Broken Antler Fen And I'm so sick of crying, yeah

This was a mistake. It was too soon and the pups were too upset. Of course it was stupid to be telling them stories right now, especially about parents. She never knew the right thing to do, always caught up in childish things like this.

Maia felt a pang of pure hurt when that thought crossed because it was such a disservice to the memory of her sister. If there was one thing she and Wraen had always agreed on, it was that stories were more than that.

This entire situation was horrible. Maia was contemplating if she should just.... excuse herself for a moment when Eljay spoke up, and she looked at him as gratefully as someone reaching for a lifeline. She hadn't even fully realized he'd been listening. She was just about to open her mouth when another voice spoke up from the side, a little ways away. Jasmine.

Oh gosh. That reply tugged at her heart strings in a completely different way, one that Maia didn't expect. She looked at the pup and immediately knew that something about the story had stuck out to her. Immediately the storyteller blended with the mother in her and she smiled warmly, nodding. She knew how the story would end now. It was perfect.

You're right. She answered, shifting subtly in a way that hopefully would invite Jasmine wordlessly to come in closer. Then she glanced over at Eljay silently, nervous and hoping that this was right. Everything was so much harder now. It took a while, but she began to feel badly about the way things had happened. Her parents didn't understand, all they knew was that when she was in the sea, she wasn't with them. She hadn't realized before how much she was gone until that night when she discovered that she did miss them. And maybe they missed her too.

So the next morning, when they came, she told them. She apologized, but she also told them about the ocean, about the friends she'd made and how beautiful it was. How much she loved it and how good it made her feel, being down there and not having to worry about if she'd ever be able to fly. And then she asked if they, maybe, wanted to meet her friends too.

When she'd started the story, the dragon's parents had been somewhat faceless as characters. But she couldn't help, now, thinking of her own parents as she told this end. About how they'd reacted when she had told them about wanting to go. And then, Eljay and Weejay and their parting.

They had thought she was just avoiding them; they didn't realize how happy it made her. And when they visited and saw for themselves what it was like, and that she had such great friends, they never tried to make her stay again. They apologized too, and together they all lived happily, visiting often and sharing stories from sea and sky.

It really was a way better ending than it would have been if she made it more interesting. The parents could have been the villains, but that wasn't what they needed right now. And, honestly, it wasn't what Maia needed either.