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Angelbud was silent today.
Now, the viera woman was usually quiet, but not to this degree. On a normal day, she would hum while she sewed, or share conversations with her husband or friends, even if she didn’t say much. She moved about the house or the market, exchanging greetings with her usual shopkeepers.
Today, however, she hadn’t said a word at breakfast, and retreated to a window seat to stare out the window.
M’hilo, her husband, left her to it, since he wanted to investigate Omphalos a little more on his own time, since G’raha Tia had disappeared into his research somewhere and Krile was busy. Yet he couldn’t shake off the bad feeling he had about his wife, sitting on the window seat, staring out the window with such a somber expression on her face.
A while ago, he discovered her distress at the realization that she was young. Well, she hadn’t worded it like that, but she had no experience in the world and forgot, somehow, that she would live thrice as long as he would, if not four times as much. He’d also forgotten, or more like it simply hadn’t crossed his mind, when he only saw her perfectly gentle heart and felt the calming sanctuary that was her mere presence. Her physical features were divine, and yet her long ears and soft nose never reminded him that she was a viera, with a long life.
That was a difficult conversation. Together they had acknowledged the pain that would inevitably come, but M’hilo was able to convince Angelbud to let that happen in the future, and try to focus on the present. She tried taking it to heart, and while she still had her sad moments, she was more like herself now.
At least, until that morning.
M’hilo gave up on his investigation—nothing new had appeared, and he didn’t know how to make heads or tails of the information that was available already—and went home early. It was still the afternoon when he opened the door and called, “I’m home! My angel, are you in?”
There was no answer. He wondered if she had gone to the market and went into the house, only to find her asleep in the window seat. He set his weapon aside and took off his outer jacket, then climbed onto the seat. As he was wriggling his way into her arms, she woke up.
“Hilo?” she whispered sleepily, speaking for the first time that day.
“Hello, my angel.” They shared a long kiss and when he broke away, he butted his ear against her jaw. “What were you thinking about so deeply that you fell asleep here?”
Angelbud, who had been running a hand through his long, wavy, golden hair, paused. A moment later, she continued stroking his hair. “This… this ‘New World’ that the others mentioned…”
“Yes, it’s bound to be terrifically exciting,” he purred. “I can’t wait to go with you.” For the first time, it was possible to go traveling with his beloved wife. M’hilo could just imagine her at the famous beaches of the new world, her long, petal-pink hair braided in the local fashion (a vague image in his mind), and wearing a white swimsuit. His beautiful wife always wore white. And that was only the start! They’d be traversing into jungles as well, which meant she’d be dressed as an explorer. It would be incredibly fun and exciting.
She smiled and shifted so that he could sit better in her lap. “G’raha Tia mentioned tales of a Fountain of Youth there. Do you think that might be true?”
“I’ve seen far stranger things than a magical fountain,” he commented. “In fact, that seems almost mundane. How do you suppose the fountain functions, if it were real?”
She giggled. “Have you been spending time with Moonflower again?”
His great, fluffy tail lashed against her leg. “I’ll have you know that she doesn’t have a monopoly on odd questions,” he protested teasingly.
“I know,” she replied, and lifted his chin from her chest to kiss him again. “You two just remind me of each other sometimes.” She fell quiet once more, playing with his ear.
M’hilo knew she had brought up the Fountain of Youth for a reason, and so waited patiently for her to get to her thoughts. They sat together comfortably for a few minutes, holding each other and absently playing with each other’s hair.
“Hilo… If there is a Fountain of Youth, what do you think it will do?”
“It could do a lot of things. Restore a person to a younger age, make him live forever, revert her to a baby, heal old wounds… Anything.”
“If it were to extend a youthful life—not forever—would you drink some?”
His muscles tensed. He had a feeling about why she was asking about this special fountain in particular, but he didn’t expect her to ask him this. “I don’t know. The thought never crossed my mind that I might want to live forever, or a very long time. You know that it’s hard enough to live to tomorrow.”
“I’m sorry.” Her brows were upturned. “Does it upset you to ask?”
“Perhaps not upset.” Even her suggestion had loopholes. He could live until the age of seventy as young as he was now, and then drop dead. Or, he could look youthful for his age for the rest of his life and he could live to 100 but look as if he were sixty.
Or, he could live an extra hundred years, with the gradual progression of his life slowed such that he would be the same youthful and spry man he was until he was ninety, then he’d be a middle-aged man until he was 165, and finally die at 187 in his elderly years. Assuming his life as the Warrior of Light and adventuring would let him live that long.
M’hilo had to face the fact that his beautiful, divine wife struggled with the concept of death. Viera barely aged, after all, and lived beyond the rest of the world. “There is a lot to consider when it comes to extending my life,” he said. “There is you, of course.” He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. “But there are also my friends and my family. My life as an adventurer, the expectations people have of me.”
She clutched his sleeve. “We could gradually leave the public eye. Retreat to the woods, or a smaller settlement. We could raise a family in peace.”
He couldn’t help but ask sadly, “Angelbud… Are you sure that’s what would happen?”
“Yes,” she answered vigorously. “As the Warrior of Light, you lead by example. I know… I know we will face struggles as a family.” She was speaking passionately, earnestly, and part of him was incredibly proud of her for breaking out of her shy demeanor to speak with him like this. Another part found it equally attractive, while the rest of him was actually listening. “I know that people will judge us and our children, but our love will prove them wrong and our happiness as a family—which won’t be easy, but, but with you, with you I know I can work hard to make it happen—we will make them reconsider their thoughts and maybe they will open their eyes to mixed couples like us. Your example does wonders already, why wouldn’t it when we are raising our children?”
Her grip tightened and he could feel her leg muscles flexing as well. “And, as the Warrior of Light, it makes perfect sense that you might have been blessed by the Mother Crystal to live longer. Or that somewhere on your adventures, something happened to make you young and beautiful for a while longer than might be expected. Don’t you think so?”
“I am less certain,” he admitted, and it felt like he’d been stabbed with a blunt knife when he saw her face fall. “It could all go as you say… for a time. It’s possible that eventually, people would not know of my deeds or not believe that I am me. There could be incidents. We may be forced to move more frequently than necessary. Is that right, for our future children, for us?”
“No,” she whispered, and then looked away. She blinked a few times, and then looked back at him. “But we don’t know that will happen. Should we be outright denying the possibility of more years together?”
Her pale green eyes made his insides twist. Angelbud loved him deeply, and wanted more time with him. Don’t we all wish we had more time to be with our loved ones? he wondered. A brief, aching flash of a silver-haired knight came to his mind’s eye.
“Please, my love, my light… At least think about it?” Her fingers twirled a lock of his hair. “We can weigh the pros and cons and then talk about it if there really is such a thing as a Fountain of Youth.”
“Would it stop with the Fountain of Youth?” he asked. “What if some other year, there’s a magical weapon that can do the same?”
“Then we will have had more time to consider the idea, and be in a different era of our lives,” she answered with a nod. “But… I suppose that if there is no Fountain of Youth, when we come home, we can sit down and talk about the idea again, to lay the issue to rest.”
“I think that’s fair, my angel.” It wouldn’t be right to either accept or reject right away. This was a topic that was important to them, and needed careful consideration, from whether he should be extending his life or she shortening hers to what methods were acceptable and which ones weren’t.
Although the conversation was serious, he was happy that she didn’t stay in her head all day, and let him hear her thoughts. “Now,” he said, smiling as he rubbed his thumb over her cheekbone and the trailing leaves there, “I believe that I said I’d give you enough happy memories to remember a new one every day, for the rest of your life?”
His angel giggled and welcomed the overture.