It was impossible not to have heard about it—everyone was talking about how her son had killed another slave. She had heard so many stories by the end of the day, she feared which might be true. She had heard that he wasn't being punished for it, that he was being killed for it, that he was being sold to someone else. They obviously weren't all true—though she feared some more so than others.

She ran all the way home, and was relieved to see him sitting on the bed. He was shaking, she noticed, slightly: A distinct tremble throughout his body.

She went to her son and he looked up at her, still shaking. "Are you all right?" she asked him, knowing that nothing could ever be all right.

He nodded once, looking back down. "I'm fine," he lied.

She bit her lip. "Let me get you something to eat." She turned to go, but he caught her sleeve.

"No," he insisted, shaking his head. "I won't be able to keep it down." He spoke as if it pained him to do so.

She stared at him, wondering what had been done to him. Her heart ached for him. A mother shouldn't allow her children to wallow in such misery. She wanted to do something—anything. She started to embrace him, and he hissed, as if in pain. Her eyebrows raised in alarm, and she stepped back. "Darling, what's-?"

"I have three broken ribs," he confided, still shaking slightly. As he tilted his face and looked at her, she saw a dark bruise across his face, fresh. "And I can't lie down because… twenty-seven lashes." His words were broken by pain. For the first time, she glanced at his back, and saw the blood that had soaked through his tunic.

She paled a bit. She had no bandages, but her eyes fell to the spare bed, with its freshly washed sheets. She went to it, ripping off the sheet.

"Mother, don't," he said, but he was helpless to stop her, and she tore the sheet to strips, and helped him, gently, out of the tunic. He was so covered in welts and bruises that it made her want to cry to see her only son like this. The broken ribs were the important thing, and she had had to tend to Calias once in the distant past when he had hurt his ribs. It felt like a lifetime ago, like it had happened to someone else, so long had she been a slave.

She fetched some water, as swiftly as she could, and cleaned the bloodied wounds, quickly but tenderly. She wound the makeshift bandages around his chest, gently, but firmly, making him gasp and cringe. She saw her son's eyes water, and she felt hers begin to water as well. It pained a mother to see her child in pain, no matter their age.

She didn't want to see him like this. Her heart ached for it. Maybe when Varania came back, she could…

"Varania," she said, looking to the door. Her mageborn daughter could heal all of this—why hadn't she considered it?
Leto gave a slight shake of the head. "She's confined to a room in the manor," he whispered. "Can't heal me until tomorrow night."

His punishment was to live with the pain until then, she realized. That was why they kept her daughter locked away. Varania wouldn't be able to bear seeing her brother, who she so adored, in such pain. As she wound the bandages firmly around his ribcage, she thought, fourteen years. They had been here for fourteen years.

She should be finding a husband for Varania. She should be seeing Leto married to Lura and looking forward to grandchildren. Instead… instead…

"Mother…" Leto said, reaching out to her. "Don't cry."

She hadn't realized that she had started crying, but she was. She couldn't bear this. She couldn't bear that they should be here, that anyone should have to live like this. She wiped at her face, sniffing, holding back her tears. "I'm sorry, honey," she said, tying off the bandage, and getting to work on the rest of his back, which was more difficult. "I just… hate seeing you in pain." In the end, she just had to dress the wounds as much as she could, and help her son lay down on his back, because he couldn't lay on his stomach or side. Every movement was an agony for him, though, and she knew it hurt him to so little as breathe.

His eyes shifted away. "It won't be for long," he said, his voice soft.

She shook her head. "Too long."

He snorted, and gave her a half-smile. "Mother, if I had killed someone in Seheron if we were free…" He took a labored breath, then another. "It would be a crime. I got off easy, don't you think?"

She cupped his cheek tenderly, wondering how he could smile for her after all this. She could barely smile for her children half the time. Why should he have to be the strong one? He was a man yet, but she was the parent. It should be her responsibility, not his—never his. "I'm sorry, baby," she told him, as if he were a child again instead of nearly eighteen. He looked up at her, and in her eyes, she saw him as a three-year old again. It made her eyes water to think of how hurt he was. "I'm sorry I haven't been a good mother to you."

He seemed saddened to hear her say that. "Mama, you've done the best you could," he said, and she smiled to hear him say 'Mama' again, despite herself. "And I love you."

She would hug him if it wouldn't hurt him. She kissed his cheek instead, and he made a face, but seemed to generally accept it. "I love you, my son." She combed his pretty ebony hair off of his face with her fingers. "What happened—or are you not well enough to talk?"

