novelraw Chapter 464 - Extraordinary Life, Sanctified Strife
Chapter 464 - Extraordinary Life, Sanctified Strife
I pick up my lovely fox mug. The last bit of chai has gone cold inside it, but I drink the it anyway. I refuse to waste my own successful effort when some of these ingredients may be actually impossible to find before long.
Also partly because I need something to do with my hands that isn’t reaching for my son or fidgeting until Kyrie can get here. But also because I’ve been left with the most disturbing woman in the room, while my son sleeps on my lap.
> And... whatever she’s been seeing in us since she walked in. <
"You don’t need to hover by the door. If you wanted to stay and say something, just stay."
To her credit, Dr. Mei didn’t flinch at being called out. She just nodded once and came back to the table counter to sit across from me. Good, I might have reacted badly if she got too close while I hold him.
"Thank you for the tea. It was very good."
"You’re welcome. Now can you tell me why you’ve been staring at us and what Life-Thread Perceptive means?"
Direct. Maybe too much so, given that I’d spent all meeting being honest - but diplomatic. However, the others were gone, and I was *tired*... and the woman who wants to touch my son for *mysterious reasons* might as well be as dangerous as any fae.
> Mythologies where life, fate, and other things are not just symbolically ’thread’ but literally spun and cut by deities quickly come to mind. Why would I risk it? Even if she likely could have just done it to me and then went to my son... unless she can only cut once so often? <
"Interesting. To you it has a name already."
The way her hands settled together make me feel like I’m being ridiculous. There is no kind of hostility or wariness from her at all. But that’s almost the most concerning part!
Even when she was making fun of the others so harshly... not one single hint of genuine malice from her at all. At least according to both my own social intuition and the system’s version.
Which... I admit I have been ignoring in favor of my own prejudiced assumptions throughout most of the meeting...
> Still, do people like that exist? Or is she an even more excellent liar than I am? Than the system is? <
"I have a sense for living things, Citra. It’s part of why I’m good at what I do with plant cultivation. In short, I can... perceive a vibration of vitality."
"...What does that mean specifically in this instance? Being long is fine."
I can hazard guesses, but I won’t. Not aloud.
"Mm. How strong something’s hold on life is? How much potential existence sits inside a seed, or a cutting... or a person."
Her head turned away from me, looking down at the floor. No... down below it. Far below.
"Everything in this tower has been dimming since the solstice. Every person I pass in the halls, every plant we coax out of the grow beds. The cold outside presses down on all of it despite our efforts."
She has already spoken almost as much as she had the entire group meeting. I guess she is more of a one on one talker.
"Some days I could barely look at the people coming in from the Rimecoat’s early rescue sweeps. Because I can already see the ones who won’t make it far past..."
She stopped herself. Swallowed once and placed her palm flat, pressing down like she could push the thought back into the table - where it definitely didn’t come from.
Well, overall I guess I understand her... ability. Maybe something like what | Matron’s Monitor | does when it tells a target’s Status? Actually, could it be that is the reason why the system recognized it instead of leaving only question marks?
> If so, that means the others have unique qualities that either the entire Apocalypse System cannot entirely quantify... or the damned thing is refusing to tell me information about things which I do not have similar themed abilities given to me. <
Probably the latter. It can literally map places I haven’t been after all. Give me lots of information I can’t reasonably have. To think it just doesn’t know things would be almost as foolish as assuming it knows everything!
"I understand."
"No. I don’t think you do. But I know you mean well by the attempt."
Fair. I haven’t watched hundreds of strangers slowly lose their light while being unable to do anything about it. I just gave a token attempt to warn someone who might do something good.
Then hid to save myself and what I brought into the world, while everyone was culled by catastrophe. Maybe I can do enough to help who is left so that I stop... blaming myself.
> Unlikely. <
"Your son... his vitality oscillates at a magnitude I have never encountered. Not in any living thing that I’ve seen."
My hand on Asha’s back curled without conscious thought. The rise and fall of his breathing, the now everburning furnace warmth of his little body now that it has Tolerance. Which is something I’m not... entirely sure Martha appreciated.
That I literally gave her control over something that means an insane amount to the safety of my own offspring. Granted, it could still be taken away if she isn’t worthy of it. But if she chose to betray us while he was vulnerable, in a cold spot?
> Kyrie said it would be alright. That she’d contact me the instant she felt the ability stop for herself. And... <
While that means I’m trusting two others with my child’s wellbeing, I’d already decided Kyrie will be there for him. Even before she did so many little things to prove it on the way here.
"He was born under some very unusual circumstances."
"On the solstice. In that beast form. In the werewolf conclave’s caves, where the Lunar Goddess’s presence is strongest and they receive their spirits. Yes, I’ve heard the Pineheart’s version."
Something cold tore through my stomach at her speaking these details... especially with a different pack as the capstone to her statements. What her relation is to them, whether she is speaking on their behalf, all the usual motivations that a noble must consider when speaking to anyone.
"You’ve heard this from them?"
"Not directly. But news of a miracle birth tends to spread through a community that is already primed to look for signs of saviors. Their Alpha has called him a divine creature that needed to be protected."
Mira’s leader... the one that lunged for Asha in the cave the same as the others. And herself a woman whose body was taken over by the Lunar Goddess once. Of all the people I want to see in this tower, I’ve dreaded running into her again the most.
> Because I kind of want to punch her, just in case. <
"And... he did it in front of a large crowd in the basement. Humans and wolves alike heard his speech. On the coming of the Lunar Goddess’s miracle amidst this tragedy."
Well. That’s not wrong. She told me at least part of the plan herself? But-
"And he did it the very day after Kyrie Voss left the tower to look for you."
"He’s a *pup*. He bites nipples, now fingers, and falls asleep for hours like any other baby."
The sharpness in my voice, the lilac glow in my eyes... didn’t seem to bother her. She simply studied my face and new posture with annoying patience.
"I’m not saying he wasn’t born different, as that’s clearly not true. But whatever future *anyone* wants to project onto him - other than the one he chooses when he is old enough to understand choice?"
"Well, you are a mother. However, I’m not projecting, Citra. I’m telling you what I see. His vitality, from my point of view, is extraordinary. And so is yours."
That stilled me for a moment longer than I’d have liked. Of course, I do have that spark of divine energy from the blessing I was... tricked into being given.
"Mine?"
"The vibration in you is just as brilliant. And as of yesterday, in the white haired leader of our hosting pack."
"...What do you mean?"
"During the whole ordeal in the lobby, we happened to be informed by Ms. Thomsson that the two of you were on the way. And she did not seem nearly so... vastly different than any of the other wolves then. When it came to how I perceive things."
Well. That... huh. How exactly is lacking a wolf spirit now making her more full of life? Or it’s not the partial mate bond being enacted, is it?
"In my mother’s tradition, I might have wanted to call him something like ’shénshòu’, a divine beast. From my own observation, his guardians seem to be turning into something similar. So be careful with fanatics."
She stood and began to leave the room. But not all the way through the door before a little bow and a final word.
"For they might be more right than you want to admit. And they will feel that in their own ways, like how I can see it. Hope we have a pleasant cooperation moving forward."