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IF HER PRIDE WASN’T DEAD SET against it, Leah might be able to entertain the idea of staying at Kaylah and Eric’s estate forever. Kaylah continued to insist that Leah had the invitation to do so, and that everyone needed to accept help at times in their lives. Humble pie was a tough meal to swallow, and Leah wasn’t sure she’d ever fully accept help without guilt or grudge.
But she did take her time in the library. She finished the Valeska’s Adventures series, and reread them all again.
Kaylah and Eric stayed with Leah at their manor for Thanksgiving, a few of the staff members and their families joining them. The pumpkin pie was divine, even the crust.
On Leah’s daily stroll about the grounds, she always carried a book with her; many from Kaylah’s private library hadn’t even been read by their owners. Granted, Kaylah and Eric were politicians, retired rulers, so a lot of their collection was dry reading, so Leah steered clear of those. Marcus might have enjoyed them, though, given his political aspirations and current internship.
Leah hiked the little hill in the back woods, made a vine hammock for herself in said woods, and soaked often in the swimming pond.
She stood a dead log up against a pair of healthy trees to use as a target. When her anger or frustration festered too much, her throwing knives got good use. She pelted them into the log time and time again. When feeling a little less violent, Leah practiced extending her vines around her palms, and squeezing them—Kaylah’s tip of something she’d done many a time under the table during frustrating negotiations.
Three weeks after arriving, Kaylah and Leah held their weekly picnic, this time in the pavilion near the pond. Kaylah and Eric were having an old friend visit them, another mutual friend of Rachel’s.
“And I mean it when I say you don’t have to stay holed up in your room,” Kaylah said. “It won’t be awkward.”
“Okay.” Even as the word left her lips, Leah fully intended to do just that—hide away in her room.
Kaylah’s Seeder friend was expected to arrive the next day for a few-day visit. Leah had met her only once before.
As soon as Leah woke, she dressed and searched the manor for Kaylah, having forgotten to ask her an important question about their agenda while the guest would be there. Eventually, Leah poked her head into the sitting room, where Kaylah already conversed with the woman—a strawberry blonde.
“Oh, sorry,” Leah said. She hadn’t meant to intrude, and she hadn’t expected the visitor to arrive so early in the morning.
“Come on in!” Kaylah said, gesturing for her to enter.
“Well, I... I didn’t mean to barge in.”
“Come on. I insist.”
Leah nervously entered, sucking in her gut. At three months pregnant, she was definitely starting to show. She sat down on a settee opposite the two, putting on a smile. “Good morning. And good to see you, Mrs. Murialsdotter.”
“You can call me Saff.” She smiled. “I didn’t think you’d remember me.”
In truth, Leah hadn’t remembered her last name, but Kaylah had reminded her of it the day before. “I still don’t know a ton of Seeders by name, but I remember you.”
“I hope that’s not a bad thing.” Saff and Kaylah shared a playful glance.
“It’s not.” Leah straightened her shirt, afraid to expose her bump.
“You know, the two of you should have a chat while you’re here, Saff,” Kaylah said.
“Honestly, I’m going to be pretty busy,” Leah lied. “I didn’t mean to get in the way.”
“I don’t mind.” Saff crossed her legs.
“Saff doesn’t bite,” Kaylah added. “Though...” She narrowed her eyes at Saff. “The first time we met, she did want to kill me.”
Before she realized what she was saying, Leah grinned. “So, we do have something in common.”
Saff’s eyes grew wide, and her jaw slacked. Leah was about to explain how she and Kaylah joked about the assassination attempt that way, but she halted once Kaylah started to cackle, full-on cackle.
Leah’s cheeks were warm, but Saff’s face relaxed.
And Kaylah kept howling with laughter.
Leah shrugged at Saff. “That’s just kinda how we roll.”
Saff gave her a gentle smile as Kaylah finally took a breath.
“Gosh, I love you, kiddo,” Kaylah said.
And in that moment, Leah was safe. How many people could forgive someone who had tried to take their life? And then rescue them and take them in?
“Love you too,” Leah shyly confessed.
Kaylah’s smile faded, replaced by a look of deep appreciation, as though she’d just been gifted the Christmas present she’d always wanted. As though she’d craved to hear that from her only niece for quite some time.
Leah still wasn’t used to throwing the L-word around, and now Kaylah was the third person she’d ever used it on. And perhaps this wasn’t the best time to get mushy, with a guest in the room. “Anyway, I really was going to get back to my book.” She’d already forgotten her question. “But, uh, Saff, I’d be happy to chat if you’d like later.”
“Sounds good.”
