#anati

She smiled for him the day he left.

She got her hug, loaded him down with his favourite preserved foods, kissed his cheeks even as he made disgusted noises, bid him farewell… and let him leave.

Then she fell apart.

*

Two days after her son turned eighteen Gallia didn't even bother getting out of bed. She’d cried for most of the night and woke up feeling the worst she had in her four decades of life. For the first time the heavy shutters felt soothing rather than confining.

She didn't even care about the damned sheep. Let them starve.

She didn't stir until evening, when she found a cup of willow tea and her favourite fruit on the side table. The tea was the perfect temperature for drinking, and she suspected it had been all day.

She didn't bother to find her father and thank him. She didn't think she could speak without crying.

*

Three days after her son turned eighteen Gallia got up in the morning the way she usually did. She performed her ablutions and set the dog out and cooked breakfast the same as she usually did. She set the table for three, as she usually did.

Then she burst into tears.

Her father had never been much of a morning person, he found her exceptionally overwhelming when backed by the rising light, but he was there beside her so suddenly she wondered for a brief, hysterical moment if she had conjured him. He didn't like mornings, didn't like tears, didn’t like hugs, but he gathered her up and held her. Like it wasn't even a question. Like it was important… Like she was sixteen again and they had just buried her mother.

It was the sort of thing that only ever seemed to happen in the face of overwhelming loss.

“I didn't want him to go.” She sobbed. “I wanted him to be safe.”

“I know, I know,” he murmured into her hair. “I didn't want him to go either. I wish keeping him here would keep him safe, but it wouldn't.”

“You taught him anyway. You gave him the skills to leave.” She didn't truly mean her accusations, not really. She knew her father had no power in the face of the Goddess of Good Things and her rules, but she needed someone to blame.

“I did.” He admitted, voice hitching. “I did. And you gave him the skills and confidence to come home. He left in a mere handspan’s time, but Emmerich took all morning, even though there is tension between him and his parents. He was saying “farewell forever,” but Corvirus was only saying “farewell for now.””

“You don't think Emmerich will ever return? But Corvirus will?” She asked, latching onto that ray of hope with everything she had.

“I think they both will.” He admitted softly, kissing her forehead. “But when they do Emmerich will be here as Corvirus’s guest, not on his own.”

She cried again, for both children she cared about and the future that was going to be so hard on them. Cried as hard as she had the previous day.

But that day it didn't feel like the end of the world. It felt just a tiny bit hopeful.

*

“How long does it take to stop being afraid?” She asked, breaking the silence. Her father had accompanied her out to the pasture today, the one he had brought her sheep to the previous day. The one nearest town.

Both of them had known that day was coming. Both had prepared in their own ways.

“Afraid of what?” Anati asked in his usual placid way. Gallia took a deep breath and reminded herself that he probably didn’t understand without context. Corvirus struggled with abrupt changes as well.

“Afraid for you child.” She clarified. “When will I stop being so convinced the world will hurt him in ways I cannot heal?”

“You… Don't?” He replied, sounding baffled. “Or at least I don't? I've asked the Goddess every morning since you were born to look after you. I didn't stop worrying about you when you defeated your first wolf, got your Title, became a mother, or any other time. I still ask her. I just added Corvirus to the prayer as well.”

She laughed then, more from surprise than from anything else. She laughed until her sides hurt, then threaded her fingers through his and leaned on her father the way she had always wanted to. The way he'd always been too stiff to allow, until she was old enough to not ask. The way he let Corvirus.

And this time, for the first time in what felt like her life, he didn't pull away.