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“Kallus is trying to track the Scourge stones too,” I told her. “He has his own plans.”
A shadow passed over her face. “You can't trust my brother.”
“I know,” I said. “The last time I saw him, he was making plans to have me tortured.”
She rolled her eyes, which surprised me. “Kallus has always been so dramatic. He has truth potions. I can't imagine he would use any worse on you.”
“Why is that? Because he's such a wonderful man?”
“No. Kallus is a mess. But you are family, and Kallus always has loved his family. He loved me. He loved you as a baby too.” She smiled fondly. “He said you were the smartest baby he’d ever seen. He used to give you all his jewelry.”
“He gave me some jewelry unwillingly this time,” I said, touching the pendant in front of me that Kallus had prized so much.
Her eyes fell on the pendant. “Your father gave that to me. He said it would bring me luck.”
“I’m not sure it worked.”
“Oh, I had two hundred years with your father and six years with you, my love. I’d consider that lucky. Some people live to old age but never know joy like being your mother.” She raised her hand as if she was going to touch my cheek, then paused. “I hope your life is both long and full of love.”
“I’ll do what I can.”
Her fingers hovered over the pendant. “Try it on. Lysander would have wanted you to have it.”
I touched the icy blue stone, then raised the chain to latch it around my neck. It was hard to find the catch, and I knew if she were really here, she would’ve helped me instead of watching me fumble.
“Beautiful,” she said softly. “Just like you.”
I thought of how Kallus had reacted with fury when he realized I was trying to steal the objects there were Amily’s even though he hadn't seemed particularly perturbed before that when he knew I was trying to trick him. “I'm pretty sure Kallus still loves you, by the way.”
“I'm sorry he threatened you. My little brother was always an idiot. I'd offer to haunt him for you.”
“It's alright,” I said. “I'd rather you haunted me.”
The words were painfully honest and vulnerable, and her eyes grew sad.
“I know it's not the same as having me there with you, Honor,” she said. “I'm sorry I missed so much of your childhood.”
“You don't have to apologize for dying.”
“I feel like I should. I feel like I should have been able to save...” she trailed off. “Anyway. I'll be here for you as much as I can, in any way that I can.”
“I'm glad to have you anyway I can, Mother,” I hadn't used that word in a long time. I remembered the first time I'd used it with my adoptive mother. She'd folded me into her arms, the moment as emotional for her as it was for me.
“You wear someone’s marks,” she said.
I touched my neck self-consciously. I knew what they looked like, because I’d studied them in the mirror; they changed over time from that first heated, angry mark to look like tattoos. “Did you and Lysander wear each other’s marks?”
She shook her head. “I loved Lysander with all my heart—I chose him over the other Royals—but I didn’t wear his mark. I didn’t need it.”
My fingers ran over the marks, which felt hot—except for Zehr’s which was cool to the touch.
She leaned forward, studying them. Jaik’s and Talisyn’s were dragons, although Tal’s dragon was still forming. Jaik’s dragon mark was a deep metallic purple and black, the shade of his outstretching wings. Caldren’s wolf was nestled so close to the dragon the two of them touched. Zehr’s mark was abstract, or maybe a language I couldn’t read.
“Tell me about them,” she said, and so I did.
I should have been with Damyn and Talisyn, who were pouring over the books we’d brought back from the library about the chaos god. But I couldn’t bear to give up this little time with my mother, as we chatted and laughed into the night.
CHAPTER20
