4. Worth

He was dressed before she woke. Which was... something. Firen had always been a fairly light sleeper, bothered when Eris rolled too frequently, when her wings stretched and feathers ruffled and it was loud and couldn’t she be more considerate?

And yet Lucian was able to stand there. Looming at the side of the bed before she had even opened her eyes.

She stretched, rolling her shoulders and watching as her shift slipped off one, then the other as she moved. “Fair morning,” she murmured.

He glanced toward the shutters, the light pushing relentlessly against the seams and edges, suggesting it was not as early as she’d thought.

“We’ve matters to discuss.”

Back to grim tones and stony expressions. Firen rolled over with a groan. She couldn’t sleep again, not so soon and not with him looking at her like that, but she would not be hurried, either. “Of course we do,” she agreed. Mostly about how quickly he wished to leave to meet with her parents and retrieve her trunk, and please do keep his nonsense about blood and old families to himself as they did so. “But I shall take a moment in the bathing room first.”

He grumbled something low in his throat, but she could not make out what it was.

She wanted the sweetness back from the night before. Wanted the tenderness they’d found in fervent touches and desperate kisses.

She grimaced, thinking of her teeth, and hurried into the washing room as Lucian settled into his chair to glare into the fire.

That was fine. She enjoyed sitting on his lap there. Would like it better after she’d attended to her more personal matters.

She did not take long. If she’d thought of it, she would have brought her dress in with her so she could appear with a little more dignity as they discussed. But she hadn’t. But her hair was combed, and that was a feat all its own. She brought the tangles on herself, going to bed without proper braids in it. Or so her mother would have said.

She’d been less gentle with it than she ought to have been, but she was eager to return to him, glowers and all. Perhaps he was simply not fond of mornings. Eris was rather like that. Most particularly when they were cold, and the bed was warm, and couldn’t Firen tend the chores just this once?

Which of course was really more than once, and Firen loved her sister, so did it truly matter? She hadn’t thought so. But now...

Would Varrel tend to the kitchen fire? Be happy to cook their breakfast even if he had to leave early before the fishing boat left without him?

“Did you eat?” Firen asked a little sheepishly as she approached him. “I didn’t mean to sleep so long, honestly.”

His smile was distant, but present. “Exhausted you, did I?”

She settled on the arm of the chair, not quite willing to sprawl across his lap without a proper invitation. Maybe tomorrow. “Thoroughly.”

Her hand moved toward his hair, wanting to push it back and feel its texture once more. She could not account for why, but his head turned, his eyes narrowing and his brow furrowing in confusion. “What are you doing?”

Firen huffed, trying not to be hurt. Perhaps he did not have an affectionate family. Where touch was such a common occurrence that there was no need to question such matters.

Perhaps there was more to discuss than she thought before.

She curled her hands in her lap, trying to be placid. Trying not to entertain the thought of sitting on the floor again before the fire while she collected herself. “I like touching you,” she answered truthfully. “I... do not know if I can stop, but I can try.” There was no denying that particular hurt, even as she offered it. “If you want me to.”

He rolled his eyes briefly upward before he returned his attention to the fire. “No. I... it was just unexpected, that’s all.”

She relaxed, if only marginally. She did not reach for his hair again, and this time leaned down and placed a kiss to the top of his head instead. It did not have to be all scowls and suspicion between them. But maybe... maybe he didn’t know that.

“We could go somewhere,” Firen offered, reaching for his hand to give it a careful squeeze so he would know she was not too cross with him.

His eyes shifted so they could drift over her. “As much as I appreciate your immodesty in this chamber, I do not think your attire is entirely appropriate out of doors.”

She shoved as his shoulder, partly in play, partly because he couldn’t possibly think she would not dress first. Except... all she had was a dress. Which made flying a challenge now that there was daylight.

She would not dwell on how he was more comfortable with her nudges than her caresses.

“I just thought it might be easier somewhere else. Somewhere with food, perhaps.” She smiled ruefully, because she had been the one to sleep long, so she was likely the only one of them that had foregone the morning meal.

He stood from his seat and picked up a plate settled on his chest. He’d covered it with a cloth, but removed it to place upon her lap before he added the plate on top. Then it was back to sitting and brooding and avoiding looking at her at all.

Mama would have kissed Da for the gesture. Even if the bond was the one that prompted such things, it did not mean one should not be grateful. To punctuate little kindnesses with thankfulness, some in words, others in touch.

“Thank you,” she murmured. “That was very thoughtful of you.”

But rather than smile at her, kiss her cheek—even squeeze her hand, he merely nodded his head and continued his vigil over the state of the fire.

The foods were not what she was used to for a breakfast. Stewed grains she knew well. Drizzles of fruit syrups and sometimes sprinkled with spices she found intriguing at the market.

These were an array of delicate pastries. Curled into intricate shapes, some studded with dried fruits, others glistening with sweet glazes. If fetched from the kitchen, his mother—sibling?—must be a fine baker to produce such items of quality.

Or perhaps he’d foregone the kitchen in favour of one of the shops she’d seen nestled between the towers themselves. Where a family made their profession perfecting a craft Firen had never even attempted.

She understood the napkin across her lap when a single bite made a shower of buttery flakes rain down onto both cloth and plate alike. “You said there were matters,” Firen reminded him as she swallowed and did her best to contain the rest of her crumbs. “Or would you prefer I finish before we talk?”

Lucian sighed and ran a hand through his hair as he looked at her plate briefly. “I do not know how to do this.”

It was a confession. One he did not wish to give—of that, she was certain.

He was distraught. Agitated. And it seemed as if it cost him something to continue sitting with her rather than to pace about the room.

Firen took another bite, then took up the napkin and the plate and went to the window.

That made him stand, eyes fierce and his jaw tight, and it took her a moment to reason why. “I’m not leaving,” Firen assured him. “But I would see you properly. Problems seem smaller when the suns are out.”

Lucian did not relax, his hands curling into fists as she opened the shutters and allowed bright sunlight to fill the space. Dust swirled gently, and she wondered how long it might have been since they were last opened fully. The hooks to secure them were heavy, black iron struck into the stone. Sturdy and perfectly willing to hold back the thick wood of the shutters.

“Better,” she declared, taking another bite of her breakfast. The light played with the room strangely. It had felt almost ominous the night before. Too rich and too masculine. But now...

It was just a room. Finely furnished, but not so very different after all.

“I prefer the fire,” Lucian muttered, sinking back into his chair in a way that—had he been one of her brothers rather than her mate—she might have thought him sulking.

But that was not generous enough for a mate, so perhaps he was simply... reflecting. Fiercely.

Another bite. This one larger, so the crumbs were kept to her mouth rather than the floor.

“What do you not know how to do?” she prompted, because if that was his main trouble, they might as well start there.

He groused low under his breath, and if she had been Mama, she would have gone to tap none too gently at his shoulder and insist that if he had a complaint, it should be vocalised clearly enough that the recipient could hear it and do something about it.