He sighed, gently though. "I was just… really angry," he said. "It was Erron. He's done nothing but mock and ridicule me since we came here, and… I'm so sorry, Mother." He paused frequently to breathe, and flinched occasionally as he spoke. She knew there was more to the tale, but she would leave him his story. If he wanted to tell her all of it, one day he would. Until then, she would leave it be.

She had to leave him, though reluctantly; she was famished. They never fed them enough.

Maybe… it was a training accident. She didn't know all the details, exactly; it was an accident, and he had been too angry to properly control himself? As awful as it was, she was glad that it wasn't her son that had died.

Though, she had counted thirty strikes on his back, not 27. A miscount? Or had the extra three been for a different infraction? She had no doubt that her son kept things from her; he was almost 18. If he wasn't keeping something from her, she'd be astonished.

Still… She left him, both to eat and because he probably just wanted to sleep. As she ate, alone and in silence, Erron's mother and sister giving her a vicious glare from across the room, she thought. The extra three could be for losing a match the other day. That seemed likely enough.

Her son was hurt. His back was covered in slashes, and it made her want to cry to think of it. She tried to eat quickly, knowing full well that she needed to eat, but scarcely tasting any of it. Before she had been enslaved, she hadn't thought a body could subsist on the meager amounts of food they gave them. Rice and sometimes beans, and once a day a bowl of some unidentifiable-looking brown liquid they called a soup that was composed entirely of scraps and perhaps occasionally food that was beginning to turn. They were fed little better than most swine.

Thinking about it too deeply sometimes made her weep. How had her children grown on this diet? How? How did anyone grow on this diet? The food, the living conditions, the patched, cheaply made clothing they counted themselves fortunate to have, and her son hurt on top of it all, and nothing at all she could do. Not take him to a healer, not even properly care for the open wounds.

"I've known you for almost fifteen years now, and I don't think I've seen you smile once, except to your children," a voice said from behind her. When Mieta looked up, she saw that it was Marlance. The statement was true; slavery had drained the life, the song, and the dance, from Mieta in a way that nothing else could have hoped to, and all her smiles had felt oddly vacant since coming to the Imperium.

Mieta looked at the woman, and felt her heart hang heavy even as her voice rang like a hollow bell. "I'll die in slavery. And my children will die in slavery. How could anyone smile?" It was a mystery to her that despite all of this, some of them didn't seem to care about it. Was it truly that they just didn't know any better? Could that really be all there was to it? She just couldn't make herself believe it though.

The woman looked at her for a long time, as if contemplating something. "It's not as bad as you think," she finally said, and sat down beside her on the old bench. It creaked slightly at the added weight, but it wouldn't give, not today anyway.

Mieta stared at her, incredulous. "How can you say that?" She had no words to convey her astonishment, the horror of that statement. How could it not be "as bad as you think"?

Marlance shifted in her seat, and to Mieta it seemed as if the woman were far away, in another place, another time. She began to speak, "I was born on a farm in the country. We were not fed; we were given some seed and a bit of land, and told to farm it on our own time. Our own time marked the hours we should have spent asleep. We ate very little, because there was simply very little food. When I was nine, I was sold to a grape plantation, and made wine. We ate from the same trough as the dogs-I remember having to fight over scraps with the dogs. When I became a woman, at thirteen, my master made the men mount me until I was begot with child. They refer to it as 'breeding.' Some of the men refused; they were beaten until they submitted." It was no huge secret that elves didn't breed as quickly as humans. For Mieta to have had two so close in age was a rarity. Pairing elven women with multiple male partners was considered the "solution" to this "problem". And didn't Mieta know the truth of that. Marlance's voice was low and grave, and did not carry far beyond Mieta's ears. No one else was listening; it was a story everyone knew even if they hadn't heard it. It was quite familiar to all of them, in one way or another. "When I was older, I was considered pretty, and I came here to be a serving girl. I had a child, and I was not so fortunate as to have my child come with me. I imagine that she's still there, fighting over spoiled meat with a dog, getting raped by the overseer, and making wine." She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Mieta was shocked to silence, not knowing what to say. She imagined that there simply wasn't anything to say.

Marlance looked at her, and raised a delicately arched eyebrow. "Your children will not outlive their usefulness and be sent to the mines to work until they die. Your daughter is a mage and will never be seen as anything but valuable as a slave, and your son is a skilled swordsman. Once he has outlived his usefulness as a gladiator, yes, he'll be sent to Seheron to fight the Qunari, but is that so much worse than working a quarry until he simply drops of exhaustion and dies? And on top of that, you have a skill—a learned trade; you will never fear for yourself the same way nearly everyone else does." She rose, and her voice was still quiet, but somehow strong. "So stop feeling sorry for yourself."

