Hello, my readers! Yes, to everyone who's ever clicked on this story, thank you! This is my penultimate chapter, and every hit I see encourages me so much! To everyone who has ever reviewed on this story over the years, you have my thanks! Also, please don't feel shy about commenting! I'd love to see your reactions! :) Btw, I wanna give a special shoutout to BewitchingRedhead36 for her constant support and faithful reviews of each update! You rock! :) Oh, and btw, readers, please don't forget to go to your accounts and enable the Email Opt-in for alerts about chapters/new stories from me!
The title of this chapter, which is about Roshan's significance in the herd's creation, since they all bonded over him on their journey, is taken from the film LoTR: The Fellowship of the Ring, said by Galadriel to Frodo. Thanks to my beta for tightening this chapter and her continued interest in L and my CI-verse! Now, enjoy the chapter! :)
"Oh, Manny," Ellie said. She reached out her trunk, linked it with her own, and laid her cheek next to his. "You were living with that - those memories - all alone. I'm so, so sorry." Tears welled in Ellie's eyes. She'd never seen her mate look so broken. It haunted her.
She wondered how often Diego and Sid had seen that brokenness during their years together as the band of legendary heroes they'd become known as, before Manny stumbled into her path before the flood.
Ellie knew she and Peaches could never fill the void left in Manny's heart by Kate and Benny. The realisation sometimes broke her heart but then she would again resolve to love Manny harder and fiercer than ever.
Manny never mentioned whether Kate or Benny were honoured with a Time of Lacrimosa. The migration south had occurred immediately after deaths, and all the other mammoths were too eager to leave and break the way for the mammals trailing after them. There hadn't been time.
In grief, Manny had chosen to head north instead, into the ice and snow and his own death. Ellie met Manny's eyes, silently wrapping her trunk further around his, hoping he'd appreciate her warmth.
Diego cleared his throat and Ellie noticed that his eyes glistened with tears as well. Diego's empathy for Manny made perfect sense - he had recognised the truth behind the cave paintings before Sid had, and maybe even before that. His next words confirmed her suspicions,
"I think I saw bits and pieces of those memories haunting Manny on our way to return Pinky," he said. "Sid never noticed, but I did, and it made me wonder because Manny never said anything…"
"You understood, though, Diego," Manny said, his voice breathy with emotion. "At the cave paintings you did, and maybe even a little before."
Axel cleared his throat. "I have a question," he said, uncomfortable with the overwhelming emotions circling around the fire. "Why did the human lady give her son to you, Mr Manny? That's one part of the legend that still puzzles me."
"Yeah, why did the human lady give her baby to you?" Sid butted in. "Becauthe I feel thure thle didn't thee me at all. Thlo you must've been important in her mind, to give up her baby to you."
Manny brushed away his tears with his trunk, glad for the change of topic. He didn't know if he had a good answer for this question, but part of him had some idea for why the lady had offered up her babe to him at the river.
"Even the smallest person can change the course of the future," he said. "Pinky changed mine, Diego's, and Sid's. We would've died without that kid," he said. "Maybe, his mother knew he needed me… or maybe she saw in me the answer she was looking for."
Below the Falls
Roshan. The name cut through the searing pain of her broken legs and gave her the strength to keep herself and her precious bundle above the dangerous waters. Roshan. Nadia and Runar had chosen the name for their firstborn together and it carried special meaning. "Roshan" meant "Light" in the People's tongue.
She managed to grab onto the branch of a large log that had fallen into the river. Somehow, Nadia, with her rapidly evaporating strength, kept her little light safe.
Through the haze of her fiery pain, she saw the figure of a dark brown mammoth bull. He stood on the bank of the river, frozen in place, and their gazes met. She couldn't explain why, but an unspoken realisation passed between herself and the bull.
He looked like the one she'd seen dead and mourned over the day the fire mountain erupted. Had Bre'de sent her a miracle?
As if in answer to her unasked question, Ancient Mother Bre'de, a crone with hair as white as the permafrost and startlingly pale eyes, eyes the colour of a clear sky, appeared in her mind in a vision. Bre'de smiled at Nadia, and she heard Her say, without any vocalised words, that giving her babe up to the mammoth bull on the riverbank was the right choice.
