[b]Addis Ababa[/b]

Even in the pale morning sun, Queen Azima's skin felt cold. Numb. The air was cool and wet from the mist running off the marble fountain in the center of the garden, and the green grass was weighed down by dew protected from the sun by the shade of the palace itself. The building was smooth brownstone, with pearly white arches protecting the collonade. Birds sung peacefully in the trees, and the calm babble of the fountain should have made her feel comfortable, if not happy.

But it didn't.

Her mother-in-law - the Queen Dowager Elani - was one of the kindest women she had met. She had become her mother, in a way, in law and in her mind. [i]My real mother was taken away. Now i'm losing another...[/i] 

She had be raised with the royal children, spending her childhood playing in the gardens with Yaqob and pining over his older brother while her father, Ras Hassan, discussed politics. Hassan was a cold man, and fatherhood had not warmed him. She had learned later that he had not wanted to take her from her mother at all - the decision had been made by Yohannes. 'My fathers men don't want a Somali upstart to come before them' Yohannes had argued. He had not been the Emperor yet - just the governor of Wollo, with grand plans for the future that would follow his ailing father's passing. Hassan had risen fast, and his popularity with the Prince annoyed those who he threatened to replace. Old names, those that had followed Iyasu when his reign was still uncertain. They argued that Hassan was a thug, and the allegation that he had raped a woman in his home country of Somalia only fueled their campaign against him. Yohannes told him to marry the woman and adopt the child she claimed was his, but he proved to stubborn too marry. He took Azima and left her mother behind.

But Elani had filled that gap. She had always been a sweet woman, willing to treat the lost little girl from the shanties of Mogadishu with the same care she gave her own children. She had heard the homesick little girl when she was frightened and helped in any way she could as that same little girl grew into a headstrong, but lost, adult. Sadly, the world did not repay her kindness. A bullet ended her marriage, and the threat of war caused her oldest son to disappear - a disappearance that only Azima understood, but even to her seemed to have ended in death. A second bullet had nearly taken her second son from her, and even though he lived it had left him scarred and surly. She had lost so much, but now she was losing her self. 

The doctor was young - hardly twenty five if he was that old at all. His skin was the color of coffee and his eyes brown pearls behind a pair of glasses with circular frames. [i]Too young. What could he possibly know?[/i] He had came recommended by Dr. Sisi himself - the wealthy psychiatrist who had surprised the medical establishment across the world when he presented them with advances Azima didn't quite understand. He had spent the better part of a week interviewing Elani privately, and his diagnosis came as no surprise. Early onset Dementia. Her brain was dying and she was fading away.

"We can make her comfortable, of course." the doctor explained. "She will be aware of it at times, and it will distress her. But I can prepare a small team to help her cope."

"Will she need to be moved." Yaqob asked. He held Tewodros in his arms as the child slept. To Azima, it looked like he was holding him close to himself for comfort. [i]This bothers him more than it bothers me. This is his mother, and the last of his family besides Taytu.[/i] Taytu had meant to be there for the diagnosis, but work had taken her. There were reports of suspicious action being taken by the Spanish forces in the Mediterranean. An informant had sold information to several agencies that a Spanish commander had made his troops aware that they were planning to invade Africa. 

A warm gust caught the doctors coat, sending its open sides flaring like two white flags hanging from his shoulders. Underneath, he wore an orange sweater with a student's identification tag pinned to the chest [i]Dr. Malcolm Orji.[/i] He was charismatic in a soothing kind of way, but there was a subtle hint of distance in his eyes. Was she just thinking of Sisi? The Good Doctor - or so his students seemed to call him - was ice hidden a smile. He spoke like a thesaurus who's understanding of the world had came from reading a dictionary, but that wasn't what his ice was. It was hidden in his face. His smile was always the same, more condescending than warm, as if everything around him was a joke. And his eyes... he looked at people with the same focus he used to stare at a piece of art or a plate of food. He had done a lot for them, but what he truly felt was... Azima didn't like to think of it.

"Your home is large enough for us to take care of her here." the young doctor assured. There was a tenderness in his voice that made her comparisons to Sisi fade away. "And it will be better for her"