Because She's Pitiful (2)
The Vladimir Empire lay in the southeastern reaches of the continent.
On the surface, the nation proudly proclaimed itself a multi-ethnic state, but in truth Humans made up roughly seventy percent of the population, Beastfolk another twenty, and the remaining ten percent was scattered among minority races such as elves, orcs, and demons.
Even among those minorities, the demon population was so negligible as to be practically nonexistent — and what few demons did live there were almost all slaves, invisible even to the official census.
And yet, for a people that barely registered on anyone's radar, the hatred aimed at demons soared clear into the heavens.
Still, the moment any demon from the Demon Realm laid eyes on Tia, they would know at once that she was no demon.
Aside from the pair of black horns growing from her head, Tia bore no connection whatsoever to demonkind. She was a dragon-human hybrid.
Yulia had probed plenty of people about it, discreetly, but not a single soul seemed to have ever heard of a dragon-human hybrid before. Most didn't even know whether a human could carry a dragon's child at all.
Under those circumstances, telling people that Tia was, in fact, the daughter of a dragon raised real doubts about whether it would be believed — and Yulia had no confidence whatsoever in weathering the avalanche of questions that would surely follow.
A tale of a woman who overcame a staggering difference in size to conceive a dragon's child was far harder to spin than the simple, plausible story of a demon newborn scooped up off the street. There was simply no better option.
Which meant Tia was a profoundly ambiguous creature.
One who belonged nowhere — unwelcome in the human realm, unable to melt into the Demon Realm.
One whose true nature was something so foreign that no one in the world could name it.
That was Tia.
"Why am I the only one who's different? What are these horns? Who am I?"
"......"
That was precisely why the question, asked through rising sobs, was so agonizing to answer.
What on earth was she supposed to say?
No matter how hard she wracked her brain right now, there was no way a brilliant answer would suddenly materialize after all this time.
It wasn't as if she could say: You're a dragon-human hybrid, sweetheart. Your mommy was suddenly raped by a colossal dragon, tried to abort you over and over, failed every time, and so she's raising you because she has no other choice.
But she was equally reluctant to give the answer she'd been handing out to everyone else — you're the demon I picked up off the street — because she couldn't bear to imagine how crushing the loss would be if Tia one day grew homesick for the Demon Realm, went searching for it, and was rejected by the very people she'd believed were her own kind.
She had known this day would come.
She'd had a premonition that Tia would one day be thrown into confusion over her own identity.
But this was far too soon.
She'd assumed only the girl's body was growing at an alarming rate — never expected that her mind might outpace even that.
For someone utterly unprepared, Tia's question landed like a threat.
It felt as though the girl's entire future hung on Yulia's next word, and that made it infinitely worse.
The responsibility pressed down so heavily that her chest grew tight, constricted, until she could barely breathe.
"Waaah?"
At the sound of that tearful voice demanding an answer, Yulia approached without a word and pulled Tia into her arms.
She needed time to choose her words.
But no matter how she churned her muddled mind, no satisfying answer took shape — she was only burning through meaningless seconds.
She wanted to cry, too.
"Are you... are you not my real mama?"
"Who said that?"
"A mishter shaid sho. He shaid you're not my weal mama......"
Which little bastard was it?
That bastard is going straight onto my blacklist if it's the last thing I do.
"Don't listen to that man. I am Tia's mama."
"Then what about theshe horns? Why am I different from you?"
"Well, you see... that's because you're special. You have horns because you're special, Tia."
"Weally...?"
Of course she was special.
How could the child of a dragon not be?
Yulia caught herself worrying whether wings might sprout from the girl's back someday, or whether she'd start breathing fire — and shuddered at the thought of how hopeless she'd be when the time came to explain the girl's father.
"So Tia isn't weird?"
"No. What on earth would be weird about you? You're just Tia. Our adorable, beautiful daughter Tia. And your mama loves you more than anything in the world. That doesn't change no matter what anyone says. Looking a little different doesn't matter one bit. What matters is that you're my daughter, and that I love you."
"Hnnngghhh......"
In the end, she'd talked in circles around it and delivered nothing but a vague, foggy answer.
Apparently it was enough for the moment. Wrapped in Yulia's arms, Tia finally let her tears pour out in earnest.
Yulia gently patted the girl's back and sighed in silence.
The future worried her far more than the present did.
For now, Tia merely wondered at her own appearance, at how different she looked from her mama — but once she grew bigger, what manner of terrifying questions would she come asking then?
Yulia couldn't picture herself delivering any clear-eyed answer to those, and the uncertainty made that future all the more frightening.
I regret it. I regret it so much......
In the beginning, she hadn't understood.
Hadn't understood at all what it truly meant not to abandon a child — to raise one.
And she had a feeling the price of that ignorance would only grow steeper from here.
