Blessed are they who wash their robes so as to have the right to the tree of life and enter the city through its gates. Outside are the dogs, the sorcerers, the unchaste, the murderers, the idol-worshippers, and all who love and practice deceit. Revelations 22: 14-15

Like so many of her time, Cheza's exposure to life was as a small bud cowering to Winter's acrid sting. It was only under the radiance of love that she was drawn outside of herself. There were many more prisons in which to escape, but she wanted be free of them all. Life in its succession of days was an ever-unfurling bloom. The insights each reveal brought to Cheza were totally refreshing.

Perhaps she was a flower, after all.

She could find Kiba most nights at the highest summit near their encampment. In his fey human form, he would lie on his back and take in the wan glow of both the moon and the stars. Hige would affably join him on most nights. Knowing the habits of the two, Cheza absconded from the company of Toboe and Tsume one evening of what had been known as the middle of March, and climbed the hill to Kiba-by herelf.

Cheza observed the reverence of both Hige and Kiba to the twilight. She had exerted herself in her travels all day, and wanted then to sink back into something soft to support her muscles and joints. Yet as she positioned herself between the wolves, she found the grassless ground to be hard and unyielding.

Hige was chattering to Kiba as Cheza tried to sprawl next to them. "Yeah, it figures. They always make it too easy."

"What were you discussing just now?" Cheza wondered.

"Everything," murmured Hige. "I guess."

Kiba reached for her, so his arm could offer her warmth. The temperatures still dropped at night, and Kiba had begun sharing even his warmth with her from the nights he had observed her shivering in her sleep.

The firmament seemed to be framed by the branches surrounding their view. All was idyllic and still. After a few minutes of taking in the scene in silence, Cheza spoke. "I want to know."
"Yes, Cheza?" asked Kiba.

But she turned to Hige instead. "I know the reason why everyone is here. Except for you. Why did you decide to come with us?"

"Oh. Huh!" chuckled Hige. Then he eagerly explained, "A man needs a sense of adventure…He needs romance. It's part of life."

Cheza was on her side, looking straight across to the autumn shades of Hige's eyes, still glowing through the darkness. "You are coming for that?" She considered all of the risks and sacrifices they had made together to journey to Rakuen. His words seemed insufficient.

"From the time that Kiba came into the city, I could smell something new about him. It was kinda interesting. So, I have followed these scents ever since."

"It has not been dull," observed Cheza.

"Never was." Kiba concurred.

A gust of wind suddenly broke free that stirred the forest and brushed across Cheza's face. The giant whooshing noise reminded her of something.

Of…

Of what?

The note, like a bottle someone blew across, sounded the same as the wind in the field near hear house when she was little. There was a clothesline, she remembered. Towels and sheets would snap in the breeze. As the veil of forgetfulness was lifted, she saw a woman with long red hair, and another older lady in a grey bun.

Cheza could churn no more impressions from her mind. She was left in the stillness of the evening, but by the warmth of Kiba's "hand", she knew she was not alienated. The simple chatter between him and Hige was hers to join if she so wanted.

"What do you make of the weather patterns here?"

"It won't amount to much if the winds keep moving the clouds in the opposite direction of where we are going. If not, we'll have some problems moving forward."

The topics then veered to the regional game (Rabbits would be abundant, according to Hige.), and the insights they were able to gain from their quiet observations of each of the towns they had sojourned. Cheza was being lulled into a soporific state, but instead she fought the urge to fall asleep, and pushed herself into a standing position.

"It is late. I should check on the others, say my prayers, and go to sleep."

"You were awful quiet," Hige observed.

Kiba had seen her slip into herself, as though recalling something distant to her now. "Let her be, Hige," he admonished the other wolf.

As Cheza eased her way down the hill, she considered the two figures of her memory, and wondered where the red-headed young woman was now.

Rease felt nearly sick with glee.

He was fast following the one Noble who had not let slip his sense of power; his means of authority. Rease's painstaking efforts at ingratiation had yielded rewards. He had been invited to Lord Darcia's Keep on a number of occasions, though he would not indulge in its sensual pleasures. It would be as to pluck the fruit before the time of harvest.

