Chapter 568: Bereaved

Days passed.

Arc made no effort to mark the hours. She stared at the ceiling to avoid thinking about her dragon. She let time blur into moments spent crying. Moments spent staring. Sleeping. Pretending to sleep when her family members came to sit next to her.

Sometimes she watched the threads that seemed to appear and disappear at random, wondering what they meant when they didn’t seem attached to anyone. She ignored her food, not feeling hungry at all, even when her moms started sending her sweets.

On the third day, though she did not know it, Arc was visited by the only parent she didn’t want to see. He entered the room, looming in his three-meter form. The one he used for state visits. Quietly, he sat as Arc lay on her side, staring at the curtained window.

"I executed a dragon today," Kir said. Arc knew that he knew she was awake, which was why she didn’t bother to close her eyes when she felt his teleportation and approach through whatever qualia let her perceive the threads. "The Heavensred that killed yours was deemed too feral to keep."

"I didn’t ask you to do that," Arc said. Now two dragons are dead because of me...

"The decision was the Dragon Knights’. I had nothing to do with it... I made sure it was quick. Painless." He paused for a long time. "In a year, maybe two, your soul might heal enough to try another bond. They still welcome you to continue your training until then."

The thought of learning without Ascala, watching others raise their dragons and fly... it felt like it would be torture. And besides... "No other dragon wanted me but Ascala," Arc said, her voice breaking as she cried. "She wanted a mother... I thought... I talked to her. My magic let me... And now I wish I never had..."

"Tell me about her," her Father said. "Even if she’s no longer with you, for a time she brought you joy... I’d like to know more about Ascala."

Arc sniffed heavily. Even though she felt he didn’t deserve it, her Father was finally trying to be more than just the patron of the House of Stars. She started to talk. To describe Ascala, how she found the little stripe of pink to be so lovely. The little ways her dragon had shown affection and other emotions. The disdain she felt when Arc tried to feed her fish, even though it was supposed to be a rare treat for dragons.

She talked for hours, going over every moment she could remember of their brief time together. Even describing what she felt through the threads. Through it all, her Father listened, asking only a couple of questions as he stroked her head through her hair. A familiar gesture and yet one she couldn’t place her last memory of.

And when at last Arc had nothing left to say, she let him pull her into a hug as she cried into his shoulder.

"I’m sorry I wasn’t there," he said. "If I had known..."

Was he trying to absorb blame for what another dragon did? She knew he was responsible for the spell that preserved the dragon eggs, but he didn’t have her ability. He couldn’t have known what monster he’d preserved... Not without bonding it as Margaret... had...

"Father..." Arc swallowed her sadness, something hollow replacing it as her mind started to form connections. A vessel of thought, ready for the anger sparking inside her. "The Heavensred’s knight, Margaret, did anything happen to her? How did she react when... she found out."

"She was calm," Kir said. "I think she’d come to terms with it. Why?"

"Even when they... when you killed the dragon?"

"I severed her bond before the execution. She would not have felt what you did," he said, his voice betraying a bit of discomfort. "The Academy will keep an eye on her, though, and you when you return."

"I’d like to go back tomorrow," Arc said.

"Are you sure?" he asked.

"I’m sure," she nodded. "I need to talk to Margaret. I need to..." she didn’t know what she would say, but she knew that there were things she had to know. Things that she would use her mavenry to know, even if it killed her. The hatred she’d felt from Margaret couldn’t just be over a stupid contract or her privilege as a scion of the House of Stars. "... figure some things out."

"If that’s what you want, I’ll tell your mothers. They’ve just finished with Owyn."

A spike of worry cut through Arc’s emotions. "What happened to him? Is he alright?"

"He’s fine," Kir said. "Stable, for the most part, though he’ll have to wait for his mana to settle. The transformation was... more intensive, because of what he chose."

"What did he choose?" Arc asked.

Kir hugged his daughter again. "That, I think, is something you should find out from him. But you should know that he’ll be under our direct protection, now. A ward of the House of Stars."

"Does that mean I won’t have to look after him anymore?" Arc asked, her voice catching a little as she realized she no longer really minded the role.

He seemed to sense her thoughts as he replied, "No. It means you’ll have to look after him now more than ever. He’s the only one of his kind... There may be others who would try to use him because of it." He brushed a hand along her horns before standing. "I know I haven’t been the best Father... Thank you for letting me help you with this."

She nodded, watching him leave the way he came as he ducked past the door and let it close before teleporting.

For a few hours, Arc waited. Her thoughts twisted around themselves in loops of remembrance, sorrow, and worry. Until at last she could take it no more, and she slipped out of her bed, leaving her room with the intent to find Owyn.

It was evening outside, but she found the night orderly starting her shift and got the elf to ask about where she could find Owyn. A short ride up the elevator, and Arc found herself at the top floor of the hospital, where her mom’s offices were, and only a few rooms for ’special patients’ according to the orderly.

The orderly here had her desk facing the elevator, and she knew to expect Arc as she directed her down the hall to the last room, which occupied a corner.

Owyn wasn’t in bed, but rather sitting at a table in his hospital gown. Where Arc had felt no appetite, he seemed to have become entirely a being of hunger to judge by the stacks of cleaned and waiting dishes that occupied almost equal halves of the round table.

He stopped the moment she opened the door, though.

"Arc," he said, his voice somehow a bit richer than it had been, with a slight, almost feral sound added to it. "You’re alright." She saw his hands. The black scales and claws. The small horns that were starting to poke forth at his browline. He saw her notice them, and his face reddened a bit as he grabbed a towel and wiped his claws. "I... chose to become part dragon."

"How is that possible?" Arc asked. "Why would you..."

"It seemed reasonable at the time," he said, his emotions through the threads that connected them betraying more complex emotions directed at her. "And it turns out... It’s a bit of a long explanation."

Did he do this for me? Arc wondered, sensing he had but not knowing how she should feel about it. Anger at what felt like an attempt to replace her dragon warred with the relief she felt over his survival and the inexpressible sense that he truly cared about her in a way beyond any sort of love she’d imagined him feeling.

"Would you like to sit?" he asked, pulling some plates off the second seat and stacking them amidst the pile. "I’m sorry about all the food... I need to build up mass to handle, uh..." he trailed off. "Never mind." He clearly felt embarrassed about something, but Arc was still too tired to press him on it, though she sensed he intended to reveal something to her.

Instead of taking the chair, she sat on his lap and curled into him.

"Could you just... hold me, for a while..." she sniffed, letting herself feel relief first and foremost as he wrapped his arms around her. She didn’t care if there were still greasy spots on his forearms as they pressed into her hospital gown. She just needed comfort.

So she listened to his heartbeat for a while as he held her. It was deep and slow, and she let it clear her head just a bit before she lifted her head to find him staring down at her with his big green eyes and pale white hair, full of worry and the desire to see her find happiness once more.

His only intent was to make her happy...

So when she drew herself up and kissed him, shedding her gown as she threw herself into the intensity of a desire she’d kept herself from feeling for so long, he replied with equal fervor, holding her gently against himself until she came up for air.

"Take me to your bed," Arc said.

"Yes," he replied.