But she was just Firen, so she had to stifle her little prickle of worry, and smile instead and approach him and simply have faith that everything would sort itself out if they tried long enough.

“What was that?” she asked, and it wasn’t one of Mama’s taps, but just a little nudge with her arm in a way she hoped he knew was playful as well as a prompt to try again.

“I do not know what to do with you,” Lucian clarified, his hand back in his hair, tugging and pulling too hard to be comfortable.

Firen swallowed, her mouth suddenly too dry for pastry. She put the plate and the cloth back where he’d found it, ordering her thoughts as best she could. She could do nothing about the racing of her heart.

“We could sit in here and worry about it,” Firen agreed. “I’m not sure what will change about anything if we do. Wait until an egg catches, if that would help matters any.”

His eyes darted to her middle in something that could only be considered alarm.

She’d only been half-serious, but the hurt was whole and real if he was bothered by the prospect so greatly.

“I don’t...” he began, then groaned and looked toward the ceiling again. “No, it would not help.”

It wasn’t a rejection. Not of her and not of their young. She repeated it to herself over and over until her eyes didn’t sting as fiercely. She mustn’t get ahead of herself. “Right. Well, then why don’t we simply go down and meet them? And then we can have all the messy business behind us.” Then when they went to her home and he could see how welcome he was, he’d love them all the more. “And yes, I will put my dress back on first.”

He snorted. Rubbed at his forehead and there was that muttering again. Firen stepped closer, but he stopped before she could make out any of it.

That habit would grow irksome with time, she was sure of it.

She could feel his anxiety pouring unfettered through the bond, making her tense and fidgety to do something.

So she dressed. Not with the reverence she had the evening before. It felt like lifetimes ago rather than a few scant hours. She did not know what to do with her circlet—it was finery for a fete, not a trinket to be adorned after a lie in.

She settled on wrapping it about her wrist a few times, a bracelet far less conspicuous when hidden beneath her sleeve—thin though it was. Pretty in the way it fluttered as she danced. But she hadn’t danced, had she?

She was almost sad that they hadn’t gone in. Hadn’t found each other in the throes of a dance, following the movements together for just a moment while the bond settled and then their hands would have touched and it would have been beautiful...

Daydreaming, Mama called it. Fanciful nonsense when supper was burned because Firen was too busy in her own fantasies to remember she was supposed to be stirring the pot and minding the bread in the oven.

Firen had thought it would end when her mate filled her thoughts and heart, but maybe she’d been wrong.

She didn’t regret it. Regret him. She didn’t.

He was pacing.

She was uncertain if that was better or worse that sitting and glaring and brooding, but she would someday. For this morning, she straightened her skirt and her hair and hoped she did not look as dishevelled as she felt.

She did not ask him to compliment her. Did not ask him if she’d do. She’d heard quite enough of her failings the night before, and she was not keen to revisit them now.

But she would. When they found his parents and they saw she was a stranger to them and not... not what they would have chosen.

She took a deep breath and released it slowly. Did it again when Lucian paused in his stride, some of his own tension easing out of him the calmer she became for him.

And because she had needs of her own, she closed the distance between them and took his hand in hers, squeezing it tightly. He did not pull away, did not even glare—and if that meant he was coming to accept that such gestures would be frequent between them, she was glad of it. “It’s going to be all right,” she promised him. And that one settled better than her others had. True and real and something she believed with the whole of her being.

His mouth curved downward, and while he did not tug his hand free, he did not hold it back. “We might have differing opinions on what constitutes all right.”

She didn’t flinch. They probably did. She would be content with a small life. Something simple. Where work was hard, but their joy was easy.

He... he’d known a different life. She could not be cross with him if all he’d known was suddenly in jeopardy. Because of her.

It was a nagging, niggling thought. One that had no business being there. This wasn’t a matter of blame and fault, they were destined.

She tilted her chin just a little. “Mine means that we’ll be together. No matter what. That even if we never spend another night in that bed, I’ll be happy to find another one. With you in it. To kiss you all over.”

His hand tightened around hers, and his breath caught just a little. “We could make use of it now,” he reminded her, his head ducking just enough that he could whisper the words into her ear. “Forget about the rest of it. I believe there were a few places that missed your attentions earlier.”

The bond flared. Encouraged.

Reminded her of just what she’d felt and how she had felt, and she was ridiculous to want to leave this room, leave his arms...

She swallowed.

Closed her eyes.

Took a careful step to the side lest his lips follow where his words had been, and she would have been lost. Would have agreed to anything at all if he continued to encourage her back toward the bed.

“We have forever for that,” she said instead, her voice feeling as if it came from terribly far away as she wrestled with her own rapid heartbeat. “But this morning, we need to make some introductions.”

One night spent away was one thing. Two would have her parents worried, and they did not deserve that. She tightened her grip on his hand as he sighed. “Come on. I will be brave for the both of us.”

His steps were reluctant as she made for the door, but he did follow. “You can only say that because you do not know them.” At least the grumble was loud enough she understood him, even if she could not imagine speaking of her parents in such a manner.

“They will say things about my birth,” she reiterated from their earlier argument. “They will fault me and our bond, and you might be disinherited.” She said it as calmly as she could, even though she knew of no statute that could permit such a law.

But that was his job, wasn’t it? Lucian’s father. She wanted to believe that a lawmancer was most interested in justice and the good of all, but she supposed, in the strictest sense, he might use it for his own personal whims.

Her stomach gave an uncomfortable twist, but she smiled anyway. “Did I leave anything out?”

His mouth tightened, and he seemed to think she was mocking him in some way. Which she wasn’t. Truly.

But before she could reassure him, he brushed past her and made a quick plummet down the tower’s centre. Not to the ground floor, but very near it. Instead of a balcony, there were thick stone steps leading to the closed door. He did not call up to her, but she could make out the quirk of his brow and he waited.

While she had to fiddle with skirts and worry that they’d already made a mess of things, and perhaps she should have indulged his offer of an interlude in the bed before they faced... this.

It might not have been so frightening if she thought he would defend her. But their agreement was that she would not have to hear those complaints from him, not that he would ensure they were not spoken at all.

It was an odd sort of descent. It lacked the thrill and twist of freedom that came from proper flight. Instead, it was an awkward movement of wings and fabric that left her flustered and uncertain when finally her feet met stone.

Her only comfort was the hand he extended, helping her balance as she settled. “You get used to it,” he assured grimly. “Or maybe you won’t. Since we’ll be banished soon enough.”

That part was muttered beneath his breath. She could brush it away. Could ask why it wasn’t enough that they would be together and they’d make whatever life they could and it would be beautiful.

But she didn’t.

If she thought for a moment that her parents would not love him...

If she faced losing access to her childhood home. Perhaps even the family she loved, all because of her mate...

