ESLIN AURIARIA-VERLICE
Red, aureate, white, and black. A fine set of colors, an absentminded thought occurred.
And a very vivid one, too.
Averting my gaze from the blinding tapestry of colors, I turned my thoughts inwards, replaying scenes from the meeting hours prior. It had been a tense and dull few days leading up to it, what with the recent activities of 'the Traders'—as the Council referred to them..
Slave trading activity had spiked exponentially over the course of the recent few months within the kingdoms, causing heightened tensions in the Council.
This was no good.
King Galahd of the Beast Kingdom of Eurethemia was becoming agitated with their recent findings—or rather, lack thereof—leading to impromptu decisions, such as the closing of all teleportation gates leading to or exiting the Vaella-Baella Kingdom. This meant that the gates wouldn't be able to be activated again until months later due to their design. Spontaneous decisions in our current situation would only hinder us, the rest of the Council let him be aware of.
Fortunately, we managed to convince him otherwise, with the help of his wife, Queen Lauriel.
Despite the fact that one of her children had just been attacked during an outing, she was managing to keep a professional demeanor.
This was a matter for another time, I deemed. I was not the ruler of Eurethemia.
With the Cult's recent break from activities, the Council members agreed to recuperate for the moment, and to monitor their respective kingdoms.
If the Traders were bold enough to attempt to harm a kingdom's youngest princess, then there was no way to say for sure that they weren't aiming for the others.
This was a much-needed break for us all. It also allowed me the time to further work on my other plans.
Peering out of the window, I watched as the clouds rolled in the sky, recalling the words of a person I once knew.
'Clouds do not rush to conquer the sky, nor do they seek to blot out the sun. They move with quiet purpose, nourishing the earth below. Free and unbound, unbothered and unrushed, taking their time to wander the endless skies, their journeys having no apparent conclusion. Perhaps, mages should strive to learn from them—to use their gifts to foster and protect, rather than pride and devastation.'
…A foolish thought, I decided at the time.
Pushing the deceased out of my mind, I focused my thoughts on my kingdom.
More specifically, my one child. He'd be about…six years of age, as of now.
An icy tinge of guilt gripped at my heart.
Esil's letter mentioned that he was having outbursts of mana that didn't seem to harm or even notice him, nor anyone in the palace, presumably due to some sort of imbalance between his body and his forming mana core.
Possible explanations surfaced at the thought of this, but I wouldn't know until I arrived at the palace.
…Would he still remember me, I wondered?
I—regrettably—haven't been in his life as much as I should have, admittedly.
…That made me no different from Him, it seems.
Other than that, Esil mentioned that he was in great health, and was turning out to be quite the prodigy.
A bit of pride swelled from within me upon hearing this.
Unfamiliar buildings and homes blurred past the carriage window for what seemed to be hours, slowly transitioning into scenery that was more familiar to me, until eventually, we came to a complete stop at an area across a bridge.
"Do pardon me, Your Majesty, but we have arrived at your destination."
Sliding out of the cushy, auburn seat, I maintained a noble poise, pushing all thoughts unrelating to the current situation to the very rear of my consciousness.
I moved to the other side of the carriage as the driver—a man with bushy brows and well past his prime—gave a deep bow, removing his ashen gray hat.
Reaching into my extra dimensional storage with a flare of mana, I withdrew a minor amount of eris. "This is for you."
The driver slowly lifted his head and I watched in a subdued amusement as his eyes almost bulged out of their sockets. "T-twelve gold eris?! This is enough to pay for generations of housing and education…! I-I can't accept this Your Majesty!" He sputtered in disbelief, his eyes flickering between the coins in my hand and my gaze.
I held back a mischievous smile, tilting my head in pretend-confusion.
An amusing ploy came to mind.
"Hm? Was this, perhaps, not enough? Have I undercompensated you for your services? Forgive me for that, high-quality services such as yours are to be paid for appropriately, after all."
With a deadpan expression and tone, I withdrew another couple gold eris.