As the night deepened, so did the atmosphere at Lyuba Tavern.
Once again today, Yulia was run ragged, summoned from table to table by an endless chain of call-outs.
Tia, sprawled across the bar table sipping milk through a straw, watched Yulia's retreating back as she was whisked off yet again, and her face twisted into a sulk.
"Oh? Tia, sweetie. Where'd that milk come from?"
"Mama gave it to me."
"Ah, from Yulia. Hm? But the milk deliveryman got hurt today — there wasn't any delivery. Where'd it come from?"
"Mmm......"
Tia breezily ignored the Boss's question, propped her chin on her hands, and let out a little groan of discomfort.
Lately, there were so many things she wanted to know.
And yet not a single person would give her a straight answer.
She'd heard the fragments — the demon thing, the adoption thing — but the moment Tia pressed for details, everyone dodged the question and laughed awkwardly into their sleeves.
"Hey, Tia! How about an arm-wrestling match with ol' uncle here? You win, I'll give you pocket money!"
"Weally?"
Out of nowhere, a male customer had plopped himself down at the bar table and issued his challenge.
At the word money, Tia's eyes underwent a startling transformation.
Money was what Yulia harped on about from morning to night whenever they got home from work, so Tia knew better than anyone that money mattered.
And this man was offering it just for winning an arm-wrestling match.
Tia did a few brisk stretches, loosening herself up for battle.
"Don't let appearances fool you, little lady — I'm the reigning champion of the neighborhood arm-wrestling tournament!"
"Tia can win!"
"Bwahaha! Now THAT'S the spirit!"
The man burst out laughing at the sheer audacity of the tiny hand shooting toward him.
Those dainty little fingers attached to that dainty little hand were simply too cute. He couldn't help himself.
When Tia fixed him with a ferociously serious glare, however, he clamped his mouth shut and took her hand.
Her hand was less than half the size of his — half of half, really — so his own hand ended up swallowing hers whole.
"All right, we start when uncle says so. Ready......"
"SHTART!"
"Hehehe. That's not very sporting of you, now is it?"
"MMNGGGHHH!"
At the word of start, Tia flushed scarlet and began to push with everything she had.
The man laughed on, utterly relaxed — until, a moment later, he registered what was actually happening, and bewilderment began to creep across his face.
Something was wrong here.
A child who looked barely two or three years old should have been able to shove with all her might without him feeling so much as a flicker. Instead, his arm was trembling uncontrollably, no longer able to hold.
"Mmmmmnnngh!"
"Uh? Uh-uh?"
"Wow. Look at this kid's acting. The shaking arm — totally convincing!"
"Anyone watching would think it was a dead-even match."
It was not a dead-even match.
Merely by attempting to resist, the man was already being drained, his strength siphoning away as his arm inched steadily toward the table.
He had, granted, been planning to throw the match — but this was a scenario entirely outside the script, and it flustered him badly.
The moment he gave up on holding out entirely, his arm swung over in one clean sweep, slamming into the table with a resounding thud.
"Tia wins!"
"Heeheehee! I won! I won!"
"This kid — you held out against me for a whole five seconds!"
"Ohh......"
Cheers erupted all around.
But the man alone, clutching his numb, tingling arm, found himself unable to smile.
While everyone else was playfully celebrating Tia, he alone was looking at her with eyes mixed of awe and fear.
"Beat the champion already! That's incredible!"
"Must be the demon blood! Kid's strong as an ox!"
"Because I'm a demon......?"
Tia's head tilted to the side.
Demon. That veiled, clouded name again.
But she knew from hard experience that if she pressed the matter here, the mood would turn awkward in an instant and everyone would scamper away from the question. So she couldn't bring herself to ask anyone.
Lonely.
Surrounded by all these people cheering and shouting for her, Tia felt, strangely enough, lonely.
"Tia......"
Watching the scene from a distance, Sasha let out a quiet sigh.
Her serving shift had just wrapped up, and she began making her way over to Tia in long, careful strides, taking pains not to spear any passing customers with her horn.
The girl was smiling on the outside — but that glassy, wounded look lurking underneath it was more than Sasha could bear to watch from afar.
"Tia! Want to go for a walk with your big sis?"
"Mama shays I have to get permishshion first......"
"Oh, come on. Going out with me is fine. Me and Yulia are super, uh, super close!"
Even as she said it, Sasha's conscience pricked her, and she stumbled over the words.
Thinking about it now, were she and Yulia really all that close?
When it came down to it, weren't they just coworkers who exchanged the occasional word — with Sasha's only real claim to fame being that one time she'd handled a nightmarish customer on Yulia's behalf? Her benefactor, at best.
But that hardly mattered at the moment, so Sasha shook the stray thoughts right out of her head.
"Wanna go! A walk! I'm tho bored I could die!"
"Where do you even learn these phrases......"