Her throat tightened, and her hold on his hand tightened. “I’m sorry.” And it was true. Not for being his mate, but because he should never have to face any of the troubles that so clearly plagued him. Never had to worry that family was temporary.

They should have started with hers. Then he could be certain they’d be well cared for as they shifted and grew.

But he sighed deeply and pushed open the door, and it was too late to make a full retreat. So she shoved away her mounting worries. If Lucian was going to be anxious enough for the both of them, she could be calm. Would be calm. And friendly, and maybe they would surprise him.

She wished he’d told her who they were to meet. If there would be sisters or brothers, or if his mother was deceased after all.

But he hadn’t.

She’d expected a kitchen. It seemed a practical place for one. But she supposed the steps had been too heavily ornamented for something so common.

Instead, there were books. What light came from slivers of windows built into the shelves themselves, muted by some sort of covering, so there was no true light, only a glow. Then there were the moonstones, punctuating the cases themselves and lending an even eerier light.

There were no lanterns. No lamps. Not even candles. The only firelight came from the hearth on the left, the embers low, the log within charred and battered. The room itself was large, and she suspected each one would be. Shelves reached up at least two storeys, but perhaps it was even three. There was a balcony separating two sections, with chairs—a desk? And there were tables every so often with tomes so large they required such ample space simply to open them.

And in the midst of all of it, a figure. He did not raise his head to greet them, did not give any indication at all that he’d heard their approach. He simply continued to scrawl across a scroll of parchment. A scroll. Not a simple pad where one might scribble out a list for the market and hand it to a daughter and insist she not forget a single item on it.

This was a room for important business. For governance and law.

“I was not aware we had a meeting scheduled.”

Lucian dropped her hand, and she would not pretend she wasn’t sorry for it.

She looked between both men, startled at how they were with one another. Something was terribly wrong in such a family. It had to be.

“Yes, well. There was an... incident. Last night. That requires your attention.”

The man looked up, but even that was slow and clearly at his convenience. And with it, Firen was granted a glimpse into her mate’s appearance in later years. Hair the same colour. A fair bit longer. Wings the same inky black.

His attention drifted from his son to her. And lingered.

While she had to fight down her urge to squirm. To tuck herself behind Lucian and tell him she didn’t mind if they were both disowned, most especially if it meant she did not have to see this man ever again.

Which was absurd.

It was only a feeling. It would pass. He was a stranger, and the setting was ominous, as was his manner, but did not make him anything but her mate’s father.

Which was a lie, and she knew it.

“I... see.”

Firen stood tall. Let him look. Let him take in whatever faults and assumptions he liked. She had no shame, not in her breeding and not in her bond with his son, and she would not pretend that she did. She might have wished they’d fetched her trunk first. That she’d braided her hair and perhaps added a ribbon or two.

But they hadn’t. And she didn’t. And they were relations now and he could choose to accept that or not.

“A fair morning to you,” Firen offered, as neither of them seemed intent on proper introductions. “What is left of it,” she added with a rueful glance toward her mate.

He did not look back at her. Continued to look at his father, which was better than glaring at the floor, she supposed.

She did not go so far as to approach him, but she placed her hand on her chest and bowed her head slightly, a sign of respect for his age and position.

He did not offer her one in return.

“Quite a predicament you have found for yourself,” the man continued, ignoring her words, if not her person.

She laughed. It was born of the steady waves of anxiety she felt through the bond rather than anything resembling good-humour, and it was enough to send two sets of pale eyes glaring at her each in turn. She almost placed a hand over her mouth to stem the sound, but that would be foolish. It was there, mingling and settling into the parchment and vellum of the library that surrounded them. And she was certain it was the first bit of laughter they’d heard in a very long while.

“I’ve been called a few things during my years,” Firen said instead, when she got control of herself. “A predicament hasn’t been one of them.” It was offered sweetly, with a smile that was not quite genuine, but wasn’t wholly false either. “Firen, usually,” she added, because she’d rather her name be known. “I am most pleased to have found your son.”

There. Those were the most important elements. She had not actually declared their bond—she would leave that for Lucian to present, even if it was more than obvious to any of them.

Lucian sighed, and the man glared harder across his desk, the heavy pen held tightly in his hand falling against the scroll with a thump, ink splattering at the impact. Blotting paper would help, and she almost suggested it, but Lucian was stepping between them and she supposed that meant she ought to be quiet.

He did not speak, only positioned himself so she was half behind him, and the two men stared at one another for a long while. “Were you not told,” Lucian’s father began at last, “of the consequences that would come should you bring an unworthy mate into this house?”

Unworthy?

She had to bite her tongue to keep from offering a retort to such a claim. This man wrote their laws? Oversaw matters of justice? She had never given much thought to such matters, but it suddenly felt absurd.

“You did,” Lucian admitted tightly.

“So. You ventured out, away from your assigned areas, and you happened upon one another.” He shook his head slowly, and his attention drifted to the splattered ink, which earned her yet another glare. As if she was responsible for his grip and his temper. “If your desires were so strong, there are facilities that could have seen to them.”

Firen’s mouth dropped open.

Suddenly Lucian’s position between them did matter so greatly. Not when there was such a grave insult not only to her, but to her mate. She moved, the better to address him, to tell him to keep such vile inside his black heart and not pollute either of them with speaking them, but Lucian reached out and grabbed hold of her forearm, his grip tight.

“I went to the fete, as you required of me. I wished to remain home.”

A quirked brow, a tightened jaw. “So you are blaming me for your inferior bond?”

It was Firen’s turn to glare at the floor, lest she lose control of her tongue.

“I am suggesting, ” Lucian answered, his grip tightening on her as he struggled with his own temper. She reached up with her free hand and laid it gently on top, reminding him to be careful of her. That she cared for him, and she was sorry, and really, they should just leave and make a life with her family because this man was ridiculous.

Perhaps not all that made it through the bond, no matter how she tried to push it through, but something did. Because his grip loosened and his eyes softened, if only briefly. “It’s not about fault and blame. It happened. I cannot change it.” Nor could his father, but he did not add that part. Firen did not either, although she thought it with all the vehemence she could muster.

“If you think that will save you...” His father did not shout, but there was a coldness that unnerved her. Made her move a little closer into her mate’s side.

The door opened. Not all the way, not until the feminine head poked through and saw them all standing there.

Then it was thrust open with such force that the door hit the side wall with an echoing clamour.

His mother. She was certain of it. For as great a resemblance as there was between the two men, it was her expression Firen recognised. The shimmer in her eyes as she took in the two of them settled so close.

Then the disappointment.

When she did not recognise Firen as one of those approved women with an old family and an important title.

“Oberon,” she breathed, her hands clasping in front of her heart. No... in front of the bond. “We cannot be hasty. Please. Just...”

Lucian’s father—Oberon—stood, and Firen very nearly flinched when that hard look transferred to the woman across the room. Mates should not look at one another in such a way.

