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Mia might just be discovering why some people are claustrophobic. She previously thought being stuck in the crowds during Newcomer's Day or the palace was stuffy, but the swarm of younger elves huddled around her when there's so much space in the crater might take the cake.
“Can you show us your illusions?” A shy voice draws Mia's attention. The same little girl that clung to Mo and asked him not to leave them when they all hid in the tunnels.
Mia hums, it's arguably smarter to save the little magic and energy she's recovered, but she has no reason to think Gargona would attack the crater right now. They seem to need a distraction, they’re all tired to the point of acting hyper again.
“What do you want to see?” She sits up, barely having room between Taro and Om on her sides.
There's a cacophony of high-pitched voices, mostly belonging to new arrivals from the last batch of kids. Ones that still find her skills an absolute novelty and her the coolest elf ever, in what Mia thinks is just their limited knowledge.
“Alright! Hey!” She yells out, trying not to sound too amused, lest they keep screeching. “One at a time, don't make me find a talking stick.”
“A phoenix!” An excited voice says. “Santi said you met them at a coronation.”
“I did, and at some other points.” Bringing up time travel might just make them get too eager with their questions. “You'll see them too, when you grow up and go to Iriditopia.”
A chorus of sighs and huffs follows. Mia raises an eyebrow. She knows Yuko and Mo might see the island in a bad light, and she can't get over her resentment for the Panthea situation just yet, but…
“None of that.” Mia says gently.
Taro, one of her new loyal little defenders, speaks up from beside her. “They didn't help. And they wanted to take Mo away.”
“Whatever political issues we might have doesn't mean I want to hear any hatred from you.” Mia briefly brushes his bright green hair with her fingers. Her stomach turns at the idea the kids could become hateful or bitter over the technical misunderstanding, not when they'll soon spend the majority of their lives being Iriditopians. “That mouth of yours is going to be kind.”
Taro's eyes fix on her scar, internally indignant on her behalf. Mia sighs. “They didn't know how bad things had gotten. And they played with you, they were nice, right?”
The kids stay silent, nodding along. Some of them might've liked the attention even if they unanimously wanted the guards out of Centopia. Mia finally straightens up, sitting with the rest as if she's telling a story around a campfire. “They do care on principle, they just… they didn't understand what to do. Doesn't make them terrible people, they had good intentions now.”
It's the same reason she was adamantly against letting them fight or hurt anyone. Aside from how infighting would make them sitting ducks for Drakon, she's just not going to teach the kids that. They should be forgiving, give the benefit of the doubt. They cannot be weighed down by a few years of their life here when they inevitably meet the adults again. If she did it for Violetta, she can do it for the guards… She's still on the fence about Queen Linoa. But they don't have to know she's not quite practicing what she preaches, they just need to be better off than she is. That’s her job right now.
“But they had to leave?” Om says, trying to bridge the actions with Mia's logic, like most of them are. All they saw was someone trying to take away their protectors and reacted accordingly.
“They had to.” Mia confirms, not just because protecting them would be too hard without Mo and because they'd miss him. “Because… good intentions don't always mean good results. They care because you're kids, but they didn't move to fight the muncs quick enough that day, didn't listen at first when we brought up certain… stuff.”
Mia's mind runs through every tiny cue the guards gave her. She knows for sure now they were onto her rather than Mo as the heir, she can assume it's due to her distance towards them. Her… seemingly territorial nature, at times.
“We didn't know if they'd be the best option for keeping you all safe.” Alive is what Mia thinks, but she tries to avoid scaring them too much. “I- we love you all. And we love Centopia. When you love something so, so much you'd never let someone else take over. Not unless you believe they'd care for it as much as you do.”
“And we were their second option.” Rhea says from her spot just outside the more crowded area.
“It's… They are Iriditopians. Ideally, yes, they would've helped us, but they believed we had good, legitimate rulers with us doing their job. Just like the Queens in Haventopia protect their island and not the others.” Mia has to breathe in, not used to giving such long chats. “Their priority wasn't meant to be Centopia. That's why Yuko, Mo and I are sticking around. Because you are our only priority. It's just different.”
