These last weeks were very interesting for Agatha. In a way, they weren’t that different from her daily life at the academy, as she spent most of her time practicing lithorica and exercising, but at the same time, never before had she felt this fulfilled before. She wasn’t training because someone was forcing her to do so, but rather, because she wanted to. And most important of all, she was freed from the bony grasp of anxiety. Being open about one’s relationship did wonders for one’s mental state.

  Perhaps she didn’t play all the time with her girlfriend, even though they didn’t need to hide any longer, but there was no need to. Just knowing that Christie was there was enough for Agatha.

  So soon came the end of their stay at the Valasela Estate.

  “Ah, how short this stay has been,” Hasel, Christie’s father and patriarch of the family, lamented as they all stood next to the carriage. “I wish you could stay longer…”

  “You know that is not possible, dearest father,” Christie said diplomatically, though Agatha could tell she was giggling in her insides. “We have stayed for more than a month here already; we risk making it late to the academy if we stay any longer.”

  The lithe miner didn’t protest any further, simply choosing to deflate and grunt weakly. Miss Diorite took this opportunity to address them.

  “Miss Christina, Miss Agatha,” the maid spoke professionally, which made the seamstress-in-training a bit uncomfortable. She wasn’t used to such respect. “Here are some sandwiches for the day. And after Miss Agatha’s petition, I have readied a coolbox on the carriage, fully stocked with fresh ingredients. The way back should be more comfortable for your stomachs this time around.”

  “Thank you, Miss Diorite,” Agatha accepted the basket of sandwiches with a smile. “It feels a bit odd having more comforts on the road than in my own house, though.”

  Hasel snorted. “This is your house now, girl. Well, or it is unless you make my dearest daughter-“ The man stopped speaking as said daughter stepped on his foot with peerless might. Even Agatha backed away from the sheer violence of the impact, yet the miner failed to portray any pain on his visage; only a vulpine smile could be seen. “Take care, both of you. I will be waiting for you next year.”

  Christie huffed and made her way into the carriage without bidding goodbye to her father. Her girlfriend was angry, and Agatha could perfectly understand it as her father had become very protective and didn’t fail to at least threaten the dirty-blond girl once per day. The redhead took it far worse than the actual threatened girl, as Agatha just found it endearing, cute even. Imagine if I were a man, though, she giggled as she made her way into the carriage. I don’t think Hasel would stop at threats. Though, I mean, he wouldn’t have taught me so much if he actually hated me.

  The carriage began to move, and Agatha found herself waving her hand to the shrinking figures of Hasel Valasela and Miss Diorite. Perhaps she had only known them for a month or so, but they had been very welcoming and warm to her, which she greatly appreciated, as the same couldn’t be said for her village. And talking about Malachite…

  “Could we make a detour?” Agatha said over the driver’s window.

  “You only need to point the way,” Adrien said chuckling. He already was welcoming when he learned she was Christie’s ‘best friend’ two months ago, but now he almost felt like… family.

  ***

  Malachite wasn’t that far from the Valasela Estate, the trip being only a couple of hours on a horse-pulled carriage. Agatha knew that Malachite was small since she was little. More often than not, her mother would bring her to nearby cities to sell clothes as there was a limit to how much money you could make from confections in a village where most women knew how to sew. That always – and even to this day – struck Agatha as odd. Why would a seamstress stay in a place where no one would appreciate or require her work?

  That hostile Malachite now looked minuscule, pathetic even. The half-abandoned mining outpost already looked miserable compared to towns, but when compared to Knight’s Ascent, it was laughable. And she wouldn’t even dare to compare it to the Skyscraper Academy or the Valasela Estate. There was a limit in decency on how much you could kick a downed man.

  “Do you want to stay out? I will only be there a short time,” Agatha suggested to Adrien and Christie.

  “I would like to meet your mother again, Agatha. You have been able to interact with my father for a whole month, but I have only seen your mother for a fraction of a day.”

  “I… guess we could all go into Malachite then…” The dirty-blond girl rubbed her hanging sapphire as she blushed.

