NOVEL NEXT Aeternae – Chapter 248: Filling the Void
Ferio remained silent and still. She tried to move her arms to respond to her mother's hug, but Aperio's hold on her was absolute.
The thoughts, emotions, and even memories her mother was sharing did not help the matter much, either. Ferio might be a Goddess, but the All-Mother was showing her enough information that even she was struggling to keep up. But perhaps that was a good thing; at least it did mean there was more to Aperio than a mortal-appeasing brute.
Aperio drew back, her wings remaining wrapped around Ferio while she placed her hands on her daughter's cheeks.
The Goddess of Life and Light looked into her mother's eyes, the dancing flecks of silver on the infinite swirl of blue somehow carrying a warmth she hadn't seen before. Had not wanted to see, perhaps.
"I may not agree with everything you do or believe," Aperio said, pulling back her hands to brush away a few non-existent wrinkles in her dress. "But I do care about you. I cannot speak for my actions in the past, but you are my daughter and I love you as one."
Ferio needed a moment to parse the words as the stream of emotions from her mother had not yet ceased. She never would have guessed that Aperio was even capable of feeling any of this. All her memories of the All-Mother from before her disappearance had featured an aloof and uncaring Goddess, and after her return it felt like Aperio had simply become the exact opposite of her old self; but only for mortals.
Quite seemingly, she was wrong.
"Wouldn't hurt if you showed that for more people than just Caethya," Ferio mumbled, the words coming out on their own before she had even properly thought about them.
Aperio tilted her head at the words, her wings shifting slightly to allow Ferio to leave if she should want to. "I had thought I was following your wishes, at least a little, by allowing you to keep your distance. Perhaps I should have understood sooner that that was not your intent, but there are still many things where I am not sure if people do them because they wish to, or because they think I want that to happen and they are scared of what might happen if they act in another fashion."
"And that includes me?" Ferio asked, doing her best to hold back a small laugh.
The All-Mother gave a nod and folded her wings behind her back. "All I have are memories of you, viewed from the near-constant omniscient perspective I — for some reason — preferred in the past.
"Yes, I saw everything you did, but even now I can only bring myself to feel a passing interest to what happened then." Aperio hesitated for a moment before she let out a sigh and shook her head. "No matter what I try, there is little to no emotion in most of the memories I have from before my… disappearance. A part of me simply assumed that that was the version of me you knew and liked more, so I simply acted like that." She gave a huff. "A foolish approach."
"Good to know that part about you didn't change," Ferio said. "For someone who can know quite literally everything if you put your mind to it, you have always made quite a lot of assumptions. But then, I guess that is the point. At least now. Be more like a mortal, was it?"
"Live a more normal life," Aperio corrected, her voice quiet but still omnipresent and almost crushing. "That is all I want."
"Well, we got the family drama part done. The amount of prayers I have listened to which ask me to fix relationships between parents is astronomical." Ferio offered a small shrug. "If you want a normal life, you are good on that front."
"That is something I could do without," her mother said as she turned slightly to look at Caethya. "I would prefer to have a place of my own, in a village somewhere. Somewhere where I could settle down and learn a trade. Make things."
“You could always go and make a house somewhere," Caethya said, a small smile flashing across her face. "I wouldn't mind having a little vacation in the middle of nowhere. No magic though, you'll have to go and chop trees for wood."
"You mean she will go to the nearest forest and punch a tree into perfect planks?" Ferio asked, the image of her mother doing exactly that a bit too easy to imagine. "Probably doesn't need magic for that."
"I do not need magic to do that," Aperio affirmed, tilting her head slightly to the side. "But I am also not sure I have time for that right now."
"What else do you have to do?" Ferio could think of a few things that the mother she had known might do, but all of those were purely magical in nature. It's not like she really needed to focus on any one thing in order to make it work perfectly fine. Perks of being an infinite being, I suppose.
The All-Mother simply spread her arms, seemingly gesturing at everything. "What do I not have to work on? Before I left, my creation was not in a good state and my absence has not done it any favours."
"It seems fine to me?" The Goddess of Life and Light was not quite sure what her mother meant. Sure, she had just put in place her fancy multiverse on Earth, but that did not really mean reality itself was broken. Anything else Ferio could see also seemed to work just fine. Perhaps not as efficient as absolutely possible, but good enough.
"Epemirial and her ilk have tried change things and while they might not have achieved much they have left… marks, ones I am not willing to just leave be." Aperio offered a slight shrug of her wings. "There is also the fact that I wish to bring the change Earth has experienced to more worlds. I already know that it was not the only planet that sometimes split into shards on its own, so why not make the process all the more effective?"
"That's one way of putting it," Caethya said. "But I think that before you do any of that, there is a bit more talking you and Ferio have to do." The mortal crossed her arms. "I know Aperio really likes taking the first step, and then going on an extended walk along the nearest tangent. Like mother, like daughter, it seems."
