Chapter 17: The Queen's Room

Melina's POV

Zoe went to Stavros's sister's for the morning, with the ring in her pocket and a promise of six cousins.

I went down to the hall with Kyros.

He walked half a step behind me the whole way, and he did not say a word.

The room at the end of the blue gallery had a plain door.

"This one is yours," he said. "It was always yours. I never let anyone move a thing."

"I lived in this house for four years."

"You slept in mine. This one I couldn't enter."

He opened it and stood back.

It was a small round room with a window onto the deep water.

There was a narrow bed with a blue cover, a shelf of herbs in jars, and a pair of small shoes by the wall.

They were baby shoes, never used, in soft grey wool.

I picked one up.

The room tilted.

I stood in it ten years ago, heavy and slow, with my hands on my belly and someone laughing in the door.

I heard my own voice say, "You've knitted these wrong, they're for the same foot."

His voice answered, warm and unashamed.

"It's the first thing I've ever made. Be kind."

The memory let go of me and left me holding a wool shoe with both hands, crying so hard I couldn't see.

Kyros crossed the room in two steps.

He did not touch me. He stood there with his hands open at his sides and his whole body leaning toward me.

"You can," I said. "Touch me."

"Halia."

"Say it again."

"Halia."

It sounded right in his mouth, and I wanted to hear it again.

I put the shoe down.

I turned and put both hands flat on his chest.

"I'm not her yet," I said. "I'm still Melina. I'm both and I don't know how that works."

"I don't need you to know."

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