heal your soul

[MSG:] [random assortment of emojis]

[MSG:] my fave emoji is the star one

[MSG:] pen!!

[MSG:] that is pretty funny

[MSG:] don’t worry about it!!! :) :) :) :)

[MSG:] i dont really talk about her that much

[MSG:] it’s hard sometimes i guess

[MSG:] okay!! 

[MSG:] i think i will need help

[MSG:] i’ve never put up a tent before

[MSG:] i googled it before we left but it didn’t really help much

[MSG:] and that tent was much bigger than mine

[MSG:] it didn’t have any walls either???

[MSG:] i googled it again 

[MSG:] i’m on my way!! [star emoji x 4]

[MSG:] i’ll bring cash, maybe he knows how to fix fridges

[MSG:] i’m not sure

She hadn’t meant to give the girl hope, but if she came away from this having learnt anything, it would be to trust few, or better yet, no one. It bothered Adalwolfa slightly that Venus was a mother. In the brief moments before she’d killed the child, the girl had opened up a little, and what had she given in return? Adalwolfa was not so heartless that she could claim, with certainty, that she felt nothing for killing the baby in Venus’ arms. Adalwolfa was a mother like Venus was a mother; it hurt to take an infant’s life more than she could possibly say, but she knew how to ignore it. She had to. Had to. This was the way it had always been.They could not have taken care of that boy no matter Venus’ ideas. 

Once the baby’s warmth was drained, his life stirring at her fingertips like little, invisible wisps, Adalwolfa removed her hands from his corpse. She prepared for the girl’s response in austere silence, and didn’t flinch when a cloud came over her expression. “You were going to – what?” Adalwolfa grew pathetically irritated with her own curls, and raised her hands up into her locks to begin pulling them back into a tight ponytail; her braids, too. “Raise him as your own?” Once she was finished with her hair, she dropped her arms and stepped away, eyes only briefly going to the baby in Venus’ arms. It was enough of a glance to make her lips pinch tightly together. “You know why. I’ve explained why.” She said, and stared the girl down. “You should have just given me the child, Venus. I asked you twice.” Again, her lips twitched, as if she wanted to say I’M SORRY.

As the seconds ticked past Venus only began to shake more, the small body in her arms growing colder as she tried to blink away tears. Stupid, stupid! Why did you trust her? It was too fast. Shouldn't have let her near. The more Venus thought she more she realised she should have just left with the baby -- surely she would have been fast enough to make it out of the room and down the hall, anywhere where more people were. Maybe Adalwolfa wouldn't have wanted to do that in public. For the first time in as long as she could remember, Venus sincerely wanted to hit someone. People had been mean to her in the past, hurt her, taken her things, been cruel to her friends, and she'd been angry those times but she'd never wanted to physically harm anyone. The feeling was odd and it made her heart beat faster than normal, made her thoughts speed past before they could fully register.

Adalwolfa's apparent lack of empathy for what had just happened made her even angrier -- she was a mother too, wasn't she? How could she feel nothing for killing a baby? How could she stand there like someone's life hadn't just been ended for no good reason? How could she stand there like it wasn't her fault? “Yes! I could have done that! Nobody wanted him so I could have raised him.” Venus had, in fact, been fully prepared to do just that. She'd wanted to find him some kind of family but she knew that would have been hard, if not impossible, and was ready to be a parent to a second child if need be. “No you didn't explain why. You just said that this is how it is. That's not an explanation! That doesn't mean anything.” Ice began to form at the tips of her fingers as she became angrier, sharp spikes meant for hurting. “How can you just stand there like nothing even happened? You just killed a baby. Does that not even bother you? Are you really that heartless?”

Venus’ refusal to give up the child left Adalwolfa with limited choices, and her expression soured a smidgen as she waited for the girl to finish talking. It gave her time to consider her next actions. She did not want to kill the child herself, especially not here, but then Venus resisted by taking a step back, and the action sparked in Adalwolfa a harshness. She waited a moment in silence, stoic as she stared at the girl. All that could be heard after Venus’ outburst was the gurgles coming from the baby she held. Adalwolfa could have easily ripped it from Venus’ arms, though Venus would no doubt get hurt in the process, but she had a feeling that the girl, as passionate as she was about the well-being of infants, would not desist even if she stole the baby. Very briefly, Adalwolfa’s nose pinched, and she looked as if she might get angry, but something odd occurred. She broke off her glare to gaze down at the infant, and it was obvious to any who watched that the tension in her posture eased, as if she was changing her stance, as if the girl had gotten through to her. 

