death is the only ending for the trash queen

Part 19

In retrospect, it was insulting. Cale had not pretended to hold feelings for Alver. She'd only shown some hesitation in watching him depart. That was very much not the same thing as holding onto ill-conceived feelings for him.

His request to stop pretending to have feelings was entirely inappropriate at that juncture.

As she had done so many times before, Cale attempted to mend her wounded heart with pride. The medicine she'd chosen never really healed the underlying pain but she simply didn't know of another way.

That was the trouble now.

It was easy to put up a front before his majesty. To become consumed with her own feelings of bitter dissatisfaction and lash out without a second thought.

Penelope was different.

Cale hesitated outside of her daughter's door.

Penelope had appeared so distressed when she left. Cale couldn't say what exactly had caused it among the cacophony of events of late. Really, there was just too much that had happened lately for there to be a single simple reason for Penelope's distress. It was a miracle that she wasn't even more distressed than she was.

Even in the best of circumstances, sudden changes in the environment can scare children. Cale knew that just as well as she should. The Henituse estate would certainly have been an adjustment after living in the palace. Beyond that, the travel on the way here could have distressed her as well.

But this wasn't the best of circumstances. Cale had nearly been killed, Penelope had been exposed to her parents fighting near constantly, Penelope had almost been kidnapped, and now she'd witnessed something that led her to believe that Alver was disloyal.

Cale didn't for one moment doubt the veracity of Penelope's statement. Her daughter would never lie to her, especially not about something like that, but it was quite possible for her four year old daughter to misunderstand a situation.

It wasn't that she trusted Alver's explanation, at least not until he'd sworn it to the god of death, but well... it did appear to be unlikely that Penelope's words, although honest, were in fact true.

Now that Cale had the time to calm down and think clearly, there really was no evidence of Alver ever behaving disloyally. And if he'd been so careful about it up until now, why would he suddenly grow sloppy?

Of course, there was almost the potential that he was just too passionate about her to care but Cale was trying to hide it but Cale was trying not to think about things that filled her with so much irrational rage that she was unable to think clearly.

Regardless of the matter with Alver, Penelope had left in a state of distress and Cale set aside all of her complicated feelings for him.

Cale didn't have her pride to fall back on and she knew that she held some fault in Penelope's current unhappiness. The things she'd said in front of Penelope...

Cale swallowed thickly.

Sorry wasn't a word that came easily to her. Of course she'd apologized to her daughter before and meant it but Cale wasn't a person who let go of her pride. She felt remorse for what she'd done but there were just so many other complicated feelings. And the emotion she hated most of all was present too.

Cale was aware that no parent, no matter how angelic the child, could go forever without giving the child some form of reprisal. Whether it was fire is hot, don't touch it or don't tell lies there were countless ways that parents had to offer somewhat strict guidance to their children. She had been lucky that Penelope required very little reprisal and so, Cale never had to deal with this nasty feeling in her gut.