  “I love when you blush like that,” Christie whispered in her ear as she toyed with one of the petite girl’s locks of hair. “But considering what you have chosen to wear today, should you not act more… imperiously?”

  Agatha took a deep breath. “Yes, I should.”

  Her choice of attire was none other than the Skyscraper’s Academy military uniform. There were many reasons for that, but the main one was that she wanted to show it to her mother. She knew the seamstress would be thrilled by it, for her mother was even more passionate about textiles and clothes than her.

  When the luxurious carriage rolled into the small village, it garnered a lot of attention. The villagers of Malachite stopped working and fooling around, and they gathered around the carriage, or more accurately, they looked from afar. They knew better than to get close. Too many horror stories about peasants getting too close to noble carriages. Of course, this wasn’t a noble carriage, but one from a nouveau riche – or so had Agatha heard Christie call herself – not that the people of Malachite knew how to distinguish one from the other, however.

  Agatha was the first to step down from the carriage, and the reaction of the villagers instantly shifted from disconcert at having such a carriage here to surprise at seeing a familiar face inside.

  Though not everyone remained silent in their surprise.

  “Look who we got here! The pebble!” Who spoke was none other than the local bully, Juan. A burly boy – though man would be more accurate considering his height and age after this last year of absence – who always loved to terrorize those younger than him.

  Agatha had never been scared by him. She had only looked at him with hate and had fought to the point of bleeding more than once. Yet now she could only look at him with copious amounts of loathing. His sheer presence turned her Christie-laden happiness into a sour and dull taste.

  “Have they finally kicked you out of the academy, pebble?” Juan continued vociferating as she failed to respond.

  Mostly out of repulsion.

  Even a man with half a wit would notice that the statement didn’t make sense in the slightest, as she had just come out of a very expensive carriage, and she was wearing fine clothes. But what really irked her wasn’t the man-child’s lack of intelligence, but the usage of that abhorrent nickname.

  Pebble.

  Agatha was small; she was very aware of that. She also had difficulties with it. Yet this fucking moron used that word twice already in a row.

  “You haven’t even grown a nail since last year, pe-“

  “Juan,” she interjected coldly. “I am not here to listen to your invidious prattle, so you would do well in keeping that strident mouth of yours closed.”

  “What’s with that language, huh?” He growled. “Are you too good for us now?”

  “Yes,” Agatha answered without a second thought.

  “Listen here, you little sh-“ His words were cut off this time as suddenly there was a small agate embedded in the ground in front of him. The impact was fast enough to create a small dust cloud.

  “I have guests, so I would rather that they not hear your squealing,” the uniformed girl said sternly.

  “Oh, I just was going to punch you, but now,” the man-child summoned his agates on his palm, “now you are going to get it.”

  He threw that handful of agates like buckshot as he gave them the Speed command to every single one, but Agatha didn’t even blink at that. She wasn’t the same girl from a year ago – who would have not backed down from such a fight already – after her instruction at the academy, but now she wasn’t even the same girl from a month ago. Personal instruction from a miner had been very… educative.

  “Eh?” Juan mouthed in surprise as all his agates now suddenly halted midair.

  “Everyone present has seen that he has been the first one to attack me, right?” She said calmly, and a single nervous nod from a child was enough to bring a cruel smile to her lips.

  The trick that Hasel had recently taught her, Invert Speed Range, was enough to discombobulate the bully, but her next trick was even more amusing. Agatha changed the Speed of her series command for Summon, and in the next instant, all the agates in the vicinity were erased from existence, recalled to the bodies of their summoners.

  Her own included, of course.

  She didn’t even need to be told this. Hasel’s confession on the death of Christie’s mother had been quite explicit, both graphically but also technically. The miner had applied six commands to a lot of agates – and while the sheer thought of the mental strain already made Agatha’s head hurt – she had noticed how the man needed to protect his own agates to not be recalled. The young student didn’t have the luxury of protecting her agates as she had already reached her maximum capacity with that single series, but she didn’t need to either.

  The man-child was outright petrified after having his agates snuffed out, which gave Agatha enough time to resummon her agate and give it a Shape Control Speed series, perfect for slapping the shit out of Juan remotely.

