Crusade – Chapter 69: Regret

Aperio cautiously appeared above Ebenlowe, her wings holding her aloft. She did not want to appear in front of her daughter and succumb to the anger the same way she had before. No, first she had to actually know how the world affected her. And after that, I have to apologise.

Now that she was back in the reach of the planet and its inhabitants, she could already feel the anger rising within her. Since she now knew that the emotion wasn't her own, she could tell that it had a distinct alien feeling to it. Looking at the countless network of mana threads that linked all of creation to herself, she could see the emotional qualities — which had been absent in space — interwoven within.

That she had not noticed them before was not something that surprised Aperio. Every thread only carried a minuscule amount of what she would identify as emotion through the subtle differences in the mana that reached her. Each thread alone would not be much of a problem, barely noticeable and definitely not able to influence her. But, with millions of them feeding her the collective anger of the people, it became a tide that dragged her along and threatened to drown her in seething rage. How do I even know these bits are emotions?

The answer was likely that, since she had created all that there was, her body simply remembered what everything meant on a base level. It was just that her mind had to ask the right question first. But, can I simply ignore this? Aperio was no longer angry like she had been before; the emotions she felt from the threads of reality were somehow distant, removed from the rest of her feelings.

Only one way to find out, no? With those thoughts, Aperio vanished from the skies of Ebenlowe and appeared next to her daughter in the house of healing. For the briefest of moments the thought of using her teleport ability in a fight crossed her mind before she pushed it down and, instead, wrapped her wings around Ferio as she pulled her daughter into a hug.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, gently stroking the back of Ferio's head. Aperio had seen how distraught her daughter had been, how she had been on the verge of tears. Something that was very much unbecoming of a Goddess, especially so in front of mortals.

Ferio did not say anything, simply holding onto her mother tightly. That Aperio could feel an ever-so-slight discomfort from her daughter's hug spoke volumes about how much strength the Goddess of Light and Life was putting into it. And yet, I still have to be careful to not use too much. Her daughter's embrace had also strained Aperio's dress to the point of being pulled apart — nothing a little repairing wouldn't fix.

"It's okay," she whispered as she felt tiny drops of wetness stain her shoulder. Aperio also spread more of her mana in the room, creating a small barrier that visually and physically separated Ferio and herself from others who were nearby. She enjoyed their company, and she still had to deliver an apology to them, but it felt wrong to let them freely witness Ferio in her current state.

Her daughter mumbled something that Aperio did not understand as she gripped her mother a little tighter still. The All-Mother gently stroked her daughter's back as she asked herself how her actions could have resulted in this.

She had been angry, unreasonably so, but what Ferio displayed now was not only unbecoming of a Goddess but wildly out of proportion for what had transpired. ...Or was my previous self always so mercurial, and she fears that I will become so once more?

Very carefully, Aperio separated herself from her daughter, setting her down on a chair made from her mana. "Did something happen after I left?" Aperio inquired, no longer so sure that the reaction of her daughter was entirely her fault.

"No," Ferio said with a shaking voice, wiping away a few remaining tears. "It's just too much. Trying to act all right and proper like you taught me to, only for you to still get angry and then disappear.

"I know this is not 'befitting of a Goddess' and surely not something someone my age should do," she said, "but I don't care anymore. I had hoped I would finally have a family, that you had changed. Then you disappeared again, dashing my hopes. But now you are back, hugging me in front of mortals. Trying to comfort me. I understand you now even less than I did before."

Aperio cast her gaze towards the floor at her daughter's words; she was also confused with herself. Though she now knew the source of her anger, telling her daughter that the world itself was the reason felt like a cheap excuse. She could have done more to control herself. She was the All-Mother, older than everything – surely she should have mastered her own emotions by now? Even as a slave I was able to control them better.

"I do not understand myself either," Aperio said as softly as she could. "I do not know why I can feel the anger of the world, nor why it would influence me to such a degree. It is not an excuse for my actions — cannot be one – but you deserve to know the reason for my current state. I did not mean to cause you distress, Ferio. I care about you." More than I ever thought I would.

The only thing in her mortal life that had come vaguely close to the notion of family had been Moria, but that paled in comparison to what she was feeling now. Even before she had retrieved the memories of Ferio's childhood she had known the Goddess was her daughter, something she could not say about the other Gods or Goddesses.

Ferio sighed at her mother's words. "This is what I mean. It's like you are flipping between the old you and some new you, but can't decide which one you truly are. I had hoped that, perhaps, I would have someone who cares now. Who doesn't expect the impossible from me simply because I am your daughter. I am not you; nor will I ever be."

I am not 'me' either. The thought was kept to herself, her daughter having already pointed out the occasional dissonance of her actions and words. "I am doing my best," Aperio said with a sigh, pointedly ignoring the disgust that was already making itself known. "But I do not know how anything is supposed to work. I have to fight with myself to even say these words. The bits and pieces that I can recall are not of much help."

