“But your body remembers. It’ll always remember.”
I removed the gauze wrapped around my arm and looked at the wound. The dry webbing was gone, and now healing skin had replaced it. The flesh was slightly pink like it should be.
“We can’t live this way any longer, Morco.”
I turned to look at her, to feel her stare even though it didn’t exist anymore.
“If we were home, we would have had the medicine on hand.”
I stared at her for a while before I wrapped the bandage around my wound again. “I know.”
“Hanne has shown us that we can survive in the dark, even thrive in it.”
I nodded in agreement, knowing full well she couldn’t see me.
“We shall speak more of this when you’re well.” She reached for my hand again, missing at first but then finding it after she corrected herself. “Hanne possesses courage that beats in theheart of few. She believes in the many, not the one. She was willing to forfeit her life for the chance that you would keep yours. I had my reservations about her character, but I see that doubt was deeply misplaced. I was surprised by your sudden rejection of Allegra, but a king forsakes his lovers when he finds his queen.” She brushed her thumb over the top of my hand. “Her blood is different from ours, but her heart is the same. If she’s the one you choose, I fully embrace that choice.”
Perhaps my mind was still in a haze, but the words were unavailable to me. My mother was impenetrable like a mountain after the horrors she’d endured, and it was impossible to even scratch her surface. But Hanne had dug all the way to her core. “I believe we live and we die. I believe the only one looking out for us is ourselves. But my heart tells me she was meant to come here.”
“My heart tells me you’re right.”
The maid escorted my mother out of my cabin, and then a moment later, she entered, the woman who spared me a painful death. In her travel clothes and boots, with her hair around her shoulders, she locked her eyes on mine as she came into the room.
I continued to sit at the edge of the bed, in nothing but my sleeping shorts. I didn’t have to worry about my dress in my mother’s presence, but I didn’t feel the need to change for Hanne either. I was still tired, so I knew I would fall back asleep and continue to heal once this conversation had concluded.
I saw a flash of emotion in her eyes, like she hadn’t expected to ever look at me like this again.
I grabbed my mother’s chair and pulled it directly in front of me, wanting us face-to-face, knee-to-knee.
She took the invitation and sat down, her knees in between mine, our bodies closer together than they had been when we’d held hands in the dark. We faced each other seated at the tables at the Gathering, but this was different.
We were alone.
Her beautiful blue eyes held mine and waned in confidence, but they held on anyway.
I hadn’t thought I’d live to see this conversation. Hadn’t thought I’d ever have this moment. And now that I had it, I didn’t know what to do with it. Didn’t know what to say, how to convey the depth of my gratitude and my anger and the desire that burned hotter than the sickness that had nearly killed me.
Her eyes flicked away when the intensity became too much, but she found the courage again a second later and came back to me. Minutes of heavy silence passed, the two of us looking at each other with a depth we’d never shown before.
I didn’t know where to start. Didn’t know if I should yell at her for the risk she’d taken. Didn’t know if I should thank her for her sacrifice. Didn’t know whether I should praise her for having more bravery than most of the men here.
Instead, I extended my hand, palm up, and held it between us.
She glanced down and stared at it, saw it hanging between us like an invitation. She swallowed, her delicate features tightening in quiet emotion as her rare eyes lingered. The firemade one side of her hair bright and blond, while the other was cast in dark shadow. Her slender neck had a few freckles. There was another at the corner of her mouth. The shape of her lips reminded me of the bow she’d drawn for me. Every time I looked upon her, I found something new to appreciate.
She reached her hand forward and gently placed it in mine.
I immediately wrapped my fingers around her small hand and squeezed, capturing her like prey that stepped into a trap. My grip was tight, just to the point where the pressure might become too much. I conveyed the emotion that words couldn’t replicate in that touch. Shared my gratitude physically.
Then I guided her hand to my chest and placed it over my heart.
She flinched at the touch of my skin and sucked in a quiet breath. Then she relaxed her fingers and flattened them against my flesh.
I held her hand there, my eyes on hers as she felt the beat of my heart. Felt it slow and steady, strong and growing stronger. It’d been dead and dormant for so long, lost in the darkness of sorrow, beating only to survive but never to live.
But now, it burned with the brilliance of hope. Sunshine that I’d never seen with my eyes now warmed my heart. The void in my chest was now filled with seeds of her flowers—and I felt her petals bloom in my heart.
12