Nadia inched her way down the log to the riverbank, and with her last ounces of strength, she pushed the bundle that contained her baby, her light of her People, towards the mammoth. He reached out with his trunk and caught Roshan, keeping him from falling back into the river as she exchanged another meaningful look with the bull. Her work here was done.
Nadia sighed, laying her face down against the warm ground, and let the river waters carry her away.
XXX
Manny couldn't believe his eyes. Sid's inane babble faded into nothingness as he took in the sight before him: a woman, barely clinging to life, looking into his eyes from her perch on a log in the river. In her arms, she carried a bundle. Even though he was some distance away, his nose informed him her bundle contained a human baby - her child. Despite himself, his heart swelled with compassion for the two in the river, and he couldn't help wondering if the baby was all right.
The woman in the river moved gingerly along the huge log, pain shining in her eyes as Manny watched her struggling to make contact with the bank.
Manny forgot Sid's presence entirely as the woman reached the banks, still holding his gaze, and with the last of her strength, pushed her swaddled baby towards him. Without thinking or hesitating, Manny placed his trunk on top of her precious bundle. The woman held Manny's gaze, and compassionate sorrow travelled between the two without words.
Manny turned his attention to the leather-swaddled lump in front of him and winced inwardly, wondering if the leather came from someone he knew… another mammoth, maybe. He shut down his thoughts before they could lead him down a dark road and uncovered the baby's face.
The child was pink all over and seemingly had no fear. It opened its mouth and smiled at him. In the baby's cooing, Manny heard the echo of his son's laughter. It was too much.
Why had he saved this human child? He had lost Kate and Benny a mere three weeks ago, and now here he was sheltering this human baby. This baby with the bright smile shining like sunlight. Most humans knew to fear the mammoths, but the baby showed no fear. Despite himself, the child's bravery stirred Manny's heart with compassion.
Manny turned away, trying not to let Sid notice the tears brimming in his eyes and the emotion that had swept over him. He couldn't leave the baby. Pinky, as he was already thinking of it, had already captured his heart with that smile. He wanted to protect that smile.
"Hmm, methinkth Manny ith giving himself too much credit for the baby's rescue," Sid grumbled, earning himself eye rolls from the mammoth and the tiger. His irritation overrode his lisp. "If I hadn't insisted we take him back, nothing would've happened."
"Sid, you would've failed taking back the baby by yourself and you know it," came Diego's growl.
"I was never gonna abandon that kid," Manny said, a gruff undertone in his voice. "I saved him, and I saved you, Sid, and I let you stay with me despite being a nuisance. I was bluffing with you about the kid before Diego showed up."
"That walth another bluff?" Sid asked, his face alive with surprise. "You are a shrewd mammal, my friend."
"I have a question," Axel said, and all eyes turned towards him. "Mr Manny, you and Diego talked in the ice cave, didn't you? When neither of you noticed that Sid had gotten lost and left you both alone with Pinky?"
"You guyth didn't notice I went a different way in the ice cave?" Sid wailed, pretending to be upset. "For shame, for shame."
"Pretty sure I told everyone to stick together because it's easy to get lost in those caves," Diego countered.
"Also, I picked up on the fact that you'd fallen behind and told you to keep up once you joined us again," Manny said.
"I'm juthth messing with you guys!" Sid said with a laugh. "But really, what did you two talk about when I wathn't with you? You two are quiet, but not that quiet."
Diego and Manny swapped looks with each other as silence fell over the herd members around the fire. Diego turned to look at the others.
"I asked Manny why he was so protective of the baby," Diego said at last.
The mammoth and the tiger walked along in companionable silence. Both failed to notice that the sloth trailing them suddenly wasn't. Diego strode slightly in front of the mammoth, as Manny wanted, leading the way.
