The heavy iron latch clicked, and the thick oak door groaned softly as Elias and Elicia stepped back into the twilight of the living room. The sudden movement made me flinch. I immediately curled tighter into the corner of the sofa, yanking a large, soft throw pillow against my chest. I buried my face into it, my newly regenerated left arm and my right arm squeezing the fabric so hard my knuckles turned white.
I couldn't stop the tears. They soaked right into the pillow fabric as a quiet, shaky sob escaped my throat. My massive crimson blood wings pressed flat against my back under my dress, trembling with every uneven breath I took. I felt so small, stripped of my weapons, my armor, and the terrifying reputation of the Crimson Phantom. I was just a broken puzzle piece trying to hide from the brother who had seen the worst of what I had become.
Elicia's soft, familiar footsteps crossed the carpet first. She sank onto the cushion beside me, her warm presence instantly cutting through the freezing panic in my chest. She wrapped her arm around my shoulders, pulling me and the pillow close against her side.
"It's alright, little Ren, Big brother is not going to hurt you. He knows everything, and he's here to keep us safe." Elicia murmured, her voice a soothing, gentle balm that vibrated softly against my ear. She rubbed my arm, her crimson eyes looking up at Elias to guide him forward.
I kept my face buried in the pillow, but my ears strained in the quiet room, tracking the heavy, hesitant sound of Elias's boots as he slowly approached the edge of the couch.
Elicia shifted her weight on the sofa, sinking deeper into the cushions right beside me. She pulled my trembling form closer, her gentle hands beginning to rhythmically pat my back and smooth down the stray, disheveled locks of my hair. Her touch was warm, infused with a faint, comforting trace of her divine mana that worked to quietly soothe the frantic, racing pulse in my chest.
"It's okay, little Ren... just breathe, Everything is going to be fine. Big sister is right here, and no one is going to harm you or the baby. Just let it out." Elicia whispered, her voice a steady, unchanging anchor in the dim room.
I kept my face buried deep within the soft fabric of the throw pillow, my shoulders shaking as a quiet, hitching sob escaped my throat. My newly regenerated left hand clutched the fabric with a desperate, white-knuckled grip, the skin still tingling with the raw, hypersensitive energy of its recent reconstruction.
From the edge of the carpet, the heavy thud of Elias's combat boots finally came to a halt right in front of the sofa. The shadow of his towering frame fell over me, but the volatile, dark static that usually crackled around his silhouette was entirely gone. He felt completely deflated, stripped of his fearsome identity as the legendary Shadow Walker.
For a long moment, the only sound in the twilight of House 132 was my uneven, ragged breathing. Then, Elias slowly dropped to his knees, bringing himself down to my eye level.
"Look at me, Weird Eyes," Elias said.
The old, familiar childhood nickname cut through the thick fog of my panic like a physical blade. It wasn't the cold, authoritative voice of a Luminous Knight captain, nor was it the tone of an operative tracking a deadly S-rank target. It was the exact same voice from twelve years ago on the dirt roads of Allure.
Slowly, hesitantly, I peeled my face away from the damp velvet of the pillow. My mismatched jade-green and crimson eyes, heavily blurred with hot, unshed tears, locked onto his haggard features. He looked exhausted, the faint purple bruises of his own recent medical ordeal still lingering under his eyes, but his gaze was filled with a profound, crushing sorrow.
He slowly reached across the small gap between us, his leather-gloved hands carefully loosening my frantic grip on the pillow. He didn't flinch away from my exposed crimson wings, nor did he look at me with the clinical detachment of the Bureau. Instead, he slid his bare, uncovered palms beneath mine, gently lifting my hands into his own.
As his fingers closed around mine, a look of immense shock and relief flashed across his face. My hands weren't the icy, dead limbs of a reanimated corpse. Because of the accelerated pregnancy and the immense life force thrumming through my core to sustain the child, my palms were entirely, beautifully warm.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, Eirene... I'm sorry for not looking for you. I spent all these years chasing shadows for the Kingdom, thinking I was protecting the realm, while you were fighting through hell all by yourself. I should have been there. I should have found you before the curse took hold."
Elias choked out, his voice cracking as his thumbs gently traced the smooth, newly formed skin of my regenerated left hand. He squeezed my fingers, his head bowing slightly as the weight of his guilt finally broke through his stoic facade.
A fresh wave of tears spilled over my eyelashes, tracking down my pale cheeks, but the suffocating panic in my chest was finally beginning to dissolve, replaced by a heavy, numbing exhaustion.
Beside me, Elicia kept up her soothing, rhythmic patting against my shoulder, her presence acting as a bridge between the two of us, ensuring that the fragile peace in the room didn't shatter. She looked between her younger siblings, a soft, melancholy smile touching her lips as the fractured pieces of our family finally rested in the same space.
Elias let out a long, steadying breath, his grip on my warm hands tightening with an unyielding, protective resolve. He looked straight into my mismatched eyes, his expression serious, completely cementing the vow he had just made to Elicia outside.
Elias said softly, his voice echoing with the absolute finality of a big brother who was never going to let the world hunt his little sister again.
"Let's talk, Eirene, Tell me everything. We have all the time in the world now."