A warmth, similar to the look she gave her daughters ( yet not quite ) softened out her normally sharp features, and she nodded her head. “I… suppose…” Pretending to contemplate Venus’ words, Adalwolfa studied the child, whom stared back at her with large blue eyes and an unsuspecting smile. She would not regret what she was about to do, but something in her chest did tighten. “He is– sweet looking. Isn’t he?” Taking a subtle step closer, she raised her hands to the child’s face, wary of how fast her movements might make Venus pull away some more. Every thing about Adalwolfa’s sudden demeanour was meant to appease Venus. “Boys always have fatter cheeks than girls.” As she spoke softly, she stroked her fingers over his cheeks until her palms cupped his head entirely. He appeared to react well to the touch, and the smile he gave made her blood run cold. A ghost of a smile fluttered across her lips, thumb smoothing against his face a final time. “Gute Nacht.” She said, gripping the infant’s head with a sudden force. Her wrists flicked to a side, a small crack, a little pop, sounded, and the boy grew limp, silent; dead. 

All at once, a quiet anger came back into Adalwolfa’s face, Adalwolfa’s body, and blue eyes flitted to Venus’ face, hands still cradling the baby’s head. She could feel death fill up his tiny body; how it pooled into her palms like a surge of new power. She took no pleasure in this. DUTY.

Venus swallowed, watching Adalwolfa's expression for any kind of change, waiting for some words that would mean she'd gotten through to her. For a moment she held her breath and as the blonde seemed to relax, so did she. Still she stayed that extra step away though and her grip on the baby stayed firm. It could easily have been a trick, some way of fooling her, but when Adalwolfa nodded and spoke those doubts began to evaporate. She was a mother too, after all, and she was sure that instinct had won out against whatever she thought was the best thing to do for the situation. Venus began to wonder where she would put the baby to sleep, what she would feed him, if she should give him a name. She wondered how she might have felt if she'd kept her daughter four years ago and if it would have felt anything like this rather than sad.

“He is.” Venus nodded, a smile cropping up on her face as her eyes moved from the baby to Adalwolfa. “Do they? I didn't know that. I... had a baby myself. A few years ago. She was a girl. I don't really remember how fat her cheeks were though.” Venus rarely brought up her own child, because it wasn't something she needed to talk about and it wasn't like it was ever a topic of conversation. But right then it felt relevant and as she talked she didn't notice how close Adalwolfa had gotten. It didn't make her nervous just then either. She was fine with it, wasn't she? She wanted Venus to take care of him. She was supportive of this. Venus swallowed as Adalwolfa's fingers traced over his face, and then it happened -- faster than she could stop, faster than she knew how to react to. It was near instantaneous. A crack, a pop, and the infant in her arms went limp. He made no more sound.

For a few seconds everything seemed to hang still in the air, moving in slow motion. She couldn't breathe and tears began to pool in her eyes, hot and blinding. Why did she do that? Why did she do that? Why did she -- “Why... what did you...” Venus sucked in a shaky breath, bottom lip quivering as the tears began to drip down her face. Her hands began to shake and she didn't want to hold the baby anymore; it felt wrong and made her feel sick, but she didn't want to give him to Adalwolfa either. Her eyes rose to meet Adalwolfa's slowly, and though Venus did not often feel hate for another person, she was sure it burned clearly in her eyes right then. “Why did you do that? You didn't have to kill him! I was going to... why would you do that? There was nothing wrong with him! He didn't need to die!”

Adalwolfa’s lips thinned the slightest amount, and she stared at Venus in small displeasure. She hadn’t needed the girl to tell her what she could see for herself; it already irritated her enough. “Not all of the time, no.” Her jaw sharpened. “Sometimes they are abandoned because they are unwanted, or human. But this one’s too young for anyone to tell whether he has a power or not, so I’m going to assume that it’s the former reason.” Adalwolfa could understand leaving the deformed to die, they would not survive long here, it seemed a small mercy really; yet it made her sick to think that any mother could leave their healthy child by pure CHOICE. “If we knew who the mother was, or the father, they’d be exiled for this.” As if that was any form of consolation for what was going to happen to the child she held. 

