No. Notimpossible.His smile was exactly as it should be.
Lu hadn’t been able to tell him about Tom yet. She wasn’t sure, at this point, how she ever would. For now, Teo had settled into the suite of rooms she shared with Kari in the castle.
“Do you hate him? Tom, I mean,” Lu whispered.
A pause, and Kari dropped her chin, meeting Lu’s gaze.
Those were definitely tears. A lingering grief.
“Nothing is that simple, Adeluna,” Kari returned. “Especially not your father. But at the end of it all, he gave me you.” She cupped Lu’s face in her hands. “And that”—she inhaled, the breath tripping—“is all I need.”
Lu smiled. She smiled through her tears. She smiled through the broken pieces of her heart that would never truly heal. She smiled through scars and memories and pain, through aches that were as familiar to her as her mother’s face.
Lu smiled and, impossibly, her smile felt as large as Teo’s.
Devereux Bell was nineteen, and he was happy.
“Here, help me lift this—ohh, that’s right. You can’t.”
Vex shot Nayeli a look from where he sat on a crate, sorting through a stack of nets to find the ones that hadn’t been damaged beyond repair. Ahead of him, Nayeli half lifted a broken barrel, and she sagged, overdramatically acting as if she’d drop it.
“Really?” He scratched at the bandages under his shirt. “Sticking with the injury jokes pretty hard, are you? You’ll have to find something else to mock when my rib heals.”
Nayeli shrugged and dropped the barrel into the pile of rubble she’d made. “Well, if you could handle your magic like anormalperson, you wouldn’t have to heal on your own. I have weeks ofpoor broken Vexjokes ahead of me.”
Vex made an inappropriate gesture at her. But he smiled.
Yeah, he did have weeks of healing ahead of him. Weeks of what he felt now—itching along his nerves, wounds binding together.
His body, working to make him stronger. His body, doing amazing things.
“What did she say?”asked Ben, through the Budwig in Vex’s ear.
“Ben’s not yet to Argrid. He says he’ll send his armada back to Grace Loray to kick your ass for me,” Vex told her.
“Don’t promise things like that! It’s too fresh still.”
“Kidding.” Vex waved his hands, looking around at anyone who might’ve overheard. But the only people nearbywere other raiders, focused on cleaning the wharf. “You hear, everyone?Kidding.Ben has no plans to send an armada to Grace Loray. For now.”
“Vex!”
“Seriously, what’s with you?” Vex adjusted the bean in his ear. “Gunnar not calming you down enough?”
“Hilarious.”
“Hey, you went six years without my delightful personality in your life. Gotta make up for lost time.”
Cansu came up behind Nayeli.
Speaking of lost time.
The two of them talked, low and quiet; then Nayeli kissed her. Cansu blushed. Nayeli kissed her again, and again, until she was chasing Cansu across the wharf, shouting over-the-top declarations of love in Thuti.
“Oh, I thought of a great wedding present for you,” Vex told Ben.
Nayeli and Cansu raced past Kari and Lu, who halted some conversation they’d been having. Lu laughed, the sound pulling Vex to his feet. He started forward.
“You don’t need to send a gift—oh, Gunnar is informing me that it is rude to refuse gifts. I think being the king’s consort is already going to his head.”
