Vincible Ignorance

Of course she had loved him. How could she not? He was the Fuhrer and although she knew he had been a hard man to many people, he was always kind and pleasant to her.

Goodness, though, he had needed instruction in how to treat a lady. With all the wars, there were more women than men, so some of them would never marry, the poor things. It was no wonder that some of them were even in the military and Mr Bradley (she called him that in private and the Fuhrer or Fuhrer Bradley or simply "my husband" in public) had been used to treating every woman like a soldier.

Some people had been upset about Order 3066 (she never called it the Ishval "Annihilation" or "Extermination" or heaven forbid "Genocide") but she made it a point never to get involved in politics. She left that to Mr Bradley. Whatever he had decided must have been necessary.

She had loved Selim too, from the moment they had adopted him. It had become apparent in only a couple of years that something wasn't right, because the child didn't grow. She'd taken him to doctors, approved by Mr Bradley, of course, and they'd given her different diagnoses. For a while, she'd tried to learn about the various syndromes that they suggested. But when she found out that none of them ever actually matched Selim, and that other than not growing, he seemed to be just fine, she decided that medicine was best left to doctors.

After the horrible day when that woman general had changed the government and that nice young colonel and his men had taken such good care of her, they had brought Selim back to her. That had been wonderful. This time, she was getting to see him grow like a normal boy.

They had been worried about how she would react to the news about Selim. But she had taken it completely in stride, accepting the strange condition of her adopted son as if it were nothing more than an unusual medical condition.

They had also told her that Selim was a homunculus, something to do with Alchemy. That was what that strange marking meant. Mr Bradley had had the same marking on the eye, which she knew had seen perfectly well, that he had kept covered with an eye patch. He had told her not to tell anyone, so of course, she hadn't. No one told her that Mr Bradley was a homunculus too and she didn't ask.

She had many years of leaving the difficult questions to others. Alchemy, she decided, was best left to the alchemists.

Vincible Ignorance: Lack of knowledge for which a person is morally responsible.