THE WINTERCHILD | onc 2021

iv. family

The family dinner was a longheld Allinos tradition. I could not say with any certainty who had been its progenitor, but its purpose remained constant. Together, the living generations of Allinos and their kin could gather and disseminate their learnings from battle and beyond. As the youngest, I was the last to graduate past the Academy walls, and I had witnessed the changing of many guards. At its height, the dinner had been a gregarious affair, rife with the boastful japes of my brothers and our cousin Mefornis, overseen by our bemused matriarchs.

Now with my brothers and Mefornis all graduated to battle, it had become a rather staid affair. More often than not, I only had my mother and Aunt Aenalik for company, and I had heard their various lessons a thousand times.

But Kanos's homecoming boded of more arrivals to come. A mage's retirement was no small matter, often both celebration and tragedy interwoven in one, depending on the circumstances. Aunt Aenalik had retired early enough that her partner Coriane survived to pass on her own Hunter wisdom. My mother had not been so lucky. I wondered what sort of circumstances had summoned Aunt Ferika back to the safety of Academy walls.

I arrived at the dinner to find Kanos in deep discussion with both Mama and Aunt Aenalik, but they hushed when they saw me. The adults having their own private conversations not privy for my childish ears was not a new occurrence, but my brother's involvement in such talks was.

"What is the secret today?" I scowled.

Kanos sighed into his hands, leaving the lecture to Mama. "Kaneiva," she greeted. I took my full name as the admonishment she intended and pursed my lips rather than pursue my grievance. "We are happy you have at last arrived to the family dinner."

"No one else?" I asked.

"Mefornis will join shortly, I am sure — he arrived not an hour ago," said Aenalik.

"And Kanal is still some days' journey away," Mama explained.

"What of the lady of the hour?" I asked. The table was set merely for five, and I frowned in consternation.

Mama looked at Kanos with a hint of disapproval, and I could not help but be gladdened that the ire was at last no longer directed solely at me. "You told her?"

"My sister asked why I had returned," Kanos replied. "I saw no reason to lie."

"Where is Aunt Ferika? She should be here for her own retirement, I imagine." I crossed my arms.

Aenalik glared first at me before she, too, narrowed her eyes at Kanos. "This is why we agreed to talk over this as a family, Kanostis."

"Mage Ferika is resting, Kanei," Mama told me at last. "You should know that, at least. Her retirement will be announced once the Elders feel she is ready."

It was not uncommon for mages to undergo long healing respites when they returned to the Academy. But the timing of her impending retirement and the solemnity with which Mama told me this news clued me to darker meanings. "And... what of Hunter Polix?"

I did not know them as well as my relatives did, but my family's hunters had, in a fashion, come to feel like family, too. Hunter Coriane always had an open invitation to these family dinners whenever she visited the Academy and Aunt Aenalik, her former partner. I imagined I would soon see Lumina, Kanos's hunter, and Everard, who partnered Kanal, sometime in the coming weeks as well. But Aunt Ferika rarely visited us without Hunter Polix in tow.

I looked to Mama with searching eyes, and she shook her head.

Loss was hardly new to us; to be a mage was to accept its inevitability. My father's death preceded my birth, and Aunt Aenalik's husband Doramis had died when I was a child. Some in the Academy believed it was this loss that had shocked my aunt into retirement before her fourth decade. She had survived the loss of brother and husband and did not wish to suffer the loss of partner, too.