It had been two weeks.
Two full, surreal, beautiful weeks.
Malvoria, the feared Demon Queen, had spent every single moment of them ignoring her kingdom.
Entire provinces could have caught fire and she wouldn't have known. She'd have raised an eyebrow, maybe. Possibly muttered something about bad timing. But she wouldn't have left Elysia's side.
She'd helped with Kaelith. Helped. A word that felt too small for what she had done. She'd been at her daughter's side for every cry, every wail, every suspiciously wet moment.
She'd learned to swaddle, bottle-feed, and even whisper in the exact tone that made Kaelith blink and blink, and then sleep like a stone with fire breath.
For fourteen days, she had been nothing but a wife and a mother.
And she had never loved anything more.
The documents had piled up like ambitious mountains in her study. Reports from the border watch. Petitions from high nobles.