The baby, nestled on Manny's shoulders, was enjoying himself as the two animals moved further into the ice caves. The interplay of blue and white hues of the ice walls was captivating to the baby and he made faces at his reflection. The mammoth noticed the baby's fun and the hint of a smile lifted the corners of his mouth though sorrow glinted in his dark eyes.
Diego caught the entire interaction when he glanced over at the two, and, when the mammoth met his gaze, he looked down, embarrassed, feeling privy to a moment he wasn't supposed to see. Manny took the baby off his shoulders and started bouncing him up and down on his trunk. The baby's soft giggles echoed off the walls.
"Manfred," Diego said, breaking the silence between the two mammals. "What's your deal with that kid?"
Manny looked down at the baby in his trunk. Subtle affection for the child gleamed in his expression but there was something else, too, in that expression. It was grief peering out, and Diego hated himself for seeing it and wondered why Manny had such complex emotions about this human baby who, according to Soto, deserved nothing more than murder for sins he didn't commit.
Instead, the mammoth had saved him - from the river and from Diego himself - in spite of the fact that he was a little human, a fact that frustrated and confused Diego. The why was out of his reach, and the mysteries of the mammoth eluded him. Had he really grown that attached to this mammoth, who he was planning to serve up to Soto as a gift, that quickly and that strongly?
Manny's answer was quiet,
"He reminds me of someone. Someone I failed. I can't fail Pinky because of that."
Those simple words cut Diego to the quick, and tendrils of guilt began to seep through him as the realisation hit him he was going to be party to the deaths of Manfred and this baby: these two innocents.
"Oh," Diego said. He glanced down at the ground before glancing up again as Manny set Pinky on top of his hair tuft. Manny met his glance and sent him the fragments of a smile. Diego returned it, feeling warmed in spite of himself.
He fell into step alongside the mammoth, not in front, and Manfred voiced no objections.
Diego was sure that his guilt over the two would be the death of him.
Thanks to you two, I've been saddled with unnecessary… feelings.
"Aww, that was so sweet," Ellie crooned. "And Diego, how conflicted you were about Manny, Sid, and Pinky… so cute."
The tips of Diego's ears reddened.
"I don't like remembering those days… how I was only concerned about saving my own skin…"
"You've changed, though," Manny said, as Sid gave a proud smile to Diego.
"Yeah," Sid agreed. "Our Diego grew up."
"Thanks, you guys," Diego said, his eyes moist with emotion.
"Hey, Diego, I have a question for you," Crash broke in. "Me, Eddie, and Ellie have heard your legend before but I just wanna know - do you think Soto had it in for you, now that it's all over? Because I always thought he did… he was just really sly about it."
"I have my own theories about Soto," Diego agreed. "I can guess what he was thinking … about me … after he sent me to get Pinky." Diego sighed. "I think Soto was setting me up … to fail, hoping for my death … the way I set up Manny and Pinky…"
"And me too!" Sid added.
"You honestly weren't relevant to my plot, Sid," Diego said bluntly. "After all, to sabres, you're junk food. Oscar and Zeke didn't notice you at all."
Sid pouted,
"Well, I like to believe that I wath," he said as Manny and Diego exchanged amused looks and rolled their eyes.
"What do you mean, 'Soto was setting you up as you were doing the same with Manny and the baby'?" Axel asked. "I've heard the legend with a sabre spin on it, and Shelley told me the whole version as Theo relayed it, and none mentioned that detail."
Diego shook his head, a dangerous grin playing at the corners of his mouth.
"Soto never forgave me for taking his place as heir, or for being, as he thought, the reason our pack lost Hernando, Stepmother, and Shira," Diego said. "I never knew what he was thinking but he always wanted me out of the way. That became clear to me on my journey with Manny and Sid to return Pinky. I realised his dark intentions for me, in hindsight, after Brede intervened for my life, and when Manny and I talked everything over on the way to the Bredelands South…"
Soto had a plan. He intended to get his revenge on the humans and walk Diego right into a trap at the same time. Kill two birds with one paw, as the old sabre saying went. Diego, from their earliest days together, had been a thorn in his side. Soto resented Diego's survival, barely escaping the claws of his mother, the Scarlett. Then to rub salt in his wounds as firstborn, Cortez chose Diego anyway, the second son, as the successor to his alphacy.
