Page 33 of A Legacy of Stars (The Lost God Legacies)

33

STELLA

S tella hadn’t been able to face her mother when she first got home. She needed time to process everything. She had dinner with her father, who watched silently, constantly trying to feed her more, and then she’d bathed and locked herself in her room. She’d wanted to reassure her parents that she was fine, but so much had happened and she needed the night to untangle all the complicated things she was feeling.

She’d slept heavily, waking at nearly midday. She’d bathed again, and it wasn’t until she found herself scrubbing the skin of her hands raw that she realized she couldn’t even reassure herself that she was fine.

Stella stared at her bright red skin for several long moments, listening to the steady drip of water from her body. She rose from the bath suddenly, sending water sloshing over the sides of the tub.

She dried herself in a hurry, slipped into a simple cotton dress, and patted the water from her hair with a towel.

Finally, she felt ready to face her mother with honesty. Stella crept down the hall and tapped on her parents’ bedroom door.

“Come in,” her mother called.

Stella cracked the door open and stepped inside .

Late afternoon light poured in through the large windows, the curtains stirring with a breeze that held the salty tinge of sea air. One of Rosie’s dangling dried flower sculptures hung from the ceiling over the bed. Vases of Rainer’s carved star flowers and roses were squeezed into every crevice of the overflowing bookcases on the far side of the room. His oldest and most rudimentary carvings were combined with the new, intricately detailed ones in a small glass jar on Cecilia’s nightstand.

Stella didn’t know how to start. She felt suddenly, keenly aware of how her secrets had formed a rift between them. There was a time when she’d told her mother everything. Stella had no idea why she stopped. Some part of her had always been afraid of her mother’s knowing assessment, or maybe she’d subconsciously known that her romance with Arden wouldn’t hold up against her mother’s scrutiny, the same way it hadn’t with Kate.

She couldn’t remember the last time she’d laid in bed beside her mother and whispered stories in the dark. She’d wanted to be part of her own fantasy so badly that she had shoved Cecilia away.

“You know, I picked this room because it doesn’t get morning sun and I could easily sleep as late as I wanted. But now, being pregnant again and taking afternoon naps, I remember how much I love the light this time of day,” Cecilia said as she pushed herself up. She patted the bed beside her. “Come here, Little Star.”

Stella crossed the room and lay down beside her mother. Cecilia wrapped one of Stella’s damp curls around her finger and waited in the quiet, patient way she always did when she knew Stella needed a moment to untangle her feelings.

Stella traced her fingers over the flower pattern on her dress as the sadness in her chest began to unravel. “I thought that Arden was the hero in my story.”

“And now what do you think?” her mother asked, gently stroking her hair.

“Now I think I’m the hero.” Stella burst into body-wracking sobs.

She was shocked by the grief. She hadn’t expected that being her own hero would be so stunningly lonely .

Her mother hugged her like she understood. She was maybe the only person who could.

A lump formed in Stella’s throat, and she pulled back to meet her mother’s bright blue eyes. “I didn’t know you went through that, Mama—that someone hurt you like that. Endros had no right to your pain.”

The grief and fear were still fresh in Stella’s chest. The ragged agony of her father trying to get to her mother, desperately fighting across their bond so she wouldn’t feel alone in the worst moment of her life. Her mother’s harrowing grief that he would feel what she did and suffer alongside her.

It was one thing to hear the pretty version of a story, but what they had been through was so brutal and ugly.

Stella had never been under the impression that what her parents went through was easy, but she hadn’t realized how much she’d bought into the folklore when the lived reality was right in front of her.

How many times had Stella seen quiet moments where they’d both seemed haunted by something only the two of them could see?

Cecilia offered a watery smile and brushed the tears from her cheek. “The fairy tale is the story everyone else tells. The truth is messier, full of heartache and frayed edges. We didn’t tell you not because we didn’t trust you to be able to handle it, but because we tried to make a world where you wouldn’t be exposed to the horrors we’ve endured—” Her mother took a shuddering breath. “You saw the worst parts of it, but the real magic is in the healing. It’s in loving someone in their weakest, most vulnerable moments the same way you do in their triumphs.”