She tries not to badmouth even Raynor and Mayla. She'll bring them here next time, get answers from them, but they're staying away from the kids. Even then, she's not going to feed into any existing resentment. She knows how bad she feels about it, the betrayal and the loss. Her utter panic at the mentions of Panthea or the messy emotions it brings when she thinks of just how utterly alone she, and her friends, were in hindsight. She doesn't want them to have that in their conscience, that she suffered for them and they therefore owe it to comfort her. They won't be as haunted as she is. No one will blame them for what happened today when they leave Centopia, and that's exactly the way it should be.
“All you guys need to keep in mind is that, whatever happens, we all care about you very much. This isn't about picking sides as much as it is doing what'll help you guys more in the long run.” The Iriditopians were fine with leaving Panthea's threat to fester, they and Queen Linoa's daughter didn't take it seriously when it was preventable. They were fine with letting them fight, to a certain extent. It pains her to not accept their help, but she'll pick the kids' survival over their naivety. The kids still had to defend themselves the other day, and the guards would've just made it worse by taking Mo away from them as well.
Mia slowly conjures up a Phoenix, careful with her magic usage. She guides it to fly over the kids, much to their delight. Their laughter soon drowns out her thoughts, and she welcomes the distraction for however long it lasts.
Some of them are asleep after she's done entertaining them, having scattered around the courtyard to their preferred spots. Om and Taro stay with her, joined by Santi, Andem and Rhea.
“Is it true? That you love us?” Taro says, staring up at the sky through his adorable, thick eyelashes.
“Of course we love you. All of you.” Mia includes, even if she can internally admit to herself the green-haired little boy tugs at her heartstrings in a way only Onchao has.
“Right, Mia does so much to keep us safe.” Santi tells them excitedly, her pink hairpins still noticeable even in the dead of night. “She started wearing them for you” Mia remembers Yuko having told her that.
Mia smiles at her, playfully pinching her cheek. “And I wouldn't want to do anything else.”
“Not a thing?” Om says, trying not to make it obvious he's thinking of the tales surrounding her technical death at the hands of the old crone.
“I would do it all over again. You know why?” Mia's tone turns conspiratorial, leaning closer just like her own mother would before going on a sappy rampage that would make her giggle uncontrollably. “Cause I love you guys, and every little strand of hair in your heads, and every little freckle on your cheeks and-”
She tickles them, ignoring Taro's whining about no longer being babies. “I’m not a baby anymore, Dad. I know you miss when I was all little and cute, but I’m almost an adult.” Mia can remember once saying to her father, but she brushes the pain aside in favor of this new, happier memory.
“Oh? Not a baby?” She arches an eyebrow, making an overly silly face at Taro.
“No!” He exclaims, his voice still squeaky.
“No?” She says, quietly horsing around. Some of the other sleeping kids stir, and she finally stops. Om giggles as Mia freezes, before she confirms they didn't wake anyone up and sneakily ruffles his hair.
“We're not going anywhere.” She assures them. “Not even when the mountains break apart.”
Her little callback earns a few giggles. Om speaks up. “I can't believe you fought a mountain-Midos.”
“I can't believe you won.” Andem says, just to get elbowed by Santi, because how could he not believe Mia would scare the dark elf off. “Apelo said Midos never loses, it's why they thought he must've gotten what he wanted when he came here.”
“Yeah, maybe he never did. He had a good plan.” She can admit that, if only because it's satisfying to know how thoroughly they ruined it. “But he picked a fight with the wrong elves. He had no way of knowing what we could do with our magic, or what we'd do for Centopia. Just like I told you, no one's going to fight for you like we will.”
With that last statement, they smile at her, comforted. Because it's true, they made Midos lose for maybe the first time ever. Mia faced him one on one knowing what he was capable of. She squeezes the two closest to her.
“You should all sleep.” She won't sleep yet, but it's hypocrisy hour, apparently.
“If we're babies, you should sing us a lullaby!” Rhea, her chaos gremlin, says. It's a joke, but Om's eyes light up, looking up at her like Tarzan when he begs for a treat.
Mia racks her memory for a song that could be classified as a lullaby for them. She can't remember the words too well, so she starts humming the song her parents would sing after reading to her about Centopia. The younger kids’ faces have a spark of recognition in them.
