Yin's POV
I couldn't stop staring at her even now, hours after finding her on that road, I half-expected her to vanish like smoke. To reveal herself as another cruel dream sent to torture me with what I'd lost.
But she remained solid and real, sitting before me with that familiar expression of patience mixed with amusement that I remembered from my childhood.
My mother. After five hundred years of believing her dead, of carrying the guilt of her sacrifice, she was here.
"You've changed," she said, reaching out to touch my face. Her fingers felt cool against my skin. "You've hardened. The boy I knew was softer, more trusting."
"The boy you knew died in that tomb," I said, voice rougher than I'd intended. "I spent centuries alone in the darkness, Mother. I had a lot of time to think about trust and what it costs."
