An Engagement Gift

It was rare for Emrys to get a package. His birthday had come and gone some months ago, and he had been busied with the ever evolving needs of House Matheredor, surveying his recently gifted lands, and his now cancelled wedding to Lady Sky Matheredor. So, when the courier delivered this unassuming box wrapped in parchment to his home- his curiosity was peaked.

He set the box down on the coffee table, and the lanky lad folded himself into the plush cushions of the couch. The box didn't land straight on the table, and so, he took the time to maneuver it left and right, to set it just so along the parallel of the coffee table. A letter opener was plunged and dragged along the twine to open the box- which shifted the box to miss the parallel again, so he took the moment to straighten it once more.

Flaps opened to reveal a letter, and something else wrapped. Cushioned to prevent breakage. He adjusted his glasses by the side of the frame as he brought the letter up to read.

> *Dear Emrys,*
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> *Or perhaps, I should address you as Sir Emrys now?*
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> *I had all but assumed you had perished in the fire with your parents those many years ago. Young Wynevra had told the whole city what had happened, and had asked for help getting her self to Stormwind City. We gave her a rucksack to take, a few gold pieces we could muster, and had helped her on her way. You were such a sweet boy, it made me sick to think of what had happened. We never saw her again after that.*
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> *So, imagine my surprise when I heard your name again-- engaged to a noble lady nonetheless! Unless I have the wrong Emrys McEny, by chance? It's become the talk of the countryside.*
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> *The people of Southshore are a strong, close knit family. If anything had survived that blasted fire, I know in my heart not much more survived after the sacking. Pardon for the assumption, but, I assume you did not have any personal affects survive. My family and I were quite fortunate to be travelling at the time; while our home did not survive, we all did.*
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> *Please accept this gift I've enclosed in my letter as an engagement gift from an old neighbor. Your father and I were close enough to trade vegetables and help each other out on our homes, and I hope that I captured everyone just as you remember them. I wonder if you remember me?*
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> *- Nigel Bursk*
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Emrys hummed in thought. "Nigel Bursk?" he repeated lowly, in question. It had been more than a decade since he had left Southshore, seen the faces of those people. While he had returned several times since- it was post sacking, and thus, the threat of Blight and Horde were ever present. It seems a few flyers had survived, with his now old name and his old intentions.

It wasn't going to click, at least, not now. He shook his head and set the letter to the side, on the soft cushion of the couch. It too needed adjustment, a maneuver left and to the right, so that the bottom of the paper went parallel with the seam of the couch.

He leaned forward to take the gift from the box. Wrapped in paper, he gingerly picked at the sticky wax that kept it sealed. Paper wrinkled and unraveled, to reveal his gift.

Framed in a simple wooden frame, it was an oil based sketch-paint of a family. His family. Or at least, his old family. A young Emrys, besides a young Wynevra, and above them the images of Derwyn and Evelyn McEny. The children were just that: children, bright eyed and ecstatic for a new and exciting world; before pain, before suffering, before trauma. Derwyn had set his hand on Emrys' shoulder, and the family of four looked at the viewer in the peak of contentment. Looked at *him*.

Emrys stared, long and hard at the image. Memories. He set a his hand on his own shoulder to mimic how Nigel had painted Derwyn doing so to his younger self, while the other went to cover his mouth. He hadn't seen their faces in so long. So long in fact, it had started to become difficult to recall them beyond the feeling they gave him. Their spirits had left him at the altar the day he was ready to realign moons and stars to become August's vessel. He had dedicated his whole life to bringing them back- a failed and ghastly, macabre, pursuit he had long casted away to save his own neck.

Emrys could count on one hand how often he had cried in the last decade. Three of them were reserved for Lady Sky, even. Adding another to the count, his eyes welled up beneath his glasses and the usually strong man shuddered with haunting emotion.

He saw them again. And that's all he had ever wanted.