He enjoyed the convenience of his superior clearing the path to the future, while Rease brought up the rear. He could just glimpse the horizon now, as his predecessors had shown the way. He reasoned that second in command was a good place to be. Too much power would be messy for him. It would, in turn, involve too much work.

Lord Darcia was unequivocally the natural successor of their recently deceased leader. Few even knew of his passing; it was a well-guarded fact among The Nobles. While the feuding and slaughtering between the commoners was inevitable, Lord Orkham had involved himself too much in their affairs. To touch the soot of the common was to dull your own luster. The once super-man was no longer a true rival of Darcia's.

Lady Jaguara was another matter. Her Keep was renowned for its elaborate and exhaustive hedonistic rituals. They far surpassed Lord Darcia's. Yet overindulgence of the senses made vigilance nearly impossible. Now was the time to be alert, and calculating. To wield superiority involved planning. One would require all of his active faculties. And with one's vision blurred, one could never know if the guest was holding a vial of liquor, or a dagger.

Weakness was a disgusting liability to show to anyone. And Lord Darcia's weakness was Harmona.

If someone was to incur too much money for medical support in the land, or could no longer serve as a product member of the community, he or she was humanely euthanized. However, it was ultimately The Nobles who made whatever law they felt was best for all. And for Darcia, no measure was too extreme to sustain his love and keep her among the living.

But love-that kind of love-would merely serve as a distraction to the goal which was nearly within their grasp: the renewal of The Earth. Lord Darcia believed that the escaped prisoner named Cheza was somehow a key in unlocking a Paradise for the elect few. There were times that The Nobles were full of conflicting information. Rease would not speculate over Paradise, but he believed in what he saw, and what greater power did his master want than assuming control over the best and the strongest who endured this time of trial?

Let Darcia have his Cheza, and even his Harmona, Rease reasoned. Soon, it would be his turn to grasp whatever he wanted.

As Rease gloated, an orange light flashed by his desk. Someone wished to enter his quiet, efficient office. Rease pressed a button, and a man in his mid-forties entered. He was older than Rease, but of a lower rank. Rease strained, and failed, to recall his name. No matter.

"Hail to Lord Darcia, and to our master," the commander greeted him hollowly.

"Very good. What word have you?"

"I have documents, sir, that are pending approval of Lord Darcia."

Rease leaned across his desk to the commander. "Have you read the inscription by the door? Do you know that I am not Lord Darcia?"

"They will need your signature, too, sir."

"Then leave them. If that is all, then you are free to go."

"By your word, sir." The commander left an acre's worth of paper, bowed slightly, and brusquely strode out the door.

Rease perused the first of many documents. At the bottom, he signed his name. Then, in carefully practiced hand, he forged Lord Darcia's signature.

Cheza enjoyed the way the light seemed to bounce off her dress. The gently-used hand-me-down was a present from one of the proprietors of another safe house. No one, not even Tsume, dared to mention the practicality of wearing a dress while hiking through the woods. Tsume noted the cheerful gait, saw her responsiveness, her smiles, and thought it better to refrain from remarking on it. Thus, with her airy dress, and solid hiking boots, she was vested like a hippie at a weekend-long music festival.

If only she had known what either of those things were.

She ran up behind Toboe, and practically caught him in an embrace. "Hey!" she exclaimed, hooking her arm through his.

"Oh. Hi."

"You were twitching in your sleep all night. I noticed."

"Oh!" His face suddenly flushed. "I'm sorry."

"For what?" she smiled. "Were you dreaming again?"

He nodded.

"Do you want to tell me about it?" she pursued.

"We were all at a huge banquet hall. But the master of the hall was taking care of us and stuff. Like he was the servant, not the master. And…" In his excitement, Toboe paused to collect his flurry of thoughts. "He said we're supposed to do what he was doing."

"That is a great little secret you were given. Do you believe him?"

"Yeah! I do."

The front of the pack was lead by Kiba, Hige, and Tsume. They were approaching an area where the growth became sparser. They wove around rocks and shrubs as seamlessly as speed skaters around cones. To their left, the base of a ravine was growing visible. It was shaded terra cotta like the plates in Maya's kitchen.

