Thirty-Three

The wedding was set for next June.

The area I’d come from in the West was destroyed in what was quickly becoming known as the Women’s War. It was ongoing, and messy, and many faceted. The people I’d grown up with, my family and friends, were long gone, and that was something that settled inside of me like a heavy stone that I knew I’d always carry. But the West wasn’t the only problem area, and Queen Belle was working hard to educate as we fought. I wanted nothing more than to help her create a better world for my daughter, and we decided together the best way to proceed.

As a former Queen and widowed First Wife from the west, I had a voice on the stage of world politics, and a marriage to Trayne could amplify everything I had to say. Mine was a tragedy that others would listen to, with just enough horror and stamina to keep even the most distant minds interested. I was just scarred enough to be a hero, still pretty enough to be interesting.

But within our own home, everyone knew that this marriage was a farce. Trayne was my friend- my good, good friend, with strength to lend whenever I needed it and a kindness that enveloped me on my saddest days. But he was only a friend.

Cheylin was my soulmate, something so far removed from anything I’d encountered previously in my life. This was warm and natural, not forced. I felt nothing but hope and comfort every time I lay in her arms. There was no apprehension, no forced affection. I didn’t know it could be like this.

After the public wedding ceremony linking me to Trayne forever, to which several world leaders would be invited, and a spectacle made about the good done in the West, we would have our own private ceremony, with only our closest friends in attendance. Queen Belle was resigned to my position as her seventh daughter-in-law, letting go of her hopes for a true romantic partner filling that space for her son.

“I guess he can’t be absolutely perfect,” she said with a smile. I adored my new mother-in-law.

From the First Wife to the Seventh Wife, I’d stepped down in society but up in the world. I was, for the first time, in charge of my own destiny, and I was certain that this was the right decision.

Time would prove me right.

Epilogue-Fifteen Years Later As I watch Bird hitting her target once more, I know with certainty that she will be deployed in the next draft of soldiers heading to the South. My heart aches at the thought, both with pride and with worry. She’s my darling daughter, Lynn’s darling daughter, the darling of the entire castle, to be quite honest. She has a charming smile that enables her to get exactly what she wants, and she wants to be a soldier. My own Forrest will probably follow her in a few short years, and the thought makes me hover ever more closely to him now. He doesn’t understand, and I pray he never does. With any luck, by the time he has children of his own, we will live in peace times.

Maia spends her time in the library, reading, always reading. We have a tumultuous relationship, and by that I am not surprised. She resents my interest in her life, my attempt at guiding and steering her. I wonder if this is an age appropriate relationship between the two of us, getting worse with age as it does, and if one day she’ll be my friend, or if somewhere deep inside of her, she remembers rolling around alone and cold, afraid and left to die in the back corner of a wagon by a cruel and broken mother. I wonder if her spirit will ever truly be able to forgive me for that. I find peace in the fact that she doesn’t seem to possess her father’s cruelty in the least, though sometimes when she looks at me with disdain, her face perfectly mirrors his and I have to walk away from her so that she doesn’t see my fear.

Trayne’s father passed away eleven years ago. I am Queen in all but name, but the politics of my position only matter at state dinners, which happen infrequently and at random. For the most part, Trayne and I run this empire together, with the guidance of Queen Belle and the consultation of Cheylin, who is more physically involved in every aspect of our kingdom than any of us. We do the most good where we can and destroy evil at every conceivable opportunity.

Cheylin has held off on joining the commune in the woods, but I don’t think that decision will last forever. I think she’s waiting on me, as patient as she’s ever been. It took us years to find each other, worlds apart as we were, and neither of us are eager to be without the other. So, she waits, my wife in my heart, and she doesn’t push me, but she’s wild and I know her soul longs to be in the wilderness with her people. I go there with her often, trying to find a balance that works for both of us, but for now I still have so much work to do here. We both do. I worry that the old adage is true, that a woman’s work is never done. We go to bed together, heavy with the weight of it all, but find lightness in the night, holding each other until we’re better and stronger for the next day’s fights.

Once, a diplomat brought a gift for us, something to add to our vastly growing library of history and the arts. Word spread that ours was a kingdom that valued such things, and they sent this gift in hopes of some political trust or another. It was an astonishing portrait of a woman, her face etched forever in my mind, her smile half hidden. I glanced at her, knowing her pain deeply, hoping that, whoever she was, she eventually found a reason to smile without duplicity. And I put the portrait at the back of the library, where few would ever see it.

She’d inspired me for the entirety of my youth, but I no longer had any use for her captivating, deceptive smile, and I hoped I never would again.