Randi nodded, taking it in without speaking.
Children moved in the distance, laughter carrying faintly on the wind. A truck passed slowly along a dirt road way older than its driver, dust rising behind it. An elder sat outside a small home, watching the morning unfold with quiet patience.
Nothing about it felt empty.
It felt… enduring.
“It’s not what I expected,” she admitted softly.
Braden glanced at her briefly.
“Most people do not know what to expect.”
They continued on, the silence between them comfortable and unforced.
When they reached the clinic, Braden slowed his horse.
Randi’s gaze shifted to the building.
It stood apart from the others. It wasn’t grand, but solid and long, with shutters painted a soft andinviting blue. There was a quiet strength in its structure, clean lines set against the open land.
“Brew built this,” Braden said as he dismounted.
There was no embellishment in his voice.
Just pride.
Randi dismounted slowly, stepping closer as she took it in.
“He told me he wanted to do something more,” she said.
“He did not forget where he came from,” Braden replied.
Her fingers brushed lightly along the stucco exterior, something settling deeper in her understanding.
A well-landscaped wildflower garden graced the length of the building blooming with colors of red, yellow, blue, and purple in multiple shapes and batches.
A short distance away, something older stood, almostmonumental. It was smaller in size, weathered, and worn by time.
She turned toward it and pointed.
“What’s that?”
Braden followed her gaze.
“Our medicine lodge,” he said. “From before.”
Randi studied it quietly, not as something abandoned but as something that needed remembering.
“We carry both,” Braden continued. “What was… and what is.”
She looked back at the clinic, then the old lodge, then him.
“And Brew?” she asked.
“He walks between them,” Braden said. “That is not always easy.”
They were words she had heard for a second time and this time they lingered, not heavy buttruer and with more meaning than before.
