Chapter 30 #2
I reach out hesitantly for his hand, unable to stop myself from giving him the same comfort I would have wanted. His eyes fall to my hand as my fingers wrap gently around his, and his features morph before my eyes.
Longing, pain, regret, but also something different. Something new.
My father finally looks happy, even if it is only just a little.
“I made a lot of selfish decisions,” he continues, “and I regret them immensely. But my regret does not change how they affected you, how they shaped you and made you doubt the love I held for you in my heart.” He squeezes my hand and his brows draw in.
“I don’t expect your forgiveness, and I am not asking for it.
I just cannot leave this world without you knowing that I do truly love you, Lennox, despite being a terrible father, and incapable of showing it.
I never wanted to leave you to be a young queen ruling a kingdom, yet here we are. I did exactly that.”
I lean forward slightly, wincing as I try to push past the pain and say what I need him to hear.
“You said I wasn’t ready,” I rasp, and his face falls.
“You heard me.” The sadness in his voice is unmistakable, and I wait silently for him to explain, hoping he understands.
“I was not referring to you becoming queen, and knowing that was your first thought just shows how much I failed, not only as your father, but as your king. No, Lennox, I was talking about what I told you tonight, the truth of what happened. It was less that you weren’t ready to hear it, and more that I was not ready to tell you.
I was not ready to relive that night, and cause you more pain than I already had.
But today I had no choice. I couldn’t leave this world, leave you, without you knowing. ”
My body shudders with quiet cries at his words.
I was wrong, like I had been before, but this time, it was not my fault.
How could I assume anything different after years of him halting my attempts to advance in my position, to act the way the heir to the throne would?
He admitted as much tonight, but knowing I was wrong, that it was out of his fear of being honest with me, not his doubt of my abilities, makes the deep hole of inadequacy in my chest a little shallower.
“You will be the best queen Blackwood has ever seen, Lennox. You will be even more loved than your mother was, I am sure of it. Your intelligence, your wit, your stubbornness, but most of all, your compassion. Your heart. Every bit of it is from her, and this kingdom needs it. We were locked away for far too long, and your people need you. I’m sorry I will not be here to see it. ”
But isn’t that always the way it has to be?
The parent will never see the regent their son or daughter will be come, they just have to know that they did what they could to shape them into a leader.
My father had the chance to see me grow into the princess, the heir to the throne and all that I could be, but his selfish actions took that chance from him.
Now, he will never have the opportunity to see who I will become, because while his heart still beats, there is no queen.
“West,” he says, finally turning away from me, and beckoning Weston closer from where he still hovers behind me. Dropping to a knee at my side, he’s as close as he can be without touching me, and I long to lean into him, to have him hold me as my father’s words alter the axis of my world.
“I tried, Rem.” Weston’s throat bobs as his chin dips in grief, but my father shakes his head as coughs wrack his chest again, followed by a shrill, deep breath.
“No. Do not blame yourself,” he wheezes. “It was just not meant to be. What is it your father always told us?”
“Light always finds a way, even through the blackest woods.”
“That was it,” he whispers, his lips tipping up in the hint of a smile as he glances between us. “I think there may be some light that has come from this darkness.”
Weston’s head raises, and he looks at my father directly, silently conversing with him, as maybe they had all that time ago.
But as I take in the two of them, it is so obvious to see the magic of Dawnlin.
Weston, still a young man, the friend and guard to the king, who now looks as if he’s aged a lifetime.
No one would look at the two of them and believe they grew up together, and once again, I’m thankful for everything the magic brought into my life.
Father releases my hand and reaches toward Weston’s, taking it and placing it over mine, in the space where his just occupied. Without hesitation, Weston weaves his fingers through mine, squeezing tightly, and my father watches the movement.
“Keep her safe, West,” Father says softly. “Do what I couldn’t do. Give her life. Love her. Like she deserves.”
My chest aches and I squeeze Weston’s hand back. I thought we would have to fight to be together, especially among those who wouldn’t understand Dawnlin and what happened there. I thought my father would be the first to forbid us, to remind us of Weston’s oath and do anything to keep us apart.
I was wrong.
Weston clears his throat. “I will, Rem. I swear to you I will. And I do. I love her.” He raises my hand to his lips and presses a firm kiss to my knuckles. “More than I ever thought possible.”
“Then I can leave, knowing you won’t be alone.” He smiles at me, tears still shining in his eyes, and I can’t hold back my emotions any longer.
I’ve now lost both my parents, and my guard.
I’ve lost everyone I grew to love on Dawnlin, except for one.
The one who is by my side as I say goodbye to the only true family I have left, and usher in a new era of my life, one that I was not expecting today of all days.
If it hadn’t been for Dawnlin, I would be sitting on this floor, truly alone.
My father’s eyes slowly close, the soft gasps loud in my ears, until the rise and fall of his chest stops.
I don’t know what I expected, whether I expected it to be different, or more ornate; whether I expected there to be some sort of physical passing of the title, to make it feel more real than it does.
But whatever I expected, it wasn’t this.
Because the moment finally happens, the moment no one could ever be prepared for. The moment I wasn’t prepared for, despite knowing it was coming my entire life.
As I look at my father’s lifeless body and still clutch the hand of the man I love, I know my life will never be the same.
I am the queen of Blackwood.