The conservatory was biting cold when Morwenna stepped inside, the air holding a stillness that felt almost brittle. The glass walls offered no protection from the elements, allowing only a pale, thin November light to filter through and cast the room in muted shades of grey.
A piano sat in the far corner, its dark wood polished to a mirror shine that reflected the overcast sky, though the lid remained closed and silent. Nearby, koi fish drifted within the depths of a stone fountain, their orange bodies moving with slow, lazy strokes through the water.
Morwenna didn't know why her feet had carried her here. She had been wandering the corridors while her mind drifted elsewhere, and now she found herself standing in the middle of the room, staring at the instrument.
In her past life, she had never touched a piano of this quality. She had seen them in films or in the homes of strangers, but she had never been given the chance to learn. The world of music had always been something that belonged to other people.
She walked to the bench and sat down, the wood feeling cold even through her trousers. When she lifted the cover, the keys appeared before her in a pristine line of black and white. She pressed a single key, and the note rang out, sharp and solitary in the heavy silence.
She pressed another, and then another, producing random sounds that held no melody or shape.
Yet she couldn't stop.
Her fingers began to move of their own accord, governed by a strange, deep-seated instinct. She wasn't telling them where to go; they simply moved.
The notes began to find each other, and while it wasn't a song yet, the sounds clearly belonged together. A shape formed slowly, like something rising from the depths of dark water, and she recognised the tune before her conscious mind could even catch up.
It was Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.
Jane had taught her this melody years ago, before the baths, before the fire, and long before the memories of another life had surfaced to tangle her identity. Her fingers kept moving while her mind went blank. It felt as if she wasn't the one playing at all. Her body and her hands remembered what her thoughts had forgotten, the muscle memory surviving the upheaval of her soul.
She played the song through once, and then again, the simple notes echoing off the glass walls. Her hands were shaking by the time she finished, and she didn't know why the simple act had affected her so deeply.
Warm, wet tears began to run down her face, standing in stark contrast to the cold air of the room. She couldn't understand the source of the grief, but she couldn't stop it either. The tears dripped from her chin and landed on the keys, yet she made no move to wipe them away.
. . .
Jane was leaning against the doorframe, watching her with a quiet, knowing expression.
Morwenna didn't know how long her mother had been standing there. She hadn't heard the door open or the soft fall of footsteps; she had heard nothing except the music and the ragged sound of her own breathing. Jane crossed the room and sat on the bench, pulling the girl into a firm embrace.
The child went stiff at first. The contact felt overwhelming—too warm and too close for a heart that had grown used to its own walls. She hadn't been held like this in her other life, and she hadn't let anyone get this near to her in this life. But Jane didn't let go. Her hand moved in slow, soothing circles on Morwenna's back until the girl's resistance finally broke.
The tears came harder then. Morwenna couldn't breathe or think. She simply cried, her face pressed into Jane's shoulder as her fingers gripped the thick wool of her mother's jumper.
Eventually, she hugged back. Her arms wrapped around Jane's waist and she held on tight, terrified that the woman might disappear, or that she might suddenly wake up in that lonely apartment again with no one to reach for her in the dark.
"Mom," she whispered, her voice broken and wet.
She hadn't known she was going to say it. The word just surfaced, unbidden and raw. Jane's arms tightened in response, and Morwenna cried louder. The sound filled the conservatory, bouncing off the glass and echoing in the cold, empty space.
Footsteps sounded in the corridor as someone approached, drawn by the noise of the girl's distress. Jane looked up to see Jack in the doorway with Saoirse standing just behind him, their faces etched with worry.
Jane simply shook her head, her gaze meeting Jack's. "It's fine. Go."
Jack hesitated for a moment before he nodded and stepped back, closing the door to give them privacy.
Morwenna cried until her throat felt raw and her eyes were swollen. She cried until there was nothing left inside her but a hollow, exhausted peace. When she finally pulled back, her face was a mess. Her nose was running, which she wiped with the back of her hand, and Jane's jumper was soaked through.
Morwenna looked at her mother's face, then at the piano, and finally at her own hands. A deep flush crept up her neck as the reality of her outburst set in. She had just called Jane "Mom," she had sobbed like a baby, and she had clung to her as if she were only five years old.
She was five years old.
But she was also so much more.
She squirmed on the bench, her legs kicking instinctively. She didn't know what to do with her hands, which felt clumsy and conspicuous.