“Ellena, I will deal with this matter.” The words were harsh and brokered no refusal, and yet...

This was a mother, so she took a step further into the room, regardless. “Of course you will,” she soothed. “But perhaps... perhaps we might talk a little, first.”

It was a placation. One that Firen did not think was deserved in the least.

But this was not her family. It was supposed to be. Might be in the future.

But the thought was a distant one of earlier dreams rather than the stark reality before her.

She did not want to know these people. Not with their stiff formality and harsh looks that flowed far too readily between them.

Lucian could not forbid her from seeing her kin. And she could not prevent him from having further dealings with them, either.

Oberon would. Any of them could see that. They’d be banished and she would comfort Lucian through the whole of it, and they’d be the better for it afterward.

He made no concession to his mate. They simply continued to stare at one another, and Firen did not know where to look or what to say. Manners drilled into her from her hatchling days insisted she give another bow, offer her name, insist it was a pleasure to meet her mate’s mother. To thank her for his raising and his birth, and might they share tea together when it was convenient?

But this was not a home for niceties.

“Lucian, darling. Please take your mate and wait for us outside.”

Lucian turned, his expression worried. “Mother...”

She moved further into the room so she could touch his cheek and smile at him briefly. “I’ll not lose you,” she murmured so softly that Firen wondered if she had heard it at all.

“Never,” Lucian mouthed back, allowing no sound to accompany the word.

It felt too intimate a moment to be witnessed, even... even by a mate. Something deep and personal and while their bond was bright and true, they were still relative strangers.

She turned her head, lest she see any more of it.

Only to be ushered out soon after by her arm, Lucian’s mouth set grimly as he walked her through the door and out into the atrium. She did not know what to suggest. Back to his room to hide? Or better yet, hers. They’d never find them.

She settled for putting her arms around him. Absorbing his tension, the anger that left him shaking. She worried little about her welcome. She needed him, and he needed her, whether or not he chose to admit it. “Was that better or worse than you imagined?”

It was whispered. She trusted the heavy door that stood between them, but not the echo of a tower and its impossibly high ceiling. “Both, I suppose. If that’s possible.”

Firen nodded, because it was. He did not hold her back, but that was all right for the moment. It was about his comfort more than hers. “Shall we escape to mine? Not... not forever. But maybe we could sort some things out along the way.”

Lucian’s hands found her shoulders, and he pushed her back so he could look at her. “If I run now, I shall lose whatever respect he has left for me.” There was the hardness in his eyes again, and she could not say she had missed it while it was absent. “I’ll not stop you.”

She wanted to chide him for that. Insist that he most certainly was supposed to stop her if she took off for her childhood home. Remind him just as thoroughly that it was custom for them to make parental introductions together.

But his eyes flickered toward the door. Where she could just make out a raised voice and cringed a little inside to hear that it was from his father.

Mates did not hurt one another. That was known.

She would be fine.

And yet...

It was enough to keep her quiet. To keep talk of their future tucked away for later.

“Do you want to go back in?” she asked as gently as she could. “I can stay here.”

He frowned slightly. “Best to leave them to it. I tend to make him angrier.”

She did not embrace him again, but she nestled her hand into his. “I’m sorry.”

He made a sound low in his throat. Not a hum and not a grunt. An acknowledgement and maybe an agreement. That... he was sorry, too. Whether for his father’s attitude or for what he’d said and insinuated, Firen couldn’t be sure. But it was comforting. To be unified, if only for a moment.

“Come along,” Lucian urged. “We’ll go to Mother’s room and wait for her.”

It should not surprise her they did not share a chamber, yet it did. Mates... always shared. How could they sleep otherwise?

Except the room he took her to held no bed. It was a parlour, instead. Or... might have been. If there were not so many easels and canvases spread about, the shutters open wide, the suns streaming through and illuminating the space. Despite its clutter, the brushes were all clean. The palettes as well. Cups of murky water were the only thing that could be considered untidy. Even the paints in their bottles were wiped clear at the sides. She took care of her things.

“The painting in your room. Your mother did that?”

Lucian eased onto a long sofa beneath the largest of the windows. The suns made his hair shimmer slightly, and it was such a contrast to how she’d seen him thus far. Shadowed and severe. He was not relaxed—nothing in his countenance suggested that he was. But it was a glimpse of how he might look in her mother’s kitchen. Stiff perhaps, but... normal.

“Yes.”

Just that. But it was something. More than she’d pulled from him the night before. Not strictly true... there was the mating bit.

“Why are you smiling?” His tone was almost accusatory, which she supposed was fair given the abysmal introduction they’d just endured.

“I was thinking of last night, if you must know.”

A grunt. Which was not a flattering appraisal, and might have stung if he was not so... Lucian.

“Oh, come now,” she countered, determined to ease some of the tension from him. It was over. There would be more—she was not so deluded as to think that Oberon would leave them be without consequence. But they needn’t dwell solely on it. “You cannot tell me you can’t think back on it with some fondness.”

She sat beside him and placed her hand on his leg as she leaned closer.

“You are not to seduce me in my mother’s room.”

Her eyes widened, and her hand retreated. “I wasn’t!”

Another huff, and he shifted away from her.

Which... did sting.

Quite a bit, actually.

“Lucian,” she murmured, closer to tears from his movement than she was from his father’s upset. “I was only...”

He glared at the floor, which was an improvement from sending his ire toward her directly. “I cannot shift my feelings as easily as you do,” he managed to get out from between gritted teeth and the urgency she felt welling in him to either pace or run away entirely.

She clasped her hands tightly together to keep from reaching for him. Wanting to rub at his shoulders. The sensitive spot between his wings he’d liked so much the night before.

“All right,” she agreed. Eris had often complained of much the same. Da said that Firen burned brightly. Fast and fierce, and then she was ready to move on. Back to smiles and pleasant matters. Eris liked to simmer. To brood.

Lucian must like the same.

She took a deep breath and tried to let the hurt pass through her. She should have taken the pastries back to his bed. Cared nothing for the crumbs they might have left, but indulged herself and him until they were both full and wanted only for kisses and the feel of one another moving together instead.

But she hadn’t.

She did not bring up her parents. Or her trunk. Or where they might sleep tonight.

Instead, she allowed the silence to settle over them. To work on feeding calm and peace through the bond until she actually felt it in herself as well.

Eventually, he looked at her. And though he frowned slightly, it lacked the undercurrent of anger it had before. “I take it that your parents are not like mine.”

It was the most invitation he’d offered her to speak of her own life, and she brightened considerably. “I should hate to make judgements after only one meeting, but I think I am safe to say that no, they are not.” The chatter came easily. Of Da and his creations. Of practical Mama and her firm, yet loving manner. Chimes in her market stall, some made by her, others by her father. The way they tinkled merrily in the breeze, inviting more custom.

She hadn’t expected the sadness to come. The one that reminded her that those days might be quite behind her. Would be. If Lucian had his way and he continued as apprentice to his father, his future one of law rather than craft.

