No News is Bad News

"So, are you going to tell me what's going on with Rain or do I have to guess?" Sarai placed one hand on her hip.

Noble glanced back at the register. Pillow was dutifully taking orders once again, leaving the owner of the shop free to chat. And by the determined look on Sarai's face, the woman wasn't going to leave without at least some semblance of an explanation.

Noble motioned to the seat recently vacated by the fleeing teen.

"You don't have to guess. It isn't a secret or anything."

Taking a sip of warm tea, Noble smacked her lips. It was delicious. If only her story could be as sweet.

"Ever since we decided that we are moving, Rain has been on a mission. She has a checklist of things she wants to do before she leaves the waking world, possibly forever. Some of them are simple, like getting her favorite ramen or going to the park we visited when she was little, but one of the things on the list was finding out more about her family." 

"What does she want to know about you that she didn't already?" Sarai tilted her head. 

Noble swallowed. "Not me. Her biological family." 

"Oh." The baker had temporarily forgotten that Rain was adopted.

The precious teen wasn't treated any differently than the twins, and some of her expressions even mirrored Noble's. Aside from Rain's complexion, there was no indication that the two were not blood-related. 

"I take what you found out wasn't good?" Sarai bit her lip. 

"Worse than that. We got almost no news at all. I had no idea that as soon as adoption papers go through or the child ages out, the record of the individual is deleted from the orphanage's database. They just don't have enough space to keep long-term records. And the government simply doesn't have the resources to keep those systems updated for noncitizens. Ugh, I hate that term..." Noble clicked her tongue. 

People were people, weren't they? But in the Waking World and the Dream Realm, status mattered. The government had to support the best and brightest, and that meant there were not enough resources to go around. 

Noble rubbed her forehead. "Fort did all he could. He pulled every string. But you can't get information that no longer exists." 

"But you said almost no news. That would mean you found something, right?" Sarai tapped the table gently. 

"We couldn't track down Rain's records, but we were able to track down the facilitator of the orphanage at the time, Opal. She told Fort that Rain's mother died of some illness," Noble sighed. 

"That is news, at least," Sarai tried to comfort her friend, but Noble shook her head. 

"It could be true, but Opal only said that after Fort grilled her with a dozen other questions. He got the impression that she would say almost anything to end the conversation. Still, he gave the information to Rain last night." 

"Poor Rain..." the baker looked to the door where she had last seen the girl. 

Rain had taken the news with a brave face, but there was no closure to her query. Her biological mother and father still had no names and no burial place. It was possible that no one alive had any memory of them at all. 

Noble herself had tried to wrack her brain for any memory that might be helpful. On their way out of the orphanage on adoption day, Noble had let Rain go and say goodbye to the people she had met there.

While she hadn't gone in to pry, Noble had felt all of the emotions. Even though the girl hadn't really spoken at the orphanage, she had been well-liked, loved even, by some of the other children. 

Now, Noble wished she had memorized their emotional signatures. If she could track them down, maybe they would have an inkling about her daughter's early life. 

Alas, the new mother had been so wrapped up in her own thoughts and feelings that those details were lost to time. 

In the end, it might not have mattered at all. That didn't stop Noble from blaming herself a little for her lack of initiative.

"Poor Rain indeed," Noble hated when her children were sad. 

She would do almost anything to fix the problem. To repair what was broken. To recover what was lost. 

But Rain was not a child anymore, and some things were not fixable. That was life. 

All Noble could do was be there to help her child work through the pain. 

There was a lot of pain. 

"I know you don't need my advice, but maybe taking her to the outskirts before you leave wouldn't be the worst idea? It could jog a memory hidden away," Sarai suggested. 

"I had thought of that. But the outskirts are so big! It would take a lot of time to comb the area closest to where we adopted her. I also thought of taking her back to the orphanage to give her some closure. But when I mentioned it last night, Rainy turned me down." 

Sarari furrowed her brow. "Too traumatic?" 

"Maybe. I got the impression that she didn't want any false hope. I can't blame her."

In truth, Noble wasn't sure how she would feel when Fort came back with the results from Rain's request.

Would she feel jealous of the parents who gave birth to such a wonderful young lady? 

In the end, Noble was happy that she wasn't petty. Rain's first mother and father had given Noble a most precious gift. She had nothing but gratitude for them. 

It would have been nice to visit their graves to thank them properly. The appointment was long overdue.

But it wasn't meant to be.

Noble felt a small sense of loss at the missed opportunity, but it was nothing compared to the dark-haired teen.

'Maybe we could donate a tree in the outskirts in their honor?'

Noble's thought was cut short as the front door of the bakery opened. A man with hair the color of straw and alert blue eyes sauntered in and joined the line. What caught Noble's attention was not his looks, though he was incredibly handsome even with his well-trimmed beard. Instead, it was how nervous he seemed despite being immensely powerful.

He even looked over his shoulder once or twice, further cementing Noble's belief that something was amiss.

"Sarai, I don't want to worry you, but…"

"I see him too," the baker tensed.

They watched in silence as the stranger got to the front of the line. Instead of ordering, he got into a hushed conversation with Pillow.

Ignoring how nosey it was, Noble strained to hear what the two were saying, but it was no use.

"He's using some sort of Memory to block sound," Noble noted as she continued to watch out of the corner of her eye.

"I can't take it. Pillow looks out of his depth. I'm going over to…" As Sarai stood, the store manager broke and pointed her way.

The stranger strode over and gallantly dipped his head. "Master Sarai?"

"That's me," the redhead raised one eyebrow at him.

"I'm Master Roan," the handsome gentleman flicked his eyes to Noble and then back to Sarai. "May I have a moment of your time? I'd like to speak to you…privately."