I never wanted to forget Isla. Even as I was dragged out of the Beast Dungeon that fateful day, I bit and clawed at the adventurer tugging me away. I wanted desperately to go back and save her while we had the chance. Although I knew we didn’t have much time.

“I’m sorry, man! We just can’t go back there!” The adventurer yelled back at me, his blond flowing in his face. “I don’t want anyone else to die.”

I didn’t take that as a satisfying response, and so I further tried to worm my way out of his arms so I could go back to save my wife. All of this while we were being chased by a small group of mature.

“Damnit! What did I just say?” The male adventurer clicked his tongue and tried to subdue me. But there was no I was going to let her death do us part,

He was carrying me over his shoulders as if he was carrying a large bag over it. I thrashed and kicked harder, stretching my hand out as far as it could. I jabbed my fingers into the side of his stomach and he staggered back in pain. He slipped up and let me loose. I was free.

“Ouch! This guy!” the male adventurer rubbed the side of his abdomen. He turned his head to his friend, the petite red-headed healer in snow-white robes. I was relentless in my endeavor to return. I scurried to my feet and was just about to go running in the opposite direction, towards the matur.

“Be prepared to cast a Regeneration spell,” he said to his friend. She nodded and readied her staff.

I turned on my heels to sprint back, but the last thing I saw in my periphery was that male adventurer striking me with the backside of his staff to the side of my head. Everything went dark afterwards.

I never did forget her. She was in my every dream, and was always sitting next to me when I woke up in a healer’s hut after being knocked out. Isla was alive, smiling like she always did. We laughed together at home, snuggled up against one another once the weather got colder, and we even ate together at our favorite restaurants, although the barmaids always never bring her order. I guess we always get unlucky with assholes that are always serving us. I wasn’t an issue, I was always willing to share my food with her, despite the weird glares I was being given. Jealousy, I assume.

“‘Til death do you part.” That phrase haunted me more than anything else, especially irking me on my wedding day with Isla. There was no big celebration, the two of us just got together with a local priest and said our vows.

“Will you love one another, in sickness, sadness, and in joy forevermore?” The priest asked us.

Both of us replied in sync, “Yes, I will.”

“Then may your lives be intertwined, unified as one, ‘til death do you part.”

No, even in death, we will never part, that was why that phrase annoyed me. Love is not separated by merely death. That thought continuosly swam in my head, unconsciously making me more affectionate towards Isla. She’s not dead, yet even when that fateful day comes when one of us does pass, we still won’t be separated.

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Everything changed when Charliette came into the picture. My first impression of her was very pretty, almost at Isla’s level, but just another wimpy child trying to make a living in a dungeon, seeing how she broke down next to me in our encounter with the dungeon master. Surely she had more magic energy in her to continue fighting, but no, she was immobile. Hell, I’m one to talk. I was wailing my eyes out too.

But then I got to know her more and fought alongside her more, and I was sorely mistaken. She was headstrong, knowing exactly what she wanted. She wanted to learn magic, and she made it happen. She needed money? She gathered us all together and made it happen. But she was also truthful to the bone and caring. She never brought us along without telling us the dangers of the latest excursion, nor did she sugarcoat anything. She was thorough in explaining what we were signing up for. This was especially apparent with her repeatedly warning us that the Treasure Dungeon was full of very powerful monsters when Lio invited us to come along. Not a lot of adventurers do that nowadays when trying to recruit a party, seeing as how that strategy could scare off anyone.

She came over to my house one time to thank us for the gift, Lio in tow behind her shadow. They were like a package, where one goes the other follows. What she said, though, shocked me to my core. As they sat down on the couch, Isla stood next to my at the hallway, smiling like she always did at our guests. Charliette then got to her feet and said something that caught me off guard.

“Fiar, your wife… where is she?” Her face was sickly pale.

I thought she came to thank Isla? What kind of thanks was that? She gave my own wife the cold stare, ignoring her mere existence, even after all that she had given to her?

I was furious, but I knew Charliette was still recovering from the Treasure Dungeon incident, so I assumed it was her fatigued mind speaking. I turned to Lio to ease my racing heart. But he said the same thing.

“Fiar, there is no wife there. We can’t see anything.”

Both of them stared back at Isla and me like we were monsters. Like we were crazy. I turned to see Isla. Her smile had disappeared and tears flowed down her cheeks. They had gotten to her head, which was quite enough for me to handle.

“Please just stop this.” Lio stepped forward and approached me. My wife was crying because of them. She was hurt because of them. They weren’t treating her like a person, but like a lifeless, bodiless thing! I clenched my fist and went all in. All to protect my wife.

I never saw my wife again after that. I saw glimpses of her here and there, but she never truly returned to me. She gave me durian and other fruit, as well as tea, but she never spoke to me, reached out to me, or hugged me. I was so confused, so lost. What happened to my wife? Where did she go?

After what seemed like forever, the two scums of the earth, along with their knight buddies, returned. Did they come to take me away too? Like they did to Isla?

No, they didn’t. It was quite the opposite. They gave Isla back to me. They gave me her wedding bracelet, one that she never took off.

“We found her. I’m sorry, but she really is gone.” Charliette said these words with a sorrowful glint in her eyes. I knew exactly what happened right then and there.

She never survived the Beast Dungeon. I remembered my desperate attempt to save her to no avail. I remembered seeing that bracelet in her arm jingle as she fell into that wretched hole.

Death really did part us, that was the realization I had. I burst into tears and let my sorrows pour out on Charliette.

Death parted us, but it could never separate the memories I had of her. So while I drenched Charliette’s robes in tears and heard her sniffle too, it gave me comfort knowing that a piece of her was still with me.

Isla was gone, and I’d accepted that. It was the least I could do, as her husband, on the foot of her grave. White lilacs were always her favorite, and they looked so good on the polished stone.