“And you’ve... siblings.”

“Oh yes. All mated now. And me, the last of them.”

She’d an elder brother, but she was the one that had to wait longest. A pity, Da would say. Since she was the one that wanted it most.

She wanted to pry into his family, in turn. That was the nature of a conversation, wasn’t it? To give and receive. Until at the end, everyone knew each other a little better for it.

But she didn’t.

He was making little patterns with his forefinger over the arm of the sofa. He was listening—she knew that. But his eyes drifted to the door with greater frequency, and she was certain his thoughts were with his parents. With his future.

Their future.

“There’s a room above the smithy,” Firen offered. “I would play there when I was little. Da made me a cupboard and called it my kitchen. A bed so I could put my dollies to sleep. But it’s a full room.” Used for storage, now that she was grown. But it was proper, and could be outfitted all the better if they needed it.

“You wish me to live in your playhouse?” Lucian asked, brow furrowed and lips curling.

Firen tapped at her leg, rolling her shoulders slightly in answer. “I want to be with you,” she clarified. “Whether it’s a tower or a room above my father’s forge. We’ll not starve, and there will be a home for us. So maybe... maybe you don’t have to be so nervous about what he’ll say.”

They were going to argue. She could see it in every line of his features, the coiling of his muscles. And if he said one word about her home, if he called it a hovel and reminded her of the finery he’d known and was not at all willing to sacrifice...

She was liable to fly out that large window behind them.

“Do you need all this?” she asked as gently as she could manage with her heart racing. “To be happy?”

He turned to look at her, not with the glare she expected, but with absolute confusion. “What has happiness to do with anything?”

Firen deflated almost instantly. And before she could formulate her reply, the door opened. Lucian’s mother entered with her mouth twisted into obvious displeasure, although it smoothed as she saw the both of them seated together. Assuming, however wrongfully, that they were pleased with one another.

She was a beauty. Fragile, with delicate features. The lines about her eyes and mouth suggested more of frowns than at smiles. She shared her son’s fair hair, but her wings were a mottled white and fawn. She said nothing, at first. Pressed her back against the door and closed her eyes.

Firen wished she could ask if she would like her to fetch something. Water, or a cup of tea to settle her. But that would be a ridiculous offer when she did not know the kitchen’s location.

Firen stood.

If she had been denied one proper introduction, she would at least attempt a good one if possible. “A fair morning,” she began. “I am Firen. You are Lucian’s mother?” A hand over her chest, a bowed head. She even spread her wings ever so slightly to complete the posture, just as her mother had taught her.

She raised her eyes and was met with a small smile. “Ellena, mate of Oberon.” Not a typical addition, the words given with little pleasure. Habit, rather than thought. She scowled, catching herself, before she pressed away from the door and moved toward them. She paid little mind to the easels, the movements so natural and done so often that she did not fear clipping against corners or edges.

“I’ve negotiated for a supper. With the family. But it... might be best for you to be gone for a little while. Let him adjust.”

Lucian’s eyes darted about, and Firen could tell he wanted to pace away his frustration. But the room did not allow for such movement, so he had to settle for placing his head in his hands, his elbows perched against his knees. “I am not certain I could imagine anything worse.”

Ellena gave him a hopeless sort of smile. “She might surprise you.” As if she was not standing there, able to hear all. “She is quite pretty. If she keeps quiet and smiles at the right moments. Beauty can cover much.”

Firen pushed a lock of hair behind her shoulder. She should have bound it better before they’d come down. It would prove a nuisance on the flight home. “I thank you,” she cut in, trying to keep her tone sweet even if she prickled. She did not care if Ellena found her pretty—she cared if Lucian did. And it was one thing if she was nervous and shy and wanted to allow others to lead in conversation, but to be told?

Ellena blinked once, slowly, and turned her head. “Was that insulting? I did not intend for it to be.”

The insult was that she would not have manners enough to conduct herself without a pretty face to cover her uncouth behaviour. The insult was in talking to her mate rather than to her.

She took a breath. Felt entirely too closed in. “I’m sorry,” Firen offered. She wanted Ellena for an ally. For someone to react encouragingly, for Lucian’s sake. “None of this is... quite what I expected.”

“Of course it isn’t. It might be, if you’d been born to it.” Like a proper mate. She did not say it. She did not have to. It hung between them, unspoken, but felt by all.

Firen swallowed, feeling a pull of tension through her. Some of it Lucian’s. Some of it a grasping, horrid part that was all her own.

“If you will excuse me,” Firen murmured. She was no prisoner here. She had opened the door before Lucian rose to his feet and called after her. The door was hard as she gripped it. She wasn’t what they expected. What they wanted. She’d known that. Lucian had made it clear from the start. But she’d had enough of this smothering, horrible awareness. She needed fresh air and a home and a family that loved her.

“You know where to find me,” she said over her shoulder. He might come. He might not.

At the moment, with her heart racing and her temper flaring, she did not much care.

“Firen!”

She shut the door behind her.

The main door was trickier to navigate. There were the large double doors that were nearly twice her height. Then a smaller one, its latches and bolts not nearly so thick. A door within a door. Well oiled, which made her retreat an easier feat. As if even the tower thought it best for her to leave.

She went upward. Didn’t bother with running through the streets first, getting lost in the tangle of towers and shops and little homes that weren’t worthy of being as tall or as grand as the one she was leaving behind.

Lucian was tugging at the bond. She could feel it, just as surely as she could if he was reaching out to grasp her wrist. But he wasn’t there. He’d let her go, the better to talk with his mother. About this supper. About a family she did not know and people she did not much care to meet.

Which was a lie.

She wanted to meet them, and badly. Wanted there to be smiles and welcome, and there wouldn’t be. Not with all their drivel about birth and heritage.

She was born of the bond. With all the rights and protections that came along with it.

Her dress caught about her legs as she flew. And she was so frustrated. It did not help that Lucian’s own emotions were flooding into her own. Mingling and overpowering in turn, causing them to turn to anger, as she did not know how to tune them out. To allow herself to simply be, to feel as she felt and nothing more.

She followed the sea. Saw the fishing boats out on the horizon.

Without conscious thought, she was drawn out further. Past the shore. Past where waves broke. Where water smoothed and the water shone brightly in the light of the suns.

And she plummeted.

Head first. Uncaring of fabric or hair or any of the rest of it. The warmth of the first layer gave way to the shock of cold as she went further down. And there, for a few blissful seconds.

It was only her.

The world was muffled. Her thoughts were dim.

The bond...

It was quiet.

And it couldn’t last. Because already her body was moving her upward, bringing her back to the surface for a full breath.

And she was sorry for it.

Mama would chastise her thoroughly for such morbid thoughts. She had wanted a mate. Now she had him. She could be disappointed all she liked, but this was her bond and her family, and it had grown in ways she might have preferred, but she would have to adjust.

