled, then laughed for the first time in a long time.

"Yes, Zefel. You're right, it is a beauty, isn't it?" she asked. "And once we're finished, it'll be all the more so!"

By the time night fell and they left the garden to head home for the night, Emma had her answer from her own question earlier. As she paused by the squealing gate and asked Sparks to tend to it, she cast one final look back over the garden. Restoring this place really was an attempt to make up for her past mistakes. But, she realized, as the lights around her father's statue lit up in the distance, she was okay with that. Because she was still human, if only half, and thus prone to mistakes every now and then. For the first time in a long time, she was glad she could make those mistakes. It made fixing them and doing better the next time around all the more meaningful. It made them actually stand for something. It made her realize what really mattered.

Friends, Sparks throwing the empty can of lubricant at Zefel's head and their bickering, and family, her father's distant roar carried by the cool spring night's wind.

She smiled softly, and closed the gate without a sound, giving the garden its silence back until the next time she would return to make new memories with those she would never let go of for anything.
 

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