Jane laughed softly, a warm sound that was barely more than a breath, and reached out to brush the damp hair from the girl's face.
"You are a mess," she said gently.
Morwenna's cheeks flushed a deeper shade of red.
"I cried too," Jane went on, her voice tender and steady. "After you were born. After the first bath. After you woke up. I cried many times, Morwenna."
The girl looked down at her hands. "I don't know why I did it."
Jane drew her into another hug, and this time, Morwenna held on immediately. Her arms slipped around her mother's neck, clinging without any hesitation. They stayed like that for a long while until the tension finally left the child's small frame.
When she pulled back, her face was still red, but the tears had stopped.
Jane rose and moved to the other end of the bench, lifting the cover from the keys once more. She didn't ask what had happened or why Morwenna had been upset. She only took in the puffy eyes and the flushed nose before offering a small smile.
"Would you like me to play?"
Morwenna nodded. Jane turned to the piano, her fingers settling before they began to move, and a quiet melody filled the room. It wasn't a song Morwenna knew; it was slow and ancient, something that seemed to settle into the very air around them like dust motes in a sunbeam.
She leaned her head against her mother's shoulder and simply listened.
. . .
Jane played for a while, the music remaining soft and steady. The koi fish continued to drift in the fountain, and the grey light through the glass didn't change as the morning wore on.
"You know about the Keith line," Jane said, her fingers still moving across the keys as the melody dipped into a warmer, lower register. "You know what Myrddin was, and what Fawarx and Aleahkys are."
Morwenna nodded against her shoulder, the vibration of her mother's voice comforting. "Yes."
"Then I will tell you about mine."
Morwenna lifted her head, her interest piqued by the shift in the conversation.
"The Evans line comes from two magical creatures. Both were female—a high elf and an elder dragon."
Morwenna frowned at that, her mind trying to work through the information. "Both female? Then how did they have a baby?"
Jane's hands stilled on the keys. She looked down at her daughter, her green eyes bright with quiet amusement. "They were magical creatures, ma chérie," she said gently. "The answer is magic."
Morwenna stared at her, unsure what to make of that.
Jane laughed and gave her a teasing look, one brow lifting as if she expected the girl to understand the mysteries of the world.
Morwenna didn't understand why her mother was looking at her like that, but her ears began to feel hot, and she squirmed uncomfortably on the bench.
Jane's laughter softened. "All right," she said, easing back into the melody. "I won't tease you anymore."
Morwenna turned her gaze back to the koi fish. They were still drifting, slow and orange in the water. "Are they still alive? The high elf and the elder dragon?"
Jane nodded. "Both of them. The elder dragon rests beneath our deepest grounds in France. She sleeps most of the time, but she wakes occasionally. When she does, she speaks to us. The high elf is elsewhere. No one knows where, as she doesn't wish to be found."
Morwenna thought about Fawarx sneaking into the manor at night to leave his heart blood in vials. She tried to picture a dragon beneath the earth—vast, still, and stirring only rarely to speak. "The elder dragon... can I meet her?"
Jane's fingers moved through a quiet chord. "Next year. When you are stronger, I will take you."
Morwenna nodded, holding tightly to the promise of that journey.
Jane let the music fade slightly before she continued. "We don't know the name of the first Firbolg-Born in our line. There are no records, and the ancestors never told us. What we know begins with Morgana."
She glanced at Morwenna. "She wasn't the first, but she carried the line forward. That's why we bear her name. LeFay."
Morwenna's brow furrowed. "I thought it was Evans."
Jane shook her head. "It's both. And it's neither. It's complicated, as many things are in our world."
She played a chord, the notes hanging in the air. "Do you remember Nicholas Flamel?"
Morwenna nodded, remembering the old man with the kind face and the way he had looked at her in the nursery.
"Do you remember his eyes?" Jane asked.
Morwenna thought back. His eyes had been green, just like Jane's and her own.
"Green," she said. "Like yours. Like mine."
"And when he left?"
Morwenna's frown deepened. "Blue. They were blue."
Jane nodded. "The Flamel family hides their true eye colour in public using potions or magic. The Evans family doesn't." She paused, then added more quietly, "Flamel and Evans are the same family. We split a long time ago."
"If you are the same family, why are your names different?"
Jane's fingers slowed, and the music softened to a whisper. "A long time ago, the LeFay name was hunted. Those who carried it were killed, and the family was nearly wiped out. Only two survived, a brother and a sister. They chose to disappear to protect the blood. The brother took the name Flamel, while the sister became Evans."
