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I close my eyes, and feel myself slip away. When I open them, a tall feminine figure towers over me. She smiles at me warmly, and offers her hand. I take it, and we move forward into the abyss. As we walk she offers me small comforts. How scary it is now, but won't be soon. How this is the cycle of life, and we must all play our part. Soon enough she pauses, and she looks to me like a mother bird to her chick who’s ready to leave the nest. It’s then when I know our time is over.
I let go of her hand and feel myself enter the beyond. A bright purple light engulfs me, and when it does, all the heaviness in my body is gone. After some time, the light begins to fade, and I feel grass settle in between my fingers. I’m in a field of some sort. I crane my neck to get a better grip of my surroundings, and around me there's nothing but lush green grass filling the plains as far as my eyes can see.
Off in the distance I see two more figures standing side-by-side, holding hands with another. The one, a tiefling woman with crimson skin, white hair adorned in a braid, and ram horns on her head. The other, a human man with brown hair and clear blue eyes, the top of his head reaching the woman’s shoulders. It’s only the three of us in this field, and after a few moments of staring from both ends, they beckon me to come closer.
I hesitantly pick myself up off the ground, the grass crunching underneath me, and find myself walking towards them. Standing still, their gaze unbroken, they let go of each other and hold out their arms to me like we’re old friends. When I approach the tiefling greets me first, “It’s so nice to finally meet you.” She opens her arms wider and tries to initiate a hug. I don’t initiate it back, and she brings her arms back to her side.
“We were starting to wonder when you would come,” says the human in a gentle tone. He glances over to the tiefling, giving her a slight smile.
I don’t recognize either of these individuals. My eyes find themselves flicking between them both, trying to place either one somewhere in my life. I fail. I stand in silence. The tiefling, recognizing my confusion, clears her throat, “Where are my manners? I’m sorry. I’m Ivey, and this is my husband Azmar.”
Azmar flashes me a tight lipped smile and shakes my hand. Suddenly his face brightens, “You know, you might’ve heard of me before…does the name ‘Azmar the Cunning’ mean anything to you?”
It doesn’t.
I shake my head, “Sorry. Never heard of you.”
His face dims again before resting at a neutral position. “Ahh, don’t worry about it,” he puts his arm around Ivey, “It’s been a while since we’ve been gone. The fame had to die out sooner or later.”
I laugh awkwardly, and we all stare at each other some more before I remember that I’ve yet to introduce myself. I do, but not without missing that signal.
They both beckon me to walk with them. I go to consider the decision, but seeing as where we are, what is there to consider?
Trailing behind, I try to rack my brain as to where I know these two. I’ve seen my fair share of tieflings and humans alike, but nothing about either of them stick out. We continue to walk in silence for what seems like only a few minutes before Ivey pipes up, “It’s a little confusing when you first cross over.” She looks up at me from the ground with sympathetic eyes, her large black pupils widening in the sunlight.
“It took us both a while to understand what had fully happened to us,” Azmar continues. He pauses for a moment before glancing at his wife, who gives him a knowing look back and squeezes his hand. I glance away partly to give them privacy, but also because I don’t know where to sit in those feelings.
Suddenly Ivey lets go of his hand and casts her gaze to me, “But we were so happy to learn that you had taken in our son.”
“Your son?”
Now I’m really confused.
“Azzlore,” Azmar explains, “Our pride and joy.”
My feet plant themselves into the ground. In hearing his name, all the memories come flooding back. Seeing that bruised up kid curled up underneath an awning, trying to take cover from the rain. Hearing his cries of triumph when he won his first sparring match all on his own. Feeling how tight he hugged me in the Burrow Shark Drift after ten years under the surface.
I look at Ivey and where I couldn’t place her before, Azzlore starts to fill the gaps. Her hair. Her horns. Even her nose. He is nearly her spitting image. When Azmar and I lock eyes, the same crystal blue eyes stare back at me as they did with his son. Except now I’m seeing a fuller picture than I ever did before.
My mouth twists into a smile. Azmar beams just as much as I am at the sight of it. Ivey’s sullen face is replaced with a joyous one, her tail flicking with excitement.
