Evadne slowly opened her eyes.
She was no longer in the Château de Chambord version of Solmara.
As her vision adjusted, she saw Uriel standing beside her, gently offering her a tissue. The woman's expression was calm, but her eyes held a glint of knowing.
"Did you find everything?" Uriel asked, helping her sit up properly on the therapy bed.
Evadne exhaled, her eyes still distant. "I think so."
Then she looked Uriel in the eye. "Did you know?"
Uriel smiled, serene, almost too serene. "Know what?"
"That the soul that occupied my original body in Solmara… was my sister. Ceres."
Instead of answering, Uriel countered with a question of her own. "Do you know why angels fall from grace?"
Evadne blinked. "Because they sided with Lucifer?"
"No," Uriel replied softly. "Because they committed one of the Seven Deadly Sins."
"Pride?" Evadne guessed.
"That's what most would think," Uriel said, her smile turning sad. "But no. The most common sin among angels… is envy. A lot of fallen angels envy humans."
That made Evadne frown. "Envy? Why would angels envy humans? We're mortal. We live short, painful lives. Angels are immortal."
Uriel looked at her with the eyes of someone who had lived far longer than eternity. "Because humans have will. The will to choose. The will to feel… especially to love."
She paused.
"Angels can't do that. Do you know why?" Uriel asked gently.
Evadne shook her head.
"Because if we were allowed to love," Uriel continued, "we would become biased. We would choose the ones we love over the commands of the Creator. We wouldn't be able to carry out our purpose. That is why our emotions are muted. Controlled. Sacrificed."
"I see…" Evadne whispered, nodding in understanding. Then her voice turned sharp again. "But that still doesn't answer my question. Did you know that my sister Ceres was in Solmara?"
"It does answer it," Uriel replied with that maddeningly calm smile.
Evadne scowled.
"If I had told you," Uriel continued, "then I would have been biased. Toward you. Toward your healing. And if I had interfered, you would've rushed your process. Pushed your limits. Forced yourself to go through therapy sessions even when your body and mind weren't ready."
Evadne rolled her eyes in surrender, annoyed but no longer angry.
Uriel was right.
She always was.
With a huff, Evadne followed her out of the therapy room. Outside, waiting anxiously, were her parents, Romos and Cielo. Their faces filled with concern.
"You've waited a while, Mr. and Mrs. Monteverde," Uriel greeted politely.
"No trouble at all, Doctor," Romos replied, standing.
"Hon, are you okay?" Cielo rushed to her daughter the moment she saw the redness in her eyes.
Evadne gave a soft, tired smile. "Never been better, Mommy."
Uriel nodded. "This was our final session, Vee. It's been a good ten months."
She turned to Romos and Cielo with a gentle assurance. "Rest assured, she won't have any more serious episodes. If she ever acts out again… well, let's just say your daughter is spoiled and likes attention."
"Hey!" Evadne pouted. "You're not supposed to tell them that!"
Her parents chuckled at her reaction.
Romos looked at the doctor. "She's really better now?"
"There will still be nightmares," Uriel said honestly. "That's normal. But nothing like before. Vee can live a normal life now, well, as normal as someone like her can." She gave Evadne a teasing glance. "Except when she's being difficult. Because she does like being difficult."
"I'm giving you a one-star professional review," Evadne muttered with a smirk.
"My results speak louder than your one-star," Uriel replied with a chuckle, then her expression turned serious. "You're free now, Evadne. No more appointments. No more sessions. Go live your life."
Evadne hesitated for a moment… then stepped forward and hugged her tightly.
"Thank you," she said quietly, but with heartfelt sincerity.
Uriel held her for a beat, whispering softly, "You're welcome."
Uriel practically pushed Evadne out of her clinic in a joking manner, making it very clear, again, that she was not to come back for another appointment.
As they rode in the Monteverde family limousine, Evadne glanced up from her folded hands.
"Mommy, Daddy… can we visit sis?" she asked softly.
"Of course, hon," Romos said immediately. He leaned forward and instructed the driver to take them to the mausoleum of Ceres and Zeus.
After Zeus's death, the Monteverde and Falcon families had jointly decided to build a mausoleum on Zeus's private estate, right where the mansion he had planned for himself and Ceres still stood, unfinished. They had Ceres's remains moved and buried beside him, together in death the way fate had denied them in life.
A rotating staff of guards and caretakers watched over the grounds. Despite the years that had passed, visitors still came. People still remembered them, some with reverence, others with remorse.
The three of them stood in front of the tombs, offering prayers in silence.
It had been years since they last stood here. Their move to France had distanced them not only in miles but also in grief. But since returning to New York, Romos and Cielo had made it a point to visit regularly, never letting a week pass without paying their respects, even if just for a few minutes.
Then, quietly, Evadne broke the silence.
"Do you know what my last dream was?"
Her voice was soft, almost unsure.
