The room beyond was cast almost entirely in black and deep, muted shades, dark wood paneling worked with silver filigree that caught the light in careful, deliberate patterns, tall shelves lined with tomes whose spines bore markings Alex didn’t yet have the vocabulary to read, and a single large window at the far end that let in cool, indirect daylight rather than anything warm or golden.
Vespera sat behind a broad black desk in a chair that looked, Alex thought, less like furniture and more like a throne that had simply decided to be more understated about it, working through a tall stack of paperwork with the brisk, unhurried efficiency of someone who had clearly been doing this since well before either of them had woken up.
She looked up the moment the door opened.
She set the papers down without any visible rush, stood, and crossed the room in a handful of long, easy strides, and before Alex had time to say a single word of greeting, she’d already lifted him clean off the floor and pulled him into a hug tight enough to press the entire side of his face directly into her chest.
"Mmf—"
Breathing became, briefly, a genuine logistical challenge.
He tapped her shoulder twice, then a third time for good measure, and Vespera finally, reluctantly, set him back down on his feet, though her hands stayed cupped around his face a moment longer, tilting it up so she could look at him properly.
"I heard," she said, "that you’ve been doing some rather dangerous things yesterday."
Alex blinked. "Who even told you that?"
"That’s not important right now."
"I was just trying to get used to my Aspect," he said, the words coming a little faster than he intended, the specific speed of someone who’d already half-rehearsed this exact defense in his head sometime last night.
"And to do that properly, I need to actually train with it, use it, put it under real conditions instead of just sitting still and hoping it develops on its own. It’s working, mother. I can feel it working already, I got five separate attribute increases in a single day just from pushing myself properly. If I keep doing this regularly, consistently, I really think I’m going to get a proper handle on it. It’s nothing dangerous. I promise you, it’s really nothing dangerous."
Vespera’s expression settled into something complicated, not quite disapproval, not quite acceptance, some careful place in between that Alex recognized as the specific look of a parent weighing two truths against each other and not yet sure which one deserved more weight.
"Look, Alex," she said, crouching slightly so their eyes were more level, her hands still resting gently against his shoulders.
"I know that everyone who awakens has to start preparing themselves for what comes after. Your sister was no exception to that, she trained hard from the moment she awakened, and I never once told her to stop. But you are still so young. Even if what you’re doing is technically safe, even if you or anyone else believes early training is good for you, good for getting strong faster, I need you to understand that you don’t have to push yourself this hard. Not every single day. I want you to have a childhood, Alex. A real one. The kind where you get to just be a child sometimes, and not someone constantly measuring himself against some invisible deadline only he can see."
She paused, her gaze steady on his, searching.
"You’ve always been extraordinary," she continued, quieter now.
"Intelligent since the day you were born. You understand things far too quickly for your age, your father and I have known that since before you could even properly hold your own head up. But that doesn’t mean you have to carry everything alone, or that you have to act like the weight of some grand responsibility is already sitting on your shoulders. If you ever run into a problem you can’t solve, or you need help with something, or you just want to talk, any of it, all of it, we are here. All of us. You don’t have to act like you’ve already been handed the task of saving the human race, Alex. Right now, you are just our little baby. And I want you to actually let yourself know that, not just hear it."
Zara had gone completely quiet beside him, listening with an expression that had softened into something sincere, something almost wistful, the teasing energy from earlier entirely absent now.
Alex felt something complicated twist in his chest, and it took him a moment to recognize it for what it was.
’Ah. This again,’ he thought, and there was less bite in it than he wanted there to be.
’Mom, if you keep talking like that, you’re actually going to convince me. I refuse to fall for this Mommy-and-Daddy temptation. I have spent a lifetime being the person everyone else relied on, I am not about to start relying on—’
’Okay. Maybe a little.’
"Even if you want to keep training," Vespera said, straightening back up, "neither your father nor I are going to stop you. We’re not going to lock you in a room and tell you to just play with blocks all day. Just know that I need you to take care of yourself properly. Every day. Every single time, without exception. Eat well. Rest when your body actually needs it, not just when it’s convenient for whatever schedule you’ve drawn up for yourself. I mean that, Alex."
Alex looked up at her, and something in his expression cracked, just slightly, into a small, helpless smile.
"Yes, mom," he said. "I’ll take care of myself properly."
Vespera reached down and ruffled his hair, the gesture warm and slightly absent-minded, the way parents touched their children when the affection didn’t need to be announced to mean something.
"So," she said, straightening again, her tone shifting back into something more practical, "what was the actual reason you came to see me? You had the look of someone carrying a great deal in his head the moment you walked through that door."
Alex nodded. "I wanted to ask more about the shadow bond."
"Ah." Something in Vespera’s posture eased, like this was familiar, comfortable ground compared to the conversation they’d just had.
"So that’s what brought you here. Alright, then. Sit, both of you. I’ll tell you what I can to help you get more properly in tune with it."