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Aperio raised a brow at her love, ignoring the Fae that shook slightly on her shoulder, likely trying to hold back its laughter. "I am not sure what else I can say. I have shown her how I feel, how I see all of this." Much easier than trying to figure out the words to properly describe it.
"I don't have anything else to say either," Ferio said with a shrug. "You didn't expect us to become a model family after a little talk, did you?"
"Not quite," Caethya replied before she let out a long sigh. "I had simply thought that there might be a few more things the two of you would like to discuss. But I guess not." Her love looked between the two of them. "No more fighting, then."
"Or what?" her daughter asked, her voice a bit too threatening for Aperio's liking. "What are you going to do?"
"Nothing." Caethya offered a shrug. "I just don't want to see the woman I love fight with her daughter, that’s all.”
Her love gave a small smile, continuing to talk to Ferio even as she looked at Aperio. "She might not show much of what she feels, but that does not change the fact that I perceive her feelings. There was always a note of worry, of sorrow when she thought of the past... or you."
Aperio tilted her head in reply, her ears twitching ever-so-slightly, the motion causing Caethya’s smile to widen. "You aren't as good at hiding your emotions as you think you are. Sometimes I feel like you are better at deceiving yourself than you are at deceiving me."
"Because I probably am," the All-Mother replied, lowering her gaze towards the endless expanse of nothing below her feet. "I do not wish to deceive you, so I do not. I… do not think I can say the same for myself."
"And even a thought is enough to change reality," Ferio mumbled. "Does that also apply to yourself?" she added, at a more normal vocal volume. "I never really considered that. You were always just… beyond reality as far as I was concerned."
"Not in the way you think, but I am perfectly capable of lying to myself like anyone else. Even when I know that I am doing it."
Being aware of your problems rarely meant that you could also just remove them. Perhaps she could, but Aperio had no interest in altering her own mind. There had been enough of that in her time as a mortal to last her a good long while. But then, drawing on my well calms me; does that count as altering my mind?
Aperio shook her head in an effort to clear it. "It also does not matter. I dislike lying and have not done so unless absolutely required. And even then, it was more avoiding the topic than speaking a lie."
"An attempt to be mysterious?" Ferio asked. "You have done that a few times in the past. The mortals didn't like it."
Aperio shrugged before a thought brought her behind her love. "Good thing I do not care all that much about what most people think. They are free to do what they want, just as I am."
Caethya took a step backwards, taking Aperio's hand into her own. "It's also good that nobody can force you to do anything."
"Not anymore."
Ferio opened her mouth to speak before she thought better of it and remained silent. The All-Mother was sure her daughter had wanted to say that nobody was ever able to force her before she remembered that most of her mother’s current memories came from a time that was entirely out of her control.
"In any case," the Goddess of Life and Light said. "No more things to discuss for now, we can go back to Earth. Or Kuslo. Or Vernier."
"I think you should give those people their flame back," Aperio said, wrapping her wings around her love and resting her chin on her head. "Or should I give them one? It would be nice and blue."
"You can if you want to, I don't really care about that world."
"Are there worlds you do care about?" Caethya asked.
"Some," Ferio replied. "Usually they are ones where the people do worship me but do not view me as the solution to all their problems. The knights I brought to Ebenlowe are from such a world." She looked at Aperio and raised her hands. "Don't worry, I will bring them back once the city figures itself out again."
"I was not worried about that," Aperio replied. "I am more worried that they might start talking about things from their world, or bring back things from Verenier. While I do not know exactly why, I can tell you that that is a bad idea."
"Are you going to find out why?"
"Probably, but only through research of my own, not by letting myself know all there is. It does not feel nearly bad enough for that." Aperio extended one wing, waving it instead of a hand. "Back to the world without its flame. If you do not wish to give them back the thing their lives have been built around, I will do that."
"Sure, go ahead, maybe they will stop bothering me."
Aperio only raised a brow at her daughter's words before a thought caused a bright blue flame to flicker to life in all the temples of Kuslo. She took the liberty to include the ones that were not even dedicated to Ferio or herself. Perhaps they would see it as a sign that those Gods were not present on this world.
She also added a feather that would lay somewhere near each of the fires and updated all the images and statues of herself that were dotted around the world. Perhaps they would see it as her subsuming her daughter's place here — something that wasn't too far off, as her daughter had no plans to further help the people of this world. Just to be certain that the mortals would not misinterpret what was happening, she gave the various followers of 'the Star's Mother' a new title that properly reflected the one she carried. She was the All-Mother, not the Star's Mother.
"All done," Aperio said with a small smile, barely a moment having passed. "They should be able to figure things out fairly quickly."
"You give them too much credit," Ferio said. "I predict war, as every religion will claim you as their Goddess and therefore they are the one true faith. It happened when I first arrived, but they only had spears and slings then. Now they know of siege magic, and other fun things."
"Perhaps I should give them a stern warning too, then," Aperio mumbled to herself. "But for now, we can return to Earth. We have been gone for quite a while already and some people are looking for us."
"We didn't tell Adam that we left, did we?" Caethya asked, looking up at Aperio.
"We did not."