Page 98 of The King’s Commander

“How were you able to bring a smile to her face?” my father asks at the door.

Kipp stands, patting the spot from which he’d risen.

“Come and see for yourself. ’Tis not hard. Just ask what she keeps under her remaining pillow.”

I make a strangled sound. Kipp knows that while my father may have built a healing room for me, he does not care for reminders of my training.

Kipp leaves, and my father settles in the spot he vacated.

Knowing he will ask, I pull out the Kona again and show it to him. When he leans toward me, I think he means to take it, but instead, he closes my fingers around the doll, turning my hand into a fist.

“Treasure it, and the memory of Edrys.”

I would not have been more surprised had my Amma come back to life and walked into the chamber.

“Father?”

He doesn’t move his hand.

“I’ve failed you, Aedre.”

I put my other hand over his, shaking my head.

“Nay, never . . .”

“You are so very much like your mother. And ’tis not a surprise, given your Amma’s influence. She would be so proud of you.”

All will be well.

“But you still dislike this part of me?”

My father has never looked so . . . vulnerable before.

“I worry for you, maybe overly much, but there is no part of you I dislike. How could there be? Look at the woman you’ve become.”

I feel awful about keeping a secret from him. Perhaps I’ll tell him one day, long after Vanni has left. “I’ve made mistakes,” I confess. “I miss Amma so much.”

“As do I. But she is still here.” He points to my heart.

“Father, do you wish you’d married again? Are you not lonely for companionship?”

He thinks on that and then answers.

“Nay, I am not lonely. I have you and the forge. ’Tis all I need.”

It is as I thought. I could never leave Murwood End. Father needs me, and he would never leave the forge behind. Not that it mattered—I was not going anywhere.

By tomorrow eve, Vanni will be nothing more than a part of my past. A man who swept into Murwood End, captured my heart, and then left me behind to mend it back together.