In the end, Dema hadn’t washed up, but they went on to return Tras in the morning hours anyway. In a genius feat of misdirection, Tras had made them believe that his home was on the plateau on top of the cliff, when in reality, he’d only climbed that cliff to be able to look out for the wolves in the valley, and then fallen down accidentally.

So, they’d never had any chances of finding his village up there from the start.

It turned out to be a nice small settlement reminiscent of Dusketon, although there was no orchard to be found in the middle; the buildings were just generally interspersed with beeches and oaks all the way through.

“So, we gonna go with him?” Dema asked with a glance at Theora. “Or just drop him off once we see the house?”

Dema still looked absolutely horrifying, dried dirt and blood all over her body. She’d barely scrubbed her eyes free. Theora desperately wanted to dump her into a hot spring. When Tras had woken up and seen Dema in the morning, he’d instantly cheered up. Now, he kept running around and laughing and playing games with her whenever he could.

After all, it had shown him that while the wolves were scary, being taken by the wolves was not the end of the world. He had still promised Theora multiple times not to go look for them again.

“We should leave,” Theora said. “They don’t know us. They have their child back now, after all. That’s what’s most important.”

“But wouldn’t they wanna thank his saviours! Also, someone’s gotta tell ’em what happened! And we need to make sure they remember who he is! Right, Tras?”

Tras nodded. “Come with me! You can meet mom.”

Theora gazed at Dema, then at Tras, who was already heading towards a small wooden house, painted all red.

“Alright,” she said.

“You’d rather not, huh?”

“I’d rather not,” Theora confirmed.

“Want me to do the talking?”

“Yes.”

“Nice!” bloodied Dema cheered and ran after Tras. “Was hoping for that, I love doing the talking!” Clearly, this was her idea of fun.

When she’d caught up to Tras, she offered to pick him up, and he obliged. Eventually, the two of them stood in front of the door, Theora trailing shortly behind.

Dema knocked. “We’ve got your son!” she shouted.

“I’m here, Theo’a!” Tras added.

In almost the blink of an eye, the door was torn open, and a sleepless woman emerged from it. Wrinkled face, eyes bleary from crying, grey hair. Theora noticed a lot of things at once — for one, she had Tras’ name tattooed on the back of one of her hands. She was wearing a locket around her neck with his picture on it. The inside of the door had his name and likeness engraved on it too, and she had a wristband made of several small wooden sheep.

There were a few other peculiar things about her, too — she wore a peculiar scarf, emblems on her shoes, little messages stitched into her clothing. All of these Theora could see being reminders in some way, to make her remember her son as frequently as possible.

Before the woman could say anything, Dema pointed at her, hand and finger stretched out.

“Five thousand gold or bust!”

Tras, as if on cue, repeated the gesture and declared, “Five sand gold or bus’!”

The woman stared at the boy for a moment, rather lost, until her eyes lit up in recognition.

Then, she let out a wailing sob.

After making two steps forward to take Tras from Dema’s arms, she hugged him as tight as she could. “Thank you,” she muttered breathlessly, and within a few seconds, had slumped to the ground with him, kissing his neck and cheek. “Tras, I’ve missed you.”

Dema shrugged and looked back at Theora, with a question on her face that communicated as much as, ‘let’s go after all?’

Apparently, this wasn’t as much fun as she’d imagined.

But Theora gently shook her head. Judging from the reaction, after days of him not returning, that woman clearly thought he might have died. She was crying uncontrollably, couldn’t even talk.

There must have been a ton of questions going on through her head right now, right?

Slowly, Theora came up and kneeled down next to her, placing a single hand on her jerking back.

“He’s alright,” she spoke calmly, but loud enough that it would carry over the sobs. “We found him fallen from a cliff, but his wounds were shallow. We cleaned them and his clothes. We gave him food — roots and cooked wild potatoes, as well as all the healthy berries we could find on the way. He wouldn’t eat the mushrooms. Tras led us back here. He shouldn’t be thirsty right now, either. I made beech tea for him.”

As she kept her voice talking, the woman calmed down under her touch, and eventually gazed at her with wide eyes, then enclosing Theora in a hug as well.