Soto had no empathy himself, but even he could see the soft spot Diego, his second-in-command, had for the human chief's young son. Nothing would be sweeter than to snare Diego into retrieving the baby for him to eat alive to punish the human chief, whilst ensuring Diego's permanent removal from his pack at the same time.
Soto took Diego to the cliff overlooking the human settlement, with its odd tents and crackling fire, and pointed out the child to him. He savoured Diego's hesitation as he left to relay the information to the sabre troops, that they would attack at dawn.
Soto's trap for both the human chief and Diego had been set. If fate proved kind to him for once, he'd get his revenge on the disgusting human and finally eliminate his half-brother. He imagined Diego squirming under his paw, pleading for mercy that would never come. The image brought him deep pleasure.
Part of him hoped Diego would manage to get the baby for him on the day of their attack, whilst another, darker part of him warned him to prepare for disappointment. After all, Diego had always been a disappointment.
Regardless, Diego was the only one he trusted out of the meagre scraps left of his and his mother's pack. Even so, ever since the Scarlett and Shira went missing, Soto threatened Diego with death, blaming him for Hernando's death and the disappearances, which he believed was entirely Diego's fault.
Soto believed that Diego deserved it. He had moulded Diego into such an image of himself that Diego accepted his treatment without complaint. Outwardly, Soto appreciated Diego's fealty, but inwardly he found it revolting. Soto and the Scarlett had engineered a coup, ensuring Soto's place in the alphacy, and deep down, Soto feared that Diego still desired the position. The notion was ridiculous, but Soto found it impossible to shake.
Diego, predictably, failed to snatch the baby. Soto wondered if his half-brother had done so on purpose, holding back against the wee thing and its mother. Furious, Soto ordered Diego to get the baby whilst he led the rest of the pack to Half Peak.
You'd better - unless you want to serve yourself as a replacement, Soto had threatened him. It rolled around in Soto's mind after he'd led the pack towards Half Peak as did the flicker of dismay in Diego's expression. There was no way Diego could weasel his way out of this one. He was as good as dead.
Half Peak, in years past, had been a dormant volcano called Vetta Inferno. When Diego was fifteen, the lava from its explosion seeped underneath the permafrost fields. Soto knew those lava fields were due for an eruption soon, but Soto and the remainder of his pack would pass by them before they erupted and would be safe, leaving Diego, with his baby cargo, much less fortunate.
At least, Soto hoped that would happen. Since Half Peak was a good fortnight's journey from the human settlement, Soto and Lenny went on ahead whilst Soto sent Oscar and Zeke back to spy on Diego and report back on his progress, with the instruction to emphasise how he was getting tired of waiting on Diego. Come back with the baby, or don't come back at all! He'd ordered Zeke and Oscar to threaten his half-brother. If Diego had lost the baby, he was done for.
Oscar returned to Soto with the news that Diego had the baby and had even added a lone mammoth bull as a gift for Soto. He reported that Diego was travelling with the bull to Half Peak, the bull being none the wiser about Diego's plot. Soto was reluctantly impressed.
Soto channelled his impatience into pacing through the bottom of Half Peak as Oscar, Zeke and Lenny watched. He had managed to obtain some dodo bird meat for his remaining pack members on the journey to Half Peak, but it wasn't enough to fill their bellies. Zeke especially was left unsatisfied.
Zeke's rambles about how he'd sort the bull's flesh into various pieces drove Lenny crazy and he would have attacked Zeke if Soto hadn't stopped him. Soto laid out the ambush plans for mammoths for himself and the three members of the pack, omitting Diego as being the fourth one against the bull.
No one left in the pack noticed his omission. Soto smirked to himself. His mother would have been so proud of him for laying this trap against Diego, right under the pack's noses.
Now, all he had left to do was wait for Diego to show up with his gifts of the baby and the mammoth and feign concern at his half-brother's lateness. Once he killed the baby and they had eaten the mammoth, he'd go after Diego next. Provided, of course, Diego hadn't died at the lava fields.