Childish, begrudging thoughts came next. That a man sacrificed for his mate in equal measure. That he should have rebuked his parents for their rudeness to his mate. That she came first. Not the law. Not his apprenticeship. And certainly not his father.

It was not impossible to fly with wet wings, but she would not pretend it was the easiest either. But it did not make her regret her dip into the sea. Even if her dress clung and her hair was tangled, and she couldn’t fly quickly enough to dry either of them.

The suns helped. Helped her spirits, just as the dive had.

She was still... her.

She did not need permission to leave a tower. Did not have to ask and beg to go home.

Walking helped, as well. There were the rueful smiles as she passed neighbours in the streets, their eyes a little wide as they took in her appearance. And perhaps it should embarrass her, and perhaps, it did. But it felt strangely removed from her. As if there was so much more to hold her attention and her thoughts, and most importantly, her worries.

She did not knock on the door when she reached home. Because... it still was. Lucian and the bond did not change that. Everything was so much the same, even if she was different.

“I am home!” she called, uncertain if anyone was there. She’d go to her room if Mama was out visiting. Wash and change before going out to Da in the workshop.

“Kitchen,” Mama called back, and she ignored the stairs in favour of greeting her mother first.

She took her shoes off. They were delicate and ornamented with flowers stitched into the leather slippers. The dyes ran slightly from wetting them, and she was sorry for it.

She left them on the steps to carry up to her room and tend to them before she opened the kitchen door, ready for hugs and a cup of something hot, and maybe even a good cry as her mother listened to all that occurred.

Firen did not expect to find the kitchen occupied by more than her mother. Did not expect to see her seated at the table instead of preparing a midday meal for herself and Da.

Did not expect to be met with Lucian’s scowl as his eyes drifted over every inch of her. “Why are you wet?”

She glanced down at herself. She wasn’t dripping. Damp, yes. Wet in the thickest parts of her hair, certainly.

Mama stood, coming to give her a proper assessment as she inspected her front and back. “A dip,” she observed, eyes meeting Firen’s.

Firen rolled her shoulders, her mouth drawn tightly as she spoke a great deal without any words at all.

She’d done it before. When she’d felt overwhelmed, or just... sad.

Lonely.

And it would mean something to Mama that she’d done it even with her mate settled at the kitchen table. That he’d come to their home—alone—without an adoring Firen at his arm to make the introductions.

But... he’d come.

He hadn’t turned around and left when she wasn’t there to meet him. He’d... stayed. Perhaps because Mama could press anyone into her kitchen for a cup of something hot. Or maybe because he realised Firen had been treated rather poorly and was owed some sort of consideration.

He looked wrong, sitting there. Too stiff and his clothes too fine. He did not look happy about it, either, his eyes darting about the space and settling on her with greater frequency, expression turning stonier each time he did so.

She glanced down at herself, feeling a few tendrils of self-consciousness take hold as she felt a flood of tangling emotions come through the bond. Perhaps the fabric had grown rather thin now that it was wet. Perhaps it clung a bit more than it had and revealed more than was strictly proper.

But there were far greater concerns than that, surely.

“Sweetling, go up and get changed,” Mama urged. “We’ll still be here when you get back.”

Firen gave Lucian a dubious glance, not believing that in the least.

He stood. “Actually,” he began, and she braced herself for him to leave. He’d seen her home, seen her family, and found it as wanting as he’d feared. “I should like a moment with my mate.”

If her parents found it odd for a stranger to be heading up the stairs with their daughter, they said nothing. If they thought it inappropriate when Firen had clearly been desolate enough for one of her sojourns into the sea, they still allowed them both to retreat.

Lucian first.

Firen...

Da grabbed her hand as she made to follow. He was going to say something. Perhaps in censure of the mate, that was not at all what they’d expected. Or maybe about the state of her and that Lucian was right to be offended on her behalf that she’d flown and walked through the streets in all her dishevelment.

But he turned her wrist and there was the circlet, still wound about her wrist. “Did it bring you luck?” he asked, his tone as gentle as his fingers as he undid the tiny clasp and laid it out across the table. Just as beautiful as it had been the night before, unmarred by her night or the salt from the sea.

Her eyes welled, if only briefly. “I don’t know yet,” she answered honestly.

He nodded, wrapping his arm briefly about her middle before gesturing for her to follow her mate. “Run along, then. I doubt that mate of yours is much used to waiting.”

She was so certain of that. Not with a room that was much lived in and yet went without visitors.

But she said nothing. Just smiled as best she could toward her parents and saw Lucian on the stairs, looking at the ornaments upon the wall. Most were thin sheets of metal, impressed and shaped to represent each member of the family. It had grown when mates were found. When children were added.

She felt terribly seen by him perusing her family’s history so openly, and she brushed past him as quickly as she could. Better for him to join her upstairs, even if it would lead to another argument.

Her door stood open, waiting for her. Her bedding was as smooth as she had left it. Everything perfectly ordinary. Except that a man followed her in, closing the door behind him. She hadn’t invited him in, and that rankled ever so slightly, but he was her mate. He’d come after her. Sat at her mother’s kitchen table and—hopefully—been polite during their introduction.

“Explain a dip to me.”

She tried not to roll her eyes. Truly, she did. But she was tired and heart-sore, and nothing in his attitude suggested a penitent mate come to apologise and set things right. Instead, he’d fixated on her dress and her moisture levels, and thought that of the most relevance.

“In the sea,” Firen clarified, since it was apparently so far beyond his comprehension. She pulled out fresh clothing. Maybe she would eject him from the room and withhold such an intimacy.

Did mates do such things?

The bond was quiet. Demanded nothing. Not their reconciliation. Not to make use of the bed that seemed laughably narrow compared to the one in his chamber. Not even for her to go over and take his hand so they might be friends again.

She closed the trunk with more force than was necessary, her frustration mounting. He’d stolen even the peace she had found during her dip, and she wanted it back.

“That is a location, not an explanation.” He stood in front of her bedroom door, his arms crossed, the very picture of severe disapproval.

“Stop looking at me like that.” She went to her basin, and the water was cold from the night before. No magic pull and tanks hidden in hearth-walls to heat. Just a washbasin and a pitcher, and a cloth that worked plenty well enough to smooth salt away from her skin.

“Like what?” he urged, moving away from the door and taking a step nearer to her.

“Like I’m a fledgling you’re here to censure!” She closed her eyes and prayed for calm. That her hands would stop shaking.

If he rolled his eyes, she couldn’t see it. But she could feel it. Her frustration echoed and multiplied until she was ready to pull at her hair and pace as he was so often wont to do.

“Lucian,” she began again, her voice strained, but low. Raised voices served only to further raised tempers. That’s what Mama would say when she would brawl with one of her brothers, tugging and pulling at feathers until she’d finally come in, ready to pluck a few more herself for all the racket they were making. “What did you come here for?”