Stella squeezed her hand. “It’s okay, Mama. You don’t have to explain?—”

“I do. You saw the worst of it, but you didn’t see what good care your father took of me when I was healing, how he kept me safe and let me lead the way, how he built folklore into our relationship that guided both of us out of our darkest moments. Fairy tales are just stories, Stella. And sometimes stories save us. They have that power. But they are never the whole story. There’s an entire ever-after that is all about healing. Love is finding someone you can heal with. Someone who will sit with you in your darkest moments and love you when you can’t bear to love yourself.”

“Is that what Papa is to you?”

Her mother’s face softened. “You saw firsthand through those memories. Your father has always been a focal point for me. He has anchored me through every storm. Is that what Arden is to you?”

It was all too much. Stella was overloaded with information. Her need for love was a deep, yawning cavern that Arden had not even tried to fill.

“Papa fought so hard for you,” Stella whispered. “Arden couldn’t even defend his choosing me to his own parents.” It hurt so much to say it and face the ugly truth. “He doesn’t love me how I need to be loved, and I only loved what we could have been. I tried to keep something alive alone, and I felt so resentful and furious at him for not wanting me enough when I only ever loved his potential. I don’t know why I couldn’t see it.”

As a child, Stella thought her parents were gilded by their love, blessed with the matching golden scars they bore over their hearts. Now she could see how those marks were probably as much a reminder of their pain as they were a reminder of how much they loved each other.

A real man would have greeted Stella when she returned from the worst day of her life. A partner would have been beside her in the mess the way her parents were for each other.

She thought about the mix of terror, grief, and love her father had sent through the bond in her mother’s memory. Stella wanted someone to feel that way about her. Desperate and wondrous and terrified.

Her father used to say that fear and love were a pair. As a child, she’d never understood it, but now she did. To love someone for real was to show them where you could be hurt and trust them to be careful with you.

“It’s all right, Stella. I’ve got you,” her mother said, petting her hair softly. The movement was so soothing that Stella didn’t even care if it made her hair frizz.

“Sometimes it’s no one’s fault,” Cecilia whispered. “Some people can’t love you the way you need to be loved, and it’s no one’s fault. It just is. I’m sorry you’re hurting, because I know how badly you wanted this.”

Stella had imagined an entire relationship for herself. She’d invented an intimacy made of empty promises. She’d summoned that from the longing in her heart, all because she was too desperate to see the truth. Stella wanted to feel wanted .

She hated that Arden didn’t love the way she loved. She could have begged, but the kind of love she’d been desperate for since the first time she knew love existed wasn’t the kind that someone pleaded for. It was the kind given freely, helplessly, unflinchingly. And though some wisdom in her bones had felt that truth the first time she’d held Arden’s hand, it felt newer now—harsher. Like she’d helped sharpen and aim the blade, but was still surprised it struck true.

That was the trap of a charming man like Arden, someone who pretended to be good while actually being quite selfish. It wasn’t what he gave her so much as the possibility of more that he constantly dangled. Stella felt so stupid for not seeing it before, but it wasn’t until?—

No, she would not think of Teddy. Not now. She would break.

Her mother stroked her cheek and spoke again. “I can’t tell you what love is because it’s something different to all of us. To me, it has been the way your father cared for me so steadily, and how he learned to adapt to the ways I needed to be loved. He learned to stop fixing and sit beside me and support me when I needed to do the fixing. He learned how to choose his own path instead of letting someone else aim his sword for him. It’s all about finding the person who can love you when you’re at your most tender.”

Stella squeezed her eyes closed. There was only one face those words conjured.

She wanted to banish Teddy from her every thought. She could not even face him in her own head. When she thought about him, she thought about everything else. She thought about the fact that he had only touched her that way because she needed the distraction.

No matter what complicated thing she felt for Teddy, he did not feel it back. He was just a good man who felt responsible for the blood on her hands because he was the reason she’d had to get her hands dirty in the first place.

“That’s not all that’s bothering you,” her mother whispered into her hair.

Stella hesitated. She knew the admission wouldn’t make her mother love her any less, but she didn’t want to burden Cecilia with anything else.

“I killed someone. I—” Stella’s throat tightened. “I killed three people.”

“Oh, my Little Star.” Her mother pulled Stella into her arms and held her tight as she sobbed. “I’m so sorry. We hoped you would have it better than the two of us, but you did what you had to do.”

Stella gulped in a breath. “I know it sounds so silly. I knew it was a possibility going into this contest, but I just didn’t think it would happen like this. It was so fast, and I just reacted. And it was—” She gasped out a sob. “It was so easy .”

