Comparisons are easily done
Once you've had a taste of perfection
Like an apple hanging from a tree
I picked the ripest one
I still got the seed
Bran stroked the picture of Leah as the small church slowly emptied. He could feel the heat of his sons standing beside and slightly behind him.
"You're not as devastated as last time," Samuel said softly.
Bran laughed bitterly, "My wolf chose Leah in an attempt to protect my heart." He said, knowing his sons already knew, could understand.
"Because of my Mother," Charles said softly, "You couldn't handle losing someone you loved that much."
Bran looked at his younger son, his smile was sad. "I am afraid I might have misled you both." He murmured, "It was not because of Blue Jay Woman, although I loved her immediately and truly…" He met Charles' eyes, "I hate to say but your mother… she was second-best. Every woman has been second best, even your mother Samuel."
"What do you mean Da? Mother… wasn't she your first wife?" Samuel asked, merely curious, not upset.
Bran shook his head, his gold shot eyes closed. "First wife yes, first woman I loved… no."
Charles- sensing his father needed to talk about it- settled into the first pew. "Tell us," he entreated softly.
Bran crouched on the ground, his eyes sad. "I could not lose another woman I loved because they simply remind me of her… She was… she was… and still is… the woman I love above all others…"
You said move on
Where do I go
I guess second best
Is all I will know
"What happened to her Da?" Asked Samuel softly, sitting tailor style beside his father.
Bran smiled bitterly, "She was attacked by a wild animal. I didn't think it was possible, she was too… pure, too wild. Animals loved her, they were drawn to her. So was I. I couldn't stay away. Like a moth to a flame but she couldn't harm me. I'd just been Changed, I was wild…" His sons stared at him like he'd grown a second head. "Yes, even I had control problems. I was hardly eighteen when I was changed. But she… I saw her and was struck. Instantly my wolf claimed her, and when she was around I had control."
Cause when I'm with him
I am thinking of you
Thinking of you
What you would do if
You were the one
Who was spending the night
"She had a habit of wandering the forests alone, she was the youngest child of eight and indulged. Her parents must have known what she was, how special she was. No animal could be near her and even think a violent thought.
"When she first saw me I was a wolf, she smiled and called to me. She said, 'Come here my friend, if you insist in following me we might as well walk together.' And I came to her." Bran closed his eyes, letting his memories take him away for the first time in centuries.
Oh I wish that I
Was looking into your eyes
You're like an Indian summer
In the middle of winter
Like a hard candy
With a surprise center
"And she knew," Bran murmured unintentionally shifting to Welsh, still lost in memories of warm chocolate eyes and hair as dark as a ravens wing. "She knew what I was. I'd taken to shifting to a man and following her around the small town she lived in. One day, when it was raining like there was no tomorrow, she slipped. I'd been waking only a few stalls behind her and had closed the distance to pass her, I caught her without thinking.
"She just looked me in the eyes and her mouth opened in a little 'o'. She stared at my eyes as I righted her and asked her if she was alright. She ignored my question and said, 'It's you. You're my wolf.'
"I didn't know what to say but she wasn't afraid or disgusted. She just smiled at me. So I told her my name."
How do I get better
Once I've had the best
You said there's
Tons of fish in the water
So the waters I will test
Bran sighed and stood, "I didn't think she could be killed by a beast but I found the place where she had been attacked, her blood was all over the ground and I was so… devastated that I fled. It took me over a century before I could allow myself to love another woman."
"How did you survive?" Charles asked, "What made you keep living if she was your everything?"
Bran smiled, "She would have wanted me to keep living. She delighted in the magic each new day brought and she was devastated by death because it meant an end to the joys of living. She would never have forgiven me if I allowed her death to kill me too. I have to life and love for her. So when I do see her again I can tell her about all the things I have seen, have done." He carelessly wiped away the tear that leaked from his eye and walked away, his back straight and his head high.
He kissed my lips
I taste your mouth
He pulled me in
I was disgusted with myself
That night Bran tossed and turned in his lonely bed, his dreams haunted.
Leah writhed under him, lifting herself to meet his hips, a gasping cry being torn from her lips. But while his body, controlled by the wolf, enjoys the action the man, hiding in the corner of his mind screams his disgust. To the man each cry torn from Leah is warped, becoming higher, sweeter, a sound he could only hear in his fantasies.
The activity ends and Bran kisses is mate but to both the man and the wolf Leah's lips taste of honey and fresh berries, not of mint toothpaste and bitterness.
