"You are not being very talkative.  Did I do something?" she asked.

"No, I'm just thinking," he said.

"What about?" she asked.

"Don't pry, I'll tell you when I feel like it," he responded.

They rode on, both quiet about the ride.  Kehan wasn't feeling all that good
right now.  His heart had been torn to a million pieces and he could only
draw into himself, like he always did.  <I'll just learn not to fall in love
with the next pretty face I see.>

Raissa smiled to herself and looked back at Kehan.  His face still
tear-streaked and his hair russled up from the run away from the town and
the sleepless night on the ground, he had a certain charm to him.  Raissa
should have just listened to her horse, she figured.

The night was spent on the side of the road, this time with a bedroll and
warm, hot food instead of the cold night as his blanket and tears for
supper.  He ate hungrily, not really tasting the food going down, just
knowing that this is what he needed right now.  Feeling refreshed, he went
to clean up in the small stream by the camp.  washed the dirt and the grime
from his body, changed clothes and came back into camp feeling a little bit
better, but everytime he looked up at the sky, with it's stars overhead, he
felt alone.  Nothing could shake his feeling of Kendra, nothing.

"Maybe you should talk about Kendra now Kehan," suggested Raissa as she made
her bedroll ready for the night.  "It always helps to talk about things just
before bed, then you'll have a good nites sleep."

"I don't know what to say.  It hit me when I bumped into her in the bar.
She was beautiful, more than that though.  You know how you just know that
something is or was meant to be?  Well, that's how it was with Kendra.  I
thought I could see it in her eyes as well, but it wasn't there last night.
She was talking about going somewhere and she needed to pack in a hurry.
She even forgot our dinner date.  It felt as if the bottom fell out of the
world.  I couldn't stand to be in that town.  I just had to run from what I
thought was........well, love I guess.  I guess you could say that I loved
that woman.  I've never felt that way about anyone ever.  She represented
the world to me.  Now, that world is shattered like a glass house."  Kehan
started to cry a little bit more, not at all ashamed to show his feelings
for the woman who abandoned him so abruptly.

Raissa got up and gave him a hug.  "It's going to be ok.  When we get to
Cleft, if you want to stay and help out around there, you will be more than
welcome.  If you want to move on, you are always free to leave.  I won't
stop you.  But, please, stay at Cleft.  I think we could use some people
like you there.  You'll get over her and things will cheer up, you'll see."  

"I hope so.  Thank you for listening to me Raissa."  Without thinking he
kissed her on the cheek.

<<<Tag Amy, lets see what's floating around in Raissa's mind now! ;-)>>>



	"Therefore with the same necessity with which the stone falls to the earth,
the hungry wolf buries it's fangs in the flesh of it's prey, without the
possibility of the knowledge that it itself is the destroyed as well as the
destroyer."
	-Schopenheuer