Shadow Heir

Chapter 28

Alabama reminded me a bit of the Oak Land—or rather, the old Oak Land—when my plane touched down. Autumn had come since my last visit, bringing rain at last to the grass and shades of red and gold to the trees. It was beautiful, but I only spared it a brief thought before my mind returned to other, more pressing matters.

Two weeks had passed since Kiyo found me at the mall. I’d lived those two weeks in a daze, reeling from what he’d told me. I hadn’t believed him at first, of course. I had stared at him in disbelief and then laughed outright. It was hard not to. His words were too ludicrous.

“Of course you are,” I had said at last. “I didn’t sleep with anyone else around that time—I mean, except Dorian. But that was before I took the antibiotics. Then I was with you.” I wouldn’t trade Isaac and Ivy for anything, but it still bothered me that I’d gotten pregnant from the idiotic mistake of mixing antibiotics with birth control pills.

“What was the total time span there between us?” Kiyo had asked calmly. “About a week?”

I’d nodded. “About that.”

“That’s enough time. Even if you weren’t fertile at that exact moment, you can still conceive shortly thereafter. Find a health book and read up on it.” His lips had quirked. “It probably mentions antibiotics in the same chapter.”

I hadn’t liked his smirk. “Supposing that’s true, how can you know for certain that it wasn’t you instead of Dorian?”

“Ah, well. Because I, uh, had a vasectomy.”

That had been the moment my life transformed from a fairy tale to a daytime talk show. It wouldn’t have surprised me if the crowd around us had turned into a studio audience and a host with a microphone had appeared, ready to show us paternity results. It was too unreal. Too out there, even for me.

Kiyo had told me the story. Shortly after Maiwenn had gotten pregnant, he’d decided to ensure there were no more unplanned pregnancies in his life. This had been particularly important while he was dating me. Our relationship had been pretty serious, and we’d both expected to be together for a long time. As much as he had wanted that then, he still couldn’t risk me accidentally begetting Storm King’s heir.

“I can dig out medical records if you want,” he’d added. “Or I’m guessing if you just look at the kids, you won’t see much of me.”

Yes ... I had already noticed that. I’d simply assumed the twins had taken after me, but if Dorian really was their father ... it would be hard to say whose genes were dominant, seeing as we both had red hair and pale complexions.

“I don’t know which is the craziest part of this,” I’d told Kiyo. “That you were so adamant about birth control while we were together and never mentioned that you couldn’t have kids or that you let me think you were actually going to kill your own children!” Not that him killing someone else’s children was much better. It was horrible any way you looked at it.

“I thought ... well, Dorian was already on your side. But I thought—no, I knew—that if he found out they were his, I’d have a much harder time of getting to them.”

No doubt. Dorian would level a city to keep his children safe. Still, the fact that Kiyo could have been sitting on a lie like this was mind-boggling.

“Then why are you telling me now?” I had asked. “Why tell me any of these things?”

Kiyo had shrugged. “It’s the right thing to do, especially after you helped me on the Yew Land trip. Besides, some of the pressure’s off now that the prophecy’s immediate threat is gone.”

“Not according to your pal Maiwenn.”

“No. And probably not in the eyes of others. Even people who don’t care about the prophecy are still scared of you, Eugenie. Those kids are leverage against you.”

Kiyo had left shortly after that, disappearing into the throngs of oblivious shoppers. I’d let him go, both because I could do little to him in public and because I was really too stunned to react anyway. When I’d finally recovered enough of myself, I’d immediately sought out a book on pregnancy and learned he’d been telling the truth, that having sex a week before you were fertile could still result in pregnancy. I learned more about eggs and sperm than I’d ever wanted to know, but with my track record, maybe a little education wasn’t so bad.

And so, here I was, about to see my children at long last. We were pushing nearly three months since my last visit, and some part of me half expected them to be all grown up and on their way to college. I hadn’t told anyone the news about their paternity. I was keeping that close to my heart, unsure what to do with it. It could have a lot of consequences.

I rented a car and drove out to the country to see Candace and Charles. The little house looked the same, aside from its landscape no longer being dried and burned out. I’d given them a heads-up about my arrival, and they were practically waiting at the door when I arrived. Candace whooped with joy and barreled into me with a huge hug. Even normally reticent Charles embraced me. Evan was with them too, equally welcoming.

Isaac and Ivy were everything I could have hoped for and more. They were bigger but certainly a long way from college. They looked like the kinds of roly-poly babies you see on TV. No more tubes, no more oxygen masks. Just chubby cheeks and curious eyes that were constantly learning something new about the world. Those eyes made me do a double take. They’d been the dark blue of most newborns back in the NICU. Now, they were still bluish, but I could see hints of green coming in—green like Dorian’s. I almost started crying then and there.

