Page 47 of Pregnant at the Palace Altar

But Marias liked to bring it up, didn’t he? It was a form of manipulation, just like the ones Katerina’s mother resorted to. Using the thing that hurt him to get the behavior Marias wanted.

You’re overreacting. Marias has been a steadfast adviser who cares about the crown.

But Diamandis’s father had cared abouthim.

“Perhaps, Marias. But I am no longer a boy of fourteen.”A boy.He had been a boy. Katerina had said that, and he’d argued with her. He had been old enough to be a king, old enough to rule a country.

A child, she had said.

He found it hard to disagree with her, here in this moment. The adult that he was, making the choices that needed making for the woman he— For his queen.

“We are done here. If you cannot endeavor to find it within yourself to offer advice that protects the queen as well as the king, then perhaps it is time you resign.”

Diamandis left Marias sputtering and arguing. There was too much to do, and yet... He wanted to discuss this with Katerina. He wanted to find out whatshewanted to do. She had always given him sound advice as his assistant, and now as his queen.

It had been foolish to seek Marias’s help in the first place. Marias’s responsibility was to ensure the crown remained respected in the eyes of the people, not to consider Katerina’s feelings.

If you are considering Katerina’s feelings over what might happen to the crown, then Marias is probably right, and the results will be disastrous.

Just like your father.

It was that old curse he’d lived with as a weight on his shoulders, loving his father all the same. Marias being incapable or unwilling to point out one clear mistake had left Diamandis on shaky ground.

What was his father’s mistake? Was it trusting his brother-in-law? Was it ignoring his council advisers? Was it loving his wife? His children? What was this grand mistake? Diamandis needed to know so he could avoid it.

He could not figure out what was happening inside of him, what was shifting. Why was he now questioning things he’d previously always seen as fact? In all his years as king, he had never once allowed himself to look back with compassion at the fourteen-year-old who had made mistakes that had ended people’s lives.

But there was something wholly life-altering about Katerina wanting to share his burdens. Something...absolving about her loving him. How had she separated the boy he had been from the man he was now with a simple word on a balcony at Anavolí?

Seeing her with her mother, seeing the way she had changed into someone else entirely had thrown him. No, not someone else. A child. A child who had never been loved or protected. A child whom everyone had failed.

He wanted to reach across time and fix that for her, but he could not. If there was anything in this off-kilter moment he knew for sure, it was that you could not erase or fix the past. He could only fix this moment.

When he strode into Katerina’s set of rooms, Stelios and one of Katerina’s maids were cleaning up a tea service and whispering about something.

They both stopped immediately, curtsied and bowed. In the silence, Diamandis could hear the sounds of muffled sobs.

“The queen has requested some time alone, Your Majesty,” Stelios said firmly.

Diamandis could hear her crying all the way out here, and she wanted to be alone? No. “You are both dismissed,” he said, already across the room and pushing open the door.

Katerina was curled up on the bed, though she pushed herself into a sitting position when he entered. Her face was red, her eyes puffy, and her hair a mess.

“Please, Diamandis, leave me be,” she said, her voice scratchy.

But it reminded him of a moment he’d long since forgotten, when he’d been small—so small his brothers had not yet been born. He had snuck into his parents’ room at night after bedtime. He could not remember why all these years later, because what he’d stumbled onto had stopped him cold.

His mother had been sitting on the edge of the bed, crying into her hands. His father had gone to sit next to her, pulling her into his chest, holding her, whispering soothing words to her.

He’d been so shaken by his mother’s tears that he’d crept back to his room, crawled into bed and forgotten whatever it was he’d wanted her for.

His mother had been crying, and it had shaken his world. There was so much that little boy had not known or understood, and there was all the pain and heartache that was yet to come. He did not like to think of himself as a boy. He had no trouble blaming the obnoxious teenager he had been, but not that scared little boy.

It was harder to blame the boy for all of life’s cruelties.

All these years later, he didn’t know what his mother had been upset about, and there was no one to ask. But maybe the point wasn’twhatshe’d been upset about. The point was that her husband had sat down next to her and comforted her.

So Diamandis did what his father had done.

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