Chapter 1.
Purpose. (July, 1993)
He couldn't feel the cold anymore. If he had been in a better condition, he could have tolerated it. But the cold water hit you like a thousand needles at first, but it wasn't long before your body was numb with cold. His fur had provided some protection at first, but now that was so thoroughly soaked that it was just dead weight, threatening to drag him down. He felt like he might die. Then and there.
But he had a purpose.
He kicked his numb paws in the waves, fighting for shore. He could see it now. A distant dark line above the steely water. So close. He could make it. He had to make it. He had a purpose.
He's at Hogwarts.
His legs were too numb to move. All of his joints ached with cold and use.
But he was so close!
The cold took him. The waves tossed him around, and he was too weak to fight it. His flicked toward the shoreline, but now it looked so far. So far away.
His vision blurred, and the world dimmed away. Just before he drifted away, he felt his nose slip under the water...
Ruth sat cross legged on a small blanket, a paperback novel in her hand. She plucked the stubby pencil from behind her ear, underlined a few words, and made a note in the margin. She sighed, and sat the book down. She liked to pretend it was research, these little reading sessions. Truth was, she was blocked. Complete and total writer's block. She'd managed one children's book, with very modest success, but since then she'd not written anything printable. Well, anything her editor thought was printable, at least.
The air smelled salty, with just a faint hint of wood smoke. The breeze carried a chill from the north, but Ruth had the good sense to layer up before she came out. Unbothered, she gazed at the waves. She found the foam patterns soothing.
There was something big and black floating on the water. "Ugh," she muttered. "I hate it when people dump their garbage out here." It was common enough to find black bags full of cans and food wrappers floating on the water. Such a beautiful shoreline, and some lazy tourists on boats want to clutter it up with their trash? Ruth couldn't understand it.
Like her mother, Ruth kept a pair of work gloves in her car for just such an occasion. She stood, plucking the pencil from behind her ear. She fumbled for her keys in her skirt pocket, and managed to open up the back of the hatchback. She tossed the little book and pencil down and groped around amid the debris of the car for her gloves. Tugging them on, she turned back to the beach.
She didn't see the trash floating on the waves anymore; it must have washed up somewhere. This particular section of the shore was rather rocky. No doubt the bag had caught between a couple of the boulders. The tide was just starting to come in, so the waves weren't too high yet.
She walked along the shore until she spotted the trash. It was lying on a little ridge below the rocks. If she lay flat on her belly, she could just reach it.
When her hands closed around the bag, she felt a sudden surge of adrenaline. It wasn't a trash bag at all-it was a dead dog.
"Poor fellow," she sighed under her breath. She was a dog lover at heart. And such a big dog! He must have fallen off of someone's boat. 'Or been pushed,' she thought sadly.
It was hard for her to heft him back onto the rocks. He was very thin, she realized; his skin felt like a loose sack around some sort of skeleton. Still, the water and salt weighed him down. 'No wonder he drowned, poor thing,' she thought. She'd take him down to the vets, and have him buried properly. They had a plot of land there for that sort of thing.
She managed to tug him, and held him like a baby, his head on her shoulder. Salt water drenched her pink sweater and ran down her skirt. She turned back toward the hatchback, but didn't make it more than a meter before she stopped suddenly.
The dog was breathing.
She could just feel his ribs moving in and out as he whined in a few breaths. "Poor fellow!" she said again, running toward her blanket. She wrapped the dog up in it, and ran to the car. She threw open the passenger door and lay the dog down on the seat. As she ran around the back, she snatched the keys from where she had left them dangling from the trunk lid. She slammed her own door and drove off quickly. She had to get him to a vet quickly, and the village was quite a way off.
She had a purpose.
Dr. Arthur scratched his nose. "He's a very lucky fellow, Ruth. If you hadn't found him, he probably would have died of exposure. The amount of salt water he swallowed-well, let's just say the poor fellow's had a long swim."
Ruth shook her head. "The way people treat innocent animals!"
