Shobi was tired of the secrets. There were only two things to do. One, tell the truth, or two, stick with lies. The lies had kept them here for years, stuck in this quagmire but safely confined to the pain they were already used to. The truth was going to make things worse, inflict pain that might break them, but then there was a chance that it might start them down a path to healing.

“Truth is supposed to set us free, isn’t it?” Shobi said.

A small laugh escaped Mina. “Is it just us or does everyone have past lives they struggle to share with their children?”

There was another long beat of silence. How far they had both come from two young royal bahus smoking on a secret balcony. Unlike Shobi, Mina had navigated everything with such grace. She’d held her family together without damage. Then again, she had been blessed with a life partner who loved and respected her. Shobi thought about Omar and the familiar pang of longing for Ashna to have been his squeezed inside her.

“We haven’t had common lives, that’s for sure,” Shobi said, “but they haven’t been unique either. Marital rape is hardly rare.” All those years of managing it, but anger still bled into her voice when she said the words out loud. “There’s just too much Ashna doesn’t know. I have no idea where to start. It doesn’t help that she romanticizes Bram so much.

“‘Your father raped me and then I stayed with him for eighteen years because he threatened to take you away from me.’ How do you say those words to your child?” How did you say the million other things that wove around that truth? Were there even words to explain all the things she would have lost if she’d walked away from what being married to him meant or for having made that bargain.

“Maybe she doesn’t romanticize Bram quite as much as you think. She saw his fall far closer than the rest of us,” Mina said sharply.

No one had realized quite how bad things had gotten with Bram. It was the most widely known fact about alcoholism, that it made you excellent at hiding things. They should have looked harder, but they’d missed the extent of it. Ashna was the only one who’d borne witness, who had shared responsibility in his secrets, because her mother had failed her.

“She might be stronger than you think,” Mina said.

“I don’t know.” Why should the onus of strength fall on Ashna? Hadn’t she seen enough? “She’s not like Trisha or Nisha, she doesn’t have their spirit.” Which was Shobi’s fault, of course. “She’s too fragile, Mina. How can I do it when she’s finally holding herself to—.”

Mina held up a hand. She was the one who noticed the sound first.

Shobi spun around.