When the pain of my question overpowers her poise, her involuntary tears trickle and her noiseless sobs echo.
“Mother?”
I’m taken aback by inadvertently allowing that one word to fly away from my lips for the first time in a very long time. I’ve not called my mother ‘mother’ since way back when, coz I’ve never felt that she’s a mother to me, but only a queen to an heir.
My throat stings when I try to repeat the word, so I swallow the word back and call her what I normally call her, ‘My Queen Suprema’.
I step closer and take her hand. Then I gently rub my thumb against her knuckles while my other hand wipes away the trickling tears from her cheeks. Her wolf, Ivory, is refusing to look at me. She, too, is pained by my audacity.
“Forgive me for asking such a question,” I whisper.
I in
