It was just the clay and Mira with him. Nothing else mattered.
He wasn't trying to go for a specific design. He was making a lumpy and vaguely oval thing that might, generously, be called a dish if you squinted just right. In a past life he’d have worried what others’ opinions on the project would be. He’d have foughtto fit whatever mold they wanted him to be in, metaphorically and physically.
Now though, Archer understood he didn’t need to change. He could be himself and that was plenty good.
"How are you feeling?” Mira asked after a while.
"Better," Archer answered. "Arm's mostly fine. Leg's been good for a few days."
"I do not mean your injuries, sweetheart."
He kept his eyes on the clay. “Oh.”
She waited, hands still working the piece she had as if the damn thing wasn’t already perfect. Archer watched for a long moment before answering.
"I'm okay. I'm — Being here is different. In a good way. I just constantly feel like it’s all going to disappear. Could this be some elaborate dream that I wake up from in the morning?”
Mira made a soft sound but didn’t give her opinion.
"I've been thinking about what comes next," Archer continued. "Which is sort of dumb because I don't even know what today is, let alone next month. But I keep thinking about it. Like my brain can't stop trying to plan for the part where this is over."
"What do you mean, over?"
Archer shrugged one shoulder. "This. Being here. Eventually I'll have to go somewhere else. Figure out a life. You won’t want to keep me. No one ever does.”
"Why would you say that?”
The anger in her tone stopped him. “Because… Because I can't just stay. People like me don’t get to stay.”
"Why not? Who are people like you? What does that even mean?”
He looked up at her then. Mira’s gaze was hard, her eyes glowing golden the way Romilly’s had before. Was that a hereditary thing then? That would be a relief if it were.
"It's not important. I don't have a reason to be here," he said slowly. "Not a real one. I showed up. I got hurt. Everyone was very kind. But that's not the same as belonging somewhere."
Mira tilted her head. "And yet you said San Noctis felt like it was calling to you."
He had said that. He'd felt a bit embarrassed about it after, actually. The way it sounded, mystical and strange, like he might be making stuff up to give reason to his delusion. He'd half expected someone to laugh.
“It still feels true, but there is no logical reason for my feelings. I can’t make sense of it.”
"Most important things do not make a lot of sense at first,” Mira said mildly as she adjusted her bowl more.
Archer watched his hands shape the clay until it had walls. Low and uneven, it didn’t much improve what he’d built. "I don't want to leave," he admitted.
Mira was quiet for a moment before saying, “Then you will stay.”
Archer’s entire body drooped in relief. It was only one person’s opinion, yet it felt like themostimportant. Mira Saint might not have had whatever title Romilly did. She was still a formidable force in this family. The matriarch in a sea of testosterone.
They worked in quiet for a while after that. He asked her about the pieces on the shelves — what each one was for, how long they took, which ones were her favorites. She told him about the glaze she'd been trying to perfect for three years, a particular shade of blue that kept coming out slightly wrong despite her focus. She said the inconsistency frustrated her and that she loved it at the same time because it kept her on her toes.
He learned that she'd started making pottery before she met Silas. She’d kept doing it because it was one of the few things in her life that had always been purely hers. Mira shared with himthat none of her children had ever shown any interest, which she found both baffling and amusing.
He found that he liked her the more time they spent together. She gave him the space to be himself while also pulling at the layers he’d buried himself under to hide his truths.
At some point he looked down and realized his lumpy oval had become something resembling a small cup. Misshapen, walls too thick on one side, the rim uneven, but unmistakably a cup.
"Look at that," he whispered reverently.