Diego eventually arrived at Half Peak. Alone. There was no sign of the promised baby or mammoth. Soto's suspicion was aroused because Oscar had reported seeing Diego with the mammoth, the baby, and a sloth, but he played it cool.
Oscar wasn't sure why a sloth accompanied Diego and said he hadn't noticed a sloth on his and Zeke's mission to put pressure on Diego.
Soto's conclusion, when talking it over with Oscar before Diego arrived, was that the sloth must be a bonus gift for Diego to his alpha, but he remained guarded and decided to keep a close eye on Diego when he rejoined the pack. Deep down, he suspected Diego was up to something, but he couldn't figure out what.
It all became clear when Diego rejoined the pack, and when the sloth was sighted carrying a bundle, Diego egged on Zeke to attack it. Zeke bolted, with Oscar and Lenny following after him, all three ignoring Soto's commands, so desperate they were for food.
Diego pretended not to know why Zeke had bolted, which Soto filed away for later as he hurried after his pack members. Diego didn't join him and the others in their race after the sloth and the baby, which filled him with silent rage.
The sloth dropped his bundle and Zeke, Oscar, and Lenny parted as Soto reached them. Soto turned the bundle over, revealing a snow-baby. At that moment, Soto knew Diego had double-crossed him. He would make Diego pay for this treason, this betrayal of the Sabine Code. Diego was his to kill now.
Soto urged his pack members after the fleeing sloth before he realised the sloth was leading them into a trap. Soto fell back to reassess the situation. He watched as a log tossed Oscar, Lenny, and Zeke to the ground from inside a snow-covered plateau within Half Peak, leaving the three unconscious. Diego and that mammoth! It could only be those two, Soto thought.
Zeke was the first to awaken. Soto whispered to him to track the sloth because the sloth must be heading to where Diego had hidden the baby from him, and said that he was going to find Diego and confront him, himself. Zeke obeyed without hesitation and dashed off on the sloth's trail, which didn't lead onto the snowy plateau, but away from it.
Soto concealed himself amongst the jagged spires of Half Peak and overheard Diego talking to the mammoth. Both of them were about to slip out of the mountain. Not on my watch! Soto thought.
Soto kept his cool as he turned the corner, making his presence known to his right-paw sabre and the mammoth. Startled horror flew into the mammoth's eyes, mirroring the fear in Diego's. Neither had been expecting him.
He and Diego walked in step with each other towards the mammoth. For a brief second, Soto allowed himself to believe maybe he had misjudged Diego, but then Diego cut him off, standing between him and the bull with an order to leave the mammoth alone.
Diego's betrayal played right into Soto's plans, and he gave Diego a dangerous smile as he glanced behind him. Oscar and Lenny had flanked him and were ready for his command. Confident with his backup, Soto snarled at Diego, saying that he'd take him down first. Soto struck out at his former second-in-command.
Diego didn't attack right away. He lingered near the mammoth as long as he could. Their paws met in the air as the bull's anxious trumpet sounded. Soto felt the bull advancing on his battle with Diego, but Oscar and Lenny outflanked the mammoth, driving him away from the fight as Diego managed to claw Soto's right cheek, drawing fresh blood that dripped onto the snow.
Soto's face hardened and furious, Soto threw himself on top of Diego. Diego scratched and clawed at him, but seemed like he was holding himself back and didn't draw blood again as he fastened his paws around Soto's upper shoulders.
Soto realised he had an opening and threw Diego off him in the direction of a large boulder in the middle of the snowfield. Diego's foreleg collided with the boulder with a crack and the back of his head struck against it. Blood splattered onto the rock from the impact. Diego slumped to the snowy ground, unconscious, and Soto looked on, satisfied.
The impact with the boulder must have been enough to outright kill or at least incapacitate him - long enough for Soto to dispatch the mammoth Diego had befriended.
The alpha moved into position behind Oscar and Lenny, who had successfully bunched the mammoth into the wall and cut off its retreat. Soto bared his teeth at the mammoth in a vicious smile, rejoicing at the sheer terror in his prey's brown eyes. He didn't notice the beast glance to the side before he pounced.