“I thought you said you didn't go to Haventopia.” Taro says after a while, when all of them are either groggy or knocked out.
“Hmm?” Mia says, but gets no answer. She chalks it up to sleepy ramblings and carefully lays Taro down with Om. Even her breathing feels loud in the quiet crater, the last thing she wants is for them to wake up and decide they want to start causing mayhem in the middle of the night.
She walks into the palace, finding Yuko and Mo sitting at a table, surrounded by scrolls.
“And you are..?” She says, looking at their tired expressions.
“Trying to make sense of any actual formal proceedings a ruler should do.” Mo looks down at the mountain of information. Not having the right context for some of it probably doesn't help.
“How'd it go outside?” Yuko says, knowing it was for the best Mia, with her brains and sensitivities, made sure the kids were on the same page.
“Good. They're alright.” Parenting is hard is what she doesn't say, but then she catches herself. She's not the parent figure, she's not the… queen. Taro's constant rambling about wanting her and Yuko to be just that comes to the forefront of her mind. She coughs, hoping the low light disguises her blush. She can't think of marrying Mo right now! Nor Yuko. It's still not convenient timing for her to have feelings for them.
“They're happy you're not leaving.” Mia puts a hand on Mo's shoulder. “You really showed the guards healing doesn't make you any less capable.”
Mo smiles minutely, and Mia eyes all the scrolls. “You guys could probably just sleep, there's no need to stay up doing it all now.” They all rested after kicking the guards out, but it's not nearly enough.
Mo wraps his arm around her, and her heart jumps to her throat, feeling his hand on her waist. “Thanks for, well, everything.”
Mia swallows nervously. Right. The kingdom. “It was the right thing to do. Even the oracle agreed, and it always wants to protect Centopia.”
“I guess that's true, it didn't tell us to back off.” Yuko says, lifting her face from her hands, half asleep. “We-” She yawns, looking like a lion roaring, albeit an exhausted one. “Must be doing something right.”
“Our kids are fine, that's better than everyone else did recently.” Mo says, finally standing from his chair.
Our. Mia almost dies right then and there. She knows that her crush on them, her growing care for the kids, all points to marrying someday. But to hear him call them theirs, even if now their age makes them more like older siblings than parent-like rulers, it does something to her heart. Mo and Yuko are hers. The kids and Centopia are theirs to protect.
Mia changes gears, purely focusing on the Centopians. “Taro asked if we loved them, he's the cutest thing ever.”
“He's your favorite.” Mo clocks her immediately. “At least of the new ones.”
“If I go down, Yuko's going down with me.” Mia doesn't confirm nor deny it directly, only pointing at her.
“...Mo, he is adorably helpful.” Yuko admits after a while with a shrug.
“Your Majesty.” Mia corrects her with a grin, bumping her shoulder with Mo's. He's too tired to do anything but huff, rolling his eyes fondly.
“Do we have to bow now?” Yuko says.
“I might consider it.” Mo says, which earns him a barrage of taunts from the girls.
They all sleep huddled in Mo's room like they did after kicking Midos out of Centopia. At least, Yuko and Mo do, Mia states at the ceiling.
She looks back down at her scar, then at Yuko's and at Mo's back. She carefully brushes Yuko's face with her fingers. It's only a matter of time before Savia puts two and two together about her illusions after she made it obvious someone had impersonated the captain. The guard at the ship saw how powerful she was in a different way.
She's dug herself a little deep, even if she doesn't think the other elves would actually hurt her, they had already pinned her as being one of the odd ones out. If they don't listen and insist on doing things purely their way, that might be a problem in the future. Then again, she has a thousand other problems, like Midos also knowing about the illusions.
She breathes out. Then in, holding before letting the air go again. She's already fine with dying for Centopia, political problems are tiny by comparison. And she knows she'll do anything for them. Mia looks at Mo and Yuko, their peaceful, sleeping faces, memorizing every little detail. She truly does love every single part of them too, just like she told Taro. It's all worth it, even if it's so all-consuming it almost hurts her to just think of how much she cares.
"I love you. So much it's ridiculous." Mia whispers, and as she thinks of her little speech today, she finally falls asleep. Despite the tense day, her dreams are filled with the kids’ laughter, now joined by Yuko and Mo's faces.