Where The Wind Don't Change
Three weeks later
The road stretched into oblivion before them, Beth dragging her cowboy boots across the baking ground, each step feeling like it was going to be her last. Her desire to help Noah get home had led to a dead end. The walled community they'd gambled everything upon had been a losing hand. They'd lost Tyreese at Richmond, burying him by the side of the road, his beanie hat left hanging on the edge of a spade left embedded in the earth, forming a makeshift marker.
The image was engraved on her mind, representing all that they'd risked, summing up her sins. Richmond was just another pit-stop in her road to ruin, dragging the others down into the depths of hell with her. Where she went, they followed, like Daryl following a black car with a white cross into the darkness. And so they staggered on, the sun beating down on their bare heads, Judith's reedy wail shattering the silence into smithereens.
"Beth."
She turned around, only to see Rick coming towards her, his eyes startlingly blue against the backdrop of his weathered face, a face rendered almost unrecognizable by his wild beard. His gaze met and held hers, and unbidden she remembered the flash of silver, her father falling, their world falling with him.
"You can come back from this," Rick said quietly, "you have to."
But Beth just focused on the far horizon, his words spilling like her father's blood on barren ground. There were just some things you couldn't come back from.
Beth opened the boot of the car, only to freeze. She stood there, staring down at herself, recognizing the long pale hair and bound wrists with an almost detached wonder. The Walker's white gaze locked with hers almost imploringly, making Beth muse if she'd done the same thing, silently pleading with her captors to let her go, I promise I won't tell anyone. But there'd been nobody to tell, nobody to run to, only ghosts.
She couldn't remember much of the night she'd been taken. Sometimes she dreamt of the shadowy silhouettes of the gravestones against the black velvet backdrop of night. Or the uneven beat of her feet over the damp grass. Daryl's name on her lips, a wordless cry nobody heard or heeded. The screech of a car's wheels. Waking up to a strange ceiling instead of the sky. But she didn't need to remember; not now.
That Beth was now before her, bound and gagged, bundled into the boot of a car, taken from all that she had left. The only difference between them was that she was still here, defiantly alive. Her heart was broken, but it still beat its steady rhythm all the same. Without a word, she pulled out her knife, before putting herself down. But there was no purging of her pain, only a dull acceptance of its existence.
Slamming the boot down, entombing her other self, Beth turned away from the car, only to see Daryl standing a few feet away, his hooded stare striking her like a snake. She held her ground, forcing him to look away, Beth watching as he then headed into the woods, the sight of his hunched shoulders setting off her conscience like a spark to tinder. But she crushed it down, refusing to feel, to face what she was becoming. But deep down she knew she was leaving herself behind in the boot of that car, Beth dying even as she lived.
Beth leaned her head back against the wall, the planks of wood digging into her spine, the rain beating out a staccato rhythm upon the barn roof. The others were huddled around the dying fire, the flickering flames painting shadows across their pale faces. She glanced up as Daryl came over, his every footstep measured, echoing oddly through the still air.
"Hey," he said quietly, carefully setting down his crossbow against the wall, along with his battered canvas bag, before sitting down beside her, their elbows brushing accidentally, making Beth edge away from him.
"Hey," Beth said offhandedly, lips thinning.
"Mebbe you should try an' get sum shut-eye," Daryl suggested gruffly, "gonna be a long walk tomorra."
"I'm not tired," Beth snapped, belying the dark circles beneath her eyes.
"Well, I am," Daryl retorted, "so shut your goddamn smart mouth." With that, he turned and lay down on the ground, curling up on his side. Uneasy, Beth studied him for a moment, before doing suddenly the same, so they were face to face, close enough for Beth to see the smoky flecks in Daryl's grey eyes, her fingers fighting the urge to trace the broken outline of his harsh features.
Since hitting the road, somehow, through hook or crook, Daryl would end up by her side, and she would always find herself by his, something drawing them together despite everything, something that had started back in that candle-lit kitchen so long ago. But as night fell, Beth would begin to fall too, the darkness giving way to dreams that burned the dead heart out of her. But Daryl would throw himself into the fray after her, dragging her from her demons, waking her up with brutal words, one time slapping her into semblance.
Beth had struck him, pummeling him with her fists, Daryl letting her, knowing she needed this. It was Beth's nature to fight back, and when she couldn't, when she was cornered and corralled, it did something to her, bringing her to the brink of breaking. Under that sweet surface was a storm ready to rain hell down on everyone. As they lay there together, inches apart but worlds away, Beth remembered that night, the rage that had roared through her, Daryl weathering her storm.
"You's tough Beth," Daryl then said slowly, his gaze searching her scarred face, "tougher than elephan's hide, I's say."
Beth just scoffed, remembering her useless tears. I don't cry anymore, Daryl. But inside she wept, her tears a torrent, drowning her.
"You are," Daryl said firmly, "j'st like your dad. You're a goddamn chip off the ole block, kid, ain't no point in denyin' it."
Beth's lips trembled at this, Daryl instantly regretting his words, wishing he could take them back. He was trying to bolster Beth up, not break her. Exhaling sharply, he sat up, reaching for his rough canvas bag, curiosity catching Beth despite herself. "What you doin'?" she asked, brow furrowing slightly.
"I's... I's got somethin' for ya," Daryl said uneasily, rummaging through the canvas bag, the heat beginning to build up along the back of his neck.
"What, a present?" Beth said, taken aback, sitting up in shock.
"Somethin' like tha'," Daryl said evasively, his fingers closing around what he had been trying to find. Half turning away from Beth, he handed it over to her, unable to meet her eyes, half wondering at himself at what he was doing.
Beth swallowed hard, battling the tears that had suddenly sprung to her eyes. "It's... it's beautiful," she said quietly, holding the battered music-box between her hands, before gently opening the lid, only to find a broken ballerina perched precariously on its stand.
"It – it plays," Daryl said awkwardly, shaking back his shaggy hair, the tips of his ears turning red, "gearbox had some grit in it."
Wordlessly, Beth wound it up, watching with almost wide-eyed wonder as the ballerina began to dance with broken grace, the fractured melody filling the air. Daryl watched Beth's face in turn, all his cracked heart had secretly begun to hope for. Beth glanced up, feeling the full weight of his stare, only to see what might save her, a heart hers for the taking if she just reached out –
"Don't play that damned thin' all night," Daryl said roughly, lying back down, "some of us have work in the mornin'."
"Yes, Mr. Dixon," Beth sing-songed sarcastically, before carefully closing the lid, abruptly cutting the music off. She lay down beside Daryl again, clutching the music-box in her hand, her hope fading with the last of the light.
I had a one-way ticket to a place where all the demons go
Where the wind don't change
And nothing in the ground can ever grow
No hope, just lies
And you're taught to cry in your pillow
But I'll survive...