A MOTHER’S FINAL WORDS TO HER DAUGHTER
My Most Perfect, Loved Thing
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My dearest Aubrius,
I’m over a hundred years too late in writing this. If I were half as brave as I’ve heard you are, I’d be over a hundred years too late in saying it instead. But I know your temper, the one thing I prayed you wouldn’t get from me, and I’ve put off even writing to you because I convinced myself you’d throw this letter away sooner than read it. It may have taken me 300 more years to garner the courage to write this if I weren’t sick, but I knew I couldn’t die while you still believed that I hated you.
Where do I start my apologies? I’ve failed you as a mother at every turn. I abandoned you, neglected you, abused you — all for a crime you didn’t commit. That you were also a victim of. And when you left me, sooner than any mother should ever let her child be alone in the world, I was relieved because I could finally nurse my wounds without the face of the man who’d shattered me mocking me every day.
I’m sure you don’t need me to list my wrongs. I imagine you remember them well enough yourself. So I will begin simply, by saying only that I am sorry. I’m so sorry, Aubrie.
Your father called you Aubrie, you know. He left when you were so young, I doubt you’d remember. But it wasn’t even a day after we’d named you that he was holding you in his arms and rocking you to sleep and decided you were our little Aubrie. After finding each other, he gave me as much time as he could without his wife discovering him, but he gave even more when we found out about you. We’d hoped for a baby, of course, but Foralis doesn’t always reward those who pray. And then after you were born… it was like heaven. He was with us constantly, and you looked just like him, and I didn’t think I could be happier.
That’s why it hurt so much when he left, even though we hadn’t sealed the bond. He’d given me a bell as a promise that we’d be together, really be together as we should be one day, the laws had long been changed so it wasn’t even illegal anymore, his son was grown and married, he fought with his wife constantly, we had our Aubrie, and still he left.
The gods give you one person that’s perfect for you, Aubrius. One person you can love above any other, who makes you whole. And if you’re lucky, you find them. I had mine. I had him, and he chose to give up that gift — this perfect thing the gods had given him and this even more perfect thing he’d created with her.
You weren’t there when he walked out, so you won’t remember this, but I threw that fucking bell he’d given me at his head. I threw it so hard, it dented when it hit him. And that’s why I’m so ashamed now. You were my perfect thing, even more than him, and I picked up that bell after I dented it and tried to fix it and always wore it, but I tossed you aside in its stead. I was a worse fool than your father, because I knew how bad it hurt and knew what he was losing, and I did the same exact thing he did.
I’m telling you all of this now because I never did when you were younger, even though I should have. And you deserve to know. You deserve to know everything.
Your father’s name is Evard Wainwood. He’s High Councilman, and you’ll recognize him immediately if you ever meet him. You may have my temper, my stubbornness, and even my wings, but you have his face, and from what I’ve heard, you’re smart like him too.
I’ve heard a lot of things about you that I wish I could know for myself. That you don’t get along with a lot of people but that you help them anyway, whether you’ll be rewarded for it or not, that you’re well-liked in the city because of your kindness and hated amongst the nobility because you stand against them. I’ve heard that you’re beautiful and that you still dance sometimes and that the royal guard’s scared of you. If I were allowed to be a mother, I’d warn you away from the excessive drinking and sex, but despite my worries, I hear you protect your wings when others think they’re free to touch them.
In short, I hear you’ve grown up fine without parents to steer you in the right direction. Into a beautiful young caelus who’ll accomplish everything she gets it into her head to do. And it’s a comfort, to know that at least I won’t leave you a wreck, even if I can’t take any credit for your success. If even half of what I’ve heard is true, I’m unspeakably proud to be your mother.
Gods, I’m lost, Aubrius. I hope I can dry my tears enough not to make this unreadable, but I owe you more words than I have the time to say or the skill to conjure.
Aubrius, I fear it’s too late for us. I’ve tried to talk to you, and you haven’t answered. This, my final letter, is my last hope to reach you, and there is too much for me to possibly hope to fix after all these years. I realize I lost the right to ask you for favors years ago, but I wanted to ask you for just one thing since I have no hope of reconnecting with you. I’ve told you who your father is, I’ve told you what things were like before he left, and I’d like for you to reach out to him if he doesn’t try to contact you first. Please try to get to know him and give him a chance at forgiveness in my place.
Maybe he doesn’t deserve it — but maybe he does. He wouldn’t tell me why he left us, so I won’t ever know. And after spending years convinced that he just didn’t love us, wondering if maybe somehow having you drove him away, I’m holding onto those memories of when you were a baby, when I had the most of him that I’d ever had and how much love he showed us both. I look at the bell he gave me. And maybe I’m wrong for thinking he had good reason, but I’ve tried for so long to hate him and I just can’t. I can’t think the worst of him, no matter what he did, and I want to die loving you both, with the hope that you might love each other again. So I’m writing him a letter as well, threatening to make his life the worst living hell imaginable from the afterlife if he doesn’t get to know his daughter and attempt to be a better parent to her than I was and make things right for both of us, and I’m asking you not to shut him out for attempting to fulfill my wishes.
I’m leaving you the bell he gave me. If he isn’t the man I fell in love with, throw it at his head as hard as you fucking can. Make him wish he’d never known the anger of a Norren woman. But if he is the man I fell in love with, I leave the fate of my bell in your hands. You might consider giving it back to Evard, even. I don’t expect you to wear it. I haven’t earned that right from you, but perhaps my mate will mourn me and find comfort in it.
Aubrius… My dearest Aubrius, I can’t justify the woman I became when Evard left us. I can’t excuse the way I acted towards you. I can’t apologize to you enough. I imagine this will be destroyed without reaching you, but if the Winged One has any mercy, I ask that he protect it until you can read it and that, no matter how long it takes, you pick up this letter one day.
It’s too late to get to know you and to earn your forgiveness, but I hope I’m not too late in giving you the most important gift any mother can offer her child. My Aubrius, I want you to know that I love you — that you are my most perfect, loved thing.
Your mother,
Rusalka Norren