Mieta's eyes opened wide, not knowing at all what to say, how to react. Should she apologize for her actions? Should she tell Marlance she was sorry to hear her tale, and about her daughter? Should she simply stay quiet, and do nothing?

More importantly, should she be more grateful for where they had ended up? Things could have so easily gone any other way. She and Leto could have been separated. It could have happened so easily. She might be like Marlance, who ended up in one place while always fearing for her child, and what became of them. She had to be grateful, all those years ago, that Leto had always looked a bit younger than he was.

She remembered, when they were all separated and put in different warehouses, that one of the first things they had done was separate family groups. But Leto had been too young. They had said that he likely wouldn't survive if he were separated from her. Lura had been simply coincidence—maybe they had assumed the same. There were so many things that could have gone wrong. She could have been raped on the march. Being pregnant had saved her from that; there had been plenty of other women who weren't spared after all.

She returned quickly, though, despite that the others had begun to ask her about her son, and the circumstances around it more importantly. She replaced the water in the bucket she kept in the house, and drank a bit herself. Leto couldn't sit up to drink from the cup, so she wet another rag, and ran it over his lips, drizzling a bit in his mouth. No doubt, he thought it very undignified, but he could deal with it; he had to drink something, and he did admit that his throat was parched.

She had a bowl of broth for her son, but he was dead asleep by the time she had come back. She was reluctant to wake him, so put the bowl on the dresser, and covered it, somewhere within easy reach.

She worried for her children, for both of them.

She was loathe to part from Leto that morning, but she made sure he swallowed the broth, and had water nearby so he didn't have to move too much, as well as a chamber pot, just in case.

"I'm so tired of bed rest," he muttered. She knew it was meant light-heartedly, but she just wanted to cry hearing him say it. He wouldn't have killed someone if he wasn't fighting. If he weren't a slave. If she had been strong enough to leave her husband, and take him north like she should have.

If, if, if!

She hurried home, running over the path in her worry, unable to restrain herself to a more mature pace. Something about the very air felt wrong. She had sensed it all day, a sense of something sinister at work, something vile, like a taste in her mouth she could not banish.

She slowed when she saw the slaves rushing by, giving the small gathered group a wide berth as they headed into the compound, and tried not to look.

She froze in her tracks when she saw that it was her children, and the magister and his apprentice. Leto was in obvious pain; she could see it even from this distance, his back straight so as not to crunch his ribcage, but keeping it straight hurt his back. He was naked to the waist, with nothing but the bloodied bandage around his ribs on—the dressings on his back were gone as well.

Mieta saw Varania, too, between the two magisters. Raith had a hold of her wrist, and it looked like he was hurting her. Raith shoved her forward, and Danarius issued a command—to heal him, probably.

She saw the way Varania stumbled, and lost her balance. The young girl fell to her knees, and Mieta found herself hurrying forward again. Her hair was tangled, her skin pale, and she looked sick. Had… No, it couldn't be…

The girl wiped at her face and stumbled forward again. Leto caught her as she started to fall, and the movement caused him pain. She hauled herself up, trying to be strong. She put her hands, carefully, just a few inches from his chest. Her healing magic was blue, the color of a clear, still lake in the summer, and glowed like a fire. It danced from her fingers, burrowing into his chest, past the bandages. It didn't hurt, but setting the bone did, pushing all the pieces into place did. His teeth gritted, eyes tightly closed against the pain. She knew when the girl had finished, because they both sighed in evident relief.

Mieta was close enough now to hear what was being said clearly, even past the beating drum of her heart. "His back too—and don't you dare let it scar," Danarius hissed at her. "Use blood magic if you have to, but don't let it scar."

Varania bit back a sob, and nodded her consent. She put everything she had into the magic, as she moved to Leto's back. Sweat tracked down her face in concentration, and the magic didn't flow so much as was pushed from her, everything that she had, everything that she was.

It wasn't enough, apparently. Mieta couldn't see from the angle she watched from, but the mages could. "There's scarring—fix it," Raith barked.

She looked at the two desperately. "But, Master, I haven't the skill…"

His eyes narrowed, dangerously. He moved forward, as if to strike her. To Mieta's surprise and horror, Leto stepped between them, keeping his sister behind him, away from their master—always the big brother shielding his baby sister from harm. Danarius glared at him. Leto averted his eyes, but didn't back down.

But then the mage began to laugh, as if deeply amused by something. "Really, boy? Does your sister mean so much to you?" he mused. "Varania."

