Her life has been oddly quiet since returning, but there is no peace in this.

If anything it was more unsettling, and had caused her nerves to come alive with tension, anticipating when the tranquility would finally shatter.

When she hears that familiar voice whisper mom, she freezes. Her pulse spikes with fear and anxiety, her mind unfolding all the horrible scenarios for why Beyza would be calling for her. It doesn’t even occur to her that she has never actually called her anything other than Ryatah before, because she has been her daughter, always—even when Beyza didn’t know it. It was not something she had to learn to accept, not even with the fact that she did not actually birth her. She had felt that familiar maternal pull the moment she had seen her, brand new and trembling and being tended to by parents that were not her.

She follows the echo of the voice until she finds her, dripping and shivering, and by then she is breathless and nearly frantic. “Beyza,” her name comes as an aching whisper under her breath, her chest constricting at the sight of her. As soon as she reaches her side she pulls her damp body close, teleporting both of them out of the open and into the protection of a thick stand of trees. Even once they are walled behind the tall trunks and sheltered from the breeze by their full limbs she does not let go, holding her close, trying to radiate all the warmth she can from her own body to her daughter’s.

She smells of blood and saltwater, a mixture that brings forward her own strange memories that she has to force away, but her heartbeat flutters nervously for a moment. “What happened?” she asks her, scanning her for any noticeable injuries. Her pale coat is streaked with blood and though it does not look like it’s her own, this does nothing to abate her worry. “Are you hurt?”

She isn’t sure what she had expected Beyza to say, but the words that she utters causes her to pull back just as her daughter does.

The expression that shadows her face is nearly unreadable—a true show of confusion, uncertain how she should feel. Her life has always been turbulent, but she had simply accepted that it was the hand she was dealt. Her future had been carved out for her at such a young age in the jungles of that land so far from here, and no matter how many twists and turns she took, she had never escaped it. She was destined, it seemed, for a life of hurt—for love that was not meant for her, for breaking herself to fit into the molds they created, over and over again until she does not remember being any other way.

What had happened with Gale had been both predictable while also wildly out of the norm, breaking the protocol she was so accustomed to.

It had all the right parts, only, he was not the right player. Gale was not someone she was romantically linked to. He was not someone that she would do anything to keep close, he was not someone she would have done anything to please. She was no stranger to fury being unleashed on her when she made a mistake, but it was expected, and she always knew it was coming. She always knew, in the half a heartbeat’s moment when Carnage’s expression would change, that she had moved in error, and she always knew that the punishment was deserved.

She would never want anyone seeking revenge against him (as if it were even possible).
And she would never be able to put into words why that is, and in this moment, when her daughter is telling her that she killed someone that hurt her, she is so grateful that she has never had to try.

Because Gale ultimately means nothing to her, as she means nothing to him, and she still does not know how to feel.

“You killed him?” she repeats softly, and there is no disapproval in her voice, but still a strange kind of disbelief. She closes the space between them again, touches her nose to Beyza’s impossibly white neck as the shock begins to fade and concern once more colors her face. “Are you sure he’s really gone? If he comes back and tries to hurt you—” she cuts herself off abruptly, shakes the thought from her head, refusing to even think it. “I’m so glad you’re okay,” she says instead, and tries to ignore the clenching in her chest.