Lacey's Warriors (Bondmates #6) - Ann Mayburn Page 0,55
me to spend the next six days cryin’ and holding you.”
“That sounds good to me, but first I have to know why you had me kidnapped? All you had to do was contact me, and I would have gone willingly with Wythe.”
“Come on, have a seat over here. This is all incredibly complicated, but I’ll try and boil it down for you.”
Giving her mom a dry look, Lacey tried to hold back a smile as she said, “How about you start with how you ended up married?”
Raising a brow, her mom gave her an arch look, then said in just as dry of a tone. “I suppose that’s as good of place to start as any.”
Tara led Lacey to a carved wood swing that looked out over the edge of the treetops, the leaves up this high smaller, more like the leaves on Earth except for the odd blues, greens, and purples that dominated the color scheme. Still, it was an amazingly beautiful sight and both women were silent as they looked up at the various moons filling Kadothia’s early evening sky. Lacey had never seen anything like it, and she was literally stunned by the beauty, humbled to be gifted with such a view.
Reaching out, she grabbed her mom’s hand in her own and gave it a squeeze.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” her mom murmured. “I miss our home something fierce, but then I see something like this, and it makes the hurt go away a little bit.”
“Do you regret leaving Earth?” Lacey asked as her mom pushed the swing with her toe, the light swaying relaxing them both.
“I regret losing the people we had to leave behind, but I don’t regret leaving. I must have some wanderlust in my soul, because the idea of having a whole new galaxy to explore, one filled with such wonders, makes me feel so alive.”
Quirking a smile at her mom, she nodded. “I understand.”
“What about you? Do you regret leaving Earth?”
Stretching her legs out, she looked down at her toes, her thoughts far away. “I regret the way I left Earth, but I don’t regret coming here. It led me to Chel and Gwarnon.”
Her mom stopped the swing, then she turned to face Lacey. “I’m sorry we had to take you from them before you had a chance to bond, but we had to get your wedding gift ready.”
“Mom, you’re not making any sense.”
Her mom fumbled with something on her sparkly bracelet a moment before a silvery dome rose about them. Lacey’s implant quickly supplied that this was a privacy shield, used to keep out prying eyes and ears for private conversations. They were quite common on Kadothia, pretty much everyone had one, and most public venues offered larger versions that could fit entire dinner parties or extended families for a play. Her crystal implant continued to supply her with fascinating info, and she probably would have become lost in it if her mom hadn’t given her ribs a nudge.
“Lacey, pay attention.”
“Sorry, Mom,” she said automatically as her mom’s pointy elbow gave Lacey’s ribs a familiar nudge.
“What I have to tell you stays between us. Only Lord Rell, his family, and my bondmates are aware of all of this information. According to Lord Rell, there is no way Gwarnon and Chel will be allowed back on Kadothia without making some kind of huge sacrifice. They knowingly broke a big law by going to rescue you. Nosa and Cormac will get a scolding, but they were going to rescue their bride who had already begun her transition. Chel and Gwarnon had no idea you were at the Baladium, but they went anyways, on an ‘ill advised’ rogue rescue mission. The High Congress will have to punish them or the laws of Kadothia will be seen as weak, and something that can be broken without repercussions.”
“So, what? They should have just left me there? I should have died because the High Congress forbade anyone from participating in the Baladium? They didn’t even participate! They just helped Roxy and me survive. And now they’re being punished for it? That’s bullshit, Mom!”
“I know it is, sugar.” Her mom’s southern accent thickened as anger tinged her normally calm voice. “Lord Rell thought so as well, so he started to gather intelligence about which way the High Congress would be leaning. Most were in favor of censuring the men in various ways, but there was a large contingent holding out for banishment.”
“Banishment?” Lacey gaped at her mom. “As in, kicked