  Smack! Whack! Thump!

  A beautiful orchestra of meaty impacts was heard by all the gathered villagers as Agatha telekinetically slapped the man with a hand made out of agate. She was merciful enough to add Control to the series; otherwise, the bully might have died. Seeing how his cheeks reddened in real time brought her indescribable pleasure.

  Agatha jumped the moment she felt a hand on her shoulder. She almost sent her agate there out of instinct, but thankfully, she turned her head faster than her violence-addled mind and saw Christie next to her.

  “I think he has learned his lesson,” her girlfriend whispered.

  “Oh,” the dirty-blond girl couldn’t help but blush when she realized she had shown Christie all of that. “I… I am sorry you saw that.”

  “Do not fret,” she now softly closed onto the seamstress-in-training’s ear. “I also got angry watching him insult you.”

  As Agatha saw those passionate agate-like eyes, she almost lost her control. She might not even have stopped at kissing if she started there, but by the thinnest threads of self-control, the villager was able to stay her ground. She felt shy enough when they kissed in front of Christie’s family. A whole village might have been too much for her once her clarity came back.

  The uniformed student cleared her throat and took a step away from the dressed redhead.

  “Let this be a lesson,” she acted as if she wasn’t blushing from Christie’s sultriness. “Even a soldier-in-training can be several times more effective in a confrontation than you might expect. So, for your own sake, try not to antagonize any if the situation does not demand it.” Agatha smiled radiantly, as Christie liked to say.

  If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

  These last few weeks… they had a lot of time to talk between themselves.

  The villagers looked at Agatha with a hint of dread, but that only brought her satisfaction. She hadn’t left Malachite with so much sourness in her body that she would actively torment them or abuse them – which in this case, technically speaking, had been self-defense – but she still took joy in transforming all that backlogged sourness into a more… burning entertainment.

  “Adrien, will you come with us?” Agatha shouted once she removed the villagers from her mind, leaving the defeated bully on the ground.

  “No, milady. I will remain with the carriage, if you please.”

  “Very well,” she nodded sternly.

  Depths, I love Adrien, she chuckled mentally. The old coachman had perfectly understood the role she was acting, and he had assumed unprompted one that matched hers.

  “Christie, may I guide you to my humble abode?” She offered her girlfriend a hand.

  The redhead let out a giggle as she covered her mouth with a hand. “You may.”

  Hmm, I think I am beginning to understand why Veronica is such an antagonistic bitch. It’s kinda intoxicating. With those sadistic thoughts, Agatha escorted Christie into her house. With her military uniform, she almost looked knightly, and she knew it, which made her mental image of escorting her beautifully dressed girlfriend even more delicious.

  When Agatha opened the door to her house, she found her mother having a bowl of stew for lunch. And then subsequently choking on it.

  “Hey, hey!” Agatha rushed for her mother and patted her on the back as the woman coughed. “Are you okay?”

  While still coughing, the blonde seamstress stood up, grabbed Agatha by the collar, and pulled her away into the other side of the room.

  “Why is Christina Valasela here?” Esmeralda half-whispered half-shouted.

  “Why shouldn’t she be here?” Agatha frowned.

  “I…” The green-eyed woman pinched her nose. “Does Hasel at least know she’s here?”

  “What does that have to do with anything?” The girl looked at her in complete bewilderment. “Why are you acting like that?”

  “You don’t understand, Agatha. That man’s crazy. He would do anything for his daughter,” she covertly pointed at the redhead with her thumb.

  “I do understand, Mom. I have gotten to know him,” Agatha stood up on her tiptoes and pressed her face against her mother’s.

  “No, you don’t!” Esmeralda’s whispers nearly stopped being so. “You haven’t seen what that man is capa-“

  “I am dating Christie,” the dirty-blond girl interjected, her voice raised.

  “Oh,” the blond woman blinked several times as she was petrified in her perplexity. She turned her head around and saw how the redhead was blushing, clearly having heard at least that part of the exchange. Esmeralda coughed and straightened her back. “Uhm… Is that true, Christina?”

