Ilde thinks of it as language number four and a half for herself; she's lost most of the French that was one of her first languages, so it doesn't exactly count, as she sees it. She's lost most of the frustrated, petty blame that had led her to spurning it so thoroughly, too - she doesn't wonder if keeping a tighter grip on it might have given her and her mother the emotional vocabulary to speak to each other because it's an exhausting and pointless mental exercise, but she thinks sometimes about trying to get it back.

It's not impossible, it's just not something she's doing, however easy it is to forget that there's a difference.

I'm okay. And-- she is, on the scale of 'Ilde' to 'the apocalypse'. Today isn't the worst day. She has plans, and reality is mostly cooperating with her; it isn't perfect, but she doesn't expect perfect. She'll take okay, because it's better than what she can frequently expect, and because if it's not going to last then she'd better hold very fucking still and squeeze out of it what she can get while it does. She's not fine, but okay is okay. It's something. It's been mostly quiet here.

Raven's Gate is not, strictly speaking, the quietest place to live, but there are parts of the river that are less busy than others.