Her parents didn't answer right away. They had never asked about her nightmares, never wanted her to relive what tormented her behind closed eyelids.
Cielo looked worried. "Hon, you don't have to tell us. Not if it's painful."
"This one… I want to share," Evadne said, her eyes lingering on the massive portrait that hung between the two tombs. A portrait of Zeus and Ceres, frozen in time, in a love that never saw its ending.
"It wasn't a nightmare like the others," she added.
"Really?" Cielo said, her voice catching. "But you were crying…"
Evadne smiled gently. "In the dream, I was in a palace. Not just any palace, it looked just like the Château de Chambord. But it was in a world called Solmara."
Her parents exchanged a glance, watching her carefully.
"I met someone there," Evadne said, voice steady but emotional. "I met big sister Ceres."
"You did?" Cielo's voice cracked, unable to hold back her emotion, even if it was just a dream.
Evadne nodded.
"And you know what she was?" she asked. "She was an empress. They called her Empress Ceres Evadne of Aquilonis."
Romos and Cielo smiled through their tears, hearing their daughter speak as if she had seen a glimpse of a happier fate.
"We talked," Evadne continued. "She told me things. Big brother Zeus was there too, though they hadn't met yet in that world. He's a demon lord there… but she already knew. She said she would see him soon."
Then, with a warmth that filled the air despite the sorrow surrounding them, Evadne shared what Ceres had done in that strange, magical world.
How she had magic.
How she invented underwear, because none existed in Solmara.
How she introduced black pepper, golden cherry blossoms and apples.
How she saved commoners from being sacrificed in a blood ritual, a ritual the nobles believed would awaken a Holy Beast, Seiryu, to bring wealth to their poor kingdom.
How she built orphanages for the children who had lost their families during the Annual Monster Expedition.
How, through her vision and heart, Aquilonis, once the poorest of the six human kingdoms, was now rising to become the richest.
As Evadne spoke, Cielo could no longer hold back her tears. Romos, too, silently wiped at the corner of his eyes.
Because even in a dream…
Even in a far-off, impossible world…
Their eldest daughter, Ceres, had found a way to live fully. Boldly. With compassion and power. Just like she always would have, if only she had been given the time.
Evadne continued sharing her dream, her voice soft but unwavering.
She told her parents how she had explained everything to Ceres, how they had to leave for France because of her medical condition, how they had stayed there for almost fourteen years, and how it had barely been a year since they came back to New York. She talked about the people they met, the life they had tried to rebuild… and then, of course, she told her about Uriel.
"Ceres laughed when I told her Uriel is a total scammer," Evadne said, smiling faintly. "Her professional fees are crazy expensive, and that meditation candle she charges a hundred bucks for? It's literally two dollars in bulk."
Cielo chuckled through her tears, the image too vivid not to picture.
"And I told her," Evadne added, a playful glint in her eye, "how I keep getting Hades into trouble. Especially when he pisses me off."
Romos snorted. "I'm sure she enjoyed that part."
"She did," Evadne nodded, her smile fading into something more tender. She reached out and took both of her parents' hands, gripping them gently as her tone shifted. "Before the dream ended… she asked me to tell you something."
Romos and Cielo froze, their fingers tightening slightly around hers.
"She said she was sorry," Evadne whispered, her voice now trembling. "For leaving you so suddenly. For not even getting the chance to say goodbye. She said… she loves you. So, so much."
Cielo covered her mouth with her free hand, the tears already falling again.
Evadne blinked back her own tears as she finished, "And she said… you don't have to worry about her anymore. Because she will live a long, full life in Solmara. Until she's a hundred and one years old."
That broke something inside Cielo. She wept openly now, the sound of her sobs echoing inside the still mausoleum. Romos didn't even try to hold back. He reached out and wrapped his arms around both his wife and youngest daughter, pulling them close as he looked up at the portrait of Ceres.
In that moment, something inside him shifted. A weight, one so old and so deeply buried, finally lifted.
He had carried it for years. The grief. The guilt. The silent agony of having to bury his child. Parents were never supposed to outlive their children. They were supposed to grow old, surrounded by family, until it was their time.
But Ceres had been stolen from them. And even in the happiest moments of their marriage, the most peaceful days of their lives, there had always been that lingering void. A silent ache.
And yet, now… with Evadne's dream, it felt, for the first time, like they could finally breathe.
That maybe, somewhere beyond this world, their daughter was not lost. She was simply living differently.
She would always be in their hearts. In their memory. And now, perhaps, in another world too.
"We love you too, sweetheart," Romos whispered, his voice hoarse with emotion as he held his family tightly, his gaze still fixed on the portrait of Ceres. "Very, very much."
Cielo cried harder, but this time, her tears were no longer filled with pain. They were soft. Warm. Liberated.
When the three of them finally stepped out of the mausoleum, it was with hearts lighter than they had ever expected to carry again.