Chapter 2

Caris watched as the Urovan ambassador bowed his way out of the throne room, a headache blooming at her temples. She wished she could blame the weight of the crown she wore, but she'd woken up with the pain.

"It will be a very long time before anyone trusts Urova again, even with the peace treaty in place," General Clarence Votil said once the doors were shut.

"The new Isar has formally apologized for his country's involvement in the Infernal War."

"Apologies are meaningless in the face of their crimes. Isar Dávgon should have validated the information his ambassador and military officers were giving him."

"They were all rionetkas, and he was killed by one when Eimarille ordered them all to assassinate their targets."

Clarence shrugged expansively. "Every other country initiated physical checks for rionetkas. My understanding is Urova never did. The new Isar apologizes now because Maricol is united against Urova, and the wardens refused to patrol their poison fields until they surrendered. The alliance his predecessor had formed with Eimarille is meaningless these days, and he knows it."

Caris agreed with that, but she also knew alienating an entire country they shared a border with was not the best way to keep Ashion safe. "They've been sanctioned, the same way Solaria and Daijal have been."

The tithes those countries owed as payment for sanctions would go far to fill the warden ranks again, but it would be years before any were ready for the poison fields. The tithes Daijal sent would be the last that country ever paid under the Poison Accords, as it would cease to be a country and folded back into Ashion in the near future.

She resisted the urge to pick at the gold leaf that covered the intricately carved armrests of her throne. It wasn't the one that had burned with starfire, merely an exact replica that Eimarille had ordered be created. Caris wondered if they had the budget to replace it. Perhaps next year. Enough aurons were being channeled into her formal coronation next month, even with her putting her foot down about the costs. She'd wanted a simple ceremony, but Meleri was turning it into a grand occasion to enforce the truth of Caris' claim to the throne.

"Is that the last submission for the court today?" she asked.

"Yes, my queen," Lore said from where she sat beside the throne dais in her wheelchair, a diary spread open on her lap. "You do have a meeting in parliament this afternoon with the Council of Reconstruction."

She needed to remember to take something for her headache before that meeting, or time with the council would make it worse. "Of course. If you'll excuse me."

She stood from the throne and left, keeping her head steady beneath the crown. Weeks since the peace treaty was signed, and she still hadn't become used to it—the crown, her rank, this road. She bit the inside of her cheek, blinking back a sudden onset of tears. Grief came and went, the process nowhere near linear.

The Royal Guard followed her into the private wing of the palace, to the suites that were home now, even if they held none of the warmth and memories of the Dhemlan estate back in Cosian. She bypassed her own rooms in favor of the nursery, the design of the space something she hadn't allowed anyone to change. Eimarille had decorated it for Lisandro's comfort, and Caris would not take that from him.

The Royal Guard stayed outside while Caris entered the nursery in time to see Lisandro throw himself onto the floor, pounding his fists against it as he shrieked. "No! I don't want to do lessons! I want my mama!"

She flinched but smoothed away the guilt before nodding her dismissal of the nursemaid and governess. Both women curtsied to her before exiting the room. Caris approached Lisandro and sank to her knees beside him. She gently placed her hand on his back, a touch he allowed.

"I'm sorry I'm not your mother, but I'm here now," Caris said.

"Don't want you," Lisandro hiccupped.

Caris smiled sadly down at her nephew, whom she would raise as a son, and rubbed his back. "I know. I wish I could give you what you want. For now, would you like a hug?"

Lisandro turned his face to the side, cheeks blotchy and wet from crying. He sniffled loudly, staring with his blue eyes so unlike Eimarille's. It made it easier to look at him and see less of her, despite the features and hair she knew came from Eimarille. Caris didn't let herself look away or think about how her sister had looked when she'd destroyed Caris' whole world.

"Okay," he finally said after a long moment.

Caris opened her arms to him and let Lisandro crawl into her lap. She held the boy close, the awkwardness of their first hug having faded over the weeks since she'd taken him into her care. He blamed her for his mother not being there for him anymore, unaware and too young to understand that Caris was the reason Eimarille was dead.

I don't know how to tell you what she did and what I had to do. I don't know if you will ever forgive me.

The thought was a running circle of anxiety she hadn't yet figured out the answer to. What she knew for certain was that she couldn't lie to him, not how her own parents and Meleri had about her past. But the truth hurt, it always would, and she wanted to spare him that pain for as long as she could until he was old enough to hopefully understand.

