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Buck settled slowly on the cool ground, uncaring of the dampness the dew caused. It was early, not long after sunrise and a faint bit of mist still curled through the air. He knew, in a vague, distant way, that this was not really healthy. But also knew he could not avoid it.
All he truly knew is for the moment everything was dull, unimportant. It was spring. He should be enjoying the nascent greens peeking through the retreating snow. But everything was gray to him - colorless and dim.
The sun cleared the mountain, light spilling over into the valley. The trees’ shadows stretched long and thin, a darker gray over pale gray, old snow. The green of the pine needles were a gray-olive green under the rotting, melting ice of winter, instead of their normal vibrant, deep shade.
Eyes lost, blurred by thought, by memory, by dull, deep seated loss and pain, he rested his hand on stone. It was unmarked. Plain and unblemished by any man-made marks. It was almost large enough to be called a true boulder. Nestled against it were two smaller ones of the exact same type.
“Another year,” he murmured, his voice a pale whisper of sound. Raspy. He licked at his dry lips and tried to say more. He breathed out soundless words. Inaudible. Indistinct. His thoughts not able to be rendered. A moan, pain and regret, indescribable, indefinable, tumbled from his throat.
It was his ritual. His penance. Ten days every year. Lost. Full of regret. Soul deep pain. Unforgivable and unforgiven. Never to be recovered.
Hands trembling, eyes unseeing, his fingers cleared winter’s debris from between the stones. Slowly, as the sun infused the air with unheeded warmth, he mechanically tidied the area, straightened the border around the stones.
By the time the sun sank behind the far mountain, Buck was exhausted. His hands were scraped and bruised as he silently stoked flames from the coals of his previous fire. He mindlessly ate the slow baked casserole he dug out of the ashes. It was meaningless to him, route action, the taste of ashes on his tongue.
The sound of a bird in the growing dusk barely caught his attention. But it did and he turned, staring as it as it flew across the sky. He almost wondered at its presence, but thought was too hard. Once it was gone, he buried another casserole in the coals. Then he banked the fire against the night. Finished with the necessities required for life, he threw himself into his small tent, his mind carefully blank.
By rote memory and instinct, he rose again at a chill, predawn hour. No though was needed to rebuild the fire from banked coals. None was needed for him to prepare coffee in the old, burned metal pot. Nor to dig the simple ceramic container from the ashes.
As the sun crested the mountain to spread its light and warmth in the valley, Buck settled slowly on the chill ground beside the three stones. His hand gently came to rest on the largest.
“M….” no words came as his body trembled with long throttled pain. A breathless sound clawed its way past locked vocal chords. He bowed his head, resting his brow on the cool stone for tears that could not flow. The chill breeze ghosted over him, a caress, a reminder, a threat.
Every year he came. Wordless. Blank. Unable to express the inner turmoil he felt. Rage warred with greef. Regret. Pain. Fear. Loss. Love. Even hatred sometimes - whether for himself or for… he could not say, not even to himself. All tangled together in a knot he could not release. It was his penance to lose time. It was his to offer - blank, mindless days of service, of work, of care, of maintenance. He could not let go of what was not his but was, at the same time, his at its fundamental core.
He carried the guilt. He carried the responsibility for the loss. He paid for it - for each day he had unintentionally taken, he spent one here, lost in his regrets. He could not repay the losses, not truly. He could not make amends. He could only pay his penance.
Rising, he paced forward, beyond the stones and their border guardian stones. Eyes dule, lips thin, face expressionless, he moved in a slow shambling walk. He bent, motion painful and slow from cold, stiffness and aching joints, to pick up fallen branches in the clearing. Each removed to the side for later disposal. From his chest, a soft, morning groan filled the air as he worked.
It was his penance. It was his remembrance. It was his pain. It kept him moving, even if it was nearly mindless. It was his only way to grieve for what was past and gone.