“You can’t ask me for this.” Beyza stares at her mother - glad she had sent the triplets away after briefly meeting their grandmother (one of three, she thinks with amusement - though she hopes if they ever meet Ryatah or Anaxarete it will not go in a similar direction).
Agetta, for her part, though her dark eyes shine with tears seems completely at peace with the decision she’s made, with what she’s asking from her daughter. “You’re the only one I can ask, Beyza. What other magician could I possibly trust with this request? It’s… it’s just become too much. Too many memories, too much pain. I was not meant to live so long.” Agetta feels this truth - has felt it for a long time. She should have died in those years when she was a ghost, but it is difficult to regret not taking her own life when returning to Beqanna gave her new children to love - such as the mare she stands before now as she pleads for a death she cannot give herself now that the sun is back. Now that her healing has returned. “Send me back to the afterlife, send me back to the stars.”
Before the eclipse, Beyza thinks she would have done as her mother requests without much hesitation. Would have used her as one of the sacrifices she needed and it would have felt so noble to have someone ask her for this.
And now?
So much has changed in a few years.
Agetta has no ability to read minds but she seems to sense that hesitation so she reaches out to her daughter, touching her gently on the cheek. “I want this, I’m sure. Help me be at peace, Beyza. Please.”
Beyza’s ears flatten a little in annoyance a those words - how can she say no to that?
When her muzzle, a different shade of white all together than Agetta’s - making her mother look almost grey in comparison - touches the older mare on her forehead, Beyza absorbs memories. She feels the pain, the guilt, the sorrow - the desolation after hurting Plume, the loss of Garbage forgetting her, every failure, every mistake over almost two centuries weighing her down.
Death might be a kindness, but how can she justify killing her mother? She senses the gaps in Agetta's mind where memories have been wiped clean with no trace and Beyza feels her magic come up with the idea before she can fully articulate it in her mind - the kinder option is right there. Not death, but relief. Peace.
She doesn’t say anything, doesn't ask for permission because she believes this is the right choice. So she just gets to work.
She’s had practice locking away her own emotions and she does so with Agetta’s memories now. She cannot erase every instance of pain but there is an underlying theme to a lot of the grief.
Beyza locks up all of Agetta’s interactions with stallions. None of these memories go willingly - so much of them are tangled up in pieces of the elder mare’s personality, but Beyza is persistent. She leaves out a few - the sons, her brothers - but the rest are sealed neatly away in boxes. One day, when Agetta finds true happiness and love again, these boxes will break open. It is too much for her to erase them completely so she can just try to make sure they will not leak out until some good is present in her mother’s life to balance out the weight of all of them. When she has a support system greater than her occasional visits with her children.
If Agetta is asked about someone directly, Beyza plants a few vague lines to say. Other than that, if she were to walk past any stallion she's ever known she will have faint recognition at best. Plume, Garbage, Carnage, Atrox, Kensley, Sleaze - even that foul-mouthed pegasus. Every good and bad interaction, every joy and every pain. Beyza's magic was not fine-tuned enough to try to pick and choose memories so she took them all.
It is hard to say how effective the magic boxes will be, but when Beyza pulls back and sees a peaceful smile on Agetta's face she cannot find it in her heart to regret her decision.
They find the girls again after that, and Agetta experiences her first truly peaceful day in her entire life as she plays with her granddaughters beneath a warm autumn sun.