***
Seeders were an odd bunch. If they chose to have children, they had twenty-four. No more, no less, and all at once. Was that why Kaylah had wanted them to chat? Because Saff had so many kids, and Leah was about to become a mom? That would require Leah to divulge that secret, assuming Saff didn’t already know.
After lunch, Saff suggested they walk the grounds. Leah was always happy to do that.
“I love visiting Kaylah’s estate.” Saff walked with her hands behind her back. “Seeder lands are beautiful, but it just hits differently over here.”
“Yeah, it’s nice here.”
After a moment of silence, Saff spoke again. “Was there something in particular you wanted to talk about?”
“I kinda thought you knew why Kaylah suggested we talk...”
“Nope.” Saff chuckled. “I’m sure there’s some puzzle to put together between you and me. Kaylah always has her reasons.”
It was probably about the pregnancy thing. But really, Saff couldn’t relate that much. Seeders carried their seedlings—their children—in their bodies for a week max. Not the eight months Ivies did. And the numbers game was definitely off-kilter.
But Saff had more value than just as a mother. Leah leaned into that. “Maybe it’s that I spend so much time in the kingdom, and could stand to learn more about Seeders.”
Saff flourished her hands. “At your service.”
Leah gave her a half-smile. “Well, maybe this is selfish, because I’m a little curious about ... what Seeders currently think of me.”
For good or bad, most of that feedback had always been either blatantly shoved in Leah’s face (through obscene gestures, scowls and flashes of glowing eyes, or otherwise), or fed to her by the palace.
“Well...” Saff bobbed her head. “Like Ivies or humans, Seeders don’t all agree on everything.”
That was a politician’s answer if Leah had ever heard one. “So, they still hate me for my parents, and trying to take out Kaylah.”
“Well, I...” Saff paused. “It’s not like you’re the topic of discussion every day. Most of the time, we all just go about our business. I’m sure things appear worse than they are to you because, well, it’s your everyday reality.”
Yeah, one I can’t escape. “But when I am the topic of discussion?”
Saff breathed deeply. “Some say you’re brave. Others...”
That sentence needed no conclusion, and it wasn’t like Leah and Saff were close enough to be so frank.
“Are you thinking about doing some more travel in Seeder lands? Or doing some studies over there? I could help set you up.”
Leah scoffed. “No one wants me over there. I wouldn’t want to push my luck.”
“Well, I like you.”
That kind of validation from someone even older than her mom was like nails on a chalkboard. “Thanks. Now you just need to get the memo to the rest of your nation, and people can chill out.”
Saff chuckled softly again. “Honestly, I can understand how some people struggle to accept you. They either have rumors to go on, or official royal tours with carefully crafted speeches. Maybe you should spend some time over there, and let people see the real you.” She smirked. “Anyone that can joke about murdering Kaylah and get her to howl like that is redeemable in my eyes, and approachable. And Rachel likes you...”
Until her son knocked me up and I slapped him.
Leah folded her arms across her stomach. “Yeah. Get people to see the real me.”
They walked for a while longer, and Leah couldn’t help herself. “Is it... What’s it like having twenty-four kids? Not the physical act, but raising them. Keeping them straight and caring for them all. Do you ever go crazy?” Her kids were about to all become teenagers.
With a sideways glance and the hint of another smirk on her lips, Saff said, “One kid or twenty-four, you go crazy. But I get why Ivies and humans find that kind of life so outlandish. What you have to remember is our lifestyle, our culture. Everything for Seeders is about family and community. Aunts, uncles, and grandparents are constantly around to help. It’s a team effort.”
Leah nodded.
“Are you and Marcus considering having kids down the road? Assuming things keep going the direction they’ve been going?”
Leah’s heart dropped into her stomach. The direction they’d been going? “We’ve talked about it.”
“I’d say you two have a nice support group, then, don’t you?”
Did they? Marcus did. “Yeah.”
Children and family support... Leah’s mom still didn’t know she was pregnant with Marcus’s child, with a Boman. Just the night before, Leah had received another letter from her mom. That last line still haunted her. It was the one thing Leah had always needed to hear from her mom, and now always struggled to believe. Love always.
Leah was far too polite to ask Saff, but how many times in her stress or frustration had she ever wished she hadn’t had a clutch of kids? How many times, if any, had she regretted that decision?
As much as Leah wanted to ask more about kids, she wasn’t ready to divulge her little secret to a woman she barely knew. Overall, it was a pleasant walk, and gave her a couple of things to think over.
Saff’s visit was only for a few days. By the time she left to return home, Leah had been at Kaylah’s for a month.
Leah and Kaylah held their weekly picnic. It was nice chatting over meals with Eric, too, but Leah was growing fond of this special time with just her and her aunt. Though, she’d had some rough nightmares the night before, and was a bit on edge emotionally for this one.
