Alexander:
Caspian fell asleep less than an hour after he arrived, the kind of exhaustion that comes from too much excitement and too many questions. Eventually, exhaustion won. I carried him myself, and he barely stirred when I laid him down, turning onto his side and clutching the blanket as if he had always slept there.
For a long time I simply stood beside the bed and watched him. Four years. He had changed in ways that made me both proud and uneasy.
The softness of a toddler’s face had given way to something sharper, a line in the jaw that belonged to the Petrova bloodline. He was my son. The thought should have been uncomplicated, but it arrived wrapped in anger and a dozen other things I had not expected to feel.
Cassandra had brought him back without asking me.
I had never l
