Dream and Memory

Character:

Grieving Mother

Grieving Mother is a human female Cipher from Dyrwood who can be added to your party in Act II when you travel through Dyrford Village. She stands near Winfrith’s Arms and Armory. She acted as a midwife in a local community and was blamed for the births of other Hollowborn children in her community. The Grieving Mother’s powerful cipher abilities cause the awareness and perceptions to slide off of her and she is difficult to recognize. Many simply see her as an unremarkable peasant woman, who is not worth addressing.

The Grieving Mother’s quest begins when she is first recruited. You progress through it by talking to her and learning more about her mysterious past. Since more of her dreams open up as the game progresses, it is not possible to complete her quest before Act III.

When you first speak to the Grieving Mother, you experience a dream about childbirth. After you’ve recruited her, ask her how you were able to enter her dream. Offer to share what you saw in her memories, and when she enters a trance, describe the details that you originally saw in the dream: a huge forest, silver adra, and a child that she was bringing forth.

You can then ask her about a place called the Birthing Bell. In the course of asking about her experiences, there and the “tellings” she would give of children’s souls, you learn that she was not always honest about what she saw. Confront her about this—and her fear of Watchers—and wait for Act II to progress further.

When resting during Act II, you’ll have an eerie dream about childbirth. Talk to the Grieving Mother again and ask about what she’s wearing on her wrist. Then ask why she’s wearing the birthing chimes. Follow the subsequent conversation, and wait for Act III to progress further.

During Act III, you have a dream about a Hollowborn birth. Talk to the Grieving Mother and tell her that you saw a Hollowborn at the Birthing Bell; she enters another trance, and in this case, you risk losing her completely if you answer her incorrectly. When the option “Your soul is strong” appears, choose it to guide her out of the trance.

When the trance ends, ask her what happened next and learn about her experience with the Hollowborn. You can ask her about the choices she made and influence her accordingly. At the end of this conversation, you can either convince her that what she did in her village was necessary or that she was wrong to control the villagers, no matter her reasons.

Endgame

At some point after you have the conversation about the Hollowborn, she asks you to wipe her memory so that she doesn’t have to remember what happened. If you erase the event from her memory, she returns to the Birthing Bell to await new mothers. If you refuse and force her to live with her memories, she returns to the Dyrwood and works as a midwife there.