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wolf was snout-to-nose with him and another, standing at his booted feet, nudged his leg with its paw before turning to run into the lavender field. The other wolf sat waiting beside him. Remembering how he'd imagined Carolina that morning, with lavender in her hair, blood and soil on her hands, he guessed the wolves had found the grave she'd dug. He reached out his hand to the wolf and received one of its front paws in return. He then rose to his feet to walk with his animal escort into the field.
Initially trudging into dense plantings, the transcendental, seven-foot tall lavender shrubs gave way and his journey became easier as he moved forward, the crying no longer just in his head, but coming from the direction in front of him. He started running toward the sound until he entered a clearing with, he knew, his miscarried child's grave, now excavated, at its center, with rays of silvery light illuminating the opening. The crying stopped. He walked forward, holding his breath, allowing his eyes to follow the light down and when he peered into the radiant opening he silently, wondrously, fell to his knees.
Reaching into the earth, he lifted and examined a pristine cover of white cotton that had embroidered upon it, in radiant blue and silver threads, a message especially for him, the same one that had heralded in Justin’s birth and his own, ‘De Todos Los Dioses’. Bringing the fabric to his nose, he was treated to vaguely familiar scents, and at the moment he touched his lips to the fine needlework, the blanket vanished from his hands. Returning his attention to the opening, he reached into the luminous hollow, to bring forth a whopper of a baby boy that he immediately knew to be his offspring. The baby's eyes were the exact color of Carolina's; he had the Savage tan skin, combined with, his Pa Joe’s unique, silvery-hair and facial features in perfect miniature. Touching the child in wonder, he forgot about his animal companions until they began growling and pawing around the opening. Taking off his shirt, he wrapped his son securely in the warm fabric before laying him carefully atop a bed of lavender.
Kneeling once again, he reached his hand into the warm orifice, pushing aside moist earth to withdraw one white leathery cocoon, then another. With shaking hands, he laid each large ovate treasure beside the wriggling baby boy to withdraw a pearl-handled pocketknife from his jeans. Carefully, he barely nicked the strong white shell when sweet, spicy,