Chapter Ten
The room was beautiful. The windows faced the impossibly blue water, a view unlike anything she had ever seen before.
The bedroom was glorious. Not a tiny attic in a corner, not some other woman’s quarters, but airy and bright.
The bed was plush, with white pillows and a white duvet.
There was a hand-woven rug on the floor made with what appeared to be natural dyes, the geometric pattern on it intricate and artful.
She opened up the sliding door that led into the bathroom.
There was a massive, deep tub right next to a floor-to--ceiling window.
Because of course there was no reason one couldn’t bathe in front of a window here.
The only people on this island were the two of them. There was no one else around for miles.
There was a shower in the room as well, with a large rain head, and vines growing up the side of the interior.
Making it like being caught in rain in the rainforest. She went inside and turned that water on.
Let it hit her cold, stood there until it warmed up.
And she cried. Because she hated all of this.
Because she felt raw and bruised. Broken.
Because she was too thin, in spite of her growing pregnancy, because she just couldn’t eat.
Because this man was the epitome of a thwarted dream, and she hadn’t realized how much that would affect her.
She could step back and be impressed by her own strength if she took the time. But there was just something so crushing about losing this fantasy. For so many years, Onyx had been a bright spot in her life. He’d been the most beautiful man. An ideal in so many ways.
But the reality of him was disappointing.
King Onyx had been the ultimate fantasy.
Maybe he had been a kind of escape for her in her mind.
A secret garden that only she could go to.
While she had cleaned, she had imagined that she was doing this good work for him.
That he would care. That it mattered. And somehow in her mind she let herself forget that his wife existed.
She let herself believe that he was the sort of man who would see her, not the position that she occupied. And he wasn’t.
He wasn’t interesting or surprising. He was everything she had always feared a man in his position could be.
Cold, dismissive, suspicious of anyone who didn’t have the power and money that he did, whatever he said.
He attempted to try and convince her her that he didn’t feel that way. That it wasn’t an issue, but she knew that it was.
The way that he had spoken about that night…
God, but it was so hurtful. And why did he have the power to harm her even still?
She cried and gave thanks that the water was running down her cheeks, that it let her pretend that maybe she wasn’t this pathetic.
That she wasn’t weeping piteously over this man who didn’t seem to care about her at all.
Even bringing her here was all about optics.
She got out of the shower, turning the water off and drying herself a bit more fiercely than was strictly required.
But the scrub of the towel over her skin grounded her. Reminded her of exactly what was happening. Didn’t allow her to get too comfortable in her glorious surroundings.
She went to the lovely armoire in the corner, opened it up and looked at all of the fabulous dresses that were hanging there.
Then she opened up the drawers in the massive chest of drawers that stood in the other corner of the room.
There was no closet. Likely because of the way the house was constructed, with most of the walls being made of glass.
She found a bathing suit, and a flowing cover-up.
She put it on, and looked at herself in the mirror, frowning at her thinness that contrasted with her rounding belly.
Her breasts, she would admit, looked amazing.
She had pregnancy hormones to thank for that.
Too bad nobody was going to enjoy the look of them.
There was a pair of sandals exactly in her size, with gold cross straps and soles that seemed sturdy enough for her to walk in.
And she decided she really was going to go exploring.
She held her breath on her way out of the bedroom, down the stairs and out of the house. She didn’t want to run into him.
She needed a break from that man. And from her own ruminating about him.
He was her husband. It was the weirdest thing.
She was his queen, and that should feel like a dream come true, but it didn’t. She was being absolutely honest with him when she said she had never dreamed about being queen.
What she had dreamed about was loving him. What she had dreamed about was him loving her.
What she had dreamed about was apparently actually the most impossible thing in the entire world. Because if she, Birdie Matthews, could ascend from kitchen staff to queen, but could not secure his affection in any regard, that said something about the actual state of the world.
It really and truly did.
She didn’t encounter him, thank God, and instead was greeted only by the pleasant humidity, and the clinging warmth in the air when she went outside.
She decided to push all thoughts of him aside.
She had never been anywhere like this before.
She had never traveled before. Today she rode on her first plane.
All of this didn’t have to center on King Onyx.
He was used to being the center of everything.
He was central to Basilia, it was true. And so there was reason to his rather unavoidable inborn narcissism, but she didn’t have to cater to it.
She was a whole woman without him. She had been before. She was going to be a mother.
She found herself finally being able to get back to that place of total mindfulness. The one that she had found before the wedding.
This place was beautiful. The air, the breeze, the sound of the water.
She was elated to be here, actually. Maybe not with him. Maybe she felt emotional and everything was painful when she thought of him, but everything wasn’t pain. Not if she didn’t make him her North Star.
She was her own North Star.
She wanted freedom. And so she would claim all of the freedom that she could in this moment.
She poked around the perimeter of the house until she found a walking trail that led up the side of the hill and into the trees.
She could hear the sound of a waterfall in the distance, and she walked up farther, and came around a slight bend, and stopped.
Her heart slammed into her chest as she looked down.
Down and down. She was at the top of the man-made staircase, craggy stone steps extending down more than fifty feet into what looked like a fortress.
Large stone walls built up on either side of a pathway.
There were trees down there, hanging vines.
It was unlike anything she had ever seen before.
Beautiful and glorious. Like something from another world.
She gripped the handrail, and began to walk down the stairs slowly, listening to the sounds all around her. The birds. The wind in the trees. The ocean waves, a persistent sound even this far away from the shore.
She smiled.
There was magic. There were still miracles.
Onyx and his attitude didn’t get to take them from her. Didn’t get to decide how happy she was.
Right in the middle of that bubble of happiness she felt tired. Because hadn’t she been playing this game for far too long? Hadn’t she been trying to be happy in the face of other people’s misery for far too long?
She had been relentlessly optimistic in the face of her stepmother’s hatred and subjugation. When her stepsisters had been dismissive and awful to her, she had done her best to focus on who she was and what she was doing. She was having to do it again.
But at least you know how. You were made for this.
That was an indescribably sad thought, and yet, it was real. And true. None of this was fair. But no aspect of life had ever been fair. Why would it start now?
It wasn’t fair that Circe was dead. She had been young and vibrant. It wasn’t fair that for all he was king, Onyx was a man with his heart locked behind a wall.
And so there was nothing to be done. She could acknowledge all day long that it wasn’t fair that she was back in this position yet again. That she could never seem to escape it.
But there was nothing to be done. Nothing to be done but live it as happily as possible.
And God knew that through the years many women had to make these bargains.
Had to find ways to be happy in situations they wouldn’t have chosen.
She wasn’t unique.
Her sadness didn’t make her special.
Her determination to find joy—that might make her special. And if it didn’t, then it would perhaps make her a good mother. That was something that she cared about. The truth was, tragedy was common. This wasn’t a tragedy. She was comfortable. She would have everything she needed to raise her child.
She was on a private island.
She refused to be despairing.
She made it to the bottom of the staircase, and looked up, feeling tiny, dwarfed by these massive stone walls. The pathway was made of rocks, the masonry beautiful and ancient. She wondered what the history of the island was. It must’ve been populated at one time, or why would this exist?
She followed the stone path, where it wound around the corner, the sound of a waterfall growing louder and louder.
And then when she rounded the next corner, she stopped.
The waterfall crashed down from the very top of the stone wall in front of her, into a pool below that seemed to flow around the path that she was standing on.
Behind the walls, into a place she couldn’t see.
It was like a temple.
Suddenly, she saw movement behind the waterfall, and she jumped back. It was Onyx. Wearing a pair of tight swim shorts, his glorious, sculpted body on display, his dark hair wet, pushed back off his head.