Page 107 of Between Despair and Hope

Her words were a smack, and I sat down heavily into the chair beside her. “Gods. I don’t know where to start. Divine hell, Mother. Conveniently sank? What the hell is wrong with you?”

She shrugged, eyes lowered to the list of topics to discuss. “I am nothing if not pragmatic. I feel for those souls who perished, but it provides us a rather convenient explanation for Keeva’s disappearance. Unless you intend to tell them the truth?”

“Gods, no.” That would sign Em’s death warrant. I’d take the blame for it before I’d tell them the truth.

“Exactly. Would you have me not extend the invitation? Though they opened the pass for his mercenaries, it seems Nereza has not yet allied with Declan. She is close with the Supreme, and I suspect she will do nothing without his input. It is good you brought him in. Filenti outstayed his welcome.”

I nodded, analyzing her. Her words and motions were detached, delivered in a way to unsettle me. She’d been manipulating how I reacted to things my entire life, and I knew what it was when I saw it. “What were you crying over?” I demanded.

“I wasn’t crying.”

I sighed, rubbing my hand hard against the stubble on my jaw. I had forgotten to shave. “Why bother to lie? I could bring Dewalt—er, no, I suppose I can’t do that anymore. I could bring Lavenia in to make you tell the truth.”

“You wouldn’t.”

All I did was raise a single brow as I leaned back in my chair, crossing my arms.

“Then I would know I was right—that I have truly failed you.”

“What?”

She sighed, shuffling papers in front of her. “Nothing.”

“Divine hell, Mother.”

“I know you both say you didn’t know, but you didn’t keep her a secret from me did you?” she asked.

I stared at her a moment before asking, “Who?”

“The gi—Elora. Your daughter. Did you decide to hide her from me? From the Myriad?”

I blew out a breath, long and low. “No.”

“I cannot help but think you didn’t trust me back then. You never told me the two of you…” She trailed off, but her meaning was clear.

“Most young men don’t take it upon themselves to tell their mother after the first time they’ve been inside a woman,” I said, stone-faced. She cringed in response.

“No, I suppose you’re right. The year after the other Highclere girl died, I thought—”

“Her name was Lucia.”

“The year after Lucia Highclere died,” she amended, “we grew close. Close enough for you to tell me about the ring you had made. I just—” She scrubbed her hands over her face. “Did you miss out on years of your daughter’s life because of me? Or your father? Because you were afraid I wouldn’t stand with you and whatever you chose to do?”

The vulnerability in her question surprised me.

“No, Mother. No.”

“You’re not just saying that to protect me from guilt?”

“Do you think so little of me and so highly of yourself? Do you truly think anything you said or could have done would have kept me from my own flesh and blood? Do you know me at all?”

She groaned, burying her head in her hands. I’d never seen her so disheveled. “I have a control problem,” she mumbled, and I barked a laugh.

“You don’t say.”

“There is much you don’t know about my life before I married your father. And when you were finally born, my first instinct was to push you away to protect you.”

“To protect me?”

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