THE CHOSEN ONES ( PART FORTY FIVE )

The children were playing down by the river, it was
such a glorious day. Young Alfie was making a den,
under a tree.

Teela came running up to her Mother, "Alfie's playing, shall I go get him Mam?"

"Yes!" shouted Missy, going over to where her husband was sleeping. "Gerard you wake up now!"

"What's going on, is there a forest fire?"

"No!" cried Missy. "We have to get packed up to
leave, Willy says bad men are coming...with fire.
Now you gotta get up and find us some breakfast, I
ain't got nothing to give the children and they be
playing me up."

Gerard stared at his wife, "ain't we got no eggs?
I thought yer Ma made some rice cakes...for that
there feast we had last night."

Missy was angry at Gerard now. "You lazy lummox,
get up now, or I'll go down that there river, get
a bucket of water and tip it over you, do you hear
me?"

"Aw! yer wouldn't do that to yer man, would yer?
me heads a thumping Missy," he cried.

"If yer can't take yer drink Gerard, then don't
drink at all."

Outside Nathen was talking to Ben. "Ben I have to
leave, although it would be nice to stay with these
kind people, I miss my family."

Ben looked at Nathen with sadness in his eyes. "But
you don't even know where they are Nathen."

"I must try to find them Ben, they have probably
been looking for me. The problem is, I will miss
you, but I think you should stay with Martha, she
can look after you."

"But I want to go with you!" pleaded Ben.

"Ben I owe you my life, but if you come with me,
anything could happen to you, I would never forgive
myself if I put you in danger."

Ben thought to himself, 'I don't want safe, I want
adventure.' He then turned to Nathen, "you're not
my Father, if I want to leave, I will and you can't
stop me. If you don't want me to come with you, then I'll leave on my own."

"But Ben!" said Nathen, "it's not safe."

Ben turned to Nathen...standing his ground. "I don't want safe Nathen, if it hadn't been for me,
you wouldn't be here now, so can I come with you
or not?"

"If that's really what you want Ben, then I suppose
you had better come with me."

"Great!" shouted Ben, all excited, "which way are
we heading?"

"South," said Nathen.

"But isn't that the way, the bad hunters are?"
enquired Ben.

"Bad hunters could be anywhere Ben, South is the
only way I know. Come on, we had better say our
goodbyes."

To be continued ...........THE CHOSEN ONES ( PART FORTY SIX ) | ABCtales