Through the fog and the rain and the shade of mossy trees, Aganzir drifted in, savouring the walk through the overgrown grass. You know when you have been away a long time and see the shapes and colours with new eyes, with a feeling of déjà vu almost? You recognise the names and faces but from another distant place, and then suddenly it clicks and they are who they have always been, indeed who they are - to you - meant to be. And you know that you've come home.
OH MY GOD PITCHWIFE I MISSED YOU SO FREAKING MUCH WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN HOW ARE YOU!????
ahem
Aganzir bent to pick up something that was glistening and sparkling on the grass. It was a silver ring that she recognised from a New Year's Moot a year and a half ago (one that she had used to propose to a fellow Downer, who rejected it because apparently it looked too much like a ring pull). She smoothed it with her thumb and carried it gently back to the Great Barrow.
"It's the Barrow treasures," she said, almost shy to hear her own voice again after all this time. "You see, all scattered. We need to bring it all back to renew the spell of the mound. No more toys for Tom and for his lady Lucy. No more cracks in the walls, no more infiltrators and spies (she cast a dark look at
HDwwdbpc who was trying to sneak in). Only the Wights and the dead."
And then her face lit up and she laughed.
She rushed to grab the Lady
Estelyn in a tight hug, and to dance a few steps with
Nogrod along to
Encai's tune, and peck
Lady Great affectionately, and grope
Lommy ("HeEI!! AGANzir!"), and express great delight and surprise at seeing
Pitchwife again. And she complimented
Kuru's mighty dwarven beard and asked for permission to touch it, and then she turned around rather abruptly and wandered off whistling (Livin' on a Prayer, rather poorly). She could later be heard speaking about the complimentary drink she had got from
Kuru ("For warming his miserly old heart by being so fond of dwarves").
And she greeted people left and right - people she had barely talked to before and people she had known for years alike. And when the laughing and dancing and eating began to tire her, she sat down at Lady
Estelyn's feet, content to watch and listen.
Olen ollut pitkään poissa kotoa
.