Chapter 132: WEEKS THAT BECAME FOUNDATIONS

Three months passed without ceremony.

No alarms. No threats. No sudden shifts in the air that made us brace for impact.

Just life.

And somehow, that felt more extraordinary than anything we’d survived before.

The baby—Elena, as Adrian and his wife finally named her—grew fast. Not unnaturally so, but with a steadiness that mirrored the way our household had found its rhythm. She slept longer now, laughed more often, and watched the world with eyes that seemed far too thoughtful for someone so small.

Her magic stayed quiet.

Not absent—just… patient.

Which felt right.

The kids adjusted in their own ways. Aria took on the role of joyful helper, eager and intuitive, always the first to notice when Elena needed calming. Arianna became less obsessed with documenting and more with understanding, often sitting beside the crib simply observing, her notebook forgotten on the floor. Arian refined his protective charms until they were barely detectable—woven so gently into the house that they felt more like intention than magic.

Cassian, shockingly, became reliable.

Not responsible—let’s not exaggerate.

But present.

He learned how to warm bottles without setting off alarms. He memorized Elena’s favorite lullaby (badly). He even stopped narrating every dramatic moment—at least when she was asleep.

Adrian changed the most.

He stopped hovering.

Not because he cared less—but because he trusted more.

I watched him one evening, sitting on the floor with Elena propped safely against his legs, talking to her in a low, steady voice about nothing and everything. He wasn’t calculating. He wasn’t guarding.

He was simply there.

Lucian noticed it too.

“She grounded him,” he said quietly as we watched from the doorway.

“No,” I replied. “She gave him permission to stop being afraid.”

The house felt different now.

Lighter.

Not because the past had disappeared—but because it no longer pressed its weight into every corner. The Mercer chapter had truly ended. The legacy was no longer something we protected with clenched fists.

It lived.

In laughter.

In bedtime routines.

In small hands gripping bigger ones.

One afternoon, as sunlight poured across the living room, I found myself alone—rare, precious. I sat with a cup of tea that stayed warm long enough for me to finish it.

That alone felt like progress.

I thought about everything we’d been.

About who I was when fear still dictated my breathing.

And I realized something quietly profound.

I wasn’t waiting for the next threat anymore.

I was planning futures instead.

That night, Lucian and I talked long after the house fell asleep.

“What do you want now?” he asked, voice low.

The question startled me—not because I didn’t have an answer, but because no one had asked it in a long time.

“I want normal days,” I said slowly. “I want celebrations that aren’t reactions to survival. I want our kids to grow without ever knowing what it feels like to look over their shoulders.”

He smiled softly. “We did that.”

“We’re doing that,” I corrected.

He reached for my hand. “And when they ask about the past?”

I exhaled. “We’ll tell them the truth. Not the fear—just the lessons.”

Lucian nodded. “Then we’ve done our job.”

Spring came quietly.

The Memory Garden bloomed fully for the first time—daisies bright and unapologetic, lavender thick and calming, sunflowers turning faithfully toward the light. Elena lay beneath a shaded canopy, cooing softly while her cousins debated which flower best represented courage.

Cassian argued for the sunflower.

“It’s tall. Dramatic. Impossible to ignore. Much like myself.”

No one disagreed.

I stood there, watching them all, heart full in a way that didn’t ache anymore.

This wasn’t an ending.

But it was the beginning of one.

A soft descent toward peace.

A winding down of battles that had already been won.

And for the first time, I didn’t feel the need to brace for what came next.

I felt ready to welcome it.