Cheza began to wonder if she would have to encounter the man-occupied cities as everyone else in the pack had. She began to step forward, but a solid weight around her arm caused her to lurch back.

She turned her head in the direction of the problem. Toboe still had his "arm" linked with hers. He was staring straight, seemingly at nothing. His brow was furrowed. His teeth had begun to gnaw upon his own lower lip.

"Hey," she called, puzzled. "Tobie?"

He remained unmoved. He did not seem to register her voice.

Cheza stood in front of him, her gaze fixed into his empty stare. She took him by the shoulders and gently shook him.

"The birds," he mumbled.

"Birds?" Cheza echoed, wondering if she had heard him correctly.

"They're laughing at us."

Just as he finished speaking, she heard the cawing of crows. She glanced upward. Suddenly, a dark-winged bird appeared, high above the trees, then another swooped across the sky, joining the first. Then a third materialized, seemingly out of nowhere. They began to circle, still cawing, their cries indecipherable to Cheza.

Toboe growled.

Cheza gasped. She had never seen any aggression in the pup before. "Toboe!" she exclaimed, now more plaintively.

Toboe's posture relaxed. He looked upon Cheza with recognition. "They said we're fools for staying on the ground. Something's coming."

Cheza looked to the other wolves. Kiba was already trotting back to Toboe. Before he spoke, she caught him briefly appraising the shaken pup. His voice was as resolute as dawn. "Toboe . It's all right now."

"They're laughing. Make them stop."

"Toboe, it doesn't matter. We've been heading in this direction for a reason. We're going to take refuge in those caves over there." Kiba did not need to gesture to them, for it was easily detectable even to Cheza that caves were etched into the cliffs. He continued, "When it's over, we'll move on."

"Then you know what is going to happen," Cheza pursued.

"Let's get up there."

"Kiba." Cheza's insistence was like a command. It startled everyone.

Tsume's gaze warily combed through the forest before he added, "We shouldn't keep secrets between us in this pack."

"I can't say it. You'll have to see for yourself."

No one thought of a retort. After an awkward moment of silence, the wolves began to shuffle forward, with Tsume and Hige nudging Toboe along.

"Cheza," Kiba beckoned. Her silence reminded Kiba of loneliness. "I'm asking for your trust again." He dared to reach and touch the side of her face. Wordlessly, she clasped the "hand" he had given her, and walked alongside him.

Hige had observed the events in wonder. But soon, his sense of restraint would fail him. As their movements fell into their accustomed rhythm, he blurted, "The way you act sometimes is weird, Kiba. Like, how're we supposed to know what to do half the time, if you won't even tell us what this is ab"-

A screech was emitted from somewhere above. Cheza had time to look above, to wonder how the birds' cries had grown so high-pitched. But the hissing and squealing quickly grew, as if a hundred rats were in the grips of death. The dead forest began to resound with the sizzling squeaks, until a flaming rock the size of a beach ball seemed to dislodge itself from the sun, and hurled itself downward, landing just behind Cheza and the wolves.

The fire it gave crackled invitingly, consuming the white-bleached grass. Everyone gawped for a moment; at each other, then at the smoldering mess. The rock had left a three-foot wide crater from where it had crashed. Dazed, Cheza felt herself being lifted. Kiba had already picked her up. "Run," he gasped. He pointed to a cave's entrance well within their reach. "There."

She heard the scuffle of paws against the dirt, and Kiba's voice, shouting, "Go!" The sky boomed. The ground trembled. They ran, Cheza still secure against Kiba's chest. They were close to their refuge. Cheza spotted one black and burning mound fall to the right of them, another right behind them. Finally, they split in a "V" formation as one careened directly in front of them. Toboe tripped, but Tsume had noticed, and paused long enough to yank the pup back on to his feet. The scent of sulfur began to make Cheza and Hige nauseous.

The wide black mouth of the cave greeted them like a glutton on his next binge. As Cheza clambered out of Kiba's arms, she noticed it was big enough for everyone to comfortably stand. The floor was smooth enough for Cheza to sit if she wished, but it afforded little else. She could see nothing staring into the cave's depths, but the entrance afforded enough light for her to determine what this new environment was like. She thought the walls were like dried-out pottery clay. A few bats blithely hung from the ceiling.

