Galactic Gale

Chapter Eight

The Frail Queen's Request

Kael was accompanied by the cluster of guards down the hallway, up the steps and into the largest of the palace's bedrooms.

He had been surprised to find Nona had no interest in coming with him, but nothing shocked him about Amara's insistence that she was given something to drink. She had been swaying on her feet when they parted and the redness around her eyes had not faded.

The two girls had left him. Nona had claimed it was too dangerous to have the Queen visited by Amara Lee, the famous rogue, and had taken Amara to the servants' kitchen four floors below where Kael now stood.

Regardless of the fact his mother was resting on the bed, looking more than worse for wear, Kael could not take his mind from his captain. In all their days together, he had never seen her in such a state.

"Son," Telion Galtionie said. Her head was propped on a spread of pillows and cushions and her body covered from the waist down in blankets. The crown of Uterca was balanced on her head, pinned in place between her buns of purple hair.

Once she appeared to be the most powerful woman in the galaxy to Kael. Yet, as he awkwardly hovered by her side, Kael saw only a woman, worn and tired, and wondered what he what his younger self had been thinking. She might have been a queen – and a beautiful one at that – but Telion was no goddess. She was mortal and human just as he was.

After the way they had parted Kael had thought he would never see his mother again. She had stripped him of his royal status, taken his rights to his bank account away, and set him off with many words of disapproval.

He felt sick to the very pits of his stomach for being so uncomfortable around Telion – the woman he still loved so very much, even if she hated him for the rest of her life. Something caught at the back of his throat, and he coughed awkwardly.

"How are you feeling?" Kael managed.

The covers shifted as Telion held out a hand. "The illness will not spread to you, fear not. I would not have invited you here if that were so."

Her comment did nothing to stop his rocking heart. It was not out of concern of becoming ill that he hesitated to accept her hand. Telion had never been a sentimental woman and her soft tone unnerved him. It was not like her at all.

Uterca and Nona were not the only ones who had changed while Kael was gone. Everything in his past life had moved on, just as he had with Amara and the Rapid's crew, but he could not help but feel as if it were unfair.

This was his palace, his home. This was his mother, the woman who had given him life. Kael should have been there to witness both grow and change. He should have been there when his mother had first fallen ill to comfort and sooth her.

Kael clasped her purple hand in his own pale ones. Most of his looks had been passed down from his father. While Telion appeared as a gentle array of colours, he was fair, small, and without a trace of Telion's foreign family features.

"I was starting to believe that Nona would avoid bringing you here," Telion said. "I thought she would simply take a tour around Ramerela with those awful cruisers of hers and tell me upon return you had been killed or were imprisoned by the Celestial Watch."

Not knowing how to answer, Kael simply pattered her hand. Her skin was freezing despite the heat of the afternoon and the blankets that covered her.

"Your appearance is even more astonishing. When you turned your back on us, you looked so sure of the fate you had chosen for yourself." Telion coughed and Kael took an instinctive step back, wincing at the blood which slipped over her lips.