Time seemed to slow as a slender orange blur - a bodily shield - leapt in between Soto and the mammoth. Soto's claws shredded down Diego's right foreleg and lower abdomen and his fangs gashed two long lines down Diego's side. Droplets of Diego's blood splattered onto the mammoth's tusks from the force of the blow.
Diego collapsed in the snow at Soto's feet, unconscious, in a growing pool of his own blood.
"I have a question," Axel said, raising his paw. "It's one that's been bothering me for a while about this part in the legend, Diego. Why didn't you push Soto out of the way?"
"Me too. I've heard your legend before and it still puzzles me," Ellie added, mirroring Axel's question. "Diego, honey, why didn't you just push Soto out of the way instead of taking that hit yourself?"
"Now that would've been a better idea," Manny grumbled, almost to himself. "Maybe if I'd been able to get over to you before your pack members cut me off, your battle with Soto would've turned out differently."
Diego ducked his head, an embarrassed smile on his face.
"Ah, it happened like that because I, uh, I panicked," he said. He scratched at the rough mane on his neck awkwardly. "I didn't want Manny to get hurt. I was also weak and in a lot of pain and not thinking clearly. This was the quickest way to do that," he said, with a shrug, and then turned to Manny with a shy grin on his face. "And also because you rubbed off on me, big guy."
"You're welcome?" Manny said. "I'd still rather you risked your life for me without getting yourself nearly killed by Soto."
"Says the guy who willingly switched places with me on an ice ledge knowing the possibility you wouldn't come back from it," Diego said. "Come on, Manny, you nearly got yourself killed - for me - back there too, and I am pretty sure you still have the scar from the scratch I gave you on your trunk."
Manny lifted his trunk into the fire's light, and, amongst his dark brown fur, a long slender white scar was visible. Diego had been watching Manny with a proud look in his eyes as the herd inspected the scar.
"See," Diego said softly. "Manny, you and me, we're blood brothers."
"Yeah," Manny agreed, his gaze fastened lovingly on the tiger's own badges of love, hidden amongst his own fur. "I wouldn't change that for the world."
"And I'd do it again, if I had to," Diego said, holding Manny's gaze. "I wouldn't hesitate."
Manny opened his mouth, about to object, when Crash interrupted,
"Okay, can we keep hearing Diego's theory about what was going on with Soto during your legend?" he said. "It was getting interesting and then you stopped!"
"Did you miss the part about Soto injuring me?" Diego retorted, giving Crash a heavy eye roll. "Anyway, here's what I believe Soto was thinking as that was happening..."
You asked for it! Soto snarled inwardly, his paw poised above Diego's still form, ready to land the final blow. Diego had gotten in his way, like he had always done. Soto decided that this would be the last time it ever happened.
The cry of an upset baby broke the silence, distracting Soto from his intent to kill the helpless Diego in front of him. He turned away from his half-brother, his mouth lifted in a murderous smile as his gaze fastened on the child held by the sloth.
He didn't see the tusks and the trunk coming his way until it was too late. The mammoth flung him off Diego and against the black walls of Half Peak. Soto struck the wall and lay next to it, stunned, as icicles trembled above him.
Soto froze in horror. The icicles plunged into his heart and his warm blood gushed into the snow, making tiny red pockets beside him and splattering onto the volcanic wall of Half Peak. His last thought was satisfaction in the knowledge that at least Diego was dead or dying, and that Diego had finally met his end at Soto's own claws.
"Good theories, good theories," Crash said, fiddling with his peashooter. "Soto really did have it in for you, Diego. I'm glad Soto's dead now."
"I'm glad too," Diego concurred, glancing around the campfire at all of the different faces he loved in the herd and the new faces he was already growing fond of. Peaches was asleep and he missed her, wishing she'd been allowed to join the storytelling as well, but he knew Manny had made the right decision with her. Diego allowed himself a small smile. "And no ghosts from the past can harm our big happy family."