Tia rose to her feet with great dignity and stretched both arms out wide to either side.
A formal protest: lift me down from this chair.
Sasha tucked a smile onto her face, slid her hands under Tia's armpits, and lifted her down to the floor.
Taking the girl's small hand in hers, she headed for the back door, nervously watching Tia's tottering toddler steps the whole way.
"Whew......"
Outside the shop, in the back alley, Sasha reached for her cigarettes as usual — then flinched and froze at the sight of Tia's big, sparkling eyes fixed on her.
I absolutely cannot smoke in front of a child, she thought — even as her hands moved in precisely the opposite direction of that thought.
Before she knew it, Sasha had already lit the cigarette's end.
Startled at what her own subconscious had just pulled off, she rationalized that it would be a waste to snuff out a freshly lit smoke — and in the end, she couldn't quite bring herself to throw it away.
As Sasha took a deep drag and crouched down against the wall, Tia's head tilted curiously.
"I thought we were going for a walk......?"
"Sorry. The walk was just an excuse so I could have a smoke. But you wanted some fresh air too, right?"
"Mmmgh."
Tia's cheeks puffed out in a clear show of displeasure.
The outside she'd wanted wasn't this gloomy, cramped alley walled in on all four sides — it was the wide-open streets, full of people.
"Tia. Got something weighing on you lately?"
"......"
"Sounds like you do. Tell me about it. Big sis is listening."
Tia plopped herself down right beside Sasha.
She had plenty of worries.
Truly, so many.
But everyone — Sasha included, like all the rest — would only dodge and flee if she pressed too hard, and that frightened her......
"What are theshe horns? Why am I the only one with weird horns? Why doesn't Mama have any? What am I? Am I different from Mama? Isn't Mama my weal mama? Then who IS my weal mama?"
Before anyone could stop her, she was unloading the entire stockpile of questions she'd been hoarding for weeks, one after another after another.
Every last one a question that had never earned a clear answer.
Sasha, caught off guard, inhaled her smoke wrong and spent a good while doubled over hacking.
Heavy, thoughtful worries, for a child so young.
Sasha took another slow drag, exhaled, and finally parted her lips.
"You're not the only one with horns, you know. Look — big sis has one too."
"Oh. You do......"
From Tia's height, Sasha's horn was something she had to crane her neck back until it ached just to see.
Remembering that Sasha had a long horn of her own, Tia tilted her head all the way up and studied it for a while.
"Will Tia's horns get long like yoursh?"
"Hmm, who knows. Big sis is a Unicorn Beastkin, see? Look — that's why I've got just one horn, right here on my forehead. You've got two!"
"Then you and Tia are different?"
"We are. But horns aren't anything weird. They're something to be proud of. What do you think? Pretty cool, right? Horns. Aren't they?"
"Yeah, yeah! Sho cool! Super duper cool! Reeeally cool!"
The same little hands that had been fidgeting with her own horns just moments ago had somehow drifted down and balled themselves into determined little fists.
The truth was, even among beastkin, horns weren't common.
That long, imposing horn had earned Sasha more than her share of unpleasant experiences over the years.
But if it could do for Tia what it just had — wipe that complex right out of the girl's heart — then for today, at least, Sasha could look at her own complex and call it a point of pride.
"And as for your mama...... uh...... well, Yulia, you see......"
Her attempt at the next answer began to stretch thinner and thinner.
The question of whether she had any right to say this kept circling in her head.
Should I really be the one telling her this?
Isn't this a mother's job?
And it's only because that mother can't do her job that Tia's come asking me of all people.
Just as the warring thoughts were starting to give her a genuine headache, Sasha pressed out the shriveled stub of her cigarette and opened her mouth.
Worrying herself sick over other people's business was the one thing she couldn't stand.
"You're a demon, Tia. It's a race that lives far, far to the north, in a place called the Demon Realm — a really barren, harsh land."
"Then what's Mama?"
"Your mama is human. And from what I've heard — you lost your real mom and dad, and when you were left all alone, Yulia took you in."
Even as she said it, the doubt wouldn't stop gnawing at Sasha.
Was it right to state hearsay — something she only knew secondhand — as though it were gospel fact?
In the end, only Yulia, the girl's mother, would know the full story.
But leaving the poor girl to stew in it like this didn't sit right with her either.
"Why?"
"Hmm?"
"Why did Mama take Tia in?"
"Well......"
Sasha drew out the word and let out a long, deep breath.
The last memory she had of her own parents — that sneering, contemptuous look on their faces — surfaced, and her body went rigid.
The old memories came back: forging through the world utterly alone, with no parents, nothing, no one.
What if I'd had a mother like Yulia? she thought — and before she knew it, the words slipped out of her, words she didn't truly mean.
"Because you were pitiful."
Silence fell.
By the time the regret hit her, it was already far too late.