  “Yes, it is, Miss Esmeralda,” the nouveau riche said with a satisfied smile.

  “Oh,” the seamstress grabbed her head and massaged her temples. “I… does Hasel know about this?”

  “Yes, my dearest father was the first one to hear about our relationship, and he approves of it.”

  “I… see…” Never before had Agatha seen her mother boasting such confusion. Even though she was only a seamstress in a backwater village, Esmeralda had always been a woman with her feet solidly planted on the ground. “Can you excuse us for a moment, Christina?”

  The redhead nodded, and the blonde didn’t waste a moment to pick up Agatha by the hand and lead her to the main bedroom. Esmeralda sat on the bed, not uttering a word, completely lost in thought.

  “Uh…” Agatha mouthed hesitatingly. She truly had never seen her mother like that, and… it scared her. All her bravado suddenly gone. “Are you… mad?” She asked that with a forming knot in her throat and a slightly blurred vision.

  “Mad?” Esmeralda raised her head and looked at her daughter. It didn’t take her even a second to stand up and lock her daughter into an embrace. “Oh, no, no. My baby, no. Why would I be mad at you?”

  “B-because I’m dating a g-girl?” She snorted between her stutters.

  “Oh, my little sapphire,” the brass blonde caressed the not-so-gorgeous mane of the girl. “You need not bother about such things.”

  “Everyone in the village al-al… always said I would have to be with a man. Marry to live better!” Agatha sobbed on her mother’s chest.

  “I never said that myself. Did I now, little sapphire?” Esmeralda continued to caress her daughter’s hair. “It’s not a problem at all that you will not get married to a boy, or that you do not even like them.”

  “T-truly?” The petite girl dug deeper into the chest, her small arms around the woman’s waist as she didn’t dare to look upward.

  “Truly,” the seamstress snorted warmly. “I always thought something like this would happen.”

  All that nervousness suddenly vanished, and now Agatha was frowning sternly at her mother. “Really? How?”

  “Mother’s intuition,” Esmeralda chuckled and cleared the tears out of her daughter’s eyes with a finger. “And, well…” Her voice cut out.

  “And what?” Agatha interrogated.

  “Nothing,” the mother chuckled nervously and led her daughter to the bed, making her sit next to her as she drew an arm around her and embraced her. “So that’s why you came here?”

  “Partially,” the daughter whispered as she pressed her ear against the seamstress’s chest. “I just didn’t want to keep secrets between us.”

  “Secrets between us, huh…” Esmeralda buffed. “I guess you are already at that age.”

  “What age?”

  “I… Do you want to know about your father, Agatha?” The two blondes looked at each other.

  “Uh… if I’m honest, I don’t really care.”

  The seamstress chuckled at that response. “I guessed as much,” she wiped a tear of amusement away. “Anyhow, I also want to spill secrets. No secrets between us, right?”

  “You… don’t need to, mom.” That was what Agatha honestly thought. Christie might have been happy that her father had opened up to her, but a part of her was scared that whatever secret her mother hid might make her hate her.

  “No,” Esmeralda grabbed her head and pressed their foreheads against each other. “I want to.”

  She then stood up and started undressing.

  “W-what?” Agatha blurted as she blushed. “What are you doing, Mom?”

  Such a scene shouldn’t have been as awkward or violent as Agatha had heard how parents would bathe with their children or change in the same room because they didn’t have space in their small homes, but at the same time, this was the first time she had seen any skin from her mother. Part of the girl’s aversion to nakedness was because her mother was very private herself.

  “Revealing secrets,” she answered mutedly.

  “I don’t want you to reveal those kinds of secrets!” The girl stood up, but as soon as she was going to walk out of the room, she was grabbed by the wrist. “Mom, I don’t want to look at you naked.”

  “You stupid daughter,” her mother scoffed. “What are you thinking? I’m not naked, turn your head.”

  Perhaps it was blind trust, but Agatha ended up caving. Her eyes shot wide open. Not because her mother was naked – which she wasn’t, as she still wore a brassiere – but because of the marks she saw on her mother’s skin.

  Scars.

  Circular patches of skin far paler than the surrounding skin.

