A Tale of Romans and Slaves | PJO/HOO

Chapter 30: Hazel

Everyone has a story.

Some of them are happy, some of them are sad. Most of them are a combination of both.

But everyone has a story.

Mine? It's sad. A tale of loneliness and heartache and pain.

Except for the two months, that is.

Because somehow, I met someone who could make me happy. Someone with a past as complicated as mine.

Someone who sucked at chess.

"Well, that lasted five minutes," I said as Frank cleared the board. He chuckled.

"I think we both know at this point that a lizard could probably beat me in this game," Frank said.

I smiled.

This was how I spent all of my time nowadays. Either playing games with Frank, talking with Frank, or sometimes just lying with Frank.

And I couldn't be happier.

I leaned against him, and he threw his arm around me. We spent a lot of time like this, just holding each other. Thinking our private thoughts.

"Do you ever wonder about how your life could've been?" Frank asked after an hour. "If something hadn't happened?"

I looked at him. "What do you mean?"

"Like, if some small thing in your life had been changed," He said. "Like, if you made a different decision than the one you did? Something like that."

"All the time," I said. It was true.

"I always wonder what would've happened if I hadn't joined the Academy," Frank said. "If I was back at the farm."

"What happened to the farm?" I asked.

He sighed. "I sold it to a merchant."

"Oh," I said. "I always wonder about my mother."

I knew absolutely nothing about her. My father wouldn't answer any of my questions about her.

"What about her?" Frank asked.

"Everything," I said. "Her past, why my father slept with her, if she's even alive... anything."

Frank cleared his throat. "Lady Persephone told me some things about her," He said awkwardly.

I shot my head towards him. "She did?"

"Yeah."

"Like what?" I asked, excited.

"Not much," He said. "Uh, she said she was a slave."

That explained my skin tone. She must've been from Africa.

"Anything else?" I asked. "Did she say what happened to her?"

Frank looked sad. "She said... she said she died in childbirth."

His words broke my heart, and I could feel tears start to run down my cheeks. I killed my own mother.

"Hazel," Frank said, pulling me into a hug. "It's not your fault."

I was sobbing now. "Yes, it is," I choked.

"No," He said. "It kills lots of women, Hazel. It killed the queen."

I knew the words he spoke were true, but I couldn't shake the feeling of guilt.

Was this why my father had taken me here? Because he felt guilty? If my mother had lived, would he have left me with her and gone home, forgetting about me?

I don't know how long we stayed like that, Frank holding me and me sobbing. But eventually, the dinner bell rang.

Neither of us moved. I hoped that my father wouldn't send anyone to get me.

Thankfully, he didn't.

Eventually, I stopped crying. Mainly because I couldn't cry anymore.

"She must've had your eyes," Frank muttered.

He was right. My eyes were the color of gold, and my father didn't have them.

"They're beautiful eyes," Frank said.

Despite the circumstances, I blushed.

"She must've been beautiful, too," Frank said. "Seeing as you look nothing like your father."

"Are you flirting with me?" I asked shakily.

"I'm stating facts," Frank replied.

I smiled.

"You really are beautiful, Hazel," He said.

"You really think so?" I asked.

"It's a fact," He said. "Just like how plants need water to survive and everyone has a mother."

It had been the first time since Sammy died that someone had told me that. Right now, I felt the same way I did when I had been with Sammy. I hadn't felt this way in a long time.

That's why I'd kissed him. Because it was the first time I realized that, somehow, I had developed feelings for my bodyguard.

He was shocked at first, but kissed me back.

And, for the first time in years, I was truly, completely, happy.