It took a few minutes of gentle prodding while holding Lia and carding my hands through her hair to get her to talk. Even once she started talking, her head remained lowered, her face hidden in my chest, muffling her voice just a little, but I could easily understand her. Slowly, at first, but then with ever-increasing alacrity, the words started to tumble out of her mouth, weaving a tale of disappointment, failure and abandonment, with little Lia at the centre of it all.
As it turned out, after Luna and I left, things continued as they had at first. But, without us here, Lia’s support network shrunk tremendously, especially once those amongst my pupils she had been close to largely stopped coming to Jademoon Tower, as there were no further lessons to be had. While they didn’t outright abandon Lia, it was quite obvious in the retelling that these various people had their own chores and lives to look after, limiting the time they could devote to keeping close to Lia and providing her company and social inclusion.
That continued until it was only Samantha and the rest of her group who regularly came calling, but they, too, primarily used the tower to study and as a base for the times they ventured further into the mountains, not as a primary place of residence. They seemed to have asked Lia at one point, fairly early on, whether she wanted to join them in their community, but Lia had rejected it, wanting to stay in the tower I had built, leaving her all alone. Even Alex, her companion on our travels, had gotten absorbed in their own little project, the establishment of a gaze of their own and, again, Lia was left behind in the process.
Listening to the tale tore at my heart, and a part of me, especially the part who had felt that I had entrusted Lia to Samantha and Samantha had disappointed me, was furious, yearning to tear these foolish people apart in the most visceral and cruel fashion imaginable. But, while bathing in their blood and feeling it freeze on my skin might sound like a wonderful thing, it wouldn’t help Lia, even if my dear daughter looked a little malnourished and peckish, making me wonder if she had been able to take in enough blood or if she had been starved of that, too. Sure, she could take in power from Jademoon Tower directly, but that wasn’t enough to permanently sustain her.
“First of all, have a drink,” I told her, quickly opening a cut on my arm to let blood pool out, already infused with Astral Power. The effect was immediate and almost scary in its intensity, confirming my fears of her having starved herself, either deliberately or due to lacking opportunities. Now, she was latched onto my wrist after she had rapidly lapped up the blood pooling in my hand. Just from that lack of control on her part, I could tell that my dear daughter had been in dire need of blood, which, in turn, gave me some very mixed feelings.
On one hand, I was furious about the fact that she had been starved like this. That Samantha, and even Alex to some extent, had essentially left her behind in the tower I had built, isolated and only able to feed when hunting in the vicinity, something she apparently had neglected in what would most likely be called a depression. On the other hand, I was angry at myself, wondering if I should have persuaded, or maybe even forced, Lia to join Luna and me, thus never letting the problem occur in the first place. Did this make me a bad mother? Should I have predicted this might become a problem and ascertained that it never would?
“I’m so sorry, my dear,” I whispered, the sound barely loud enough to get past my lips, but I felt that Lia had heard me despite that. Not that she outwardly reacted, but the draining sensation I got from her changed a little, not that I could truly describe how. Maybe it was a difference between sucking and nursing; I wasn’t sure, and, at the end of the day, it didn’t really matter. For now, the priority was to make sure Lia could recover and regain her lustre and strength, not to dwell on past failures, whether they be mine or those of another.
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Finally, after draining far more Astral Power from me than she had ever done before, Lia stopped feeding and started to gently lap at the wound, her innate Blood Magic abilities already working to close the wound. It was quite a fascinating process, one that I had experienced often to be familiar with and yet, it remained interesting. But then, the entire feeding process of vampires was quite impressive, especially as it was all done by instinct. If one wanted to replicate it without being a Vampire, they’d need at least fifty in the skill, at least that was my estimation, but a Vampire could do it just because of what they were.
That, in turn, made me occasionally wonder what processes in a human, or elven, body might be something I could replicate magically and which would be useful. The gestation process was an obvious answer, especially given my desire to revive Sigmir. That, in turn, required the creation of a body, which, at its core, was exactly what the gestation process did: turn an ovum and a sperm cell into a living body. Well, if everything went right, at least.
The problem here was I didn’t have the correct ovum to create Sigmir's body, nor did I have the correct sperm, not even close. The best I could hope would be to find some giant, giant blood or something similar and make do with their material, but I doubted it would be that easy. Another variant would be to use my own material; Firn Elves and Frostgiant Blood had a common ancestor of sorts, after all. However, given that said ancestor was divine in nature, using that connection would be difficult, to say the least.
Shaking off these distracting thoughts, I focused back on my daughter, trying to decide what to do about her because I refused to leave her in this state. How could I make this right?
“What would you like to do now?” I asked Lia, curious what her desires were.
“Don’t know,” she admitted, snuggling back into me.
“Well, let’s start with the obvious question: what would you like to see done about Samantha? She, and the relationship between the two of you, was the reason why you remained here. As far as I can see, that relationship sadly didn’t last,” I managed to keep my voice calm at that description, even if a tiny part of me was happy that my daughter was free of that woman, “So your reason for remaining here is gone, is that correct?” I asked, noticing how Lia stiffened in my arms, obviously torn about the question.
For a few moments, which stretched into minutes, Lia simply remained still in my arms. Her mind undoubtedly went a few hundred miles a minute, trying to figure out what the different parts of her mind and body were telling her—maybe even what her Soul was telling her. But listening to that was always a lot harder than one would think.
“It hurts,” Lia finally whispered, her voice desolate in a way I hadn’t heard before, “I don’t know what to do,” she admitted, and my heart broke a little in sympathy.
“Would you accept that I’ll take you back under my guidance, my dear daughter? That, maybe, you have a little more growing to do, and it would be good to have a parent back you up?” I asked, getting a nod in return.
“Good, then; while I apologise that you won’t be able to give your farewells to Samantha, Alex and the rest of the people here, I’ll be taking you along with me. Given your already impressive abilities to walk the shadows, there’s going to be no problem pulling you along through them, and the continued travel with your family will hopefully give you the time to heal and recover from this,” I declared my decision, my voice clear and pitched in a way to quell any possible dissent.
“Okay,” Lia whispered, her voice filled with relief but also lingering sadness. The dichotomy tried to make me smile, even if it would have been entirely unfitting in this situation.
“Good,” I repeated. Now, you can pack your stuff while I seal up the upper levels of the tower, and maybe I’ll even leave a message to Samantha and Alex if they decide to show up again. " A bit of anger at those who had disappointed my daughter crept into my voice. I would have to think about the best way to express that anger and disappointment and get my message across just the right way.
