Luthiel stared at Morrigan as if the old kappa had spoken in a language she didn't recognize.
"What do you mean, Master? I want you to get better. That's all I want."
Morrigan's cracked lips curled into a weak smile. She shook her head slowly against the pillow, each movement costing visible effort.
"No, Luthiel. What do you want for your life?" Another cough rattled through her small frame. "What is your goal? Your aspiration? The thing that gets you out of bed when everything else tells you to stay down."
Silence settled over the room.
Inside Luthiel's mind, Lu's gentle voice surfaced first. We all know the answer, right guys?
El offered a quiet nod. Thi looked down at the frail woman beneath her and squeezed her hand tighter.
"I only want to serve you, Master. That has always been enough."
Morrigan's expression shifted. The warmth remained but frustration crept in alongside it, weathering her features the way wind weathers stone.
"I'm glad you care about me." She wheezed through a painful breath. "But that's fucking stupid."
Luthiel froze.
"What kind of mother wants her daughter's only ambition to be taking care of her? That's not a dream, Luthiel. That's a cage you built yourself and decorated with loyalty." She shifted slightly in the bed, wincing as the movement pulled at the wound in her back. "There is a whole world beyond these walls. A massive, complicated, beautifully ugly world. And you've never seen a single piece of it."
The old kappa's cloudy eyes drifted toward the ceiling. Her voice softened, the harshness gave way to a tender tone.
"When I first found you, Luthiel, you were so small. A mere flicker of living Anima, barely visible, barely real. Just a tiny spark sitting in the dirt with no body to call its own."
Her clawed hand traced absent patterns on the blanket as her eyes filled with nostalgia.
"Now look at you. You've grown so much before my eyes. It's incredible, truly." A faint smile crossed her beak. "When Urgor first crafted you a proper body, you manifested so tiny. A mere infant in a shell of Animanium and plush. You couldn't even hold your own head up."
The memory played behind Morrigan's eyes, visible to Luthiel even through the haze of poison and exhaustion.
"As soon as I found you, I knew I loved you. I brought you back to this village, raised you here, made sure nobody revealed what you truly are." Her gaze returned to Luthiel. "I did everything I could to give you a normal life. Even when 'normal' was never going to be possible for someone like you."
Luthiel bowed her head low. "I am forever grateful, Master. For everything you have done. I owe you my entire existence."
"You don't owe me a damn thing." Morrigan's voice carried a firmness that her body couldn't match. "That's not how family works."
"I didn't raise you because I wanted gratitude." Morrigan smiled. "I raised you because that's what mothers do."
Silence settled between them. The herbs on the bedside table filled the room with their bitter fragrance. Beyond the closed door, muffled footsteps indicated the medical staff hovering anxiously.
Morrigan studied Luthiel's face with an intensity that belied her weakened state. Her cloudy eyes traced the markings beneath the girl's cheeks, the tension in her mitten hands, the way her crimson gaze kept darting toward the floor.
"I know you're strong enough to protect this village," Morrigan said carefully. "You and those Sky-Fallen boys. Between the three of you, Anwansi has a fighting chance even without me on my feet."
She paused.
"But I can see something else under your eyes, Luthiel. Something you've been carrying for a long time and never told me about."
Luthiel's head rose sharply. "I don't understand what you mean, Master."
Morrigan chuckled, the sound dissolving into a hoarse wheeze. "You're a terrible liar. All three of you are."
The old kappa took a slow breath, marshaling what little strength remained.
"You are allowed to tell him what you are."
The words dropped into the room and detonated silently. Luthiel's crimson eyes flew wide. Inside her mind, all three aspects went still simultaneously, a rarity that only occurred when something genuinely unprecedented happened.
"What... what do you mean?"
"You heard me."
"I think I trust him." Morrigan's clawed hand found Luthiel's and held it with trembling fingers. "And more importantly, I trust him with you."
Luthiel's mouth opened but no sound came out.
