I was just a boy—& still mortal—when I saw my mother take up the sword. A band of raiders from the cragged shores breached our walls. Two of them approached her, a savage hunger in their eyes I would learn much later. They never saw the flash of steel that severed their throats.

A glance over her shoulder, then she hurled herself a the scrum that enveloping my father, uncles & aunts, and older cousins. They made quick work of the brigands.

Seeing my shocked face, mother and father shared a glance. Her eyebrow arched, his head dipped in the slightest of nods. Mother approached me, then.

“You’ll train with me. We begin tomorrow, at dawn .”

All these centuries later, what would she say?

& What had a friend once said to me?

“I am haunted by how much our mothers do not know.”

Better late than never, right? My contribution to dVerse Poets’ Prosery.