Her mother kissed the top of her head and squeezed her harder. “I know. It’s okay.”

It had been so long since Stella had been held that way. How had she forgotten her mother’s gentleness? How had she forgotten the person she always wanted most when she was sad or hurt? How had she forgotten how soothing it was just to be hugged and enveloped in the summer scent of her mother?

Stella cried harder. Of course Cecilia knew what it was to have blood on her hands and to be shocked by her own ability for violence.

Stella pulled back and met her mother’s watery gaze. “How many people did you kill while pursuing the Gauntlet?”

“Eighty-nine. I was eighteen the first time I killed a man.” Cecilia sighed. “Don’t look so surprised. I never forgot. That number is just the men I killed with my own hands. It doesn’t include the battalion I killed accidentally with my magic or anyone in the battles after that. It never got easier. It just became more of a reflex to protect myself.” She swallowed hard. “I did what I had to in order to survive and my grief now doesn’t come from being disappointed in you or your choices. I just hate that you have to fight when I wanted you to know only peace. All of you.” Her hand slid to her stomach.

Stella imagined Leo and Rosie in the tournament. She’d do anything to keep them from feeling this way.

“I think about your grandfather a lot as I watch you in the games,” Cecilia said. “I was so much like you at your age. I see now how the choices your Grandpa Leo made for me were out of love and protectiveness and not control. As I watch you compete, I have a whole new appreciation for the terror he must have felt watching me go off to try to finish the Gauntlet. Being a parent is always wanting better for your kids, while knowing that you can’t save them from making their own mistakes.”

“But I don’t want to make mistakes.”

Cecilia smiled softly. “You sound just like your father.”

Stella sobbed a startled laugh.

Cecilia took her hand. “We are forged by our mistakes. I wouldn’t wish you perfection because you’d be bored. I knew from the first moment you set your father’s sleeve on fire at ten months old that you would be a force , and here you are, choosing yourself. It’s a hard, lonely lesson, but it will serve you well. Sometimes it comes down to you or someone else, and I’m happy that you love yourself enough to fight.”

Tears welled in Stella’s eyes. She’d always felt so messy and out of control, a bright spark in the shadow of her mother’s grace. But Cecilia’s pride made her feel seen in a way she hadn’t realized she needed.

Stella didn’t know how to say that she hadn’t killed for herself. When it was her life on the line, she couldn’t do it. It was seeing Teddy in danger that had made her capable of such violence. That was what really frightened her.

How easily she’d lost herself in Arden and how quickly she could do the same thing again .

But it was not the same. Teddy was not weak, and he had fought for her. He had killed to protect her and he’d done it without a second thought.

“Is that all that’s bothering you?” Her mother’s voice startled her from her thoughts.

Stella couldn’t possibly begin to unpack how she felt about Teddy. She’d been certain she had him pegged, but now she was so confused.

Maybe she’d have the words eventually, but she needed a deflection. She glanced at her mother’s stomach, just the hint of a curve to it under her cotton dress. “How are you feeling?”

Cecilia smiled, and Stella understood in that moment what people meant when they said pregnant women glowed. Her mother looked lit from within by joy. “I’m still getting sick a lot—like I did with you—but your father’s excitement is contagious. He’s working on a new crib and it’s been good for him to have something to focus his anxiety on with you in the tournament. I’m happy to have him fussing over his projects instead of over me or you.”

Stella laughed. “I’m happy about the baby, but also a little jealous, which sounds so ridiculous. I’m a grown woman.”

Cecilia smiled and pulled her close so Stella’s head was tucked against her chest. “I know you’re worried about this new baby, but you will always be my first baby, Stella. You were so dearly wished for. You taught me how to be a mother and Leo and Rosie have benefited from having you as a big sister. This new baby will, too. I’m so proud of the beautiful, passionate young woman you’ve become.”

“But everyone else has found their place. Leo is a fighter, and he helps Papa with his woodwork. Rosie has her art and flowers,” Stella said.

“And you will find yours, too. It’s okay if it takes longer.”

Stella thought of the look of intense concentration and pleasure on Rosie’s face as she knotted flowers onto threads, weaving artful, intricate, hanging floral sculptures as if she could see a thing in the world no one else did.

