Epilogue
I finish studying in a hybrid manner. I can’t bear to be away from Lucian as often as school demands of me.
But we work out ways for me to complete research in person, while I do the majority of my classes at the palace, which also allows me to sink into my duty as queen.
After my graduation, we decide to have our first child.
A little boy. Beautiful, like his father.
And I know that it will heal something in Lucian every day that he gets to be a father to him.
Every day that he gets to keep him safe and unharmed.
Every day that we get to build love as a family.
He is a king, yes, but he pours lots of his time and energy into his family.
As much as possible. He travels with me as I write papers, give speeches on my focus of research.
Because I’m not doing it for him. I’m doing it for me.
For the future that my children will be living in.
I do it because I like it. And that’s one of the greatest things of all.
That Lucian and I are living a life that we like. That we would choose, time and time again.
I’m even thankful now that he dissolved our marriage.
Because after that, I had to choose to marry him all over again.
And it was a very different wedding. Attended by my sister and her husband, my mother, and her newest boyfriend, who she’s no longer with.
With a dress that I chose for myself, with my best friends as bridesmaids and with only joy, and no fear at all.
For most of my life, I knew that I wanted to do one thing. With Lucian, I get to be a wife, a mother, a scientist, a queen.
But most of all, I’m his. And that is something I would choose every day, all over again, forever.
And every night, with our children, we read stories.
One in particular that might have been written by a certain king and released under a different name.
The Sparrow and the Dragon, about the impossible love between two creatures, from two different worlds.
It has a happy ending.