Morrigan continued before the girl could formulate a protest. "After this business with the Lacerts is handled, after we deal with Gavial and whatever comes next, I want you to leave this village. Go with them."
Every aspect reacted at once.
WHAT?! — Thi.
Leave?! — Lu.
El said nothing, but something cracked behind her silence.
"I know they won't stay. They're Sky-Fallen, after all. They have questions they want answered. So they'll keep moving."
"And I want you to go with them."
"No!" Thi's voice burst out of Luthiel's mouth with enough force to startle them both. "I could never leave you, Master! This village is my home. YOU are my home. I won't abandon you!"
Morrigan simply smiled.
"I can see it in your eyes, my cute little plush. You have a dream that staying here is preventing you from achieving. I've watched it grow behind your expressions for years now. Every time a trader passes through with stories about distant lands. Every time you read about places you've never been. Every time you heal a bird's broken wing and watch it fly somewhere you can't follow."
Luthiel's lip trembled.
"I have been waiting," Morrigan continued, her voice barely above a whisper, "for someone who sees you properly. Who sees you the way I do. Someone who cares about you and can protect you." Her clawed hand reached up and cupped Luthiel's cheek with a tenderness that made all three aspects ache at once. "Someone to take you beyond these walls so you can chase whatever it is your heart has been whispering about since you were small enough to fit in my palm."
Tears were streaming down Luthiel's face now, falling freely onto Morrigan's blanket.
"I don't want to leave you alone knowing what you are," Morrigan said softly. "Knowing how dangerous the world can be for someone with your nature. But I believe I have finally found people who can give you what you need. Who can keep you safe while you grow into whoever you're meant to become."
"No, Master." Luthiel's voice fractured across every syllable. "I will spend my life with you. You are all that I care for. This village is all that I care for."
Inside her head, Lu and El murmured agreement through their tears. The three aspects united in refusal.
She's right. Lu whispered.
We don't need anything else, El said quietly.
Thi hugged herself. We can't leave Mom...
Morrigan scowled. Even poisoned and bedridden, the expression carried the full authority of the Great Sage Equal to Heaven.
"Luthiel, listen to me carefully." Her hoarse voice hardened with every word. "No mother wants to be her child's burden. And no matter how much you resist hearing it, you are my fucking daughter. Do you hear me? I don't give a damn about who disagrees. I don't care who hates you or fears you or calls you an object. You are my daughter. Period."
Luthiel broke completely. Her shoulders shook as she cried openly. Morrigan released Luthiel's cheek and let her hand fall back to the blanket.
"Now tell me, my cutie. What is your actual dream?"
Luthiel wiped her eyes with both mitten hands. Her breath came in shuddering gasps as three sets of aspects fought for control of a single body.
"My dream?" A wet laugh escaped through the tears. "I told you, Master. To be with y—"
"Your ACTUAL dream, Luthiel."
The room went quiet again. Luthiel stared at the floor and her hands. At the small puddle of tears forming on the blanket between them. Inside her mind, the three aspects were just as quiet.
Until Lu finally spoke.
Tell her.
El nodded. She already knows.
Thi sniffled. Yah, Mom deserves to hear it...
When she finally spoke, her voice was barely audible. Smaller than any of her three aspects had ever sounded.
"I want to make a world of peace."
The words hung in the medicinal air.
"I want to explore everything beyond these walls and bring joy to people who have forgotten how to smile." Her mitten hands clenched against her dress. "I want to bring life back to those who have abandoned theirs. I want to help people who are suffering the way I suffered, who feel unwanted and broken and wrong, and show them they're not."
"I want to travel..." Luthiel continued, her voice barely above a whisper. "I want to see places I've only read about."
She looked up at Morrigan through red, swollen eyes.
"I want people who hate each other to understand one another."
"I..." She lowered her head. "I want to leave every place better than I found it."
Then Luthiel's expression crumbled. "But I don't want to leave you, Master. I can't."
Morrigan laughed quietly.
