All I Need ✔️

Chapter 99

Third Person POV

"We gather here to honor the life of a loving mother, devoted wife, and brave warrior..." the bishop began.

Cassius looked around the Great Hall. Sunlight streamed in from the windows, illuminating the thousands of flowers covering the front of the hall where Zamari's casket lay. The elementalists had made the flowers by hand, and Cassius was impressed by how many different types, colors, and sizes they could make. It was truly beautiful.

Funerals inside the Great Hall were reserved for royalty, but with his marriage to Safania, Zamari was technically part of the royal family. It didn't matter though – Cassius was the acting king now and would have commanded the bishop to hold the funeral here anyway.

He scanned the room as the bishop continued. Emalina and many of the elementalists were in tears. Layla was sobbing, loudly. The whole crowd looked sad and mournful, with one exception: Safania.

Cassius looked to his wife sitting next to him, who gave no indication she noticed his gaze. She continued to stare straight ahead, emotionless, the way she had for the past week. If it wasn't for the occasional "no thank you," when people asked if she needed anything, Cassius would have sworn she was catatonic. The two hadn't slept in the same bed since she arrived in Peria, and not being able to hold her was driving him mad.

She hadn't said more than two or three words to him at a time since blowing up on him when she had arrived. As painful as that had been, Cassius actually preferred that – at least when she was yelling at him, he knew how she was feeling and what she was thinking. He was trying to give her the time and patience she said she needed, but he was growing increasingly more concerned.

"And now we'll hear some words from Zamari's son-in-law, his majesty, King Cassius," the bishop said.

Cassius walked to the front of the hall, pulling out a piece of paper he had spent days agonizing over. He hadn't known Zamari long, but he had quickly grown to admire her bravery and compassion. He wanted to do her memory justice.

But now, as he looked down at the words on the page, they seemed completely inadequate to express the enormity of losing her. He looked at Safania, who continued to stare off into space, and began.

"I met Zamari less than a year ago. The first time we met, she was very clear that she hated me and thought her daughter could do better," Cassius said with a smile. The elementalists laughed softly, while the Perians looked shocked that anyone would talk to Cassius like that.

"But that was Zamari. Never afraid to speak her mind and with her family's well-being her first...well, really only concern."

"Most people know by now that she sacrificed herself for me," Cassius continued. "That's true, and that's a debt I will never be able to repay. But most people think she did it so I could be king, and that's not true. Zamari did believe in all of us, believed that we could make the world a better place. But she sacrificed herself for love, not for the throne."

Safania's head turned towards Cassius, finally making eye contact with him. She looked confused, but she was at least listening.

"Zamari was a fearsome warrior, a passionate advocate, and a brilliant strategist," Cassius told the crowd. "But in her mind, above all those things, she was a devoted wife and mother. She loved her husband and daughter beyond what words have the power to express. She told me the love she had with her husband was a gift - the same gift Safania and I have been blessed with. And she told me that she couldn't take that from her daughter."

Cassius stopped, remembering Zamari's final moments. He felt hundreds of eyes watching him as the memories came rushing back. Breathe, he told himself. After he had calmed down, he continued.