It...

[ Instead of looking at Aran, Narmaya's gaze drops to her hands, loosely clasped together atop the table. ]

It felt at first as though... something in the world had changed. Things seemed to look strange or different in a way I couldn't put my finger on. Then eventually I realized the one who had changed was me. Something was... missing.

[ Something had been taken. And there was no way of getting it back.

She swallows very hard. ]

Are you sure? I've... I've wanted so badly to ask you what happened, but it... it was so...

[ If it was hard for Narmaya, then what must it have been like for Aran? Dahlia Voliere had been a hero, yes, but she had always been a distant unreachable figure. Not a fixture of their lives, a constant presence –

Not a mother. If, indeed, she had even been that to him. Narmaya can't help but wonder now if she had. ]

I don't want to make you talk of things you'd rather not go back to.