Royally Not Ready(65)
“What do you think?”
He pushes off the wall and comes over to the sitting area, where he bends to look closely. “You’re doing a beautiful job,” he says, his voice soft, the rumble falling over me like a warm blanket, like the warmth his shirt provided me last night.
All morning, he’s been attentive.
When I first came downstairs, he held his hand out on the last step, helping me down. It was unnecessary, but I took it anyway. When he served me breakfast—despite telling him I could get it myself—he set the plate in front of me and then dragged his hand over my back before taking a seat himself. When we were in the “learning room,” he wasn’t brash with his teaching. He opened his laptop and showed me pictures, discussing what we saw. At one point, his hand was on my thigh, his thumb slowly moving over my skin before he pulled away.
When it came to lunch, he offered to show me how to make one of King Theo’s favorite sandwiches, which involved . . . cod. We joked around, he plugged my nose when I opened the canned cod, and he showed me how to toast the bread on the stove without setting it on fire. And then, when we sat down to eat, he tapped his sandwich to mine and we both took our first bites. It was delicious.
After, he told me Lara was going to show me how to embroider, a traditional hobby that every monarch, even King Theo, knows how to do. Apparently, it’s custom during Torg for the royal family to trade different embroidered items they’ve created with the public. He hasn’t left my side. His eyes haven’t left me either. And even though he’s only snuck in minor touches here and there, I swear it’s been like he’s held me all day, and I’ve loved every second of it.
I run my hand over the embroidery. “Are you just saying that or do you mean it?”
“Would I say something just to say it?”
“I guess not. Do you think it’s trade-worthy?”
“I think it’s close to it,” Lara says. “I think if you practice a little bit more, you’ll be just as great as your mother once was.”
That puts a smile on my face. “I’m assuming when she was still here in Torskethorpe, she traded a lot of her pieces?”
Keller takes a seat next to me and drapes his arm over the back of the couch behind me. “King Theo once told me that Margret’s pieces were most highly sought after and cherished by the public. There are pieces of hers in the homes of the public all over the country.”
“I remember when the country found out of her passing,” Lara says quietly. “It was as if the weather knew the loss we suffered because it rained for a week straight.”
“Flowers lined the gates of the palace,” Keller adds. “And when they held a memorial for her, those lucky enough to have one of her embroidered pieces, clutched them tightly in the rain.”
A tear falls down my cheek from the thought of so many people loving my mother. I had no idea. Keller leans over and wipes away my tear. “I truly wish I would’ve known this, how strong her connection was to this country, how much she impacted the people. I can’t believe she never came back, over all that time.”
“Pride is a funny thing in this country,” Lara says as she pokes her needle through her cloth. “We are a loyal bunch to our cores. We take care of our own, and we come together during dark times, but our downfall is our pride. If we have something stuck in our heads, we’ll let it brew, unable to listen to the other side.”
“I can see that pride, even with you, Keller, and Brimar,” I say. “Stubborn pride.”
From the corner of my eye, I watch Keller lower his head. Yeah, you hear that, Keller? Stubborn pride.
“So, you think pride got in the way of my mom coming back to Torskethorpe?”
Keller nods. “The fight with Katla was too damaging, and even though your mother loved this country, she desired more, at least at that moment. Katla trying to take that away didn’t settle well with her.”
“So, she fled,” Lara says. “And she never came back. And because Katla carries her pride close to her heart, she never reached out.”
“That’s why Mom only wrote to King Theo,” I say, remembering we spoke about this briefly.
“Correct.”
“That’s . . . that’s so sad.” I set my embroidery down and pull my knees to my chest. “I can’t believe that they’d let a miscommunication destroy their relationship like that. Think of everything they lost, of everything I’ve lost. I didn’t have any family outside of my parents, but coming here, there’s so much more that I could have been blessed with when I was younger. I’m not talking about the royal aspect, but more about having grandparents, having an aunt and uncles, even though they’ve all disappeared in different ways. Maybe . . . maybe if my mom had mended that relationship with Katla, things could have been different.”
“Possibly,” Lara says. “But you can’t focus on the what if.”
“Very true, I can only focus on the here and now.” I look between Lara and Keller and say, “I’m so glad you guys are here with me. I know that my decision weighs heavily on you, but you haven’t once pressured me or asked me what I’m going to do. You’ve shown me the history and the beauty of this country, but you’ve also shown me who I am and where I come from. My . . . heritage. And that’s priceless. It means so much to me.”