Chapter 313: Sunlight and Healing

Vivian’s POV

I could see it so clearly in my mind: this tiny boy, no more than six years old, bursting directly into his parents’ bedroom where Algebra and Aurora lay sleeping. His dark brown curls bounced wildly with each eager step, his eyes wide and shining with pure excitement. That gap-toothed grin stretched across his face like he had just single-handedly conquered the whole world. And his parents, already smiling before he even jumped onto the bed, feigned absolute surprise with playful yelps, making him roar with sweet laughter and pride like the brave little warrior he firmly believed himself to be.

I saw it all so vividly, and gods, it hurt my chest deeply.

"He even had Zahliver wrapped completely around his little finger," Aurora said softly, her voice filled with quiet nostalgia. "Do you know how remarkably rare that is? I have never seen your mate just... sit down on the floor, let alone play a simple game and intentionally pretend to lose. But he did it with Andrew, and he did it with absolute grace. That was the exact kind of rare heart Andrew possessed."

Her voice wavered on his name, and the sound twisted something razor-sharp deep inside my chest.

"If I had only known what was coming, I would have watched over him so much more closely. Did you know... when a child is born of two completely different magical legacies, there is a fifty-fifty chance of them receiving their powers far too early or far too late? Andrew’s gifts came early. Far too early for his small body. He was just sitting peacefully under a tree one afternoon, studying herbs... and then he was simply gone. His physical body could not handle the surging power. His heart was not strong enough yet, and his inner werewolf side had not awakened to protect him. My poor little boy... My sweet Andrew."

How on earth do you respond to a grieving mother mourning her dead child? What words could possibly exist in any language for a deep pain like that? I could barely focus my mind. My thoughts were completely muddled, each one weighed down by heavy dread and that horrible, soul-crushing fear that someday I might come to know her exact agony. My hands curled into tight fists on my lap.

"I did not help Berry back then, not really. I was completely drowning in my own grief and rage," she admitted, her dark eyes growing distant as she focused on some painful memory far beyond the glass window. "I am a witch of light... but back then, I hated that light with every fiber of my being. What good was it to me? What good was I if I could not even save my own son? I screamed at the sky, I begged, I tore my very soul open trying to make my power matter... and still, my coven could do nothing. I could do nothing."

Her voice shook violently, but she did not stop speaking. I think she genuinely needed to speak the painful truth out loud, maybe for the very first time in years.

"When a witch completely gives in to her own inner darkness, it becomes so easy for the wrong kind of power to slip in unnoticed. It wraps around your mind, not like a coarse rope, but like smooth silk. And the absolute worst part? You are always fully aware inside. You know exactly what is happening to you. You know how to stop it. But I did not want to stop it. I wanted to do whatever it took... anything at all, even if it was not good, even if it completely destroyed me, just to feel like I was actively trying to fix things."

She paused for a long second. Her delicate shoulders were trembling now.

"I get it now years too late to change anything, of course. The overwhelming guilt, the complete emotional blindness... it all made logical sense after I had already run far too far away, leaving them both behind. Berry searched for me for years on end. I could feel him desperately reaching out through our mate bond, even when I tried my best to shut everything out. He pleaded endlessly for me to come back home to him. But I just... could not bring myself to do it. The dark corruption I carried became my ultimate excuse. I think I even used the intense pain I was causing him to justify staying far away from his life."

She finally turned her body toward me then, and the look resting in her eyes nearly broke my heart in two. They were not just sad they were ancient with intense suffering, hollowed out by decades of unanswered grief.

"But now when I look at him," she said quietly, her eyes searching my face, "I don’t see an ounce of anger in his expression. No bitterness at all. No blame. Just pure love. And I simply do not understand it. Why? Why doesn’t he hate me for what I did? I left him. I abandoned him to suffer alone. I ran away."

There was no perfect, poetic answer to a question like that. I knew that in my heart. But I certainly could not stay silent beside her.

Somewhere beneath the massive grief that clung to her skin like a suffocating second layer, I felt one last stubborn tether of dark magic trying to pull her back under the surface. It was not very strong anymore, but it was stubbornly clinging to the broken pieces of her soul that had not yet forgiven herself. She was actively trying to climb out of the pit. She simply needed someone to offer a steady hand.

Maybe the main reason she had never turned to Algebra with these dark fears was because he was her sacred anchor to the person she used to be before the tragedy. And if he told her something soft and comforting, she might want to believe him, but a deep part of her would always question if she truly deserved any comfort at all.

So I reached across the small space between us and took her cold hand inside mine. I don’t think I have ever felt so emotionally old in my entire life.

Warm tears slipped quietly down my cheeks, but I didn’t bother trying to hide them. I held her intense gaze steadily.

"You ran as far away as you possibly could, and he let you go," I said quietly, each word deliberate. "But that does not mean he ever stopped loving you for a single second. He just wanted to be there for you, even when you convinced yourself that you didn’t want him around. And the sole reason there is no anger resting in his eyes when he looks at you now is because he does not see you as someone who ran away from love he sees a grieving mother who lost everything she cared about, including herself."

Her slender fingers tightened firmly around mine on the cushion.

"And maybe," I continued softly, "when you look into his green eyes and wait for the blame to drop, he is secretly doing the exact same thing. Maybe he sits there thinking he should have done so much more to protect both of you back then. We all grieve very differently, Aurora. I never had the chance to meet Andrew, but from everything you have shared about him today... he sounds like the exact kind of gentle soul who would have made this whole world a better place. And maybe he still has, through you."

Her soft lips trembled violently. "Do you... do you really think so, Vivian?" Her quiet voice sounded so small, so entirely unsure of herself.

I gave her cold hand a gentle, reassuring squeeze. "What do you think in your heart?"

She went completely still beside me. Then, very slowly, she turned her face back toward the cabin window. Her voice, when it finally spoke into the silence, was as soft as falling snow.

"I think... I think you are completely right. I think Andrew would have wanted us to stay together, to smile again, to actually live our lives."

Her free hand rose slowly into the air, reaching instinctively toward the heavy, cloudy sky resting beyond the glass pane.

"I I think it is finally time for a real change."

And as if the entire physical world had been patiently waiting for her to speak those words aloud, the dark clouds outside parted just enough for a bright ray of pure sunlight to break through the overcast sky. It touched her pale face like a gentle blessing, soft and golden in the dim room.

Aurora exhaled a long, shaking breath of air that seemed to physically pull some invisible, crushing weight right off her weary shoulders. I could have sworn I heard a distant, faint screech of pure frustration echoing somewhere in the ether, like a dark entity being forcibly ripped away and forced to flee.

When she turned her head to face me once again, her smile was fragile, but deeply real. Her dark eyes once as pitch black as a moonless night were now a warm, completely clear brown.

And they stayed that way.