Dr. Arthur nodded and scratched his nose again. "We're going to keep him here for a few days, just to make sure he pulls through. I'll give you a list of things you'll need, and then you can pop round to pick him up on... Oh, let's say Thursday."
"Pick him up?" Ruth raised an eyebrow. "You want me to-to keep him?" she stammered.
Dr. Arthur patted her damp, salty army. "Ruthie, the whole village knows you're lonely. A dog will give you some company." He winked at her. "Anyway, I'd say fate has given him to you, wouldn't you?"
Ruth nodded, slowly. "I'll think about it."
As she left the office later with a list of dog-keeping essentials, she decided to give her mum a call. She hadn't talked to her in a while.
When he woke up, every joint, every muscle hurt. His jaw ached, and his eyes were watering. He was nauseous and hungry at the same time. In short, he wished he were still asleep.
He lifted his head, and sniffed the air. His nose was more sensitive in this form. He smelled the faint odor of other dogs, medicines, some farm animals, and the rather pungent odor of an incontinent cat. The room was dim and his eyes were watering, but he was fairly sure that this was a veterinarian's back room.
He stood up on shaky legs, sending aches up into his back. He'd been lying on a wool blanket in a basket, far comfier than his previous accommodations. Nature was calling. Some thoughtful person seemed to have stacked some newspapers in the corner for this purpose.
As he limped back to the bed, the door swung open. "Here now, look who's awake?" It was a rather stout, balding man in a wool vest. The vet. He bent down and patted the dog's head. "You're a lucky boy. Such a resilient fellow. Lucky the Murray girl found you." He helped the dog back to the basket, and plucked a needle off of a nearby shelf. He ripped off the plastic wrapper, and filled it with some sort of medicine. Checking the dosage, he leaned down and patted the dog's back leg. "You won't feel a thing, fella." With all the other aching, he barely felt the pinprick.
As he drifted off to sleep, he heard the doctor murmuring something soothing.
Ruth arrived at Dr. Arthur's door at precisely 4:30 on Thursday afternoon. She picked up the huge black dog, and, to her surprise, he limped slowly into her car, without needing help.
"What are you going to call him?" the vet asked.
Ruth shrugged. "Such a big dog! He needs a regal name, doesn't he?"
Dr. Arthur grinned. "How about Caesar?"
The dog snorted.
"He doesn't seem to like that very much," Ruth chuckled. "I suppose his name will just present itself, eventually. For now, I'll just call him Dog."
Ruth seemed almost apologetic when they arrived at her cottage. It was a cottage in name, only really. It had three rooms, altogether: a kitchen/living room, bedroom, and tiny bath. The walled garden was overgrown in the corners and little more than packed dirt in the center. To the dog, it looked like paradise.
Ruth helped him out of the car, and he managed to limp into the main room. He collapsed on the floor there, on a little rug beside a rather old chair.
Overall, his recovery happened fairly quickly. Ruth took excellent care of him, bathing him once a week, keeping him well fed (he was so hungry, he didn't even mind dog food for a while), and taking him on plenty of walks when he was well enough. His strength returned, gradually, even if he still couldn't sleep more than a few hours without waking up wracked by nightmares. It was better than what he had expected. Still, he wished he could have seen the boy before...
He was rather fond of Ruth as well. She was fairly young. He found her to be a quiet, lonely, bookish girl. She spent most of the day either reading in the garden, or hammering away on an old typewriter that seemed to be missing several of its vowels, which she had to go back and add by hand at the end of every page. She was tall, and slender in a malnourished way. She had a ponytail of fluffy brown hair and bright eyes that sparkled behind her glasses. She liked to laugh, he thought, but her lack of company made it hard for her to have much to laugh at. As he got better, he liked to make her laugh.
He had arrived there in the heat of summer. When September rolled around, he knew he was going to have to leave Ruth soon. Fortunately, Ruth turned out to be a teacher at the village school, a fact which gave the dog a good opportunity to attend to another important part of his recovery...
