Page 137 of Prize for the King
“The ability to chop off heads,” Arvi mutters with a smirk.
I bite the inside of my lip. I think I finally know how to ask him, but it feels invasive. When Raduna catches my eye, he smiles.
“You can ask me anything you’d like, my queen.”
I huff. “Am I that obvious?”
“Sometimes. I make an effort to learn your tells since you have trouble asking for what you want.”
“Oh.” I look away, my cheeks burning. It’s now or never. “Well, if… If your daughter had survived that night, what do you think your life would have looked like?”
He inhales sharply, and I look up in alarm. “I’m sorry!”
“Don’t be.” His face crumples, lines of sadness aging him like time didn’t. I regret asking, but I must know. My heart beats so fast, I’m almost dizzy. His answer will reveal something, I hope, and maybe, finally, I’ll be able to love my knight.
He takes a long time to speak, and when he does, his eyes gain a faraway, sorrowful look.
“I would have found us another house. She would cry every night for her mother, and I would comfort her, hiding my own grief. My neighbors and friends would help us, probably try to find me a newwife. I suppose I would have remarried for my daughter’s sake. A girl must have a mother. A man can’t understand everything, teach her everything she should know. I wouldn’t look for love for myself, but for a kind, sensible woman who would love my girl like her own. It would be a different kind of happiness.”
A sob rips out of my throat. His answer is completely unexpected, and it burns a path across my mind, revealing things I never considered, opening possibilities I didn’t know existed. Raduna watches me closely, and I get up on shaking knees, looking around for a place to hide—anywhere they might not see me.
Arvi takes a step closer, frowning with worry, and I shake my head. Sobs burst from my throat, tears running down my face as I spin around, feeling trapped, too exposed, sick with it.
“Hide here,” Raduna murmurs, tugging me to himself. “It’s all right, Caliane. You don’t have to speak, but don’t run from me.”
I cry into his chest as we stand together, and he holds me loosely but surely. Arvi comes closer and wraps his arms around us both, and I disappear, just like I wanted. My knights hide me from the world as an agonizing realization rends my heart into shreds.
A girl must have a mother.
Not once did my father speak of finding a new wife, and it was utterly abnormal, wasn’t it? Raduna made it his first choice. Find a mother for his daughter. Because he loved her.
What would have happened if my father had made an effort to find a new wife, one who wouldlove me like her own, in Raduna’s words?
I would have been safe. She would have protected me, and he never would have done the things he did.
Which is probably why he never sought a second wife.
I always thought he loved my mom so much, he couldn’t bear the idea of marrying again, but Raduna must have loved his wife, too, and yet, he would have found another woman. Not for himself—but forhis girl.
Over the years, I tried to understand the reasons for my father’s behavior. I grew up into a woman similar to my mother in appearance and stature, and I thought maybe he saw her in me, and that was why he did it.
Raduna’s simple explanation shatters that delusion. If my father wanted an adult woman similar to my mother, he could have found one, even in his court. My type of beauty is common in Farneer.
But he didn’t. Because he didn’t want an adult woman.
He wanted to touch a child.
I remember all those nights I woke up to find him in my room, his clothes rustling in the shadows, his breaths heavy. A scream of rage bursts out of me when I comprehend what it was. How can I not realize, knowing what I know now, when I have men, a husband? I know what it sounds like, don’t I? What they do, how they touch themselves when they are in lust.
My sobs freeze in my throat, and I shiver harder and harder, awed and crushed by this new discovery. It should have been obvious, but I was wrapped in it, spent my whole life tangled in the lies. I had to make sense of all the depravity by myself, without the help of adults. I knew too little.
I think I know enough now to finally understand it, though.
My father was a deviant.
My mind spins as I slowly return to reality. Above me, Arvi leans his head on Raduna’s shoulder, and they hold each other as much as they hold me. It’s so peaceful.Safe.
Maybe I could finally tell.