Bran wakes with a jolt and cries out, her name just on the tip of his tongue. He buries his head in his pillow and takes deep breaths. Not her name, never her name. Saying it would shatter him, he could hardly even think it without feeling the burning pain of his loss as if it were brand-new.
Cause when I'm with him
I am thinking of you
Thinking of you
What you would do if
You were the one
Who was spending the night
Oh I wish that I
Was looking into...
Bran rises the next morning and starts his life anew. A single wolf once more. He cannot help but feel… almost freed by the death of the mate he did not and could not love. No more thinking of a her when it is someone else he is with. No more waking in the night and being sure that she is tucked against him only to find it is another woman.
And most of all, no more looking into eyes that show him a reflection of himself that he can hardly stand. No more seeing a monster in the eyes of others.
You're the best
And yes I do regret
How I could let myself
Let you go
He knew better now. Never let love pass you by. Never stand in the way of it, and never lie about it. Why he could not let his son lie to Mercy, but also why he could not stand in their away.
He closed his eyes and he could still see her, as the sunlight- tinted green because it filtered through the trees to reach them- danced in her raven hair and her soft, sweet lips turned into a beautiful smile. He could hear her soft voice, made for singing, say lovingly, "I will be fine Bran. Go hunt and I shall see you tomorrow."
Now the lesson's learned
I touched it I was burned
Oh I think you should know
He could still smell her blood, hot and tangy as it cooled upon the earth in the middle of the path. He could feel the rage and the hate boil up inside him as he ran, as his heart shattered and his mind became a snarl of pain and despare.
Cause when I'm with him
I am thinking of you
Thinking of you
In that way, laden with the old pain of loss Bran survived fifteen years. Remembering her, letting memories he'd kept hidden for so very long resurface, relishing the pain and the joy those memories brought.
Spending nights alone only physically because she was there, every night, beside him in his memory. Her raven hair splayed across his pillows, her scent of wild things and magic saturated his room.
What you would do if
You were the one
Who was spending the night
Oh I wish that I
Was looking into your eyes
Looking into your eyes
Looking into your eyes
Each morning Bran woke from dreams, dreams he wished could be reality. Dreams where he was not a monster in the mirror, where he saw himself as a good man once more.
Oh won't you walk through
And bust in the door
And take me away
Oh no more mistakes
Cause in your eyes I'd like to stay...
stay....
Bran sat in the forest, a drawing board braced agaist a tree as he sketched the eyes of the woman he loved, had always and would always love.
A cool hand, gentle and soothing brushed along his arm, sliding from bicep to fingers. It drew a trail of bright tingles along its wake, making him feel young again. He felt the same fingers thread with his own. He turned his eyes on the offending hand, knowing that she would not really be there.
Small, pale fingers curled with his long, tanned ones. A small hand partially covered his larger one… His eyes followed the pale, delicate wrist to a small, slightly muscled arm and a delicate shoulder, to a slender and perfect neck, to soft, supple lips curled in the smile that haunted his dreams.
Before he could convince himself it was a waking dream, that he had finally gone mad with age, he pressed his lips to those soft supple ones and tasted their sweetness. He threaded his fingers with soft hair and pulled a small, dainty body against his own.
Samuel stood beside Charles, his hand tight around his brothers. Their heads bowed in grief and pain they stared at their worst nightmare, their father's headstone.
"Where was he?" Charles asked in a voice that betrayed his deep grief.
"In the little clearing he's been going to recently," Samuel answered in the same broken voice.
"What was he doing?"
"Drawing," Samuel answered dully.
"Drawing what?" Samuel just lifted the drawing so his younger brother could see. It was a beautiful sketch, slightly rough, of a smiling woman with dark hair and dark eyes. "I don't know her," Said Charles softly, "Do you?" Samuel shook his head. "So who is she?"
Samuel pointed to the familiar scrawl in the corner of the page.
"Reann," whispered Charles. "It's her, the woman he told us about."
Samuel nodded, "Probably."
"Do you think he's with her? Do you think he's finally happy?"
Samuel smiled sadly and whispered, "God I hope so. He's been pinning for her since Leah's death."
"How did he die?" Charles asked, not sure if he wanted the answer.
"His heart just… stopped," Samuel said softly, "You know those human couples where one spouse outlives the other? And the surviving spouse just… dies. For no reason at all." Charles nodded. "Da died like them, of a broken heart."
Bran dragged his lips from those sweet, perfect ones and smiled down at her. He saw himself reflected in those dark chocolate eyes; he saw the man she loved, the man he was when he was with her, the man he wanted to be, the man he had spent the last eighteen hundred years trying to become.
"Reann," he whispered reverently.
"Welcome home Bran."