I believed her, and more than that, I understood her, because I had done the same thing with the same knowledge for the six years I had run the empire — not the knowledge of Juliet, which I had not had, but a hundred other inconvenient truths about my father that I had found and quietly reburied because looking at them squarely would have required me to change, and changing was the one thing a man in my position could least afford.

My mother had buried Juliet’s existence for exactly the reason I buried everything.

It was easier.

It was always easier, right up until it wasn’t.”

She turned to Juliet, and her voice softened.

“And then, six months ago, you walked into my house,” she said.

“And I knew you the moment I saw your face, because you have his eyes, child, exactly his eyes.

I have been waiting all this time for you to tell me who you were.