  “Did… father did this?” Agatha asked aghast. She had never met or heard of her father, and now she was happy about it.

  “No! Not at all!” The woman had been previously covering herself with her arms in shame, but now she lashed out. “I mean…. No, Agatha. These were not made by your father. But… that’s how I met him.”

  “Er, what? How?”

  “Agatha, I was a soldier.”

  “Whuh?” Agatha blurted by reflex. “Y-you a… soldier?”

  Esmeralda bit her underlip and embraced herself, covering her arms and torso as much as she could. “Yes…”

  That… makes sense, Agatha realized. How a lone widower with a low income could have a house and maintain her daughter. Why she would always cover her body so zealously. Why she had partially been against her daughter going to the Skyscraper Academy even if it was the best opportunity she would ever receive in her life.

  Esmeralda, her mother, had been a soldier.

  “I see,” the girl mouthed. It was certainly a revelation, but not as striking as what she had heard from Christie’s father. In a way, having been told such a gruesome secret was what allowed her to now maintain her composure. It was a surprise, but that was all. A surprise. Not a horrifying secret, just trivia on her mother’s past. Considering she was also trying to be a soldier, Agatha had no right to comment on her mother’s past either. But that still raised questions. “Was my father also one?”

  “Yes,” the seamstress nodded. “His name was Fernando, and he was a sweet man.”

  Was. A powerful word in such a context. Agatha had always thought her father had abandoned her and that her mother just acted like a widower to ignore that, but in fact, her mother had always been one. It had never been an act.

  “So he died. In action, I presume.”

  Esmeralda nodded and whimpered.

  Whimpered.

  Agatha had never seen her mother cry, at least not for such reasons. Maybe out of pain from a wound or from laughter, but never out of sorrow.

  “He died when I had just gotten pregnant with you. I only knew because I hadn’t bled for a few weeks, but I hadn’t yet told anyone. We were both still active at that time, and we just were hopeless fools.” No longer was her mother the brass and radiant woman Agatha knew, but a widowed seamstress.

  Considering her mother was thirty-something and she was sixteen, Esmeralda had been little more than her age at that time. Depths, Agatha cursed as she realized that. Not every academy – or school for that matter – ended instruction at twenty like the Skyscraper Academy. Depending on the place and even time, some could be done as soon as sixteen. And they could be instantly drafted into the army.

  “Pregnancy and loss don’t merge well, and back then I was so… angry. That anger never vanished, really. I ran as far away from the frontlines as I could, hid myself in the midst of nowhere, and just…. tried not to think about it. Any of it. I just wanted you and me to be safe. I never told you about him because… well, he never had the chance to know about you. It’s stupid, isn’t it?” She chuckled grimly.

  “No, not at all,” Agatha swayed her head. It was her turn to hug her mother. “If anything, I’m glad you waited this long to tell me; otherwise, I don’t think I would have understood.”

  “That’s the problem, Agatha,” she heard teeth being gritted. “I wouldn’t have told you if you hadn’t opened up to me.”

  I really don’t care, but the girl knew better than to say those words. If she wanted her mother to care about her new relationship, then she ought to care about her mother’s past one.

  “But you did, and that’s what matters. The same could be applied to me, couldn't it? I could’ve just decided not to tell you.”

  “I guess,” Esmeralda chuckled as she noticed they were in the same situation.

  “So the reason why you hid your skin from me all this time…”

  “It’s because I was ashamed, little sapphire,” her mother said, smacking her lips. “I… knew that when you saw these scars you would have asked where they came from, and I didn’t want to affront the fact that you didn’t have and would never have a father when you inevitably asked.”

  Shame, yes, that happened to me too.

  “Mom, it’s okay,” Agatha smiled. “Yes, it’s a shame. But I’m glad we have talked about it.”

  “I still feel like I failed you…” The woman added.

  It was at that point when Agatha saw her mother – her paragon of wisdom and womanhood – deflated that she realized that perhaps adulthood wasn’t as straightforward as she had thought. She had already had an inkling of that as she had met her fair share of awful adults, but now it was a tangible concept. Esmeralda had taken drastic decisions, and while Agatha had somewhat paid the price as Malachite hadn’t exactly been a welcoming place to her, she also couldn’t be mad at her mother after what she had heard.