Theora succumbed to the embrace, as sudden and unexpected as it was. “You should be hugging Dema, not me,” she said. “She saved him, and kept him entertained the entire time.”

But the hug grew only tighter in response.

The rest of the day went by, with Dema and Theora accepting some of the hospitality Tras’ mother was putting a lot of effort into imposing on them. She wasn’t really in any state to do much, though, so Theora ended up brewing some amber tea to help her calm down. Later in the evening, a few people came by to tell Tras’ mom about the results of the ongoing search, and she broke the happy news of his return with newfound tears.

Apparently, mounting a rescue operation for him had been tough, because most people who went to look for him ended up disoriented in the woods somewhere.

Eventually, Dema and Theora continued their journey without staying for the night. Neither of them spoke a word while they walked out from the settlement and back onto their original path. Dema seemed very lost in thought.

At some point, while retracing the path to their original destination, which was another town on their way to Hallmark, they arrived at the place where they’d found Tras. Dema paced through the poison ivy, through the brushes, and eventually touched the stone at the bottom of the cliff he’d fallen from.

When Theora joined her, she turned around, grinning solemnly.

“You think we gotta hurry with that side quest of yours?”

Theora shrugged. “Hard to say without knowing what Fragments of Time are supposed to be. But, we don’t have to do it at all, if you don’t want to. Nothing is forcing us to.”

After all, this was just a fetch quest. Simply collecting some random items from around the planet. It wasn’t like the world would end if they let it time out.

Dema just nodded. “I see. Well, I don’t mind finishing it, but I just can’t help myself and be a bit impatient!”

“Impatient about what?”

“Secret!” she retorted, eyes glinting in amber sparks. “Hey, ever thought about getting kids?”

“What?” Theora blurted. That came completely out of left-field. “No, I haven’t. I can’t say it ever even occurred to me.”

“Why, I think you’d be a good mom!”

Somehow, Theora doubted that. Wouldn’t she just find ways to mess things up for the child?

The darker part about this was that the reasons for her ageless condition wouldn’t apply to any offspring she might carry, or any child she would adopt. She would raise a person, watch them age, teach them whatever they wanted to know that she could give, and then, she’d watch her child die.

Theora didn’t think that this was necessarily bad. Just because she was immortal, it didn’t turn her experiences with people of shorter lifespans any less important or valuable.

But she couldn’t help but feel sad about all of the people she’d once known and then lost.

That young boy she’d saved well over a hundred years ago, after she’d messed with the System, she’d never seen him again. What had been his name? Nate?

And was the man with his herbal collection who’d housed them during their search for the Devil of Truth still alive? What about Amyd? How had Hannah’s life gone, now that almost two decades had passed?

Maybe Hannah’s sleep had eventually improved.

Theora travelled such long distances that each encounter she had with a person was likely to be the first and the last. She could perhaps count the people she’d seen more than once on her fingers, but she was too scared to try. What would happen if she realised she’d forgotten some of them? It was a terrifying thought.

Speaking of that, wasn’t there another person once? A boy they’d helped reach home, after he’d gotten lost falling off a cliff? Theora couldn’t remember it very clearly, and it made her feel awful.

“Different question, then!” Dema said, and this time, she turned her head to Theora, smiling at her. “What’s your favourite name?”

“Favourite name?”

“Yeah! If you were gonna name someone.”

Theora frowned. She didn’t think she’d ever name anyone, but even if forced, she wasn’t sure which one to choose. “I don’t know. What about you?”

But right as she spoke, a name popped into her head. Tras. It was a nice name, wasn’t it? She didn’t know if she’d ever give it to someone, and she wasn’t sure why that name suddenly came to her, but it sure felt like a cosy one.

Dema shrugged. “Why, that’d really depend on the person I’d give it to! Like, I’d look at them and—” She snapped her fingers. “Find a name that fits. Just like that!”

Theora hummed in thought.

“Lemme know if you think of a name you like, though! I’d love to know.”

“Why? Why are you asking all this?”

“Big secret! Really big secret, not gonna tell!”

Theora couldn’t help but smile. “Alright, then. Can’t wait for it.”

“Speaking of, this is a nice sandstone cliff. Mind if I do a bit of searching?”