CONTENT WARNING: THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS THEMES OF FAMILY LOSS WHICH MAY BE UPSETTING FOR SOME READERS.

✧

Jiro sat on the bamboo floor outside his mother's bedroom, hugging his knees.

He suspected his mother had been feeling unwell for some time, but she had never fainted before. Seeing her collapse frightened him, and his mind wouldn't ease.

It's alright, he told himself. It could just be the heat of the day.

The door to the bedroom creaked open, and Jiro clambered to his feet. He peeked inside the room where he saw his mother propped up on a banig. She was conscious, and the glimpse of her gave him relief—the heavy rock in his heart had lifted.

A healer in a zarok vest stepped out of the room. "Jiro," he said, giving him a grim look. "Your mother is sick."

Jiro turned to the healer. "Will she be alright?" He tried to sound hopeful.

The practitioner pressed his lips together. "I'm sorry."

Jiro held his breath as he waited for the healer's words. A part of him knew, had always known, that something was wrong. But another part of him dominated with denial, and that same part wasn't ready for confirmation.

"This is the fourth time she collapsed," the healer said.

"No," was Jiro's immediate response. He shook his head and argued. "No, this is the first time."

"You've often been away on your hunts."

A shuddering breath of disbelief escaped from Jiro's lips. "She never told me." All those moments when his mother looked weak and tired, coughing. All those times when she had preferred to rest than eat. All the instances when she needed to sleep for whole days. They came to him now in a flood. He had seen the signs, but he ignored them. "What's wrong with her?"

"It's a sickness I've only seen once before. It's not contagious. It's rare, and the Eskolars have no name for it yet. All I know is that it attacks the lungs, and it's deadly. There is no cure," the healer explained.

Deadly. How could Jiro's mother hide something like this from him? "What can we do?" he asked.

The healer shook his head, regretful. "There's nothing we can do." He paused for a long while and placed his hand on Jiro's shoulder, squeezing lightly. "She's gotten worse. You have to be ready for this."

Jiro stepped back from him. "I don't understand. Ready for what?" His mind ached with denial, and a surge of heat coursed through his chest. "My mother is fine!" He shouted, shoving the healer up on a wall. He couldn't—didn't want to—comprehend what the man told him.

Your mother is sick.

There is no cure.

Jiro balled his hands into fists at the echoing words in his head, ready to throw them at the practitioner.

"Jiro?" Nana Ricka called through the open door. "Come here," she ordered.

It took much strength for Jiro not to hit the practitioner in the face, and he forced himself to enter the bedroom. He paced at the foot of the pallet bed frame.

"Come here." Nana Ricka patted the banig on her side. Sadness hovered over her silver eyes.

"You!" Jiro pointed a furious finger at her. "You never told me!" His breath came in rapid gasps, and his heart twisted. He didn't want to be angry with her, but he was.

"Jiro." Nana Ricka was gentle. "Forgive me for bringing you this sorrow."

"No!" Jiro shouted, and his voice shook. "Why didn't you tell me? Didn't I deserve to know?"

A weak smile appeared on his mother's lips. Exhaustion veiled her face, and dark rounds grew under her eyes. "If I told you, you wouldn't have gone to your hunts. I know how much you love tracking. I hear you when you speak of it, and you are good at what you do. After your father died—" She looked down at her hands on her lap and shook her head. "This is not something you needed to worry about. You've already gone through so much."

"And you think you could hide it from me forever?" Jiro's eyes stung with unshed tears, and his vision blurred. Anger curled hard over his heart. "What? Do you plan to burn your own body when you're dead?" Those last words released felt wrong. Awfully wrong.

Nana Ricka's silver eyes threaded from her lap up to Jiro, slow and agonizing, shame shivering in them. "I thought I would get better. I hoped and prayed to the old kings and the forgotten gods that I would get better. I did everything—sacrificed all sorts of things, but they did not answer."

Jiro's breaths hitched in his throat, coming in painful gasps as he shook his head at her.