“I came,” Lucian answered, coming far too close to her back, where she stood in front of her wash table. She could see him in the looking glass Da had hung there. Rippled in places, pitted in others. Hers. A gift, and one she treasured. “Because my mate ran out of a conversation with my mother.” Her mouth twitched but she kept from pressing her lips together. “I came,” he continued, his hands coming to settle on her shoulders. “Because she said I might find her here. Only I did not find her here at all, did I? Not when you were out drowning yourself in the sea.”

This he whispered into her ear, his head leaning close so it was solely between the two of them.

Firen blinked once, her brow furrowing. “I was doing what?”

She turned, disregarding the grip he tried to keep on her, wanting to face him properly. “When I get overwhelmed,” she answered as clearly as she could manage. “Or angry,” although she could not properly recall that being the cause before now. “I like to take a swim. To dive and hold my breath and when I surface, everything feels... better.”

She shoved at his chest, and if it hit where the bond was settled, then she hoped it jangled just a little bit for even suggesting something so wretched. “I might be disappointed. I might be upset that your parents find me so distasteful.” Then, for good measure, she reached into the washbasin to wet her hands and flicked water at him so he too could be a little damp. “I might have wished that I had a mate that adored me from the start, that looked at me with a modicum of happiness that I was his, but that doesn’t mean...” she cut herself off before she said something she would regret. “You do not know me,” she reminded herself. Reminded him.

“I am more than aware of that,” Lucian agreed, wiping away the dribbles of water that had found purchase on his cheek. “You do not know me, either.”

He reached for her.

Kissed her.

Tried to kiss her.

His mouth wanted hers, but she turned her head and shoved away from him, and yes, the bond gave a half-hearted pull that she wasn’t doing things properly.

“No,” she stated firmly. “No,” she repeated, because her pulse raced and she hadn’t finished washing—had scarcely even begun.

His arms crossed, and he huffed low in his throat.

“Why not?”

Brooding might become him, but sulking did not.

“Because you thought me so desolate a moment ago that you thought I was attempting to drown myself. And while perhaps I shall allow that you are relieved and wanted to celebrate that I am, in fact, in control of my own faculties, I do not believe those to be your motives.” She shoved at her hair, and she wished she was bold enough to shove him out the door so she could comb it out in peace. “You wish to distract me.”

Lucian snorted before shaking his head. “We are good at distractions. The rest is abysmal.”

It hurt. It shouldn’t. She should agree with him. But she had liked parts of it. When he talked to her. Brought her pastries. When he curled about her before they slept so that she would sleep.

“Firen...”

She shook her head. “Just... maybe you should go home. If... if you’re not here to set things right.”

He sank down onto her bed. Not Eris’s. It had either been happenstance or some innate sense that had him at the foot of hers.

“What does that look like?”

He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, his head tilting up to look at her. “Do you know? Because I do not.”

She had ideas. Of ripping him out of a life and a family that seemed strange and miserable. Of letting her mother go to work at him, plying him with recipes plucked from generational cookery books that could put his old family to shame.

“I know,” Firen answered with as much patience as she could muster. “That there were glimmers. Last night. Even this morning. Of how good we might be together. When... when you let us.”

His head turned and yes, there was his glare, and she would not cry about it. Not when it was expected.

Which made her want to cry for wholly different reasons.

“I was perfectly clear about how you would be received. It is not my fault you chose not to believe me.”

Is that what she’d done? But thinking that there were families with grace and love between them rather than... whatever foreboding and absurd expectation seemed to ooze from his.

He loved them. She reminded herself of it as she took another breath and wrenched off her dress. The one that she’d donned with such care—then with such haste only a few hours before.

“I do not know where I will launder this dress,” Firen observed when it was off of her and instead between her hands. As unsuitable for the trunk as it was for the hamper, damp as it was. “I have no home but this one. Not until you give me another.”

He got to his feet so quickly that it startled her. “And you think it is different for me? When my entire future hangs on the success of a single supper. On a mate I do not know, who I do not trust not to flee the moment she hears something not to her liking!”

They stared at one another. And which anger was hers and which was his, she couldn’t tell. Not when it flowed so freely in such mutual agreement through the bond.

“You are upset,” Firen began after a moment of too-long silence. “That I left.”

“ Yes,” he hissed, turning his back to her.

Not to leave. But to rest his forearm against the door, before his forehead came against his arm as well.

“You are upset that I left your mother?”

Another mate—a better mate—would have gone to him. Placed her hand upon his back and soothed him as she struggled with his own feelings on the matter.

But unfortunately, he was bound to her.

So she wrenched off her shift, the one that had felt so delightful in its sensuousness when they were undoing knots and ties together. When she could tease and nibble and delight in the only part of their union that was not abysmal.

If he turned, she did not care. Not when she wiped over her skin as quickly as she could, trying to get a hold of her own flaring temper. It was too hard, when she had his to contend with as well.

If he was another mate, he would have come over. Taken the cloth from her. Smoothed it against her skin and followed it with his lips. Would have dried her with just as much care and then, when he asked for the claim of her mouth, she would not have dreamt of refusing him.

But Lucian sulked.

And she did her best not to cry as she drew out fresh clothing and situated her damp things on hooks along the wall.

Where trinkets had once been held, but were now carefully situated in her trunk. Because... she’d wanted this. Sought it. Like the naive girl she’d been.

She saw to her underthings. Then the soft leggings. The tunic overtop with its fiddly straps to accommodate her wings. Eris had always helped with those, as Firen helped her dress. Lucian was supposed to do it now, but he had forsaken his position at the door in order to stare out the window instead. It was not a very important view, but it was hers. Not the street—her brothers’ rooms got to see the bustle of neighbours. Hers looked out at Da’s workshop. With its continual stream of smoke out the chimney. To the room above, she’d offered to Lucian only that morning.

Ludicrous, to think he would have ever accepted.

Dressed. Armoured. Calmer, too, although she couldn’t think why. Her hair was next. Thorough strokes that saw every knot and tangle teased apart. Interspersed with little fantasies about mates and care and stolen kisses along with nicked combs.

Three braids. Then those plaited together. Twisted and tied with ribbons because that was her custom.

He wouldn’t know that.

Another pang, another ache. And those were becoming so wretchedly familiar that she wanted to cry again.

“She fought for us,” Lucian said at last. “And asked us to wait so we could meet with her properly. And you ran off nearly at the first moment.”

Firen swung her thick plaits over her shoulder and out of the way. “She fought for you. As a mother should.” She could allow that. Eyes shimmering with tears as she took in the both of them, standing in that horrid man’s library with all the coming threats of laws that Firen did not know and chose not to believe existed. “It does not follow that she thinks any better of me than your father does.”

Lucian snorted. “As I told you. Which does not explain why it would bother you so when faced with it.”

Firen’s brow rose and if her hands settled on her hips in a startling similarity to her mother’s posture when affronted then...