"I understand that, but it still hurts when you get angry for no reason, when you don't let me help you. I am not the only one, either. Laelia and Caethya want to help you too. For different reasons, perhaps, but nonetheless they do care."

"Did you tell them what had happened to me? Why I disappeared?"

"I did not, mother," Ferio said, lifting her gaze from the floor. "I wouldn't reveal that unless you were gone for years again. But, you have to understand that you aren't alone."

Aperio looked over her shoulder at the words, seeing Laelia and Caethya kneeling in front of the barrier she had erected; her magic only blocking sight from their direction. With only a little focus necessary on the bond they shared, she could sense their emotions. She knew that they both were worried. Not the cause, but only that they were.

I am not good at being a Goddess, am I? While she had never wanted to be one, Aperio still felt that she should, at the very least, bring her followers surety and comfort in the world. Causing them to fret certainly didn't fall under either of those two categories.

"Please mother," Ferio said, standing up from the chair Aperio had made. "I can't bear the thought of you disappearing for ages at a time, or the idea of you becoming your old, cold and distant self. I don't want to lose you again."

Aperio found that something in her daughter's statement didn't quite make sense. "If you don't want me to become who I was, why are you helping me to retrieve my memories?" Why, indeed, should her daughter help to retrieve what her mother had once been? Aperio doubted she would ever be the same as her old self, but the more she learned about her past, the less eager she became to track down the next piece of her history.

"Because it would be wrong to deny you the knowledge of who you were," Ferio said after a moment's hesitation. "And it wasn't like I hated you. I simply wished you would have continued to care like you had in the beginning. But, perhaps, the novelty of having a child simply wore off for you."

Aperio scrunched her brows at the words. If you decide to have a child, it's not something you can just discard when they annoy you. …Was I like my own mother? Did I, too, get bored of my child, and simply throw them away? She suppressed a shudder at the thought, turning her mind in a slightly different direction. There was also the question of whether her remembered mortal mother was actually her biological mother. Perhaps I simply appeared in the world and she found me?

Considering what she was, Aperio somehow doubted that she had been a normal child. But then, at the time I had no powers, or anything of the like. I was just a normal Elf. She shook her head, dismissing the thoughts.

"I do not think of you as a novelty. You are my daughter, and I care for you more than I am able to show," Aperio said, stepping in front of Ferio. "I am sorry for what I have done in the past; even if I cannot remember it. But, I am afraid that my best is currently not enough.

"Admitting even my tiniest flaw fills me with disgust and I do not know why. Knowing your weaknesses should be the first step towards improvement, and yet I can seldom bring myself to say what I want aloud."

She blinked. What she just said had revealed to her a new level of wrongness she could not quite believe existed. Aperio sunk to the floor with a sigh, uncaring of how the wood broke below her. Where are these feelings coming from? A glimmer of hope rose within her, and she began examining her connections with the world. No matter how hard she looked, she could not find a source for the fallacious feelings. Her heart sank further. So it does come from me.

A hand brushed over Aperio's cheek, stopping her thoughts. Ferio, face full of what looked to be concern, had knelt down in front of her. "Just... let yourself be helped, mother," her daughter said. "I do not expect that you tell Laelia and Caethya everything, but you should at least let them know that you are not as perfect as they think."

Being portrayed as anything less than perfect was not something she enjoyed, but as both of them had pointed out, her behaviour did not make sense. "I will try."

"Your aura is feeling a lot more serene, now. You are already feeling better than before, are you not?"

Aperio tilted her head as she directed her senses inward. She could not find a change; everything looked as it had before. The anger still flowed to her on the threads of reality, the mana in her body was still dutifully improving her physical self, and the wisps that danced around her shone in their usual faint bluish-silver.

She did, however, feel like some weight had been lifted off of her. But all I did was go against my instincts. The same instincts that had, thus far, always been right about her abilities. Not trusting those instincts did not last long, now did it?

Aperio had been back in the world of the living for... well, she did not know how long it had been, exactly. A few months, at least. But in that stretch of time, she had undergone more changes than in her entire life as a slave. However long that life was.

She had told herself that she would not trust instincts that weren't her own, and yet she had done so. In matters of physicality it had been the right choice most of the time, as her body seemed to know more about what it could do than she herself did. But when it came to matters of the mind, her old instincts had continually been nothing but a hindrance.

"I do feel better, yes," Aperio said. "But I do not think I am ready to tell Laelia and Caethya."

"Then wait a little while longer. Just, try to accept their help when they offer it. You might be able to solve it on your own, but having others lend a hand is not a bad thing.

"Please, promise me."

"I promise," Aperio said, her words accompanied by a slight pulse of her mana as she dismissed the barrier she had created. Her two followers rose to their feet as they saw the magic of their Goddess vanish.

GamingWolf

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