{Elira}
~**^**~
I sat still, unable to stop the swell of emotion rising in me.
For so long, my mother's legacy had been something distant and unknown to me until I stepped my foot into ESA.
Now, it was something the people here mentioned in hushed tones, or not at all. Hearing her name spoken with such reverence felt like finding a piece of her I didn't know I had lost.
"I always wondered," Ilyra continued softly, "if she had passed her strength on to her child. And now I see she had."
My throat tightened. I didn't know whether to feel proud or unworthy.
"I'm not…" I swallowed hard. "I'm not like her. Not yet."
The vice chancellor's smile turned kind, almost motherly. "You will be, if you choose to. Strength isn't just what you are born with, Elira—it's what you build after you've been broken."
Her words settled deep in my chest, heavier than I expected.