Morwenna stared at her in shock. "So Flamel and Evans are the same blood."
"Yes," Jane replied. "The same blood, just under different names."
"So we are not really Evans," Morwenna said, looking down at her small hands. "We are LeFay."
"We are both. The name changed, but the blood didn't."
Morwenna thought about Nicholas—his green eyes, his indigo brooch, and the way he had come the moment Roxane called.
"Why did the Evans line keep the green eyes? If the LeFay eyes are green, isn't it dangerous?"
Jane smiled. "Because the Evans branch was in France, and the hunters were elsewhere. Besides, the green eyes aren't common knowledge. Most people don't know what they mean; they just see a pretty colour."
She played another chord. "The Flamel branch chose to hide their eyes completely because it was safer for their work. The Evans branch chose to keep them. It was a risk, but we've survived."
Morwenna looked into her mother's eyes. They were bright green, exactly like her own.
"The Evans family has four branches," Jane continued. "Three are in France, with one acting as the main branch. The fourth migrated to England a long time ago."
Morwenna's breath caught in her throat.
"That branch produced Lily. Your cousin's mother."
Harry.
Morwenna hadn't thought about him in months. Her memories of her entire life were still jumbled, but she remembered his name and the tragic arc of his story.
"Harry," she whispered.
Jane nodded. "Harry."
"He doesn't know," Morwenna said. "About any of this."
"No. Not yet. He is tucked away from the truth for now."
Morwenna looked back down at her hands as Jane started playing again. The music was soft, filling the space between them comfortably.
"LeFay has green eyes," Jane said. "That's our marker. What is the Keith marker?"
Morwenna knew this answer absolutely. "The hair. Black hair with white or silver. Like Grandpa, like Dad, and like Saoirse."
Jane nodded. "The markers are how you recognise Olde Ones. Evans green eyes, Keith white streaks, Potter untameable hair. Each family has one that refuses to be bred out."
Morwenna touched her own hair, feeling the black strands and the white sections, and the silver streak at her temple. "I have both."
"You are a rare intersection of histories," Jane agreed, "because you carry both lines. You carry both lines."
She played a soft chord. "Olde Ones are descendants of Firbolg-Born whose blood has stayed concentrated. Their souls are still fully hard, and they live much longer than ordinary witches and wizards."
Morwenna thought about the numbers Saoirse had given her earlier. Seven hundred years. A thousand. Fifteen hundred. "How long do Olde Ones live?"
Jane let a soft chord settle beneath her fingers. "It depends on the blood, on the ancestors, and on how close one stands to the source." She waited a beat before continuing. "The Keith line is close to Myrddin Emrys. He was Firbolg-Born—phoenix and basilisk. Both are immortal. He could have lived without end, but he chose not to."
Morwenna's breath caught. "He chose to die?"
Jane nodded. "He had lived long enough. He watched everyone he loved grow old and pass on, and in the end, he decided it was time to follow them. The closer an Olde One is to that origin, the longer they live. As the blood thins through the generations, so does the lifespan."
She glanced at her daughter. "You carry both lines. Emrys and LeFay. Phoenix and basilisk. High elf and elder dragon."
Morwenna looked down at her hands. They were small and steady, the hands of a five-year-old with something vast and ancient stretching out before her.
"How long do they live?" she asked again, her voice barely a whisper.
Jane's playing softened until it was nearly silent. "Some reach five hundred years. Some a thousand. Some go beyond even that."
She let the last note fade into the cold air. "The markers show how strong the blood remains. When they dim, the blood has thinned and the soul softens. And when that happens, the years grow shorter."
Jane played the final chord, and the note hung in the air for a long moment before Morwenna's stomach gave a loud, unceremonious growl. The sound was prominent in the quiet conservatory, echoing off the glass walls.
Jane laughed.
"Okay. I almost forgot about your appetite."
Morwenna's face turned bright red, but she offered a sheepish, embarrassed smile. "I'm growing," she said. Her voice was soft, holding a touch of coquettishness she hadn't quite intended.
Jane looked at her, and her green eyes softened. Something warm, sad, and proud moved behind them. She stood up and held out her hand, and Morwenna took it without hesitation.
They walked out of the conservatory together, leaving the koi fish drifting in the fountain and the piano in its silent corner.
The door closed behind them, and Morwenna held her mother's hand firmly, refusing to let go.