Page 32 of A Gaze So Longing (The Fall of Livenza #1)

When Favian entered her field of vision, Marietta exclaimed in delight, “Oh, Favian! I was not expecting you!” She was seated at a small table in her chair, reading a book she put down immediately upon spotting him. She held out her arms, beckoning him to come to her.

He did, sinking into the embrace as if he were a child again.

His mother hugged him tightly, then placed a kiss on his forehead, holding his face in her hands.

“It’s so good to see you. I’ve missed you.”

“I’ve missed you too, Ma,” he responded, the weight of the feeling hitting him harder than he anticipated. “I brought you flowers.”

She smiled that loving smile that Nia had inherited from her. “Thank you.” Her hands on Favian’s cheeks were soft, familiar, home. “Place them on the table, will you? I’ll get a vase for them later.”

He did, noting the warmness of the room.

It was a little larger than the room he shared with Nia since she needed space to maneuver around if she was to keep working for the majesties.

Favian had no doubts that had she not been lucky enough to inherit the rolling chair from someone in town, the majesties would have thrown her to the wolves.

As it stood, Marietta could operate the loom just like her fellow weavers and had never once made any demands for special treatment because of her condition—this was what guaranteed her survival, Favian knew.

She had never gotten more than anyone else, though the Gods knew she could have used it. Still could.

When neither His nor Her Majesty had shown any signs of aiding Marietta in the transition to her new reality, it had been the women his mother worked with who had stepped up.

It was them who continued to ensure that she was capable of moving around their hut, them who had rearranged, restructured, rebuilt the premises so she remained mobile, who had given up the luxury of a reading room so she could retain as much of her autonomy as possible.

And if Favian remembered correctly, they had done so without being asked even once.

This, he understood with a sudden clarity, was the solidarity Rodrigo dreamed of.

Marietta had made the room her home: pressed flowers hung all over the walls, and embroidery pieces were placed above her bed.

Favian spotted the books she had painstakingly taught herself how to read, the image reminding him of Leonardo’s chambers.

The contrast between the rooms was stark, but there was something eerily similar about them—both comfortably felt like the person inhabiting them.

His mother’s eyes were kind as she said, “Nico tells me you have been spending time with His Highness.” As if she could read his mind. “What is he like now? You two were such good friends when you were children. When they sent him away, I was worried you would never recover.”

It made Favian smile, the image that his mother had of him and Leonardo from all those years ago. He sat down on the bed. She turned her chair by the wheels, facing him.

“He’s nice,” Favian said. “Kind.”

“He treats you well?”

He makes me feel at home. “He does.”

“Good.” She rolled closer to him and took his hands. “He hasn’t visited us since returning. I was worried he might be overworking you, with how long it’s been since you came by.”

It pained him to think he had made his mother worry, particularly if he had made her believe it was Leonardo’s fault rather than his own.

“I know, Ma,” Favian said, “I apologize. I promise to do better.”

“Oh, hush,” she scolded. “If you get a chance to be happy, you take it.”

Was that it?

“I’m not sure I get to be happy, Ma.”

“Help me onto the bed,” she instructed instead of responding.

Once she was seated next to him, she reached for his hands again.

“What is this talk of whether or not you get to be happy?”

Favian shook his head. “I’m sorry. I was being overly dramatic.”

“You are many things, Favian, but you have never been particularly dramatic.”

If only she knew.

“Tell me. What concerns you?”

“I didn’t come here to talk about myself,” he sighed, but his mother was not having it.

“Perhaps not,” she said. “But you’re here now, and I’m asking, am I not? So tell me. What has happened to my son that he worries he might not get to be happy ?”

“I haven’t been a good brother,” he confessed then.

“I have made mistakes, and Ni—Nico got hurt because of them. I didn’t protect them, and they suffered.

” And just like that, the dam was broken.

“And now we want to change things, we want to make it so nobody will ever be hurt like that again. And because Leonardo trusts me, I’m the one who has to convince him, and it’s hard.

