“Never?”
“No. To tell you the truth, I have always assumed that whatever happened that day in the palace frightened me so much it was like a fire had been held to the part of myself that once was able to feel fear, and scalded away all of the nerve endings. Left it completely dead. I have felt vigilance. A deep sense of protectiveness for my people. But not fear. Not for my own self. Not for much of anything. It is a gift.”
“Is it? Even when it prevents you from feeling everything else?”
“I don’t feel anything else. Or rather, I don’t miss what I don’t feel. How can you, when you have no idea what to expect?”
That must be because he didn’t have any context for himself. He didn’t remember the first eight years of his life, and she couldn’t imagine what that would do to somebody. How badly that might impact you.
There were things that she wished she couldn’t remember from her childhood. But it was different to having a whole swath of yourself entirely erased.
“Just because you don’t know it doesn’t mean it isn’t important. Like eating cake. You might not have known that you were missing out, but you were.”
“And yet, it isn’t an important thing. If I had never had it, I would not miss it.”
“But doesn’t it bother you? Knowing that there is so much out there that you haven’t experienced?”
“No. It does bother you, though, doesn’t it?”
There was deep compassion in his eyes, nothing dismissive. It was entirely different from all the times before when they had talked about what she wanted from life. And the great irony was, she didn’t feel like she wanted it any longer. Not in the same way.
Yes, there were things that she was curious about. There was the potential for a life that she might enjoy out there, but it was only a possibility. It wasn’t real. Not in the same way that he was. Not in the same way that this was.
“I think it bothered me so much because I felt like I didn’t get to choose,” she said.
The truth of that rang inside of her like a bell. So clear, so bright. “I felt like because I didn’t have a say in my own future that it seemed unfair. That there was such a big wide world out there and I would never get to explore it. I don’t feel that same urgency now.”
She didn’t feel like the walls were closing in. She didn’t feel like every step was laid out before her before she ever got a chance to choose it.
She wanted to stay with him. He had agreed to let her go.
Maybe she was just a contrarian.
She didn’t think so.
It was like what he’d said. Initially, she had been determined to come out of this without changing. Then she had begun to open herself up to the idea of living while she was here.
But living meant changing. It meant growing in understanding. Of herself, of what she wanted. Of who she was.
It meant being affected.
She had been fighting that for so much of her life. Resisting allowing her father to alter who she was. To dent her spirit in any way.
He was right; she had been resisting being changed or affected by her trauma. But it had happened. That part of her life was real.
Just the same as she could allow herself to be changed by this. And she had. She could change what she wanted. It didn’t make her a failure. It didn’t mean that she was losing a fight.
She wasn’t giving in.
Not to anything other than what she wanted. What she was moving toward. There was something good in that. Something powerful in it. In feeling. In wanting. In accepting.
“After this the world will be yours.”
She wanted to correct him. She wanted to tell him that she was going to stay. But the words got stuck in her throat. He was changing. He had admitted to that. He had even said that he didn’t hate the idea of it anymore. That was the beginning of something.
But she was afraid. Afraid to push him too hard too fast. Though what she thought he might do, she couldn’t say. He had been intent on taking her as a wife forever.
Forever.