Adalwolfa’s arms remained extended, even after Venus’ hesitation. That she didn’t immediately hand over the baby garnered the woman’s disapproval, which was obvious in the way her cheeks slightly thinned. It seemed obvious what she was going to do with the child. No one could look after it now, and no one would adopt it either. Briefly, Adalwolfa was reminded of Drusus. An Ermengard, but not through blood. Adoption was not unheard of here, it was just incredibly rare. Perhaps Drusus wouldn’t have even joined them, had Adalwolfa not so recently lost her only son when she found him hiding in the mountains as a small boy. Her good deed. “I will take him into the mountains.” As her eyes narrowed, she tilted her head. “I don’t know why you’re asking when you already know.” If it wasn’t over such grim proceedings, Venus’ offer to help somehow might have endeared her to Adalwolfa. She might have even smiled. As it happened, she only hummed once. “You can’t do anything for it, Venus. You won’t be able to take care of a baby, not here, least of all now with everything that’s going on.” Again she inched closer, this time a little more insistent that Venus hand it over. “The child.”

As Adalwolfa spoke Venus looked down at the baby, a frown appearing on her face again. She didn't understand how someone couldn't want their child; although she'd given up her own daughter, to her that was just different. She wanted to keep her, wanted to raise her, but at fifteen years old there was no way she was ready. Maybe the mother of this child was only fifteen too. Maybe they weren't ready. That thought made her sad, and she swallowed, trying to remind herself once again that things were different in Hollental. There was no birth control or condoms, or anything to stop someone getting pregnant. As far as she knew abortion wasn't an option either and she had a suspicion that it was something they'd frown upon anyway. There were no adoption agencies or foster homes or anyone to take in babies that weren't wanted, and so what other choice did a person have but abandonment? Was it kinder, perhaps, to take an unwanted infant into the mountains and let it die before it remembered how to feel?

No. It's not. It shouldn't be. Venus could wrap her head around not being ready, and not having options, but she couldn't figure out why effectively murdering a baby was ever the best solution. It made her angry for a fraction of a second, and then sad, and then sick. She looked up at Adalwolfa. “Because I hoped that I'd be wrong.” Her grip on the sleeping bundle in her arms tightened some, and although she knew the blonde was right in some of what she was saying, she still couldn't hand over the baby. It felt wrong, and when she knew what was going to happen as soon as it left her arms, it went against every fiber of her being. “Why can't I do anything? It's a baby. It's not... I can take care of it. There are people who can help me, it'll be fine.” She sounded almost desperate as she spoke, taking a step back from Adalwolfa. “Please! I can't just let you take it out there. It's not right!”

Children were often abandoned here. It was not often that the child was left within Hollental’s walls, but it happened sometimes; normally because the mother, or father, wanted to remain anonymous. Taking an infant through the gates was not frowned upon if it bore a disability, but it was shameful to some here, birthing a weak babe; some thought it meant others wouldn’t want to breed with them. Adalwolfa had been watching the baby on the floor for a while now, leaning against a wall with her arms crossed. Its cries left her body stiff. As a mother, she had the instinct to go over and pick up the child, soothe it, care for it, but these feelings she squashed. Some part of her held on to the hope that this was a misunderstanding, and that the parents would return at any moment. This wouldn’t be the first time. If not, she would take the child out to the mountains herself. Judging by its hair colour, it was not an Ermengard. Freedmen abandoned their children this way more frequently than an Ermengard. Sometimes, even, without a reason. 

No one had paid the baby any mind for an hour now, so Venus’ arrival made Adalwolfa straighten. Her arms slowly dropped back to her sides, and she almost stopped the girl from picking up the child, only something made her hesitate. Venus took the baby into her arms so naturally, and cooed down at it so similarly to the way in which Adalwolfa comforted her own daughters, that she decided to take a moment and watch her. Adalwolfa might even have said that Venus was a mother herself. It seemed cruel to let the display go on for too long, however, so she approached the girl eventually, careful eyes upon the baby’s face. It was no longer crying. “No, I do not.” She replied, unsurprised when she was addressed. “Its mother doesn’t want to be known either, so you should leave it at that.” She inched closer, holding out her arms to take the child. Looking at it, she could see no reason as to why it would be abandoned, and the notion that someone would simply let it die because it was not wanted made her lip twitch. So her eyes lifted away. “You don’t have to do anything for it. It’s not wanted, and it isn’t yours.” 

