Chapter Text
Rhea kneels beside a sobbing Sitri and two dying infants. A pool of crimson gathers around them, seeping into Rhea's dress and coating her hands. In a panic she starts gathering a white light of healing magic in her hands, desperate to save the woman. Sitri grabs her wrist in her weakened grip, eyes wide with desperation.
"Rhea please," she croaks, "Save them. Don't bother with me, please, just save them!"
She hesitates, glancing back at the twin infants. Both of them had been born without a sound escaping their tiny lips, their chests heaving as they take ragged and painful breaths. The moments between each breath grows increasingly longer for all three beings.
She thinks back to last time, back when Sitri was but a mere infant. Rhea had knelt beside the baby girl's mother, blood pooling on the floor and seeping into her dress and coating her hands. The woman was sobbing, screaming, begging Rhea to save her child. She didn't hesitate. She never hesitated. The woman and those before her were nothing but failed experiments.
She never hesitated.
Until Sitri. Sweet, kind, loving Sitri.
Rhea would be lying if she said that she hadn't grown attached. She had never felt this way towards the other vessels as they had one purpose: resurrect her mother. Rhea had never cared for them beyond fulfilling her desire. Sitri, however, seemed to be the exception. She had always treated Rhea like a mother and eventually Rhea had begun treating Sitri like her daughter. Their bond only strengthened with time, which makes this very moment nothing if not excruciatingly painful.
"Rhea," Sitri begs, "Rhea please!" Her voice grows weaker as more and more blood flows out of her body.
The Archbishop looks at Sitri, then back at the twins. In all of the times she'd experienced this situation, she's never had to make so many damned choices. Save her daughter or save her daughter's children? She's also never had her vessels give birth to twins! Would she even be able to save both of them? Would she be able to keep her mother in the process?
Between the raging storm of her thoughts and Sitri's incessant pleading, Rhea manages to come to a reluctant decision; a decision that will not only result in the loss of her beloved daughter, but also the possibility of losing the one thing she worked so hard trying to accomplish.
Rhea lifts a hand to Sitri's head, gently combing through her hair with trembling fingers.
"Don't you worry, sweetheart," Rhea whispers, "They'll be okay."