“You really didn’t have to hide away in your room so much.” Kaylah gave her a playful look of scolding before taking a bite of strawberry.
“I know.”
“You okay?”
Leah stirred her chia seed pudding. “I’m fine.”
Kaylah leaned on an elbow. “Did you ever ... send a letter to Marcus?”
Frowning, Leah shook her head. “He hasn’t sent one to me either.” Not that she hadn’t thought about her letter to him, or reread it a dozen times. She was thirteen weeks along. In three weeks, she’d hit her halfway point in this pregnancy. She’d decided that if he hadn’t sent her a letter by the halfway mark, she would have to be the one to suck it up, to swallow her pride, and reach out. She couldn’t keep going on like this, not knowing what her future held, not knowing how to move forward. Not knowing if moving forward meant doing so without him.
“He loves you,” Kaylah reassured her.
Leah choked down the pain in that statement, battling the demons from her dreams. “No he doesn’t. People tolerate or pity me; they don’t love me.”
“Not true,” Kaylah said adamantly. “Eric and I love you, and the family loves you...” She sat up. “And I’ve known Marcus long enough to know that he loves you, and that you two are just ... stubborn, and this will blow over.”
That deep anguish of defeat whispered to Leah that it was all a lie.
“Your mother loves you,” Kaylah added.
Leah sniffled, shaking her head. “Not really.”
Kaylah seemed confused, rightfully. “I knew the moment I saw her at the wedding venue that she loved you. She was ready to die for you, Leah.”
And even as she knew that was true, Leah shook her head. Because it hadn’t always been the truth.
With the haunt of a whisper, her mom’s words had tortured her in her sleep last night. You and me, we’re the same.
“What’s wrong?” Kaylah asked.
Leah’s throat bobbed. “Did my mom ever tell you about my conception?”
Kaylah looked surprised at the turn of conversation. “We never really discussed it much.”
Leah had her confirmation. No one knew her mom’s secret, other than Leah.
“She did ... imply ... that perhaps her pregnancy was an accident,” Kaylah said.
Leah nodded. She’d kinda guessed that too.
“That doesn’t mean she doesn’t love you, Leah. Your pregnancy wasn’t planned either, but that doesn’t mean you don’t love your child, or that you won’t be a great mother.”
The comparison was gutting, visceral, and in no time flat, Leah’s eyes blurred with tears. “That’s not how it happened.”
Kaylah searched her face. “That’s not how what happened?”
Leah swallowed hard. “My parents didn’t plan me. But I wasn’t an accident. My mom planned me.” She looked down, picking at her nails. “He made it clear when they were dating that he wouldn’t be faithful, and she agreed to that. She told herself she could be okay with it, as long as he made her number one. But after a while, she got jealous. She grew tired of him taking lovers.” Leah dug a finger into her knee. “And she did what no woman should ever do. She stopped taking her birth control tonic, and lied. She made him get her pregnant, and lied about it being an accident to try to keep him closer.”
When Leah looked up, Kaylah grimaced.
Soren had been a monster, a piece of trash that had only ever used people as tools. Perhaps he and Beata had truly been meant for each other, because Leah had been Beata’s tool.
“And you know, it worked. Too well. My dad did one decent thing in his life; he got protective of his wife and unborn child. But then it backfired. My mom wasn’t a strategist. He took care of that part of the war. But he started to act more ... erratic, less predictable. He stretched the army and assassin networks too thin. He put his focus in the wrong places.” Her heart ached at the confession. “They lost the war because of me. He died giving her more time to get away because of me.”
Kaylah wore a deep frown. “I know it’s hard, and I... I know it’s a barely there silver lining, but that saved my life. I have no doubt he would have killed me eventually. And it saved a lot of other lives.”
“I know,” Leah croaked. If the realm knew that Leah had helped cause Soren and Beata’s downfall, they’d sing a different tune. She had no doubt they’d suddenly be a lot more forgiving to her, and even to her mom. But sharing that truth with the realm would mean accepting the piercing duality of it. Accepting the other half, or trying not to, had been destroying Leah since the day her mom had let this fact slip.
“Don’t get me wrong,” Leah continued. “I know they were wrong and horrible and misguided, and it’s good they lost the war. But my mom is the only person that ever loved me growing up. She was the only person even remotely there for me.”
Sharply engraved in the back of her mind, Leah still recalled her conversation the night she’d found her mom’s journal in the human world, had discovered her parents had been rulers of some mysterious realm.
Leah had asked: “If you knew then, what you know now, that this would happen, would you have done things differently?”