"You got that right," Manny said, giving Diego a fist-bump. His expression darkened just seconds later and his brows knitted into a scowl. "Don't forget about Titan," he muttered under his breath.
"Anyway, Diego, did you realise that the baby saved you during the battle with Soto?" Axel's question changed the atmosphere in the cave. "You heard his cries as you were losing consciousness, didn't you?"
"Yeah, I heard it…" Diego said, a distant look in his eyes. He glanced aside at Manny, "And then Manny confirmed, later, to me, how Pinky yelled out when he saw that I was hurt after Brede recalled me to life, on our journey to the South. Here's how I remember it..."
The blackness consumed Diego. He surrendered to it, his sides rising and falling with painful breath. The realisation hit him that Soto was likely about to strike him dead. A baby's cry cut through the ringing in his ears. The cry sounded like the word "No!"
Squirt? The baby's here? He shouldn't be here… The thought barely had enough time to crystallise before the blackness overwhelmed Diego entirely.
"If Pinky hadn't cried out, Diego would be a goner..." Manny said softly. "That smart little tyke gave me an opening to fling Soto off Diego and away from Pinky and Sid. Pinky's cry ultimately saved all of us there at Half Peak. Brede, I miss that kid."
"I hope he'th doing okay," Sid said.
"How can we know?" Diego sounded unusually acerbic. "For all we know, he might be a hunter." A moment of heavy silence settled over the group before Diego added, "Sorry... I'm worried about Peaches running into him. I know Manny is too."
Manny quietly nodded in response, anxiety lurking in his eyes. Diego hung his head,
"Also, I'm not sure I deserve to face that kid again. I took his mother from him, and even though she forgave me in a vision with Brede, what reason does her son have to forgive me? I ruined his life..." Tears trembled in Diego's voice.
"You might have ruined it, but you did save him, along with Sid and I, at the end of it all," Manny said, placing his trunk on Diego's foreleg soothingly. "I'm sure Pinky remembers the saving more than the other part."
"Did your heart actually stop after that battle?" Axel butted in, returning the atmosphere in the cave to an even more subdued air. "And did Brede and the woman appear to you, in a vision, as you lay dying? Shelley and I always wondered how you miraculously made it back to Manny and Sid after Soto had injured you so badly... The legend really glosses over what happened to you!"
Axel's gaiety in his question managed to raise everyone's spirits and Diego relaxed, though a haunted look still lingered in his eyes. Diego was quiet for a long moment, seemingly lost in thought, before he spoke.
"Yeah, I did really die there at Half Peak," the tiger said. He glanced aside at Manny before looking at the entire herd again, "Morrigan foresaw my death when I was young, remember? The only reason I made it back was because of Brede… and Pinky's mother. They did appear to me in a vision at Half Peak as I was dying… and both gave me a second chance. I wouldn't be here without them. I don't talk about it much because I never understood why Brede visited me, of all sabres, someone who had willingly set up his friends and innocents like Pinky for slaughter… I didn't deserve to be recalled to life."
"What wath your experience like, seeing Brede in Her country with its fieldth of gold?" Shelley asked.
"Ah," Diego chuckled lightly. "I remember, it went something like this..."
Fin
Woohoo, look at that, a sort of cliffhanger! Anyway, since this chapter is already 5k+ long, I've decided to wrap up Diego's being Recalled to Life in Lacrimosa's final chapter because it ran away from me! More IA1 missing scenes before Lacrimosa wraps up sounds good to me though! Anyway, my readers, do you have any theories for how Diego survived - within a CI-verse context of my fic - and if you do, would you mind telling me? ;)
Technically, Diego's miraculous survival does fall under the bracket of this chapter's title - since Roshan indirectly saves Diego via his mother's forgiveness in Elysium - but I've been yearning to use "Recalled to Life" (from Dickens' Tale of Two Cities) for a Diego-centric chapter or one-shot as a title for so long so we'll see how exactly Diego was brought back in L's final chapter, which will double as an epilogue/hook for the next CI book in my series, simply titled Cruel Intentions! Look for it coming sometime in 2023! :)