Mirabel woke up to the soft voice of her mother singing to her.
"You should rest, mi Vida," Julieta said when she noticed the eyes of her daughter opening.
"We can't worry about you, too." Mirabel didn't need her glasses to see the big eyebags underneath her mother's face; clearly, she had been up the whole night. And clearly, she had been crying.
"Mamá is Lina…" The girl hesitated, unable to say the last part of the question.
Julieta, seeing the growing worries, shook her head. "No. Her fever lowered, but she hadn't woken up yet." She paused, but Mirabel could feel that her mother didn't tell her everything. Without hesitation, she grabbed the hand of the healer, trying to comfort her as well as she could.
"I have seen that before, that kind of fever." Julieta abruptly said, not looking at her daughter. "It happened whenever one of us tried to leave the Encanto or the family. Actually, I assumed that Bruno…." She shook her head, physically trying to get that thought out of her head.
"My food can help lower the symptoms, but they can't heal like they usually do." She couldn't tell her daughter that she actually knew first hand which effects her food had when a Madrigal tried to leave the Encanto. Not yet, no now.
"I don't know if Lina has been too long away from the family or something else is holding her back. I only know that if she doesn't wake up soon, she will never do."
"I shouldn't have told you that, Mirabel. "Julieta sighed, wiping away a tear. "But whatever you do: Don't tell it your uncle or Elena. They need hope, not any more worries."
Mirabel remembered all those things Bruno told her only a day ago, all the worries he tried to hide from her. "I guess he already knows." She suddenly muttered, not knowing where the words came from.
"I know," Julieta admitted, looking deep in her daughter's eye. "The other ones are waiting in the kitchen for me, maybe we can get some answers from him… Promise me you rest here at least until I come back, ok?"
Mirabel nodded, fully aware that she couldn't keep that promise.
"Whatever he had done, Bruno doesn't deserve to see his little girl like this. Don't make him worry about his niece, too." Julieta gave her daughter one last kiss on the forehead before leaving the nursery. Mirabel waited until she couldn't hear her mother's footsteps any more, then she grabbed her glasses and sneaked out of her room. She didn't know what exactly she was doing, but she knew that simply staying in her bed wouldn't give her the answers she needed.
Her first instinct was to go downside; maybe she could talk to Elena. But before she reached the second part of the stairs, sudden dizziness overcame her yet again. Mirabel needed to lean against the wall next to her to not fall down the stairs, almost pulling down the most prominent picture on the plateau. She grimaced when she straightened up the image of her deceased Abuelo, who was smiling down at her.
"You are kind of obvious of all the drama in the house, aren't you?" Suddenly, Mirabel felt like the wall had vanished; she stumbled when it didn't support her body weight anymore. Then, to her surprise, someone grabbed her hand, ensuring she didn't fall. At any other moment, Mirabel would have been in shock to see the person before her, but at that moment, she simply smiled.
"I have waited for you a long time, hija. But no, I am not obvious."
Mirabel grinned, finally aware what the mysterious words Bruno told her meant. Then, she repeated her daily ritual.
"Morning, Abuelo."
"Follow me." Pedro took his granddaughter's hand, leading her down the stairs. Only now she could see that her body was still lying on the floor; only her spirit was following her Abuelo.
"Don't worry; someone will take care of that." He smiled at her without stopping to move.
"You know that I have a loooot of questions, right?" Like a reflex, Mirabel tried to fix her glasses but huffed when she remembered that they were lying with her body on the ground. Obviously, a spirit didn't need them.
"I know," Pedro answered, only now he stopped moving. "The deaths... we never really left the Encanto. We died for it, which keeps it alive somehow. Even though some of us never came close to this place."
"So...The voices telling me to look for Bruno or who warned him not to come back...It was you?"
Pedro shrugged, and for a brief second, Mirabel thought her uncle was standing in front of her. "Me, Marina, Vera... Don't ask me how it works because I can't answer it. Even if I wanted to."
"But how..."
"Listen, Mirabel," Pedro interrupted her, still smiling. "Nobody knows where the magic comes from, how it works, or why some of us know more things than others. Just... Think of it like if you hit your head really hard when you passed out on the stairs, ok? We don't have the time to discuss it right now."
The teenager tried to say something, but she immediately shut her mouth when she realized that Abuelo couldn't answer her. Together, they went to the kitchen entrance where the adults of the family were already standing.