“Of course. I see where he gets his resemblance from,” I declare, making sure to look Ivey in the eyes. Turning to Azmar, I clap my hand on his shoulder, “And I see where he got his spark from.”
“I had to do something, you know? Can’t help that the kid has his mother’s beauty.”
He plants a kiss on Ivey’s cheek and she playfully nudges him away. He gives some resistance and coos something in her ear and they go back and forth for a little bit.
At first I’m a little uncomfortable, but being here with the two of them makes me happy to see that Azzlore came from two people who really love each other. It’s honestly a shame that spent his youth on a ship with me instead of spending it with them, but life has a cruel way of twisting the strings of fate.
Ivey clears her throat and Azmar ceases. She glances back to me, “We wanted to thank you for taking care of our son. Without you, who knows where our boy would be?”
“Nonsense,” I shake my head, “It was an honor.”
Azmar grins and brings Ivey closer to him, “You were there for our son when we couldn’t be, and for that we will always be grateful.”
I smile in response. I’m not entirely sure what else I can say. Ivey continues, “He really cares for you. We’ve seen it with our own eyes.”
My smile drops and my eyebrows raise. Azmar chortles once more and lowers his voice, almost like someone could be listening in, “We’ve been keeping our eye on him from time to time.”
I look to Ivey to confirm and she simply smirks and shrugs her shoulders. I wish Azzlore knew that his parents were watching over him.
“That’s wonderful,” I beam.
Suddenly, Ivey’s face drops, a sullen appearance replacing her smug response. “It was so hard to see him suffer over what happened between you two.”
“What happened between us?” I question, tilting my head slightly. Just as fast as I thought I was getting the hang of things, they've completely lost me. Azmar’s grin is twisted into a frown, and he gives me a regretful look, “When he drew that card, even I couldn’t have predicted that they would choose you.”
Oh. Right. For a moment I had almost forgotten all about that tiny detail.
A heavy silence sits in the center of the three of us. I return Azmar’s gaze, and all I can see is his son’s. Except this time it's not a reflection of the boy I raised, but the man whose heart broke when I told him he deserved to die.
However, the worst gaze of all was the glance we shared on Kyanite, moments before he went through the portal to the underwater city. The rest of his crew had gone ahead, and right before he followed them, he uttered something I couldn’t hear, and just like that, gone. That was the last time I ever saw him. I throw my eyes down to the ground and count some blades of grass. My eyes start to burn, but not from the sun. I suddenly feel a hand on my shoulder and it startles me a bit. I rip my eyes from the ground and see that it's Ivey hand. She pulls me in closer, “Mara, you know he loves you right?”
Nodding my head absentmindedly, she doubles down. Digging her fingers into my shoulder a little harder, “You were his mother just as much as I was. I’ve seen firsthand just how much my son loves you, and I think that you need to understand that.”
Hearing the word mother leave her lips almost makes me laugh. I spent a good portion of my life recruiting men and women alike to rob, raid, and plunder. What kind of motherly figure does that make me?
I find myself dumbfounded like before, except now the burning in my eyes is only growing stronger. “I’m sorry,” my voice cracks, “For threatening your son—”
“No need,” Ivey interrupts. She takes her hand off my shoulder and Azmar takes a few steps closer to the both of us. He places his hands on his hips, “We both know that you had no control. The card’s magic is strong, and there was nothing you could have done.”
A sense of relief washes over me, melting away guilt that I wasn’t even aware of. After my time spent in the Burrow Shark Drift I managed to reenter life and make something of what I had left. While I wasn’t the captain of a ship anymore, I was captain of guards. Men and women looked to me again for orders, and it felt good. When my time came, I didn’t fight or resist. I had no regrets. No loose ends. Except for him.
I feel a tear fall down my cheek. I go to wipe it, but Ivey stops me and pulls me in for a hug. This time, I let her. “Thank you,” I whisper into her ear. She squeezes me tighter, “No, thank you.” I squeeze back.
When Ivey and I break, Azmar cuts in and brings me in for an embrace as well. It’s less comforting in the way Ivey’s was, but somehow more reassuring to me. We separate and Azmar smiles at me once more, except this time, over his shoulder I swear I can see a familiar figure off in the distance.