"This much should be enough." The old man was on the verge of fainting by the time he accepted the eris—it was a normal reaction for someone of his standing.
A single gold eris was the equivalent of one hundred silver eris, and one hundred silver eris were also the equivalent of one hundred bronze eris.
In that sense, even a single gold eris was enough to keep a family housed and fed for the better half of a year. And I had just given him fifty flat. On the other hand, I felt a bit of stress dissipate from my shoulders at the amusing situation.
"T-thank you very much, Your Majesty! Now my grandchildren can finally attend an academy, possibly even Arwynns! Oh, thank the heavens!"
Sending the old man on his way, I turned on my heel and set out for the palace, maneuvering through the large, pearly gates that surrounded the estate.
The walk through the gardens wasn't very long at all, fortunately.
I thought of stopping by the Throne Room to discuss matters with my husband, but an indescribable emotion decided that it could wait for now, and that seeing my child was what mattered the most, at the moment.
Is this the fabled motherly love, I wondered? Was this what every normal mother felt for their child? Emotions have never been a virtue of mine…
Did this feeling decide whether or not you were a true mother, or was there another criteria that needed to be met? All questions that I—for the first time in a very long time—did not have the answers to.
…Motherhood was a very curious thing, yes.
I, myself, didn't feel quite like one, but if there was some unobservable, metaphorical string of criteria and requirements connecting so-called mother-to-be's to mothers themselves, I was sure that this feeling—along with any prior excessive worrying about my child—was the key to officially being recognized as one.
The only solution for this was to see my offspring, I deduced. (Was offspring an appropriate term to use?) Maybe then, I'll come to a conclusion.
I was just a few paces away from the large double doors of the palace when I felt my once-hurried step transition into a hesitant one.
Was I… getting nervous? At the thought of seeing my own kid? Doubts of whether or not my own child would recognize his mother's face began to surface again, and I came to a standstill, my body seemingly unwilling to move.
This was a new feeling, even for me. …And it was certainly most unwelcome.
I became trapped in my mind. It felt like I was locked in a battle against a completely foreign opponent—except they were my own thoughts, doubts, and concerns.
Fortunately or unfortunately, I wasn't waiting long.
The next few moments went by in blur, and what I saw didn't exactly soothe that worrying feeling inside of me, either. Instead, it felt like it was multiplied by a thousand fold, smoothing over and dousing any sort of forming inklings of logical reason that attempted to explain what I was seeing.
First, there was a build up of mana that I soon realized had always been there, undercut by the loudness of my own thoughts.
And then…
*BOOM*
A thunderous crash rippled from the palace, spraying debris across the yard, followed by a concentrated torrent of water.
Out of sheer luck, I guessed, I was unharmed despite standing underneath it all.
"...What the hell."
The uncharacteristic words that slipped from my lips were muted by the loud chaos.
Droplets of water rained from the sky, giving me an involuntary cold shower, and a rather sizable hole was now present in the middle-upper flower of the palace exterior, giving view to the many layers of materials used in its construction. I could just make out where exactly the hole was born from, presumably along with who gave "birth" to the hole.
A boy no older than four with medium length, deep-lavender bangs that were longer on the sides, a casual noble-like attire, and a familiar set of liquid golden eyes that peered through the faint cloud of dust and smoke apologetically, his expression collapsing from pure shock, to a stupefy laced with a hint of otherworldly awe, and finally a regretful and apologetic frown.
Our eyes met and the faint smoke cleared, giving view to the barely noticeable twitching of his lips.
"H-hey—hello—there… Mother. It's been quite awhile." His voice trailed weakily and he gave a sheepish grin. Relief washed over me in a similar way that the water had just seconds prior as I saw that he was unharmed.
What left me the most astonished in this moment through all the chaos that had ensued, however, was this single, clear, distinguishable emotion surfacing deep within me, outweighing the relief that came upon his recognition of me, and any other emotion that, at that time, felt insignificant.
It was an emotion that—on the other side of the coin that was my emotions and thoughts—felt foreign, and made any of my previous worries feel silly.