Two years had passed since Carol began accompanying her son every time he went out to play with his friends. She wasn't overprotective—she simply stayed a short distance away, watching him laugh and run, calling him back only when it was time to go home.
"Alright then, we'll build the base next week," said Elian, now nine years old, to his little group of friends.
"Yes, Captain Elian!" the kids shouted in unison, raising sticks as if they were swords.
"Elian… tell us, how much longer is your mom going to keep coming with us?" asked one of the boys, scratching his head. "I mean… how do I say this without sounding rude? It's kinda awkward."
"Yeah," added a girl, "she's been coming for two years now. We're nine, and having an adult watch us all the time is… weird."
Elian sighed, resigned."Yeah, yeah, I know. But she insists on it. I've tried everything to convince her, but she won't listen." He raised his arms dramatically. "I'm doomed to have my mother follow me for the rest of my life."
Meanwhile, not far away, Carol watched him with a smile—unaware that it was her son she was being teased about.
During those two years, Carol hadn't wasted a single day. She had started calling in old favors from neighbors and friends. She asked for specific things: a safe place to leave Elian if something ever happened to her, tracking devices in case he had to go out alone, an evacuation route, false identities if they needed to flee Saint Deux. She had everything planned. Nothing could go wrong. If the Order of the Black Mantle ever dared to touch her son or set foot in the neighborhood, she would be ready.
"Elian! Time to go!" shouted Carol from a distance.
"Coming, Mom!" he replied, jumping down from the rail he'd been swinging on and waving goodbye to his friends before running toward her.
The walk home was full of laughter. Elian talked about his games, his friends, and—like always—tried to convince his mother that he was old enough to go out on his own. Carol, as always, refused, and their debate ended in laughter and playful teasing.
"Elian…" she said more softly as they reached home, "I think we'll stop going to the park at night."
"What? Why?" the boy protested. "I've been good! I do all my homework, and I eat all my vegetables! Well… almost all."
Carol smiled tenderly. His face already resembled his father's—he even complained in the same exaggerated way."It's just… the weather's been really cold lately," she said with a nervous laugh. But it was a lie. For days she'd felt that someone was watching them during their night walks—that something moved between the trees in the park.
"Ugh, fine," Elian muttered, crossing his arms. "But in exchange, you'll have to tell me more stories. Those are the best! About the places with strange, powerful animals, and people with incredible Elyth… I still remember so many of them! It's amazing how you can imagine all that, Mom."
Carol smiled, bittersweetly. Her son didn't know that those "stories" weren't inventions at all, but fragments of memory—echoes from centuries past, when she had roamed the continent with her companions.
"Haha, of course, sweetheart," she said, kissing his forehead. "But first, brush your teeth and get into bed. Tonight, I'll tell you about a boy who climbed a mountain with his bare hands, all alone."
In truth, the story was a softened version of the time Elian's father had nearly died trying to climb a mountain.
That night passed like so many others before it—Elian listening, wide-eyed, to his mother's voice, and Carol believing that her life had finally found peace. She was certain nothing bad could ever happen to her son. And he, happy and bright, believed the world was as vast and safe as the stories she told him before sleep.
They lived calm, joyful days—never suspecting that these were the final moments when the world still belonged to them.
Because sometimes, fate can be crueller than death itself.