“Look how much they’ve grown,” said Candace proudly, putting Isaac in my arms. There were no attempts at gender equality in this household. Isaac was in pajamas decorated with rocket ships. Ivy was in a frilly dress. “The doctors said the early birth might put them behind in developmental milestones, compared to other babies their age. But look—they can practically hold their heads up.”

I’d never thought of holding one’s head up as a milestone, but as Isaac’s little neck muscles fought to accomplish the feat, I saw that it truly was an amazing thing.

“They’re not really behind in anything,” she continued. “The doctors are kind of amazed at how well they’ve turned out.”

Was that the result of gentry blood? Once they passed out of the dangers of early infancy, gentry were remarkably hardy. It was hard to know for sure what was at work here, but I didn’t care. The twins were healthy and happy, which was all that mattered.

They hardly left my arms for the rest of the day. I even stepped up to change diapers because I didn’t want to be apart from them. Everything about them was perfect. Every coo, every toe, every breath. Small talk abounded, but always, the discussion wound back to the twins. No one asked where I’d been. It was obvious the Reeds worshipped everything about Isaac and Ivy, and they never tired of telling me even the smallest details about the twins’ lives. I never tired of hearing about them.

Candace finally convinced me to put them in their cribs later that night. Both had fallen asleep, and she cited some book she’d read about the early stages of infant sleep training. I didn’t follow it all but figured she knew what she was talking about. The twins had matching cribs in a bedroom that had been converted to a full-fledged nursery. There were lambs and rabbits on the walls and pastel colors everywhere.

I stayed there after she left and watched the twins sleep. Every tiny movement enchanted me. I was so caught up that I didn’t hear Evan enter the nursery until he was standing right behind me.

“I’m about to take off for the night,” he said quietly. “I wanted to say good-bye. Will you be around tomorrow?”

“Should be.”

“I’ll come back then.” His kind blue eyes drifted over to Ivy’s sleeping form. “Pretty amazing, huh?”

“Amazing doesn’t even cover it,” I said truthfully.

“What will you do now?” he asked. It was his usual easygoing tone, but there was a trace of worry under it. “Still thinking you might stay here? Or will you take them with you?”

I watched Ivy’s fingers twitch in her sleep and felt an ache in my heart. “I don’t know,” I admitted. “I thought when I came back ... well, I thought I had this all figured out. I thought the danger would be gone, but it turns out maybe not.”

Surprise lit Evan’s features. “If they’re in trouble, you know we’ll do anything to keep them safe.”

“I know,” I said, smiling. “Believe me, I know.”

And that’s where things got difficult. I’d intended to bring them back to Tucson with me. When I’d finally accepted what Kiyo had told me about Dorian, I’d even begun plans for introducing Ivy and Isaac to their Otherworldly heritage. Then ... as time passed, I began to doubt myself. Kiyo’s words came back to me, about how Maiwenn still thought Isaac might be a potential threat. Worse than that were the insinuations that the twins could be at risk simply from those seeking to make a power play against me.

I could almost dismiss that last fear. After all, with the Otherworld still recovering from the blight, conquest wasn’t on many people’s minds. And yet ... I knew enough of gentry nature to know some might think it an acceptable risk to take advantage of weaker kingdoms. I also had the haunting examples from recent times of those I loved being used against me. I’d scoffed at Varia’s attempt to blackmail me for the Iron Crown, but what if she’d held Isaac in her arms when she’d made the threat? What if she’d done that weird mind melting on him? Yielding the Iron Crown’s power to her and helping her conquer kingdoms would have seemed like very unimportant things in that moment.

Dorian’s words came back to me, when I’d lamented about those I cared about being used as hostages: That’s what heartless people do. They prey on those who love.

“I can probably protect them if I take them with me,” I told Evan. “I have lots of ways to keep them safe.” A castle, rings of guards and magic users ... the Otherworld was filled with all sorts of protective means. “But I’m almost certain they’ll be safer here. I also think they’ll have a more normal life here.” Safety, as I’d found with my pregnancy, had come at a cost. Isaac and Ivy would spend childhoods in the Otherworld tailed by guards. Most royalty did. But did I want that? Here, in obscurity, they could run around outside without shadows looking over them. “How do you choose as a mother? How do you choose between ‘probably safe’ and ‘safer’? It’s really only a tiny difference, but ...”

“... but you feel like that tiny bit is crucial,” he finished.

I nodded and sank down into a rocking chair. “It’s hard not to. I really can’t ignore even the tiniest detail when it comes to their safety.”

He put his hands in his jeans and strolled over to lean against the wall near me. “You could visit anytime you want.”

