I think I loved you that day when you turned your back on me.

I remember it, as if were but a moment ago that it happened. I remember the ache in my chest, the burning of tears behind my eyes, and the struggle not to show them. I remember how weak I felt, with the gray in my hair and the age lines on my face, all brought about because I was forgotten. That is what happens when one is forgotten: your age catches up with you, all those millennia without losing your youth. Go join your sister in the lake, you said, and be forgotten.

The ache grew, and I remember thinking how much I had done for you, how much I had sacrificed: most of my power to create you, precious years of watching my people die, just so that you could grow, my strength so that I could give you a home with Nimue. And I remember thinking that though I did so little good in my life, perhaps that little good might be my salvation, might deliver me from the Void where I would be doomed to wander.

I think I loved you.

I think.