Her mother listened through the evening and most of the next day as Aurora filled her in on everything that had happened, stopping occasionally when her mother’s body called her back to slumber. Aurora started from the beginning—from the way she had foolishly gotten wrapped up in Cassius’s flirtations, and overheard his true plans to control her and the crown. She left out details when necessary. Though she loved her mother, and she hoped by the end they would come to see things the same, she would not risk the identities of her friends and compatriots should her mother cling to her old ways of thinking about magic. They talked of the Locke family, and what occurred in the days after Rora disappeared. Aurora actually had to fill in some gaps for her mother there, using the knowledge she had gleaned from Taven. It seemed her mother had been incapacitated for a very long time indeed. They were sidetracked a few times as the queen asked for news of the kingdom, and how she had come to be wherever she was (which Aurora had refused to tell her). Aurora gave her the necessary information about the Locke takeover and the rebellion, and the Stormlord, but held her mother at bay when she wanted to continue asking questions about the current state of affairs. For one, Aurora was not entirely sure herself, having been cooped up here for days. Furthermore, she knew her mother would be determined to help against the Stormlord’s attacks, and she was far too weak to do anything but lie in bed for now.

So instead, Aurora tried to draw her into stories about her time in the wilds. She spoke at length of the changing landscapes, and the storms they encountered, and the emergence of her magic. That got her mother’s attention. The excitement that flushed over her features was almost enough to make her look healthy again. But Aurora was careful to weave her story slowly, leaving her mother in the dark about the nature of her powers as much as she had been, building to the discovery that she was something more than Stormling, something other. Though she hoped her mother could see the error of the prohibition of the natural magics on merit alone, she would make this about her if she needed to. If she had to make her mother choose between Stormling traditions alone and a free and fair way forward with her daughter, she would. Traditions and power and pride should not mean more than human lives.