Purpose. (July, 1993)
He couldn't feel the cold anymore. If he had been in a better condition, he could have tolerated it. But the cold water hit you like a thousand needles at first, but it wasn't long before your body was numb with cold. His fur had provided some protection at first, but now that was so thoroughly soaked that it was just dead weight, threatening to drag him down. He felt like he might die. Then and there.
But he had a purpose.
He kicked his numb paws in the waves, fighting for shore. He could see it now. A distant dark line above the steely water. So close. He could make it. He had to make it. He had a purpose.
He's at Hogwarts.
His legs were too numb to move. All of his joints ached with cold and use.
But he was so close!
The cold took him. The waves tossed him around, and he was too weak to fight it. His flicked toward the shoreline, but now it looked so far. So far away.
His vision blurred, and the world dimmed away. Just before he drifted away, he felt his nose slip under the water...
Ruth sat cross legged on a small blanket, a paperback novel in her hand. She plucked the stubby pencil from behind her ear, underlined a few words, and made a note in the margin. She sighed, and sat the book down. She liked to pretend it was research, these little reading sessions. Truth was, she was blocked. Complete and total writer's block. She'd managed one children's book, with very modest success, but since then she'd not written anything printable. Well, anything her editor thought was printable, at least.
The air smelled salty, with just a faint hint of wood smoke. The breeze carried a chill from the north, but Ruth had the good sense to layer up before she came out. Unbothered, she gazed at the waves. She found the foam patterns soothing.
There was something big and black floating on the water. "Ugh," she muttered. "I hate it when people dump their garbage out here." It was common enough to find black bags full of cans and food wrappers floating on the water. Such a beautiful shoreline, and some lazy tourists on boats want to clutter it up with their trash? Ruth couldn't understand it.
Like her mother, Ruth kept a pair of work gloves in her car for just such an occasion. She stood, plucking the pencil from behind her ear. She fumbled for her keys in her skirt pocket, and managed to open up the back of the hatchback. She tossed the little book and pencil down and groped around amid the debris of the car for her gloves. Tugging them on, she turned back to the beach.
She didn't see the trash floating on the waves anymore; it must have washed up somewhere. This particular section of the shore was rather rocky. No doubt the bag had caught between a couple of the boulders. The tide was just starting to come in, so the waves weren't too high yet.
She walked along the shore until she spotted the trash. It was lying on a little ridge below the rocks. If she lay flat on her belly, she could just reach it.
When her hands closed around the bag, she felt a sudden surge of adrenaline. It wasn't a trash bag at all-it was a dead dog.
"Poor fellow," she sighed under her breath. She was a dog lover at heart. And such a big dog! He must have fallen off of someone's boat. 'Or been pushed,' she thought sadly.
It was hard for her to heft him back onto the rocks. He was very thin, she realized; his skin felt like a loose sack around some sort of skeleton. Still, the water and salt weighed him down. 'No wonder he drowned, poor thing,' she thought. She'd take him down to the vets, and have him buried properly. They had a plot of land there for that sort of thing.
She managed to tug him, and held him like a baby, his head on her shoulder. Salt water drenched her pink sweater and ran down her skirt. She turned back toward the hatchback, but didn't make it more than a meter before she stopped suddenly.
The dog was breathing.
She could just feel his ribs moving in and out as he whined in a few breaths. "Poor fellow!" she said again, running toward her blanket. She wrapped the dog up in it, and ran to the car. She threw open the passenger door and lay the dog down on the seat. As she ran around the back, she snatched the keys from where she had left them dangling from the trunk lid. She slammed her own door and drove off quickly. She had to get him to a vet quickly, and the village was quite a way off.
She had a purpose.
Dr. Arthur scratched his nose. "He's a very lucky fellow, Ruth. If you hadn't found him, he probably would have died of exposure. The amount of salt water he swallowed-well, let's just say the poor fellow's had a long swim."
Ruth shook her head. "The way people treat innocent animals!"