It’s hard, Ma. I told him he needs to be better—I spoke up against the prince .

And now I’m supposed to keep doing it. Now I’m responsible for so much, for so many people—I want to do everything right, I want us all to live better lives, I want His Majesty to stop treating us like we’re disposable.

I don’t want him to hurt anybody ever again. ”

He was shaking.

“I want him gone, Ma.”

A hitch in his throat.

“I want him gone.”

Tears on his cheeks.

“I want him gone, I want him gone, gone—”

The words turned into cries turned into sobs.

Favian’s mind couldn’t follow what his body was doing—the tears were too swift, too raw.

His mother pulled him close, embraced him, slung her arms around him.

She held him.

She held him while he cried, while he covered her chemise in tears and snot. And he held on to her, held on to the presence of his mother, her warmth, her love.

“I’m sorry, Ma,” he wheezed, and again, again, again, “I’m sorry.”

He couldn’t even ascertain what exactly he was apologizing for; he just knew he needed her to say it was alright, to absolve him.

“I can’t do it. It’s so much, it’s too much—”

So Favian cried, and so his mother held him.

Only when they noticed the other women outside the room talking in hushed whispers did Marietta speak.

“I think,” she said. “You ought to come visit me more often.”

Favian laughed through the sobs, hugging his mother close. “I think you’re right.”

Delicately, she released him, once again placing her hands on his face. Her thumbs wiped his cheeks, taking the tears with them. “I love you,” she said.

“I love you, too.”

“Let’s get you some tea.”

The other women scrambled the moment Favian opened the door. They must have heard him crying his heart out, but once they saw that he was calmer now, they retreated upstairs.

“Don’t mind them,” his mother chuckled. “Nico’s visits are very different from this, as I’m sure you can imagine. I bet they were expecting you to make them laugh, not to make them worry.”

They set the kettle on the fire in the cottage’s kitchen. The tea was herbal and hot, the fumes clearing Favian’s sinuses the moment he took his first sip.

“So,” Marietta began once they were seated at the large dinner table, “you were calling His Highness by his first name. You used to do that when you were younger. Not for long, if I recall correctly. I believe he wanted you to, but you refused. I would have guessed that you wouldn’t be comfortable using his name now. ”

It was no question where Nia got her attentiveness from.

“I wasn’t, at first,” Favian admitted. “But he has been back for a few months now, and I…I have been taking him to the tavern, Ma. It’s really good for him, getting to see another life, our life , and being away from his parents.

Talking to the people who suffer under their rule.

But I’m scared I’m making the wrong choice. I know he shouldn’t really be there.”

His mother mulled this over, tapping her fingernails on the side of her mug. “How do you feel when you’re there with him?”

“I’m content.”

The words were out of his mouth faster than he could think. But as Favian spoke them, he knew they were true.

He had been anxious at first, overwhelmed by worry and nervousness and curiosity, but their visits to The Moonlit Sunflower had taken on a life of their own, Leonardo’s easy nature giving Favian an escape he hadn’t realized he needed.

Favian enjoyed being away from the palace grounds, he enjoyed being around Leonardo, and he enjoyed being away from the palace grounds with Leonardo .

Now Leonardo only had to show him that he was serious about his willingness to continue going against his parents, to make meaningful change, and Favian knew he would be done for.

“Then perhaps,” his mother pulled him out of his thoughts, “it is that easy.”

Favian huffed a middling laugh through his nose and rested his temple in his palm, elbow propped up on the table.

He envied his mother, envied her ability to see things so simply, to listen to her heart.

Leonardo was a lot like her, Favian realized.

Nia was, too. Unlike them, he was in his head, always.

He could not let go of the voices itching him to consider every possible path, each conceivable consequence.

Yet somehow, Leonardo had wound his way through all those layers of rationality, right into where Favian’s blood was pumping.

Gods, he hoped the prince would make good on his promises.