"Don't act like I won't still be here once you're gone." A weak chuckle shook her chest. "I'll contact you so often you'll beg me to stop. You'll be halfway across Aethrys trying to save the world and I'll be sending you messages asking if you've eaten enough and whether you're keeping your dress clean."
Luthiel laughed through her tears. The sound was broken and uncontrolled.
"Luthiel." Morrigan's voice dropped to its softest register. "I love you. Every piece of you. Every aspect, every mood, every stubborn refusal to accept that you deserve happiness." Her cloudy eyes glistened with a moisture that the poison hadn't produced. "Keeping you here and protecting you for the rest of your life won't bring you fulfillment. It will only make this village your cage instead of your home."
She took a shaking breath.
"I trust those boys. And I trust you. You will do great things, Luthiel. I know that with every fiber of my old, broken, body." Her beak curled upward. "But those great things won't happen inside these walls."
Luthiel collapsed forward onto Morrigan's chest again. Her sobs were muffled against the fabric as all three aspects wept without restraint. Morrigan's arm lifted with tremendous effort and wrapped around the girl's small frame, holding her the way she had held her when Luthiel was small enough to cradle in one palm.
They stayed like that for a long time.
Eventually Morrigan spoke again, her voice fading as exhaustion pulled her back toward sleep.
"Tell him the truth. The whole truth. About what you are. About everything." A slow exhale. "I'm sure they'll accept you."
Luthiel sniffled and looked up. "Master..."
Morrigan's eyes were already half-closed, the poison and the emotional exertion dragging her consciousness toward the dark. But she forced one more sentence through her cracked lips.
"Of course, before any of that... I need you to fight for those too weak to fight for themselves." Her hand squeezed Luthiel's one final time. "Protect this village. Right now, I'm too weak to do my duty. So I'm passing it to you."
Luthiel straightened. Through the tears, through the grief, through the overwhelming weight of everything Morrigan had just laid on her shoulders, something solidified behind her crimson eyes.
"Of course, Master. I promise."
After a long silence, she asked one final question.
"When the time comes....will you at least try...to pursue your dream?"
Luthiel hesitated.
"I..."
"I don't know."
She answered honestly. "I still don't think I can leave you."
"But..." She slowly nodded. "I'll tell Bug."
"I'll tell him everything."
Morrigan let out a long breath. "...Alright."
"I'll take that for now."
Morrigan's weak smile was the last thing Luthiel saw before the old kappa's eyelids fluttered shut and her breathing deepened into the slow, strained rhythm of unconscious sleep.
Luthiel sat beside her for another moment. Then she leaned forward and pressed her lips gently against Morrigan's forehead, just above the basin's rim.
"I love you too," she whispered. "Mother."
The word came out quietly enough that only the sleeping kappa and three arguing aspects heard it.
Luthiel stood, wiped her face one final time, and walked out of the room.
The head doctor spotted her exit immediately and rushed past her with his team in tow, instruments already glowing as they surrounded their Chief.
Luthiel walked down the corridor and through the front door into the evening air. The village stretched before her, battered and bruised but still standing. Lanterns dotted the streets. Distant hammering echoed from the walls. The smell of smoke and herbs mingled with the cool breeze of a Ceasus evening.
Inside her head, the aspects were wrestling.
We have to tell him, Lu said, her voice still thick from crying. Master gave us permission. We should find Mister Grub right now.
I know that, Thi shot back, her composure slowly reassembling itself. But what if he... what if he looks at us differently after?
El's flat voice cut through the uncertainty. Master believes he will accept us. That is sufficient.
Is it though? Thi's doubt was genuine, stripped of its usual bravado. What if Master is wrong?
A long pause.
Then we will have lost something precious, El replied. But we will have followed Master's wishes.
Thi swallowed hard. Lu sniffled once more.
Luthiel shook her head and began walking toward the inn. First, tell Grub the truth. Then, focus on protecting the village. What came after that, the leaving, the dream, the terrifying vastness of a world she had never seen, all of it could wait.
One impossible thing at a time.