“I have news,” I whisper. Hurt feelings like a drop of ink in a glass of clear water, unfurling, tainting a moment that should be a joyful reunion.
“Oh?” Tovian arches one eyebrow.
“I’ll tell you in your room.”
“Our room,” he corrects me.
“Right.” It sure as hell will be, once he knows the truth. The real challenge will be getting my people to accept him.
It might cost me the crown.
So be it. I’ll pay the price to have Tovian at my side. I never cared about sitting on the Myseci throne anyway.
It was a choice I always had to make, and Zosia never did.
If—whenwe get her back, I’m going to make sure she gets the chance to make every choice on her own terms. I’ll fix the damage I caused or die trying.
I glance warily at my old friend, now a stranger.
At closer range, I can see the pink raised scar above his temple, where I drilled into his cracked skull and prayed he’d live through the ordeal. The hair I shaved that night has grown back, as unkempt as ever, with a thick section falling over the injury and partially covering one blue eye. It lends him a feral, suspicious aspect at odds with the eternally optimistic boy I grew up with. Back then, no obstacle was too difficult for him to overcome through sheer willpower.
Now? There’s a darkness to him. Seething anger just beneath the surface. He’s as deadly as ever, but now, he doesn’t care whether he lives or dies.
We took that beautiful, headstrong boy and molded him into a killer. We kept him to ourselves because we knew what he was. Determined. Talented. A once-in-a-generation athlete and warrior. We did it with the best of intentions, and we were totally, completely wrong.
It’s the same thing we did to Zosia. Pressed her into the shape of someone she never wanted to be. Told her she had no choice.
We were wrong there, too. She always had a choice, and the harder we pushed, the more likely she was to make the worst one. We set her up for failure. Her father, especially, but all of us had a hand in making this mess. The repercussions are falling hard upon our people, but perhaps hardest on her. If she’s alive, she’s the one who will have to make this country new…and we’ve given her every reason to despise the role she’s fated to play.
What if we’d all simply gotten out of Zosia and Lorcan’s way? Let them find one another and fall in love on their own terms? Would they have met this challenge hand-in-hand?
Would Zosia have found in him the support she didn’t get from anyone else?
She’s the last of her line. Without her, this island might still exist, with people still living here, but our culture and history will be destroyed. There’s still a chance to save it.
Maybe. It’s up to Lorcan now.
I just hope Zosia is still alive. If she is, there’s hope for our collective redemption. Mine, most of all. If not…
I don’t know how I’ll live with this guilt.
#
“Go on, Sunshine,” Tovian says tiredly. “Tell me your secret.”
“I’m pregnant. It’s yours. Obviously.”
This isn’t as easy a conversation as I envisioned. I’ve waited weeks for him to get back so I could have this talk in person. I wonder if I shouldn’t have told him over the phone.
But then I wouldn’t have been able to gauge his reaction.
Tovian blinks. He blinks again. Then a huge grin cracks across his face. He positively lights up.
Everything inside me loosens at once. A rush of joy so intense I can hardly contain it all sweeps through me. He’s happy. Clearly, obviously happy.
But oh, Reila save me, the timing is so messy.
Tovian scoops me into his arms. I lock my ankles at the small of his back. We kiss and kiss this way, with his hands under my ass and mine in his hair.
