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Honor knelt, cradling it reverently in her hands.
I’d polished Amily’s sword and Lysander’s, sitting cross-legged on the floor of their parlor, in front of the fire. I’d felt cozy and lonely at the same time back then, listening to Amily’s sweet voice singing to Honor in her bedroom.
“It needs to be polished and sharpened for you to carry it.” I held out my hand, and she handed it over, blinking hard.
“We don’t have time. Kallus will try to hunt us down and take the stones back, if he’s still alive…”
“Why wouldn’t he be alive?” I demanded. She was trying to hide something about what she’d done.
She raised her chin defiantly, meeting my eyes. “I sent Ebba’s assassin after him. So Caldren would be safe.”
So she hadn’t just stopped Ebba’s assassin; she’d asked him for a favor. “And what did that cost you?”
“I’m sure you know what it cost me. But I’ll figure that out next.”
I scoffed a laugh, but only because I felt horror so deep it was surreal. Whether that child was mine—the first image that flashed through my mind was of a bright-eyed baby that she carried smiling tome,even though a relationship between Honor and I could never be—or Jaik’s or Caldren’s or Arren’s or Tal’s or the twins’, that child would be precious to all of us. Honor’s baby.
“I know you’re sure you’re clever, but you can’t gamble a baby’s life,” I told her.
“I am very clever,” she returned swiftly. “And I don’t have any intentions of becoming a mother, which solves that problem.”
I frowned at her. “You’re the queen.”
“Which is why I get to make my own choices.”
I plucked the sword out of her hands. “Which is why you need to provide your people with an heir. Or two, since you seem determined to give one of them away to the chaos god.”
I managed an even tone, but I was furious. I didn’t want to examine why, so I turned my back on her and moved across the room, looking for a rag, oil and a sharpening stone.
I found the supplies and set to work polishing the sword. As I did, I absently began to sing the same song I used to hear Amily sing to Honor; it had sunk into my soul, although I hadn’t remembered it until just now.
Polishing the sword brought a rush of memories back in general.
Those memories left me feeling unsettled. It had been a long time since I was that lost boy, longing for home and a family and almost—but not quite—finding it. I’d been empty, a constant ache where my sense of home should’ve been.
And now I felt the same almost-unbearable longing when I looked at Honor.
Golden girl, sunshine girl
Brightest star in my sky
You could never get lost
Because I’ll always bring you home
I looked up to find tears in Honor’s gaze.
A rush of horror engulfed me. That song came back to mind when I held Amily’s sword, but it wasn’tmysong. I never should have sung it in front of Honor. “I’m sorry.”
“Did my mother sing that song?” she asked me.
“Yes. She sang it to you every night.”
“I don’t remember it,” she said, closing her eyes as if she were trying to escape back into that moment. “But I feel so much when I hear it, like… like part of me remembers.”
I looked at the girl who had been on the other side of the closed door, and I asked, “Do you want me to sing the rest?”
She sank cross-legged beside me. “Yes.”