Dr. Arthur nodded and scratched his nose again. "We're going to keep him here for a few days, just to make sure he pulls through. I'll give you a list of things you'll need, and then you can pop round to pick him up on... Oh, let's say Thursday."
"Pick him up?" Ruth raised an eyebrow. "You want me to-to keep him?" she stammered.
Dr. Arthur patted her damp, salty army. "Ruthie, the whole village knows you're lonely. A dog will give you some company." He winked at her. "Anyway, I'd say fate has given him to you, wouldn't you?"
Ruth nodded, slowly. "I'll think about it."
As she left the office later with a list of dog-keeping essentials, she decided to give her mum a call. She hadn't talked to her in a while.
When he woke up, every joint, every muscle hurt. His jaw ached, and his eyes were watering. He was nauseous and hungry at the same time. In short, he wished he were still asleep.
He lifted his head, and sniffed the air. His nose was more sensitive in this form. He smelled the faint odor of other dogs, medicines, some farm animals, and the rather pungent odor of an incontinent cat. The room was dim and his eyes were watering, but he was fairly sure that this was a veterinarian's back room.
He stood up on shaky legs, sending aches up into his back. He'd been lying on a wool blanket in a basket, far comfier than his previous accommodations. Nature was calling. Some thoughtful person seemed to have stacked some newspapers in the corner for this purpose.
As he limped back to the bed, the door swung open. "Here now, look who's awake?" It was a rather stout, balding man in a wool vest. The vet. He bent down and patted the dog's head. "You're a lucky boy. Such a resilient fellow. Lucky the Murray girl found you." He helped the dog back to the basket, and plucked a needle off of a nearby shelf. He ripped off the plastic wrapper, and filled it with some sort of medicine. Checking the dosage, he leaned down and patted the dog's back leg. "You won't feel a thing, fella." With all the other aching, he barely felt the pinprick.
As he drifted off to sleep, he heard the doctor murmuring something soothing.
Ruth arrived at Dr. Arthur's door at precisely 4:30 on Thursday afternoon. She picked up the huge black dog, and, to her surprise, he limped slowly into her car, without needing help.
"What are you going to call him?" the vet asked.
Ruth shrugged. "Such a big dog! He needs a regal name, doesn't he?"
Dr. Arthur grinned. "How about Caesar?"
The dog snorted.
"He doesn't seem to like that very much," Ruth chuckled. "I suppose his name will just present itself, eventually. For now, I'll just call him Dog."
Ruth seemed almost apologetic when they arrived at her cottage. It was a cottage in name, only really. It had three rooms, altogether: a kitchen/living room, bedroom, and tiny bath. The walled garden was overgrown in the corners and little more than packed dirt in the center. To the dog, it looked like paradise.
Ruth helped him out of the car, and he managed to limp into the main room. He collapsed on the floor there, on a little rug beside a rather old chair.
Overall, his recovery happened fairly quickly. Ruth took excellent care of him, bathing him once a week, keeping him well fed (he was so hungry, he didn't even mind dog food for a while), and taking him on plenty of walks when he was well enough. His strength returned, gradually, even if he still couldn't sleep more than a few hours without waking up wracked by nightmares. It was better than what he had expected. Still, he wished he could have seen the boy before...
He was rather fond of Ruth as well. She was fairly young. He found her to be a quiet, lonely, bookish girl. She spent most of the day either reading in the garden, or hammering away on an old typewriter that seemed to be missing several of its vowels, which she had to go back and add by hand at the end of every page. She was tall, and slender in a malnourished way. She had a ponytail of fluffy brown hair and bright eyes that sparkled behind her glasses. She liked to laugh, he thought, but her lack of company made it hard for her to have much to laugh at. As he got better, he liked to make her laugh.
He had arrived there in the heat of summer. When September rolled around, he knew he was going to have to leave Ruth soon. Fortunately, Ruth turned out to be a teacher at the village school, a fact which gave the dog a good opportunity to attend to another important part of his recovery...