Hige was the one who appeared the most shaken. One "hand" was rested on the top of his head as he continued to breathe, "What was that?" He shook his head. "What was that?"

Tsume groaned. "Just shut up, all right?"

"Well, what the Hell was that?" Hige insisted.

"The sky is falling," mused Toboe, who continued to stare out at the scene with wide, inquisitive eyes.

"I do not think it is that," replied Cheza. "I read somewhere once that rocks from the sky are called meteors. They would have come from beyond our sky. I think they are reacting to the pollution in the air."

Tsume passed an accusatory glare to Cheza. His body tensed, as though we were waiting for a break in the fire shower to hunt down whoever was responsible for imposing an inconvenience.

As he leaned against the wall, Kiba asked, "Is everyone alright?"

"Yeah," Hige nodded, his nerves beginning to settle.

The booms of the explosions ate whatever silence or tranquility could have existed in that enclosed space. The tremors from the impact rattled the stones around them. Like the day at the creek, like the day they had met, Kiba was gazing across the distance at Cheza. Cheza looked back at him. In that moment, they spoke. They understood.

Cheza was roused from her sleep.

Howling, she recognized as she slowly came to. She quickly glanced through the cavern. By the light of the afternoon, she saw that all of the wolves were accounted for, dozing in various positions. When did this one fall asleep? she wondered.

She felt relaxed and cushioned. As she stood, she realized that she had slept against Hige. She smiled tenderly. In the distance, the thudding of intrusive rocks against the ground continued. She could see from peering out of the cave that branches had snapped, but no trees seemed to have been felled.

A voice cut through the rumbling Earth. It was a clear, sharp howl of a wolf. It seemed to carry both longing and a vision for more. Cheza looked to her pack for a reaction, but their sleep was nearly spell-like.

A sentence formed in her mind, though she recognized that she was not the author of it: Go to her.

Cheza ran her hands along the side of the cave for support as she walked forward. Awkwardly lunging, she stepped over the sprawled Tsume to reach the cave's mouth. She could see as she moved the eerie grey half-light of the day just before dawn. The tremors and fireballs seemed to have lapsed. She moved from her enclosure, and out to survey the woods.

The crows had returned. She regarded them, though they spoke to each other, and seemed to ignore her entirely. It was almost imperceptible at first; she thought she was imagining another sound. Yet it grew stronger as she moved. It was the soft tweeting of finches.

She smiled. Could God grant another Spring? she conjectured. Will He, even when nothing else holds together or makes sense anymore?

The baying of a wolf, sweet with sadness, like tapping for maple syrup on a cold day in March, resumed. Cheza still could not spot anyone, but hoped her instincts would guide her. Thunder echoed again in the distance. The ground only trembled slightly, and did not faze Cheza.

Something collided with her. On the ground, unharmed, Cheza looked up. Kiba in his human form was on top of her.

"Kiba!"- She nearly.

"Stay down!"

"Please," she sighed. "Let me up."

Kiba remained impassive. "Cheza, look at the fire. It isn't safe to keep moving."

"Did you not hear her? Let me go to her!"

Kiba was confused. Would the Flower Maiden really make an obvious mistake? he thought. "Hey." He made eye contact with her in the dim light of morning. He shook his head. "It's a dog."

"No." She struggled against him. "She is one of us."

"When we were hunted by that man, Yaiden, a dog who howled like that was with him."

Cheza considered this. "Are you certain it was a dog you saw?"

Kiba started. He remembered how much she mimicked him, and yet there was no recognition in her cold blue eyes when she called for Yaiden. He couldn't be certain.

"We can find her," Kiba persuaded Cheza. "But not like this. We can't risk having anything happening to you." His mouth was by her ear. "We'll find her when the danger passes."

Cheza stopped squirming in his grasp. Another tremor rattled the branches around them. Kiba's body shielded her own, she realized. After a pause, he spoke again: "When I was a pup, my brothers and sisters in the pack used to go exploring. We'd each go our separate directions, and when we'd regroup, we'd tell each other the favorite places we'd seen." Kiba glanced at the activity in the sky before continuing, "What's been your favorite place you have seen, Cheza?"

