52. Cecilia

52

CECILIA

T he cave mouth stretched before her, dark and wide like the mouth of a great beast waiting to swallow her whole, only this time, there was a cooing baby strapped into a sling on her chest.

"What do you think, Stella? Should we go in?" Cecilia asked as she wiggled her toes in the damp sand.

The baby tipped her head back, letting out a soft gurgle.

Rainer's warm hand came to Cecilia's back as he stepped up beside her. "Your mom and her caves." His tone was teasing as he brushed a kiss to Cecilia's temple before placing one atop Stella's head.

"This is actually your father's favorite sea cave. If I remember correctly, he used to sneak girls who were not me here to make out when he was a teenager?—"

"I did that one time, Cecilia. You'll never let me live it down." Rainer rolled his eyes.

She grinned at her husband. She'd been so sad to say goodbye to their friends when they headed back to Argaria that morning, but she was happy to return to their everyday rhythm.

Rainer scooped the baby from the sling and sat in the sand with her in his lap as he pointed out sea life in one of the tide pools in the cave.

Cecilia's love for Rainer felt ancient and also brand new, a strange paradox that left her with the bone-deep familiar knowing of what he needed as well as the doubt that she could give it to him. Their love stretched and grew with them and she was used to the things she relied on being taken away. She was afraid to settle into life, but settle she did.

Sometimes she couldn't believe she was a mother, but she remembered the moment she'd first felt her daughter acutely, drawing it up in her memory and turning it over and over like an old, precious jewel.

It was Rainer's birthday. A beautiful spring day that seemed like a good omen.

But the labor was hard. Cecilia was exhausted and she'd been managing the pain for hours, having long burned off the lemon cakes Rainer had brought her from the bakery.

Worse, she could sense something was wrong in the way Lyra and Mika kept looking at each other and then looking at Rainer.

Her husband was oblivious. His full focus was settled on her as he pulled her pain into himself and rubbed her back.

"What aren't you saying?" Cecilia snapped.

Lyra held up her hands. "We don't want to worry you, but you've been laboring quite a while and we think you need to try another position to push or the baby might start to experience distress." Her tone was gentle but serious and Cecilia had worked with her long enough to know when the healer meant business.

She turned to Rainer, terrified to lose this thing that she wanted so badly. She'd been afraid to even really admit how badly until that moment. She was still afraid.

"What do you need, sweetheart?" Rainer took her face in his hands. She couldn't focus, her wild eyes panicked and darting around the room. "Cece, it would be okay if you wanted something just for yourself. Even if you needed it."

She blinked away tears. In that moment, she wanted that baby fiercely.

For so long, she'd blamed Rainer's desire for a child, but now that the baby was practically here—now that Cecilia could feel the truth in her bones—she wanted to have a child for herself.

She'd taken what was given. She'd felt it was tempting fate to hope for more than survival and happiness with the love of her life. But now she wanted this with every beat of her heart and every breath of her lungs.

Cecilia closed her eyes and tried to sense a connection between herself and the baby. She pressed a hand to her stomach, the muscles sore, exhausted from effort. Between one breath and the next, she felt her daughter's emotions swell around her.

The baby was frightened.

"Okay, baby. I know you are scared, but you are already so loved and so very much wished for. I know change is hard and you're worried about what comes next. I am, too. But I am willing to be scared with you and your dad is here and ready to be brave enough for both of us and he wants to meet you so badly."

She pulled on her goddess power and tried for the first time to use it on the baby, sending the familiar hopeful sense of peace into the life inside her. Slowly, the tension and fear eased.

Lyra leaned in. "Ready to try again."

Cecilia nodded. Lowering to her knees, she took Rainer's hand and pushed. She stayed calm through the pain, focused on Rainer's voice, on his eyes, and only a few moments later, a muffled cry broke through the silence and Lyra placed a red-faced baby girl in her arms.

In that moment, she believed for the first time that it was okay to need other people. It was okay not to just give all the time but to want things for herself, and she looked at her daughter's scrunched-up face and broke down in sobs.

Cecilia's consciousness returned to the cave and Rainer caught her eye.

"Where'd you go?" he asked.

"Just remembering the day she was born."

Rainer grinned. "That was a top-three day."

"Top three?"

"Impossible to pick between you saving my life and coming back from the dead, the day we got married, and the day Stella was born." Rainer smiled at her, then scooped the baby up and wandered down the beach to their picnic.

With Stella's arrival, Cecilia had worried she'd have to split up her love and give the baby what had once belonged to Rainer. Instead, her heart seemed to grow and stretch to accommodate both of them with ease. She was hopeless to the sweet baby with big green eyes and a smile that made Cecilia's world stop.

Cecilia grinned as Rainer did pushups over Stella on the blanket, kissing her button nose each time he lowered. Stella giggled a deep belly laugh each time.

Rainer was the kindest, most loving man she'd ever known, and sometimes simple scenes—like when he pretended Stella was tackling him or when they had what he called "their chats," where she would babble and Rainer would speak to her as if they were having a whole conversation—brought tears to Cecilia's eyes.

