Straia will never know what her mother intended for her. She only knows what her mother looked like from her own reflection in the river. Her father used to tell her she looked like her mother, and she remembers her mother saying it once as well. But she doesn’t remember the sound of her mother’s voice, or the way the words had rolled off her tongue. She remembers love and kind words and bedtime stories, but not what those stories were or what that kind of love had felt like. Frostweaver perhaps wasn’t the best mother, often lost in her own grief, but she had been good mother. Plenty enough for Straia.
And then her sisters found her mother’s murdered body on the beach. Straia remembers Nocturnal and Araby. Remembers how they stormed into the Chamber with fire in their eyes, sure Rodrik had something to do with it. Sure at least that he should have been protecting Frostweaver. She remembers, very clearly, Nocturnal breaking the news. She remembers, very clearly, how undisturbed her father had seemed. She hadn’t understood then. But now, now she thinks she does.
Perhaps she can’t kill her own father, but taking his throne was a start. The parent she surprised wasn’t her mother. It was her father. She can only hope her mother would be proud of what she’s become, but she’ll never know. She’ll never know what her mother wanted her to be.
Engelsfors takes Straia’s prying into stride, which the painted queen appreciates. “Yes, they do say that. The future is going to be all work and no play if it’s up to my son.” She chuckles. Her son is like her in many ways, but not in that. Straia is cheeky and impossible sometimes, whereas her son simply works and works and works away. He does flirt, but only when that too might benefit the Chamber. The ravens crow above them as Engelsfors mentions how they miss nothing, and Straia just grins, one side of her lips turned up just slightly. No, they really do not. And she doesn’t need to say so, because they’ve just spoken for themselves.
“Erebor was likely the easiest child to raise ever born. I consider myself lucky.” She’d fed him, made sure he didn’t get mauled by a wolf, but otherwise the boy had done as he pleased and thrown himself into the good of the Chamber and that had been that. She’s not entirely sure she’ll ever have another one. Certainly, a second child would actually require her to raise it. Erebor popped out of the womb fully formed, like he’d just absorbed all her thoughts and needed no more instruction. “Whatever the path, he or she will be your child. And you will love them anyway.” Unless you are Rodrik and Straia. But most parents, surprised or no, still loved their children. This child would have two loving parents and a safe home. It wouldn’t be as broken as her family.
straia
the raven queen of the chamber