“Because I have a heart. Because I am a living, breathing woman. One whose mate merely tolerates her. Who would gladly lie with me again because that at least is not abysmal, even with my parents awaiting us downstairs, but does not have the decency to consider that perhaps it is his family and their prejudices that are what are wrong and not me .”

He sank down onto her bed again, his eyes glaring upward at the ceiling.

And it was almost enough for her to storm out of the room once more. To leave him to his thoughts and his sulks and let her find some comfort in the people dearest to her.

“I did not say they were right,” Lucian admitted, and it was enough to still her going, if only for a moment. “I only shared what I knew they believed.”

Firen’s throat burned along with her eyes. “And that is supposed to make it easier for me?”

He sighed, and when his attention settled on her, she could see that some of his anger had leeched out of him. “I do not want to lose everything I know,” he continued, rolling his shoulders as if there was a very great weight pressing down upon them. “Not for a girl I have only just met.”

“Your mate,” she reminded him, her voice quiet as she sat across from him on Eris’s forsaken bed. Made with clean linens, simply because Firen hadn’t known what to do with it after she’d gone.

“Yes,” Lucian agreed, but his smile was rueful. “You are that.”

It should make her feel better. For acknowledgment when he could have hurt her with denying it.

She shifted slightly, glancing at her trunk rather than look at him any longer. “Did you follow me simply to chastise me? Or was there another reason?”

He stood.

Walked closer to her.

Reached for her chin and cupped it with a surprising gentleness as he bade her look at him. “You think this thing in my chest could let you leave in such a manner and not follow? That I could feel just how upset you were, followed by an icy plunge and a sudden nothingness that could do nothing but terrify me?”

He... cared. Or... the bond made him care. Firen could not decide if there was a difference between the two, not when he was looking at her that way. Resentful, certainly. Begrudging to the extreme.

But there was something else. Something warm and... possessing. It should bother her. Should trouble her greatly. She was a woman grown, after all. She could take care of herself and her home and the family she loved, and yet...

“I know what it is to hold a bond with a mate against his will,” she answered, her heart hurting and her throat aching, and she wanted to kiss him and shove away from him in equal turn. “And I think I am lonelier now that I have ever been before.”

He grimaced, his thumb coming to her cheekbone where he pressed against it softly. “I am sorry for that.”

There was no biting comment at the end of it. Nothing that twisted back to him and his own disappointment in the arrangement. Just... he was sorry.

And there was no more burning in her eyes and throat. Not when she was suddenly crying in earnest. For all the hopes, all the sudden changes.

And she wasn’t the one that sought him out. Not in the embrace, at least. It was him that pulled her upright so he could wrap his arms about her. He did not murmur little promises in her ear, did not stroke and press kisses to the top of her head. But he held her. Strong and certain, while he let her cry.

“My mother... she tried. Once. Not to drown herself, but... there were other means. She’d been quarrelling with Father for an age and then suddenly...”

Firen looked up at him, full of horror and her own apologies, but Lucian shook his head. “He knew. The bond, I suppose. And there were healers, and she mended, and things were more peaceful for a while. But it is... difficult. Not to remember. How... bad things can get.” He skimmed his fingers about her ear, touching the touches of lavender markings that swirled there. From her mother’s side. Not everyone possessed the trait. Her siblings didn’t. But she was fond of them. A bit of history to wear upon her skin.

“I wasn’t doing that,” she insisted. More gently this time. With less offence and more sadness than she knew what to do with. “I’ll... I’ll not do it. Next time. When I am vexed, I will...” Her brow furrowed, trying to decide what could possibly offer the same sort of comfort to her. Some liked to buy things. Little baubles to decorate their homes. But she did not know where she would sleep that night, let alone where the coins for her purse might come from. “Well,” she added at last. “I’ll try to think of something.”

She did not suggest that they would suddenly be so agreeable with one another that she would never be cross enough to need such a respite. She wished it might be so. That she could bottle the feeling of peace she felt when his arms were welcoming, when his heart was calm beneath her ear as she huddled there. Safe.

Wanted.

The bond flooded with warmth. How much was real, she did not know. But she craved it.

That was what seduced her the night before, and she feared what it might encourage now. They’d sorted nothing. Decided nothing. And she couldn’t go on pretending that was all right.

“I will attempt to believe you,” Lucian answered, and maybe it was not a kiss, but he placed his cheek on top of her head and it was... lovely.

They couldn’t stand there forever. But the thought of parting, of what might come after, made her even more reluctant to let him go.

“I like when you are kind to me.”

Her arms had found their way about him of their own accord, and she squeezed him tightly to punctuate her declaration.

“I am the reason you cried,” Lucian reminded her, and there was something in his tone that suggested it bothered him a very great deal.

“Sometimes a person needs a good cry,” Firen countered, wishing to comfort him. But... there was also the need to be honest with him. To not cover over her hurts simply to reassure him. “But yes, you were.”

Even if he did not kiss her, she placed a kiss on his covered chest, wet through by her tears. She would not apologise for them. He should be more careful of her feelings if her upsets troubled him so.

His hands left their place about her waist to settle on her shoulders. They were to talk more, then. Necessary, but she found she hated it. “I love my mother.” He said it gravely. Almost as a warning.

She did not ask what sort of child did not. She did not allow her mouth to twist at talk of beauty and silence and proper mates and birthright. Strangers, the lot of them. And she could be gracious.

But she would not pretend she had no feelings, no needs. “As I love mine,” Firen said instead. “I hope...” she paused, reminding herself that insult would help neither of them. “I am sorry I was not there to introduce you.”

And it was true. Had she known he would follow so quickly, she would have allowed nothing to delay her. Another piece of her fantasies that did not come to be. Of bringing him home and showing him off, beaming with pride at what was hers.

But those were daydreams. And Lucian was real, and so was their bond—messy as it was.

“They were very polite. As was I, in case that was your true question.”

Firen gave a sheepish sort of smile. “Maybe,” she hedged. “We should go back down.”

His hands fell away from her shoulders as he nodded, but she took one between hers before he could get too far away. If contact was what they needed to keep from quarrelling, so be it.

She made for the door, her arm reaching out behind her as Lucian remained stationary.

“Firen,” he began, his expression serious. “I do not know what home I have to offer you. I do not know where your dress will be washed, whether by you or by the service we employ.” A service ? Her heart raced a little just to imagine it. “I expect all will be made perfectly clear this evening. If... if you will attend with me.”

He was asking. Not assuming. He was looking at her as if he was already expecting her answer to be no. That she would keep to her pride and what remained of her dignity and allow him to attend without her on principle.

She squeezed his hand, because...

That was the sort of mate she was.

“All right,” she agreed. Mind racing with thoughts of clothing and deportment. Mama would help. Mama could fix anything. “Tea with my family, first.”

And he didn’t grumble.

Which, Firen thought, counted for rather a lot.