Stella had none of that. No ability to see invisible patterns or create. She only knew how to destroy. Friendships, opportunities, relationships, and, now, people.

“Leo has always been good at making people feel welcome and Rosie has always been good at making things beautiful. I only seem to know how to burn things down,” Stella said.

Cecilia kissed her temple. “It’s like your father with his wooden flowers. I could never make something beautiful like that. But the world needs both the creators and the revolutionaries. I only knew how to break things, but that’s important when things are stale. Your Aunt Sylvie, King Xander, even your father—they are the ones who know how to make something beautiful. But the world needs change-makers too. They need people who burn and burn and inspire other people to burn too. I think you underestimate yourself. You know how to make people great. Do you know what I see?”

Stella shook her head.

Her mother smiled. “I see your confidence in Leo. You have always pushed him harder than your father or I could. You broke him out of his shell. His first few years with us, he was so afraid of everything. The more of a wild child you were, the more he saw that the world could be a safe place. When he fell, you were the one who picked him up, and he got braver every day. That was your doing. You showed him how to grow out of his fear and look at what a wonderful, confident young man he’s become.”

A lump formed in Stella’s throat. She’d always been so close to Leo. After her initial disturbance at his arrival, she came to agree with her parents that he belonged with them. He just fit in. But they were so close in age that she’d never stopped to see how she had helped shape him.

Her mother stroked her cheek. “And I see your softness in Rosie.”

“That’s your softness,” Stella said. Her voice wobbled.

Cecilia shook her head. “No, Little Star. Rosie has her mother’s creativity, your father’s steadiness, and my warmth. But she has your strength of heart and vulnerability. I see you in all the beautiful things about your siblings, just like I sometimes see myself or your father. But you have always had a way of seeing their beauty and reflecting it back to them in a way they can take.”

“Papa says I get that from you.”

“Perhaps. But you have always been so fiercely your own, and that is the thing I am most proud of,” Cecilia said. “That is what I fought for—for you and every other woman in the two kingdoms to be themselves and make their own choices.”

Again, Stella couldn’t remember why she’d pushed her mother away. Sometimes it felt easier to be loved so intensely from a distance, especially when she wasn’t certain she’d done anything to deserve it.

“Why is this all so hard?”

Cecilia smiled softly. “Oh, my Little Star, you’re just growing up.”

“Don’t be nice about it. It makes it worse,” Stella sobbed.

Cecilia laughed and kissed her forehead. “It’s my job to love you no matter what. Best job I’ve ever had.” She shifted and the top of her dress gapped, revealing the golden scar over her heart. Stella stared at it for a long moment.

“Don’t romanticize this scar like everyone else, Stella,” her mother whispered. “You have always loved it, even when you were a baby. But I would spare you from ever having to make that choice—from looking into the eyes of the person you love most and knowing that it’s you or them. I don’t want you to love like that. I want someone to love you like that. I want you to be safe because you’re my baby.”

“What if I fail?” The question slipped out.

Gods, Stella didn’t even know what she was fighting for anymore. She’d thought she was so unique, but she was just another woman giving too much of herself up for a man who didn’t appreciate it. It was such a disappointing end to this story she’d expected to be grand.

“What if you fail?”

Stella pulled back and met her mother’s gaze. “I thought you would reassure me.”

Cecilia sighed. “What I mean is: What are you making failure mean about you?”

Stella frowned.

“You’re my baby. I cannot even fathom that kind of failure, because it terrifies me and I have only survived thus far by putting my complete faith in you. I’m white-knuckling every challenge, hoping that if you can’t win, you’ll at least be safe.”

Stella sat up. “I don’t want to upset you. The baby?—”

“I’m fine, and so is the baby. You worry about you, Stella.”

“How?”

Her mother laughed loudly and suddenly. “I don’t know. I’ve been missing your grandfather. I’d love to know how he handled me running into danger like this. Now I know how terrified he must have been, but he never showed it. I’d love to know his secret. I wish I could tell you that I’m not afraid, that I have every confidence. But being a mother is redefining fear daily, and when I see you hurt, it makes me want to rip the world apart.”

Stella rested her head on the pillow next to her mother. “Can I stay here tonight?”

“Of course.”

Stella snuggled into Cecilia’s arms and breathed in the lemon-lavender scent that had been so comforting to her since childhood. Sometimes a girl just needed her mother.