Cheza could barely recall her old life anymore. She was alive, yet she was being crushed by a wolf on the floor of a forest for the sake of her faith. And she did not even possess memories of being in a Church. "The river where you found me waiting that day."

Kiba nearly melted when he heard this. He lowered his head so Cheza could not notice his pleased embarrassment. Then, almost to himself, he said, "Lunar flowers. The time I saw lunar flowers."

"There is no such thing! You made it up."

"There is. When I was a pup, I found a field full of them. It was night, and they were blooming by the light of the full moon."

She tested him. "What color were they?"

"The color of the moon."

Cheza craned her neck from the shelter of Kiba's arms. The sky had been torn, and streaks of a glowing red scaled from the top of the atmosphere to what seemed to be the ground. It looked as if pieces of reality were being ripped away from the firmaments, and a new existence was bleeding through. As she watched, Cheza remembered to place herself in an attitude of trust, and reminded Kiba that it was good for him to do the same. It was that morning that those with eyes to see could discern the world was going to be taken back, and reborn.

Blue Yaiden believed she was alone.

The thugs from the city had managed to separate her from Pops during a scuffle. It used to be that Pops could drink his fill of the magic water that made him forget. Then he would mutter about the wolves and of Paradise, and no one listened. They would ignore him as he mumbled into the wooden floor of the bars, blowing the sawdust across the room with his breath.

Now there were no rules. There was no code of conduct amongst anyone. When no one looked after anyone anymore, people looked after themselves, and their own best interests. The humans sought only what they wanted, and did not care who or what it impacted.

The strong began to prey upon the weak, and the weak would take revenge when they had devised a cunning enough means to do so. On and on it went in waves. The cries Blue heard at night were like the yelps and whimpers of dogs. The number of humans in the city was slowly dwindling, but their voices still filled the air with dissonance.

Since the night Blue had dreamed of the girl with the rose-colored cloak, she was able to appear as a human to everyone's eyes. But neither form guaranteed her any security. She could not remain in the city, she knew, but as she looked towards the empty woods, and thought about the wastelands that lay beyond them, she felt uneasy about her options for survival.

I'm trapped, she thought, and tried not to choke up with that admission.

Unsure of what else to do, she slunk to a dark and unoccupied alleyway where she hoped no one would pay attention to her. She took on the appearance of a human, but kept her head up, eyes open and alert, and nearly posed her mouth in a snarl. As she thought of that oddly innocent girl, she waited to devise a new plan.

She waited.

Rease was buried neck deep in a report summarizing the activity within two towns of their city-state. He glanced up. The door had opened, and he had not even realized it.

As he jolted upward, he questioned, Who could have possibly overridden the clearance code?-

Dressed in a simple black cape, he noticed Lord Darcia was standing over him.

"My lord," he flummoxed, scrambling to his feet.

Darcia ignored his marionette jerkings of motion. His range of vision was poised somewhere over Rease's head, as though he were distracted by something. "What do we know about the cities, Rease?"

"They're failing, sir, as you predicted."

"All of them?"

"No, not all." Rease followed Darcia's gaze nervously, then he composed himself. "Some are holding out longer. But all of them seem to show the same signs of weakness. A pattern is there, my lord."

"I would normally congratulate you on your sloth. Taking credit when someone else has labored shows cunning. But a mistake was made."

Rease stood erect. "I don't know what you're talking about, sir."

Darcia no longer seemed distracted. "It is foolish when you take it away from someone more powerful than you," he hissed.

"My lord, I have done nothing but stand by your side in all of your decisions."

Rease could not reason through what he encountered next. He blinked. Lord Darcia was not there anymore. What he saw in his stead was a massive, hulking creature, with a form like that of a fabled wolf. With his steely joints and a spine bound like the tracks of a locomotive, he stood at nearly the same height as he. His teeth were bared like daggers.

His eye glowed like a furnace. Rease began to wonder how his yellowing, sickly eye could glow, but his thoughts were quickly interrupted.

Rease had no time to run. The snarling, salivating creature was upon him. And just before he gasped to scream, he heard the words:

"You are not worthy of Paradise."