Mirabel could see her mother and aunt hugging Bruno before they gestured him to sit down at the kitchen table. Elena was still sitting next to her daughter, petting the head of the girl that couldn't stop rambling only 24 hours ago.
"She is running out of time," Pedro said sadly, looking at his unconscious granddaughter.
"But what happened to her?" Mirabel questioned. "She was fine only hours ago, and now everyone thinks she is dying!"
Abuelo gave her a soft but sad smile, understanding her confusion. "Bruno and Julieta already told you what happens if you are no longer attached to the family."
"But Bruno made sure that she knew everything about the family!" She objected. "How can he not talk to anyone from the family for ten years, and she passes out the moment everything could have been fine?!"
"She heard your uncle and Abuela arguing. That's why she ran away: She assumed it was her fault. Lina is only a little girl; she still has to learn that running away wouldn't solve anything."
Mirabel shook her head in disbelief. "So that's it? Lina tried to run away, and now she is dying because of that?"
"It has nothing to do with Lina being detached from her family; it has to do with Lina's family being detached from her." Pedro led her to the kitchen table, and Mirabel could see the triplets and Abuela talking. Julieta wrapped her arm around Bruno's shoulder while Pepa held his hands.
"I know that Abuela can be stubborn sometimes, and she has a hard time listening to someone, but she LOVES that girl already. Does that look like a family that doesn't want to have a connection to her?" She gestured to Abuela, who couldn't keep away her tears. There were no arguments and no fights, only crying while everyone listened to Bruno, trying to comfort him.
Pedro smiled warmly at his wife, who suddenly pulled their son into a hug. "She is not only a Madrigal, remember? All the fights between our family and the Morenos are tearing her apart."
"So, Bruno was right when he said that the fightings need to end," Mirabel mumbled, trying to hug her uncle. Of course, she knew that she wasn't physically there at the moment, but she still wanted to comfort him.
"He knew the moment she was born that her soul would be torn. Bruno also learned that you only have one chance to end this feud."
"So, when the family feud doesn't end today…."
"It will end her." Pedro frowned, looking at his son, who was still in the middle of the family hug.
"Bruno knew that he had to wait until your powers are strong enough; he knew he had to wait for the day you would finally be aware of your gift."
Mirabel starred at Abuelo. "So he was right yesterday. I do have a gift."
He nodded, finally looking her into the eye. "Yes. He didn't know it all the time, but everything he said to you yesterday was true."
Pedro gave her a warm smile like he could see all the questions running through her head she didn't dare to ask. "Having compassion in a way you have isn't always a gift, Mirabel. The more powerful it grows, the more you will be aware of all the downsides of having it as a gift. I couldn't show everyone that a five-year-old girl has more empathy in her little finger than everyone else at the ceremony."
"That's why I didn't get a door that night." She mumbled, thinking of the night that crushed all of her dreams. She thought that she might be the first person who could fly or that she would become the fastest person on earth. But, at age five, having "compassion and empathy" as a gift wasn't in her mind.
"I put you through a lot of trauma that night but trust me: Making you aware of your gift at such tender age would have been much worse. It would have broken you like Brunos almost broke him." Pedro smiled sadly at his son, whose ability to see the future made him an outsider when he was just a child.
"Make him know, please," Pedro suddenly muttered, not looking away from his youngest child. "Make him know that I am proud of him. I am proud of all of you, but Bruno doubts himself his whole life that he needs to know."
"Why do we have the gifts after all? Sometimes, I have the feeling they do more harm than good." Mirabel hesitated, unsure how to form her question that sounded less ungrateful. The feud with the Moreno's and the visions that made Bruno leave his family could have been avoided if they were just a simple family.
"I don't exactly know where the magic is coming from, and I don't understand why it chose our family. So many people sacrificed themselves when we fled from our home, and the Moreno's… Well, let me say I would have understood if their family got magic powers. But I know that you were all born for a reason. I guess you already found yours."
Mirabel shook her head. She knew what her grandfather was trying to tell her, but she still couldn't find the path to end the feud.
"Listen, Mirabel: None of you "got" a gift; you were all born with it. The only thing that happens at a gift ceremony is that the gift extends to something magical." Pedro held Mirabel by her shoulders, seeing all the doubt in her eyes.
"You are compassionate enough to see all the pain the Morenos are feeling, but so could Bruno. Your gift also has something more magical to it that will help you to make our families finally see what is going on. You only have to know how to use it."