“I know,” I said. I’d taken another convoluted path to get here. That would likely be the norm if I left the twins in Huntsville. Not ideal, but worth it. “These last couple months have been awful, you know. I thought about Isaac and Ivy all the time.”

“Of course you would.”

“I don’t want to go through that again, especially since we’d be talking about a much longer time.” It could be years before I felt they were safe enough to emerge from this retreat. “And yet ... I keep thinking I could make that sacrifice if it’ll help them. It’ll hurt me, no question. And I’ll hate it ... but I can do it. The problem is their father... .”

There it was. After the joy of realizing my children hadn’t been fathered by someone who wanted to kill them, a few realities had set in. Dorian wanted children of his own—wanted them fiercely. Part of me wanted to run to him right now and tell him the good news. He would be ecstatic—beyond ecstatic. It would be a dream come true.

It would also be a dream he would not allow to hide away here in the human world.

He would want to bring them to the Otherworld—not for any grand schemes, but simply to love them. I’d noted earlier that he would level cities to keep them safe. He would exercise every power he had to protect them in the Otherworld, and I doubted any argument I could make about safety here would win him over. He hadn’t believed that when my safety had been on the line. He wouldn’t accept it for his own children. Once again, probably they would be safe. But if something went wrong, our enemies would then have two powerful monarchs to blackmail.

I could already foresee the arguments that would come when I told Dorian I was leaving Isaac and Ivy where they were. I doubted he’d have any luck finding them. A search in the human world was difficult enough for someone like Kiyo and nearly impossible for a gentry. But there would be no peace for me. Dorian would never stop trying to get me to tell him where they were. Any attempts at rebuilding our former relationship would always be affected by this, and that hurt me in a different way.

“Is he a danger to them?” asked Evan.

“Huh?” It took me a moment to remember I hadn’t elaborated on why the twins’ father was “the problem.” “No,” I said. “Absolutely not. He would love them. He would do anything for them—except leave them here, even if it’s for the best. He would want them too badly.”

“I can understand that,” said Evan earnestly. “You keep using ‘would.’”

“He doesn’t know he’s the father.” I sighed. “If I tell him ... it’ll be the happiest day of his life. If I don’t, I’m the only one who suffers from being apart from them. He’ll be in blissful ignorance.”

Evan shook his head. “That’s an ugly choice.”

I stared off at the dark window without really seeing it. “Not telling him now eases a lot of problems—except, one of the biggest issues between us has been about the importance of honesty and rebuilding trust. I’m especially always going off on that. What kind of hypocrite would I be to push for that and then keep something like this from him?”

Evan was silent for a few moments. “So ... you’re getting back together.”

I looked up at him, only then realizing what my words meant. Evan still wore that everything-is-okay look, but I caught a glimpse of disappointment in his eyes. There’d been no promises between us, but he’d still had his hopes pinned on me when I returned.

“Evan, I—”

He held up his hand and gave me a kind smile. “Don’t worry about it. It’s what you want, and I’m happy for you. It has no effect on what I do for these kids.”

I still wanted to apologize but instead held back and respected his wishes. Going on and on about how sorry I was, making excuses ... well, that wouldn’t make him feel better. It would only make me feel better. He would have to process this in his own time.

“How long would you keep them from him?” Evan asked, returning to my dilemma.

“I don’t know. Years. Maybe until their teens.” I groaned. “God, that sounds awful just saying that. What kind of person even considers something like this?”

“Someone who loves their children,” he said bluntly.

“Would he forgive me when he finds out?” I asked bleakly. “Would you? You wouldn’t be happy to find out your girlfriend had been hiding something like this for years.”

“No,” Evan agreed. “I’d be pretty upset. But I’d also be overjoyed to see my children healthy, safe, and well.”

I stood up and paced toward the cribs. “Would that be enough? Would it make up for the lie?”

He thought about it. “I don’t know.”

I looked between the two sleeping forms, and that’s when the tears started. I wasn’t a crier. With Pagiel’s death and even in some of the more hormonal moments of pregnancy, my tears had been pretty minimal. Now, they were an onslaught as all the hurt I’d been holding within me for so long burst out. I cried for Dorian, for the secret I would have to keep from him. I cried for Isaac and Ivy, who would spend a good part of their life never knowing the truth about their parents. And I cried for myself, because I was going to hurt every day I was apart from my children.

Evan put his arms around me and let me cry into his chest. He didn’t try to tell me everything would be okay, and I was grateful for that.

“I don’t want to leave them,” I sobbed.

“I know,” he said.

I sniffed. “I’ve never had to make decisions this hard before ... and believe me, I’ve had to make some pretty tough ones.”

Evan nodded. “That’s because they were always about you. Everything changes when someone else’s life is in your hands.”