Venus was glad that it was Adalwolfa that had approached her; for one she was a little more familiar with the people around Hollental, and she could communicate properly with her. The language barrier had been a source of frustration for a few weeks and Venus had actually begun to learn German in order to combat it. Although she had hoped that the baby being left on the ground was just a simple misunderstanding, it appeared that wasn't the case, and her face fell at Adalwolfa's words. “Oh... okay.” She paused for a moment, frowning down at the baby and then looking back at Adalwolfa. “But there's nothing wrong with this baby. I mean, that I can see. I thought people only left babies if there was something wrong with them?” As far as Venus could tell the baby was perfectly healthy (certainly sounded that way too), so she couldn't understand why it had been left.

As Adalwolfa held her arms out to take the baby, Venus hesitated. “I know. I just... what are you going to do with it?” She doubted Adalwolfa was about to adopt a random child, and she was also fairly sure that Hollental had no such thing as an orphanage, or any way to place an abandoned child with a family that wanted it. More than likely Adalwolfa was going to take it out to the mountains to die. It made Venus feel sad, and a little bit nauseous, as she looked down at the baby. There were certain ways things were done in Hollental and she knew that, but it seemed wrong to let anything happen to the baby. She knew there were more -- countless more that had been and would be left to die, but even just one being spared that would be a difference, wouldn't it? “Maybe I could do something. I don't know how all of that works here but... I can't just leave it. I really can’t do that.”

It was safe to say Angel hated Hollental. He was a city kid at heart, used to the smell of air pollution and falling asleep to the mindless chatter of the city (and a gunshot or two every so often), in some ways, Hollental made him more homesick than Morgana ever had. Not to mention, he still had a running theory that when traveling to Hollental they had actually hopped aboard a time machine. The people here were different, to say the least and the fact that he couldn’t watch monotonous singing reality TV shows when he got bored was a bummer, sure, but the one thing he’d never learn to adapt to was the ghosts. He wasn’t very good at the whole “ghosts” thing – mediumship, whatever – it came and went, and it was like blurry and hazy. He would hear them, babies crying at the coldest edges of Hollental, where he once went when he needed to be alone. He could just barely make out any shapes but he could hear them, clear as day, it still echoed in the back of his mind wherever he went, something to remember Hollental by, he supposed.

He hadn’t even realized the room he’d stumbled into in an attempt to clear his of the commotion of Hollental: with it’s regular residents combined with the influx of Morgana students, it was safe to say Hollental would be in constant unrest for a while. “No, I don’t.” He told her, taking a few tentative steps to get a better look at the child, smiling down at it. “It’s a good thing you found hi-her? Them. It’s a good thing you found them.” He mentioned, “You probably saved their life.”

Venus didn’t think she’d ever met the other person who walked in -- and for a second she worried that she had, and had forgotten about them, which made her feel bad. She didn’t have much time to think about it though because the baby’s cries began again and she hurried to rock her arms back and forth, a calming motion that seemed to do the trick. She doubted it would continue working for long though -- babies needed feeding, often, and it was impossible to tell how long this one had been left alone on the floor. “I thought you probably wouldn’t. But it was worth a shot, I guess.” She shrugged and smiled, pulling the blanket back for a second to find out if she was holding a boy or a girl before wrapping it back around a little more secure. “Alright, he’s a boy. Maybe that’ll make it a little easier to find his parents.” If they even want him back. She’d heard about the babies left out to die, but those were always at the edge of Hollental, in the mountain pass or by further walls, where they would freeze to death and be left forever. As far as she knew it wasn’t so common to leave babies hanging around inside, and hoped the whole thing was going to turn out to be one big misunderstanding. “Yeah, maybe I did. Hopefully his parents  won’t think I’m trying to steal him or something.” Venus let out a small laugh, shaking her head as she looked back at her new companion. “I’m Venus, by the way. I don’t think we’ve ever really met. Or if we have and I forgot I’m really super sorry, I must have... not been paying attention or something.”

An uncomfortable swell of emotion appeared in her stomach as memories resurfaced in her mind, of holding her own child in the hospital. It had only been for a few minutes before she was taken away, but Venus remembered every second in startling clarity. A smile appeared on her face as she rocked the baby, though there was something sad about it too, and as the crying began to die down she heard footsteps approaching. “Oh, hey -- do you maybe know who's baby this is? I just found... them... on the floor. I don't know if they're a boy or a girl, I didn't look yet. I just, y'know, don't really know what to do right now.”