“Or when Bryx tried to teach you knife throwing,” I continue.
“That was a terrible idea,” she says, and the smile she is trying to suppress makes the words uneven.
“You hit the target.”
“I hit Bryx’s boot while he was wearing it.” She shakes her head. “He says he moved. He did not move.”
I let the silence hold for a moment before pressing on, because the laughter is building in layers and I want to keep the momentum. “You also tried to braid Sarnyx’s hair.”
“She pretended she hated it.”
“She did hate it. But she sat still, and she fell asleep once while you braided flowers into it.” I remember that afternoon clearly. Sarnyx woke up with blossoms tangled behind her ears and threatened to disembowel everyone who laughed. She wore them for the rest of the day. “She looked nice.”
“She did,” Thalia agrees.
We continue along the path, the glow of the Verdance soft around us. These are the memories I have been holding for her. The small, ordinary ones that accumulate between catastrophes, the ones that prove this life has been more than just survival.
A vine curls away from the path's edge as Thalia passes, making room. The city does this for her without being asked, making slight adjustments that most people would never notice. Walls widen. Roots flatten. Lantern-blooms turn their faces toward her and hold their light a little longer.
“Do you remember when you tried assigning everyone roles, declaring you were queen?” I ask.
“I was organizing,” she says, with the dignified tone of someone who knows exactly how absurd the story is about to get.
“You named Kevin deputy. He accepted immediately and fell asleep during the inaugural meeting.”
“He worked hard,” she says.
“Yes. Very hard.”
She smiles again, softer now, and it is the version of her smile that I remember from when she was very young. Before the weight of command settled onto her.
The path narrows as we enter a quieter ring near her quarters, and the moss underfoot shifts from pale green to deep amber.The air here smells like warm bark and night-blooming jasmine, and the Heartwood's hum is fainter, almost a lullaby.
“Thank you,” she says quietly.
“For what?”
“For making me laugh. And for being here.”
I pause at that. Not because I do not know what to say, but because I know exactly what to say and I want to get the weight of it right.
“You turned out well,” I tell her.
She looks down at me with an expression I cannot fully catalogue. “So did you,” she replies.
That surprises me enough that I do not respond immediately. I have been called many things across many iterations. Annoying, mostly. Loud, frequently. Heroic, on occasions I may have embellished slightly in the retelling. But no one has ever looked at me and suggested that I, too, am someone who turned out well.
“I am exceptional,” I say finally, because if I say anything else, I will mean it too much.
She smiles, opens the door, and says, “Goodnight, Peeble.”
“Goodnight, Commander.”
She steps inside and closes the door behind her. I remain on the path for a moment, listening to the Verdance hum around me. I remember when she was small enough to sit in my hands, watching everything with quiet focus. I promised myself then that I would stay, no matter what changed.
I still intend to keep that promise.
I lift into the air and head toward the guest chambers, the soft glow of the Verdance spreading beneath me. For the first time in a while, I allow myself to believe things might hold together.
