Chapter Eleven
Home Again
"I never thought we'd be back here again."
"Well, here we are." announced Seaweed. "Home again."
"Do my eyes deceive me!" cried a voice on shore. Flapping towards Olive Branch and Seaweed was a dove.
"Bird!" Olive Branch and Seaweed cried. It was a tearful reunion, one with both sides trying to tell the stories they had missed out over the years.
"After the storm, when the both of you were gone, I feared the worst." Bird said. "I blamed myself for not warning you again of the storm."
"Oh, Bird." said Olive Branch. "Leaving that dreadful village and it's villagers was the best decision of my life."
"The village is gone." Bird said. "It didn't survive the fire."
"Athena?" Seaweed asked.
"Who knows?" Bird shrugged. "At any rate, the wild had reclaimed it as its own." Olive Branch began to speak up to ask another question, but Bird shook his head. "No, no more sad things." He told them.
"I do believe we've missed a few years of gossip." Seaweed told Bird. "What, pray tell, ever happened to that swan from a few years back?"
"Oh my goodness, so-" Olive Branch laughed as the boys began to talk, catching up on the things they had missed.
It felt good to be home again.
She looked around. She saw the trees, the deer, the bears, the wolves, the wild. Home was different. She was different. She felt the breeze on her and smelled the salt-air. She heard the tune of a song Athena had once sung for her.
Oh below the olive tree
There was a piece of seaweed
High above flew a bird
A very special type of dov e
The olive tree produced no fruit
The seaweed stuck on the tree
But lo from the sea there came a storm
That sent the seaweed back home
The olive branch produced some fruit
But at what price, who can say?
The branch then fell into the sea below
A bird flew high above
And in the sea, they met again
Olive Branch and Seaweed
And their friend Bird the dove