Chapter 3: Late Realization

He was going to become a Jedi.

It had been only a few days since Amariss had arrived with these tests, but the results were overwhelmingly a yes. Apparently there was an academy for them, something he had never heard about. A place where many youths just like him went to train to become guardians of justice and peace. It appealed to every sense of adventure he had, in a way he hadn't experienced in a long time.

"Tyris, are you…even going to say goodbye to him?" Zaric heard it by chance, as he restlessly wandered through the hallways of the house, too excited to sleep. "No. He must live his life from now on. I was never good at this parenting thing. Khay was always the caring one. Better if I stay out of his hair. He'll develop better in your Academy, I'm sure." The door was slightly ajar, showing his father laying in bed, with a book in his hands. The man was always an intellectual, perhaps sometimes to his detriment.

His back quietly hit the wall, and his thoughts were in a jumble as he slowly slid to a sitting position. His father was…sorry? That seemed to be the only explanation that he could find for these words he had heard his Father say. He didn't fully understand why it hurt him so much. Zaric had…hated his father for years just to see this result?

"Zaric…" Amariss had seen him as she exited Father's room. Zaric didn't even respond, simply looking forward, his unspoken thoughts filling the air, or at least that's how it seemed in his head. This woman could see right through him.

"You're some kind of mind-reading monk, right? Just read my thoughts and get it over with." This one sentence was more than he had said to Amariss the entire time during the testing period. Many times, Tyris had to fill in where Zaric's curt explanations fell short.

"Haha, no, we don't read people's minds unless we really, really need to. Now, what's eatin' ya'?" She seemed so…carefree, like she had never felt any suffering. Perhaps from some outside perspective, it might be seen that Zaric was being quite selfish. He lived a comfortable life, and many people had lost far more than their mothers, but he felt pain nonetheless.

'You won't understand." They were three simple words to drive her away. Yet…they didn't. She still sat there, looking straight into his eyes. She didn't say anything, just smiled. "I don't have to. Noone understands each others pain, even if they say they do. All we have to do is be there for each other."

For some reason, that made Zaric cry the rest of the night. He was put to bed quietly, and only fell asleep as the rays of the morning sun already shined. Hopefully, Amariss was as forgiving a person as she seemed, because it seemed he was going to sleep in heavily.