"I only wanted to protect you."

"You can't protect me, mama!" Jiro's voice shattered, and it came out in a wail. "Not from this."

"I'm your mother. I will always protect you." Her tone became firm, showing that she still had strength. "Now, come here." She reached her arms out to him. The shame on her face faded, replaced by welling tears in her eyes. "If this is my last moment, you wouldn't want me to spend it listening to your anger."

Nana Ricka's words washed over Jiro's mind and heart. His fury drained, and nothing was left but his sorrow underneath. He didn't want to fight with her, didn't want to hate her. And he didn't want this to be her last moment.

This time, he obeyed and walked to the bedside. He climbed on the banig beside her and pressed his head on her shoulder like a child. Then with all the emotions he kept at bay, he began to sob.

"It's alright," Nana Ricka said, cradling him. "You're going to be alright."

He didn't believe that. How could he be alright?

"You will get through this," Nana Ricka whispered into his ear, the softest words only for him. "You will come out of this stronger."

"I can't," Jiro cried into her shoulder, now soaked with tears. "I can't, mama."

"Of course you can, and you will." Nana Ricka pulled Jiro's chin up, making him look at her. She cupped his face in her hands like she always did. "Oh, my little flyer. I'm proud of you, of what you have become. You are strong and—"

"I can't," Jiro said again, shaking his head. He tried not to listen to what could be her last words, but she kept telling him to be strong—that he was strong, and he'll get through this.

Nana Ricka's voice and Jiro's sobs drifted into a long night, trying to lull him to sleep. But he stayed awake, spending every moment catching her labored breathing and her weak beating heart.

Disbelief held him as if his mind couldn't comprehend what was happening, how the events had changed too fast. Nana Ricka had only been cooking, a regular daily routine, as if nothing was wrong. Yet now, she lay beside him, bedridden.

The healer told him she might have forced herself to do her tasks to seem normal. It was all an act—a lie. And now the disease consumed her, plucking on the threads of her life, serving them slowly to death.

Jiro prayed and pleaded to the old kings and the forgotten gods to save her. He begged them not to take her. Religion was not something he practiced with faith—he wasn't even sure if he genuinely believed or only followed their culture—in the teachings of their elders and the new ways of the modern age. But the night had turned him into a saint as he poured his heart out, begging.

Yet when the morning light shimmered on the edges of a window and through the cracks in the woven bamboo walls, he had never felt farther from any faith, the old kings or the forgotten gods. No one was listening.

Please!

The light of the early sun was warm, but his mother's face had gone cold and pale, and the glow of her sun-kissed skin dimmed. Her lips darkly wilted, and her closed eyes grew swollen.

"Jiro," Nana Ricka whispered, and she squeezed his hand. Though weak, she reminded him that she was still alive.

Jiro, in turn, pressed his palm into his mother's hand. "I'm right here, mama."

"Promise me," she spoke in a hushed voice. "Promise me that you will live." Her chest rose and fell with the words.

He breathed in a sniffle. What did it even mean to live? He was afraid to know what was on the other side of this moment—what kind of life it would be without his mother. But this was all he could do for her now. He nodded and whispered, "I promise," pressing his lips to her temple.

"I will be with your father soon. I'm happy that I will see him again." She smiled without opening her eyes and stilled—no more rise and fall of her chest, no more pressure in her hand. The happiness on her face was preserved, but then that also fell away.

"Mama?" Jiro said, but she didn't respond. He stood and leaned over her, grabbing her shoulders and shaking her gently. "Mama," he called to her. "Mama! Mama!"

The healer came in through the door and hurried to the bed. He pressed a finger to her nose and then felt for her pulse on her neck. Time appeared to be a measured agony as Jiro waited, teeth clenching and eyes blurring with tears.

The healer looked up and shook his head. "I'm sorry, Jiro. I share your sorrow."

"No," Jiro whispered. "No!" He shook his mother again. "Mama! Please!"

.