"How about a treat, hm? And then maybe a walk in the garden?" Caris asked.

Lisandro nodded his head against her chest, his tears probably staining her gown, but she didn't care. She guided him to his feet and got to hers, offering her hand for him to take if he so wanted. She would never force affection or help onto him and had adamantly ordered the same for all who cared for Lisandro. She'd let him keep his boundaries as his road guided him through this transition.

Lisandro sniffed loudly and scrubbed at his nose with his sleeve. He eyed her hand for a long moment before reaching for it, his small fingers curling against her palm. Caris smiled gently at him, putting as much warmth into it as she could before leading him out of the nursery.

They ate cinnamon cakes brought up by a servant with a pot of flowering tea favored by Daijalans. It seemed to soothe Lisandro, and by the time they made it to the gardens at the rear of the palace, the redness from his fit had finally left his cheeks.

Caris let him wander ahead, exploring as young children liked to do. None of the plants were blooming, and many of the trees were bare, but there was still beauty to be found amongst the garden paths. She'd spent many a day out there, walking to clear her mind, and sharing that bit of peace with Lisandro was the least she could do.

Soren found them in one of the far groves with a pond that had giant, brightly colored goldfish swimming in its waters. Lisandro didn't notice his arrival, too busy poking at the fish that came to the surface and seeing if they would eat the lilies floating in the water.

Soren took a seat on the bench beside Caris, stretching out his legs. He still wore the uniform and carried the weapons of a warden, despite no longer being officially counted amongst their ranks. He'd never caved to Meleri's or others' demands in that regard. Soren had always known who and what he was, refusing to alter his road for a country he insisted was not his.

Caris knew eventually Soren would give up being a warden, if only to preserve them. When the time came for him to walk away forever, he wouldn't be staying in Ashion, and she would never begrudge him the life he so keenly wanted in Solaria.

"How is Lisandro faring?" Soren asked.

"He misses his mother the same way I do mine," Caris said. She picked at the skirt of her gown, keeping her attention on Lisandro, for she knew if she looked at Soren, she would cry. "Thank you, again, for doing what I couldn't, for sending their ashes to dance amongst the stars."

"You needn't thank me for doing my duty."

Her parents' names had gone up on the official memory wall reserved for those in the royal genealogies at the main star temple in Amari, alongside Nathaniel's. So many names were being etched into memory walls in towns and cities across the country. Many of the remembered dead had been burned in mass pyres, while still many more walked the poison fields as revenants.

Caris folded her hands together over her lap. "I'm thinking of having a private memory wall built in the garden out here for Lisandro and I."

"You want to put Eimarille's name on it?"

"I want Lisandro to have a private place to reflect without others judging him for loving the woman who was his mother."

"And you?"

"I'll put the names of my parents on it and Nathaniel's."

It would hurt to always be reminded of Eimarille and what she'd done, but Caris wouldn't blame the woman who could have been her sister in front of Lisandro—not while he was young and incapable of understanding. There would be time for explanations when he grew older.

Caris lifted a hand to touch her necklace with careful fingers. The gold chain held the sigil ring Nathaniel had given her as his promise to love her always and a shard of clarion crystal that would never find its other half on a map again.

They'd held a private funeral service for Nathaniel two days after he died, just herself, Blaine, Honovi, Soren, Lore, and Meleri present in the star temple. She'd cried and cried during it, aching from the loss of no longer having him by her side to walk her road together.

"Nathaniel and I, we were a war story. It was never going to end with anything but this grief. I know that now," Caris said thickly.

"Don't mourn forever. Find some joy in what's left. The war is over now, and we need to stop and look at what was left behind," Soren said.

"I miss him. I think I always will." She tipped her head back, staring at the sky. "I haven't learned to give up the things he left me."

Nathaniel had been her first and only love, and the thought of cracking open her heart again for another left her wanting to weep. Perhaps, one day, she'd learn to love again, but it wouldn't be anytime soon. Until then, Caris would carry the pieces of Nathaniel's memory with her and build a world for the both of them around the space he'd left behind.

"One day, you will, and he'll always shine down on you from the stars."

It was bitter comfort, there in a garden surrounded by the only ones left of the Rourke bloodline, the three of them barely family. But Caris had always been good at building things, and she thought, catching Lisandro's eye when the boy looked back at her, smiling gently at him, that perhaps they could build it together.