Rainer grinned at her.

"Are you happy with your life?" she asked.

Rainer laughed. "My life is amazing. I get to spend my days with this happy girl and cook every night. We are going to travel the world several times a year. We have friends in high places. I'm surrounded by beautiful girls." He punctuated each word with kisses on Stella's belly and she giggled each time. He met Cecilia's eye. "And my wife is a gorgeous goddess who I'd like to get on my knees and worship right now."

"Rainer!" Cecilia scolded.

He shrugged. "What? Stella doesn't know what I mean."

"You don't know that. She could be the most powerful memory witch of all time and once she has context, she'll come back to this memory and know how inappropriate her father was and she'll be horrified. I cannot believe I have to say this—don't dirty talk in front of the baby."

Rainer grinned as he hopped to his feet and pulled her into a long, slow kiss. When he drew back, she couldn't help but grin.

Rainer was right. Their lives were pretty perfect. She'd feared domesticity would dull her, that she'd feel trapped by it, but she felt inspired, overwhelmed, expansive, and so very at peace with the variability of her days.

She'd had a lifetime of adventure in a short period of time, and now she was ready to be still. The clinic was busier than ever. Cecilia and Mika were helping people. It was a lot to manage, but Rainer made sure she had time for it and encouraged her when she felt guilty for leaving Stella with him for long stretches. He visited her sporadically so she could feed the baby and assuage her guilt for giving her time and energy to other people. And twice a year, they would take long trips to Novum or Argaria and visit their friends.

They ate in quiet, watching the waves crash rhythmically against the sand.

After dinner, Cecilia laid on the blanket next to Rainer as the sun set and the first stars lit the sky. Stella slowly nodded off to sleep on her chest.

Even in sleep, Cecilia could feel the restless wildness in her daughter—the same endless longing she'd always felt as present as her heartbeat. Cecilia watched it in her every day. The way Stella's bright green eyes studied their movements. The way her brow furrowed in concentration that reminded Cecilia of Rainer so much that she laughed out loud the first time she saw it. The way the baby let out frustrated, startled cries when her body wouldn't cooperate with the speed at which she wanted to move.

Her daughter was a force, and Cecilia promised she'd try to always encourage her to hold onto that fire. The world was dull without it. She would do what her father and mother had done and embrace every reckless, wild thing about her daughter, even when she was afraid. Cecilia knew what it was to be caged in a life too small for her and to have responsibilities much too large. The only thing she wanted for her daughter was for her to get to choose her way in life.

Staying wild was a blessing.

The bravest thing Cecilia had ever done was let Rainer love her. It took a lot to allow someone to be so gentle with her. It was hard to stay soft and open to him, but she did it each day. Some days it was easy. Some days she had to grit her teeth and repeat their silent prayer over and over in her head.

Brave with my hand. Brave with my heart.

On those days, Rainer always seemed to read her, taking the green ribbon from their bedpost and tying it around her wrist as a reminder.

Cecilia laid back and looked up at the stars shooting across the sky.

"Would you look at that—sugared with stars," Rainer said.

A smile tugged at her lips. "Sugared with stars. Well said."

She racked her brain, but the truth was she wasn't sure what there was left to wish for. She had the love of her life, a beautiful daughter, amazing friends who'd become family, and a kingdom that was rebuilding for the better. They were all complicated and flawed people, but they understood each other. They healed with and through each other. They allowed for those flaws without judgment. They loved each other not in spite of their weaknesses but often because of them.

They'd all loved and lost and fought hard for what they had. They were people who understood what it was to be lost and found and lost again. They'd helped her rebuild when she'd been broken. They fought hard for freedom and won. They were all strong in the weak places.

Cecilia had earned her freedom, and the price had been steep, but there was never a day she didn't look at her husband and daughter and know it was worth it .

She'd raged over the ruins of so many versions of herself. She'd likely be reborn again often, but she feared it less.

She'd asked for more than the small life she'd left behind three years earlier, and more than once, she'd regretted that wish. But now, with a job that helped her put herself and others back together, with a husband who took such good care of her, and in seeing their friends happy and satisfied, she'd come full circle, back home to the very place that had once felt so unsuitable.

She'd saved the two kingdoms, saved her love, and then saved herself. Her life was like a shattered mirror, impossible to perfectly piece back together but beautiful in its breaking.

Cecilia carried many hearts within her own. She carried many memories. And she no longer feared the power in them.

Now, when the sea whispered, " Remember ," she whispered back.

She reached out her hand, intertwining her fingers with Rainer's.

"Make a wish," she whispered with a smile on her lips. So far, she was two for two with these wishes. She liked those odds.

Cecilia picked a star and sent one more wish out into the world.

A wish to keep writing a long and happy story that was uniquely their own. Some stories tied people together. Some stories saved. Their stories had done both, leading them back to each other as often as they led them home to themselves.

The best tales weren't the ones written in a storybook or marked in a language of scars on a body. The best stories were the ones written in the history and love between people—in the hope that allowed those who'd lost so much to keep dreaming.

She kept their story close at heart so they could continue it forever, adding to it nightly, living in between.