She drove me half mad sometimes with her expectations of perfection.
But this woman was my whole world. My everything. She’d taught me every lesson worth learning, and some of those that weren’t. I’d never even imagined a world without her in it. I always thought she would be there, pointing out everything I was doing wrong, reminding me how amazing I could be if I just applied myself.
Her skin was cold to the touch as I gripped her hands, and I cringed at seeing the last signs of life leaving her. No matter how powerful she was, nor how much strength my sisters and I had, we could not save her.
We had tried. And we had failed.
“Things are going to change, Ava,” Mother said, swallowing hard as she struggled to breathe. Her voice sounded foreign to my ears. I did not know this voice. It could not have come from the woman before me.
I leaned forward and brushed more of her matted hair from her face. I had always thought if she died—if, not when, because I was a fool for thinking my mother would defy the odds and live forever—she would die in a heated battle against our enemies. She would go down fighting. But this... This was pathetic. She did not even fight. She lay in bed, pitiful and weak and completely unlike herself. She probably hated that this was how she was going to go.
I hated it.
It’s not fair.
I was beginning to learn that life wasn’t fair and there was nothing I nor anyone could do about it. Magic was convenient, sure, but it wasn’t powerful enough to save a dying woman. It wasn’t powerful enough to decipher a mysterious illness or remove it from a body.
Which meant magic was useless when it was needed.
“Ava?”
My gaze snapped down to my mother. I swallowed. I was so consumed in my own thoughts that I’d forgotten my mother needed an answer from me, if only to make herself feel better about leaving.
A small, petulant part of me wanted no part in helping my mother pass. I considered holding my tongue and making her fight for more time so she could get that r
eassurance from me she so badly needed.
But no. I would not be cruel.
Not this time.
“Of course, they will, Mother,” I told her. “I mean... You’ll be gone.”
I stopped, pushing down the rising tide of emotion, because I was just as pathetic as her.
I hadn’t expected to be at this life-altering juncture for many years. Yet here I sat, not much past my twenty-third birthday, watching my mother take her last breaths. Watching her go from a strong, stoic woman to a crumpling, insipid puddle.
“You’ve been our whole world, Mother,” I continued. The declaration rang false. Of course, they weren’t a lie, but this wasn’t our relationship. We were never emotional. We did not lie to make each other feel better. We opted for the truth because the truth would make us strong, and we always needed strength. “Our entire life, you have been everything to us. I don’t know what we’re going to do—what I am going to do—without you.”
As I said the words, designed to make my dying mother feel better, the truth hit me across the chest like a well-aimed arrow. She had been only parent.
The only family we’d ever known.
What would we do without her? I didn’t have a clue.
Her blue eyes, tinged with a spectacular violet, widened and filled with panic.
“I never imagined it would take me dying for you to share a kind word with your mother.” She forced a smile. “It warms my heart, girl, that you wound your pride for me. I did not expect you to be sad because I am leaving. If I’m being honest, I expected relief.”
I sighed, looking away. I knew why she felt this way. Had our positions been reversed, I would have thought my mother was out of her mind if she told me meaningless niceties to take the blow of dying away.
“Despite our differences, Mother, you have made us strong,” I said. “You have made me strong.”
“You are,” my mother said, and for the briefest of seconds, it sounded just like her. Her voice was firm and unwavering. “Do not forget it. But heed me when I tell you, Ava, that you will have... nothing.’
She gasped for air, and then coughed loudly.
I looked down, not wanting to watch as the sickness consumed her. My gaze caught on the plush carpets and the well-worn rugs in her room. I always thought they were frivolous, but my mom liked the color. She said it brought life to an otherwise drab room.