"Of course you have to be individual. But you have to do it in a way that doesn't hurt others and keeps your word too," she said. My brother didn't think it was his fault when anything went wrong either," she said a bit tartly. "Wasn't his fault when he decided to abandon the woods, wasn't his fault when he got himself kidnapped by warrior goblins, or fell into the haunted marsh." She was a bit sharp, but not angry. "And oh how he was on about how it wasn't his fault when he promised to heal the blasted lands before all else, then decided to take a break to summon our mother to Fincaryia, and not his fault at all when his delay gave Rhita Gwar the opening needed to poison her, or when he abandoned his duties still longer to try and save her, or when he ignored the strong advice everyone gave him to do things in order and night fight the ogre Balor without having completed all the songs of wizardry." She popped a berry in her mouth and let the sweetness soothe her.

She shook out her curly mane and her face smoothed some. "But when he started accepting responsibilities for the results of his own actions? He saved the lands blighted by the old king. He saved the marsh ghouls that would have killed him otherwise, even though he was giving up his own life - or so he thought - to do so. He saved the last dragon of Fincaryia. He learned to become a deer. He met his older self. You can be spirited and individual and you don't ever have to be anything half so boring as normal. But you have to do it the right way. And if even my brother can learn that, so can anyone." She smiled at the end there, unaware how very much like her mother she looked then.