we’ve had a good run, haven’t we?

Ember, oblivious to the secondhand social faux pas her father was experiencing as she asked Laeta about her illness and disability, listened with rapt attention as the elder woman regaled her with the stories of the Long Night. Although she wasn't explicit with the details, the visuals Laeta described the horrific events of that time with were enough to fill the young girl's imagination with visceral fantasies. The part of a mysterious entity that had paralyzed Laeta both terrified and upset the young Carpathian. How dare someone harm their sweet Laeta! She sincerely hoped her father had hunted the being down and brought him to justice for his crimes. The story came to a conclusion with Laeta telling her that sometimes they never truly recovered from their injuries. Sometimes they just carried on with them.

Ember's heart felt heavy in her chest as she looked at Laeta, realizing that the elder woman had been living this way for far longer than she'd even realized. Empathy twisted at her heart, and without a beat of hesitation Ember stood up and closed the distance between them so she could push her cheek against Laeta's, nuzzling at the smaller wolf. "I'm glad you survived. You're too good to be killed and we love you too much for you to die." An idealist with fantastical ideas of right and wrong, the notion of terrible things happening to good wolves felt like an atrocity to the naive Ember.

A kiss from her sire interrupted her impromptu hug with Lae and pulled Ember back into the moment. Artorias directed her back to her lessons and instructed her to practice her forms while he talked with Laeta. Ember smiled and nodded up at her father, then gave Laeta another sweet smile. "It was very nice talking to you, Miss Laeta!" Then, snatching up her training sword, the adolescent girl trotted back down to the garden to begin her practice, following the movements her father had taught her, refining them until they were burned into her memory and became second nature to her muscles, as natural as breathing. She would be just as good as he was, if not better!

"Ember"