  When she thought of what would happen if she lost Christie, she felt an impossible fear and rage overtake her. And that was just imagining it. If it actually happened… her mother’s crash out would seem tame in comparison. Deserting and hiding in the woods? Hah. Cities would burn.

  But that was kind of her reality, a real possibility of the future. Both of them would become soldiers. If Agatha held onto the Skyscraper Academy, they might both end up becoming commanders, but even a commander wasn’t without their risks.

  “Do you…” Agatha hesitatingly mouthed as she fought her inner dread while embracing her mother, “...want us to stay for a day?”

  As if it were some sort of command, all the weakness in the seamstress’s body was recalled and all that remained was indignation. Esmeralda stood up, puffed her chest, and huffed as if to say: ‘How dare you?’.

  “No, not at all,” she swayed her head. “The academic year is going to start soon, and you all have to make your way to Knight’s Ascent. I also regret having to cut our talk short after having opened up, but you have to go.”

  But the seamstress-in-training knew better than that. Her mother was too clingy to kick her out after only a handful of minutes.

  Agatha crossed her arms and squinted as she still sat on the bed. “And the actual reason?”

  Her mother blushed upon getting caught in a lie. “It’s already embarrassing enough to have a rich friend seeing such a ramshackle house, but a rich girlfriend? You are killing me here, Agatha. My pride couldn’t allow Christina to stay the night here.”

  That argument could be easily dismantled, a shallow fallacy as even a tough bed would have been better than a diligence’s benches, if only because of the extra space and leg room. But Agatha didn’t bother to counter it; she was her daughter, and she also knew her fair share of pride.

  “Can I then make a different petition?” Agatha stood up from the bed, her tone far more formal. Suddenly, the uniform didn’t seem out of place but a well-deserved mantle.

  “Uhm… Sure. Let’s hear it out.” Esmeralda hesitated a bit. Just like Agatha hadn’t seen her mother show weakness, she hadn’t seen her daughter show formality.

  “Mother, I want you to become a maid in the Valasela Estate.”

  “No shot,” the seamstress instantly turned her down, her arms crossed. “Haven’t you heard anything I’ve said about Hasel?”

  “Mom!” The seamstress-in-training protested, her immaculate mask forgone. She threw a small tantrum as she stomped on the ground. “You are living in indigence here! Why are you even doing that to yourself? I don’t want to see you rot you here!”

  “If you saw how I lived when I was a girl of your age, you wouldn’t say that,” Esmerald snorted.

  “This isn’t a laughing matter, Mom! I really don’t want you to rot here…”

  “Oh…” Her mother’s face soured. “I know Malachite hasn’t been the best place for you, little sapphire, but it isn’t that bad for me at all.”

  “What does that even mean? You are saying it yourself. It’s not good, it’s just not bad for yourself. You are torturing yourself!” Something I, unfortunately, am very aware of.

  “I…” Esmeralda clicked her tongue. “Does Hasel know about this, or is this one of your ploys?”

  “The latter, but Miss Diorite and Adrien are getting old,” she was speaking out of her ass. Christie had told her that the maid was older than seventy, but she didn’t look past fifty. Especially with those arms wider than Agatha’s head. “There are only two servants maintaining the whole estate. Half that now that Adrien is out driving us. Don’t you think they need a bit of help?”

  “…I guess.” Her mother conceded.

  “And, let’s be honest, I am Christie’s girlfriend,” Agatha puffed out her chest with megalithic amounts of pride. “Even if you don’t get a job, Hasel still could offer one of the many rooms to the mother of her dearest daughter’s girlfriend. With that alone, you would still live far better than you do now.”

  “Hah…” Esmeralda sighed as she pinched her nose. “I’m not sure about the soldier position, but you certainly would make a great politician.”

  “And what does that mean?” The petite girl smiled triumphantly with her hands clasped behind her back while she swayed from side to side as she already expected the answer.

  “…I’ll think about it.”

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