She cringed, and tried to step around her brother. He grabbed onto her, hauling her back, shoving her backwards. She let out a small yelp, tripping over something, maybe her own feet, and fell onto her bottom. Though none of them could truly appreciate it, it was exactly the position the four were in when Danarius had decreed Leto should be trained for the arena.

"Varania, extend your hand," the mage commanded. Mieta saw the knife in his hand. The blade glinted in the dying light.

Leto's gaze flicked to it too. "Don't," he hissed to his sister.

She held her arms close to herself, and looked up at her brother, and shook her head, and mouthed something to him. Mieta could imagine what it was—It's not worth it. She held out her left arm, trembling so much that even Mieta could see it from this distance. The blade was quick, precise, and the slash to her forearm coated the blade.

Magic sprang from the wound like a spring, rushing over her. Not blue this time, but red and sinister. Leto helped her to stand back up, and she, weeping, poured the blood magic into the healing magic, mixing what should never be. But blood magic just fueled other abilities, Varania had once commented. She had said that she supposed there were blood magic-specific spells, but that wasn't all it was used for.

When she stopped, Mieta noticed that the blood on her arm had sizzled and evaporated, and she no longer bled. Had the healing magic, by default, extended to her as well?

Danarius backhanded Leto—hard enough to knock him back a pace, then turned and left. Though the previous nasty bruise that had marred his cheek was gone, a red mark from the slap took its place. Mieta rushed to her children. Varania touched his cheek, tenderly. A ring had cut into his face, and blood was running down his cheek.

"He'll want me to heal that too," she said quietly, and he said nothing as she healed the cut. It didn't even leave a scar. She was trembling, and so pale.

Mieta didn't even know what to say when her two children looked at her, with such horrible pain in their eyes.

"Am I… does that make me a blood mage?" she asked, sobbing, but instead of going to Mieta, she fell against her brother's chest.

"No," he said gently. Her legs gave out—either from the blood loss, the stress of the day, or just everything. Leto blinked in surprise, and heaved her upward, as if she weighed nothing. He cradled her in his arms like he had when she was an infant, and the poor thing just kept crying.

Mieta looked at her, really looked at her. Her eyes were hollow, as if she hadn't slept, and red as if she had been crying. And she had seen how frightened she had been. Had she been…? Mieta had seen dozens of women raped when she had been captured. She had been pregnant enough that no one had been horribly interested in her, but that hadn't excused her from seeing it, and trying to comfort the victims.

Who? she wondered, though dared not ask. This wasn't the time for questions. Right now, getting the girl to bed would be the best thing for her. She walked beside her son, and he was deathly silent throughout the walk back. Mieta cleaned the blood off of Varania, and Leto pulled himself out of the wrappings, and into a shirt. He commented that he was going to go to eat, but Varania snatched his hand as he moved by. She stared up at him with her big, haunted eyes. Tears tracked down her face.

"Please stay," she whispered to him, drawing him closer. He paused, and moved toward her. Mieta knew he was hungry. Knew he hadn't eaten anything substantial since the day before, and was tired and that the places where he had been hurt were still hurting, and would for another day or two, but still he knelt beside her, and she threw her arms around his shoulders, burying her face against him as she sobbed. He held her while she cried, his eyes closed and accepting.

Mieta looked on, uncertain and feeling like a stranger to her own children.

"Don't leave me alone," she was whispering to her brother. "Don't leave me…"

They were all each other truly had, Mieta thought. She was their mother, but she had been absent out of necessity, not by her choice. She wished it could be any other way, and it was not that her children were close that made her sorrowful; it was that they truly seemed to believe that the other was all they had.

Had she been so negligent of her children? She had tried. She had done everything she could for them, whenever she could. It hadn't been enough. It hadn't been nearly enough, and they still sought solace in each other and never in her.

Varania slid out of the bed, and he supported her as she fell. He let her cry for a while, let her hug him as tight as she could manage, before he lifted her in his arms, not straining. He laid her down gently in the bed, and her grip on him slackened, and her arms fell away. She kissed his cheek as he set her down, like she had when they were children. He smoothed her tangled hair out of her face, and promised to brush it for her when he got back.

She reached out to him again, catching his wrist, squeezed, and let go. He nodded, and left without another word.

"Are you hungry, darling?" she asked her when the door swung closed, already knowing what the answer would be.

"No," she said. "I just want to go to sleep." She rolled onto her side, away from her.

Mieta sighed, and removed the old shift her daughter slept in. She set it in a neatly folded pile beside her, and left.

On the way back, after the meal, she asked Leto, "Could you talk to Varania? I fear… that something happened, but she won't talk to me. But she'll talk to you."

He looked away. "I'll try," he said. It was good enough of a promise to her.