Her mom had replied wistfully: “Absolutely.”
“Worse than being an accident, is being a regret,” Leah told Kaylah.
Kaylah looked instantly perturbed. “Your mother said that?! That she regrets having you?”
“No, she didn’t.” And she hadn’t. She’d only spilled her secret by accident on a random prison visit, and still professed on every visit and in every letter since, that she still loved Leah, and always would. “But you didn’t see the way she was when I was a kid. Emotionally checking out, writing in a journal, mourning my dad day and night. She wouldn’t even tell me his name!” It hadn’t only been sorrow that had stunted her mom all those years; it had also been guilt. “Wouldn’t you, at least a little bit, regret or resent your own child if they were the reason Eric died?”
“I’m not a mother, so I can’t say for sure, but I certainly hope not.”
But Leah had already answered that for herself months ago. As much as part of her was getting excited for the new life growing inside her, she had regrets. No resentment, but there were regrets. “You know, my mom used to say we were so much alike. We look a lot alike, we like the same movies, we both ... started having sex around the same age. And I know it’s not the same as what happened with my dad, but this baby, associated with me, and not conceived according to the high royal expectations, is going to take Marcus down a notch.”
Kaylah looked her dead in the eyes. “You both made a choice to have sex. It’s just as much his responsibility as yours, no matter who has the better or worse reputation.”
“Yeah?” Leah wiped away her tears with the back of her hands. “You can’t imagine what people are going to say? That Soren’s daughter got knocked up on purpose because Marcus got tired of her? Realized he could do better? That I did this to trap him?”
“You’re not like your mother. If you say it was an honest mistake, I believe you.”
“And everyone else?” Leah challenged. “When they all know I manipulated him before? Lied to him to get close to you? When I proved I was crazy?”
“Leah.” Kaylah’s voice was soft, pleading, understanding. “It’ll be okay.”
“Right. Because a formal notice from the palace soothes all unease, rights all wrongs.” She shook her head. Kaylah had commented about the strict palace rules and it being harder for Leah because she hadn’t been raised royal. It was true. Kaylah was made of tougher stuff. She could handle the constant scrutiny. Leah had thought she could, had thought she was strong, but that had always been a facade, a lie.
“I’m here for you, okay?” Kaylah reassured her.
The floodgates of guilt and pain and grief had already opened for Leah, and she was far from done. She hadn’t expected her pregnancy to trigger so much in her, but it had. It had shaken her to her core.
As those gates remained open, her heart raw, Leah struggled to breathe, tears continuing to cascade. “Everything is my fault. I have no one to blame but me. I built my own prison. And every time I think back to my life in the human world—the life I left behind—I realize I’m the one to blame.
“Because when my mom was too depressed, sad about losing my dad and not being able to see her family, not able to enjoy the ambient energy of the realm—it was my fault. And every time Cheryl hit me, grabbed me, pulled my hair, made me feel worthless—it was because my mom was too wrapped up in being sad because my very existence got my dad killed, so she didn’t want to see it, didn’t want to believe it.”
“That’s on her,” Kaylah retorted.
“Every time we had to move because I acted out or because my mom was afraid of us getting discovered, every time I had to leave friends behind, every time I hated it—my fault.
“Every time I made stupid decisions—shoplifting, lying, sneaking out to parties—my fault.”
“She was a neglectful parent,” Kaylah replied.
Leah sniffled, catching a breath. “Every time I was an idiot with a guy, letting things go too far, getting hurt, earning a reputation as a slut, just because I wanted friendship and love and attention... That was my fault too. If I had never been conceived, my dad wouldn’t have acted rash in the war, my mom wouldn’t have lost him, wouldn’t have grieved, and my life wouldn’t be a living hell.”
Now even Kaylah was crying. “He might have lost the war anyway. Don’t internalize all that blame.”
Despite her need to shove it all down, to pretend she’d never learned the truth of what her mom had done to deceive her dad, Leah had analyzed it. Knowing and feeling were two different things. Her heart and mind were oil and water.
Leah pointed to her head. “I know that here.” She pointed to her heart. “But this tells me I’m lying to myself.”
An unborn child held no fault because of their parents’ decisions. A little girl was blameless for the neglect of her mom.
But Leah couldn’t win. Couldn’t accept that she had any role in ending the war, in one of the best things to happen for peace in the realm in centuries, without also accepting that she was scum.
Kaylah scooped Leah into a tight hug. “I’ll never be anything but grateful for you.”
Leah sobbed. Even as tears spilled down her cheeks onto Kaylah’s back, as snot fell ungraciously onto the retired queen’s shirt, as huffs and whimpers escaped Leah’s lips, she sobbed.