8.3

He wasn’t sleeping. Which would have been fine, except something was tugging at her. He wasn’t doing it on purpose, but it was there. The persistent awareness that pushed through her unconsciousness, rousing her from sleep.

She didn’t bother opening her eyes. She reached for him first, worried he’d left her to go sit in the dark kitchen, worrying over things that didn’t matter anymore.

But no, he was there. “Did I wake you?” he asked, reaching out to pull her to him. Which was better. Especially since it quieted some of that insistent pull that woke her in the first place.

“Not awake,” she disagreed. Because she was somewhere in between. “But you are?”

They’d had a fine day. A lesson in breakfast foods before he’d gone to the infirmary to tend to patients. Tea with her mother in the afternoon.

They’d seen her father briefly toward the end of their visit. Her brother had been with him. Was that it? He’d greeted her with his usual politeness, leaning down to press his cheek to hers as a sign of familiarity rather than warmth. He’d given Athan the shallowest nod possible before he’d taken his leave. It was cordial. Expected.

By her, at least. Perhaps Athan had taken greater offense to it than she had. Perhaps he’d held out hope for a greater welcome.

But he’d seen perfectly ordinary when they got home. Attentive as always. Content with a fire in the living room and a quiet evening of separate reading.

Before she’d invited him over to share her chaise. Which then meant the book was not nearly as interesting as it had been a moment before.

And it had taken little coaxing at all before he laid her back on the chaise and kissed her all over.

“Just thinking,” Athan answered, his fingers combing through her hair. “I’ll try to stop.”

She snorted out a laugh, shaking her head as she nuzzled closer to him. He’d doused the light ages ago. Or what felt like ages. Which meant he couldn’t turn off his thinking quite so easily, or he would have done so. “And what has you so preoccupied?” She asked, reaching her hand over him and trying to give him a pat. It didn’t land on his chest as she’d meant for it, and she was fairly certain it was his shoulder. But he didn’t mind. The bond promised her that.

“I find... time with your family brings up questions. That I know shouldn’t matter, but...” She heard him swallow. “You should go back to sleep.”

There was the discordant pull on the bond again, and she readjusted her hold on him so she could pinch at his nightshirt and tug at it to regain his attention. “Do I have these answers?” Orma asked, because that mattered. He could tell her and they could lie awake, wondering together if it would make him feel better, but she would ply a little harder if it was simply a matter of him gathering courage to ask her. “Or would it take a midnight visit to my father to answer them for you?”

“I don’t...” Athan started, and she could sense him pulling a hand through his hair, his agitation mounting. “I don’t want to upset you.”

Orma wriggled. She truly didn’t want to sit up. Didn’t want to reach for the light. But she would if he was troubled. “If you’re upset, I’m upset.” Which might not be rational, might not be how things were supposed to be, but it felt true enough in the moment. There was no sleeping while he was bothered, and he would not leave her distressed, most especially if he had the power to set her mind at ease. She settled for nudging at him. For pushing all the love she felt for him through the bond—even if he did inadvertently wake her from her sleep. Which might mean a pained head and a sickly stomach in the morning, but she wouldn’t will that into being by bracing herself for it now. “Talk to me, Athan,” Orma urged, setting a lilting tone to her voice to coax him to share with her. “How bad could it be?”

Bad. She knew that. There were plenty of terrible histories for him to pull from, but she wouldn’t distract him by panicking herself. She must be steady and sure. Offer him reassurances rather than grow frightened and require from him instead.

“I just... wondered today. If... circumstances had been different,” her eyes closed and her grip on him tightened. “Do they only allow me to be involved in their family because we cannot have children?”

Orma grew very still.

“I keep telling myself it should not matter. I am grateful for their welcome, but I... wonder.”

He leaned down and placed a kiss to the top of her head. “I am sorry.”

Orma swallowed, her throat tight. “For what? It is a fair question. Only... it is one that I am loath to answer.”

Athan sighed, nodding into the dark. “I supposed as much.”

She hated how he simply accepted it. He’d convinced himself even before he knew her, before he thought anything of old families and high towers. A healer was well respected, valued, but not for one’s daughter. All those people, the time shared...

But that wasn’t why. And she didn’t want to explain it. The thought of it dried her mouth and made her angry for the old lessons that had been drilled into her before she’d even grown her flight feathers.

It was all right to play with the help’s children, but only because the rest of the family was so much older. Orma mustn’t grow too attached. They were not her friends, not of her circle. Those would come later. Didn’t she want to please her parents and find someone of appropriate blood? Have him work in the Hall as was proper? Where he could devote the proper time and attention to her and their children, not like the ones that had to scramble for coins in the market.

Orma had nodded because it was expected of her. Had never questioned if perhaps there was something nice about working there. Of knowing people. Of being known.

She did not fit with those of her circle. They’d been cordial to her, and even now when her presence was required and she could not even feign a fever to get out of it again, she would go and they would press a cool cheek against hers in greeting before wandering off into their respective corners. Ignoring her.

“Do you know why this city was built?”

Athan did not take long to consider his answer. “Why is any city built? For shelter. For its citizens to prosper.”

Orma hummed. Made a little pattern with her finger against his chest. “Not this one. According to the oldest history books, at least. It was an experiment. For rehabilitation of convicted criminals.”

She couldn’t see his frown, but she could feel it. “I’ve heard nothing like that.”

Orma’s wings rose and fell before she purposefully tucked them back in closer to her back. “Well, that’s not a very nice story, is it? That my family, the ones in the towers. The keepers of the Hall and their offspring. They... weren’t. Prisoners, that is. They were to keep order, and take notes on the successes of the city, and keep it all running smoothly. Which they did. Until they didn’t.” She didn’t want to go into the messiness of it. All the children born to the towers had to learn the histories, and they were bloody and involved a revolt, and much negotiation, in order to keep hold of what power they could.

“That is...” Athan began, voice as stilted as his fingers through her hair. “Absurd.”

Orma tilted her head, trying to catch some hint of his expression. “Which part?”

He blew out a breath, shaking his head. “When was this?”

Orma laughed, although it truly wasn’t funny. “Don’t ask me for dates, please. I never could remember them.” She rolled so she could drape herself across him. Because they would not quarrel about this. They would not let old troubles influence them now. She reached up and found one of the ties of his nightshirt and tugged it open. Burrowed in and found warm skin and kissed him there. “A long, long time ago,” Orma offered, because that’s all she could. There’d been talk of moons and cycles and how years were separated into lifetimes of the judicators, but he’d need a book for all that. It meant nothing to her. Hadn’t then, and certainly didn’t now.

“Well then, how can it possibly matter?” Athan asked, his hand coming to cup the back of her head while she nuzzled about what bits of skin she could find.

“It doesn’t,” she agreed. “Or at least, it shouldn’t. And obviously,” she continued, finding another tie and tugging it free. “The Maker agrees with me, because my mate wasn’t in one of those towers, was he? He was a healer. Born of two perfectly ordinary people that I am so very sorry I was not privileged enough to meet.”

Athan swallowed, and she kept going. Another tie, this one closer to his throat as she kept making her way up his body. It wasn’t even a hunger for pleasure that kept her moving. Kept her kissing. It was for connection, for him to know they were all right. To soothe and be soothed, because she couldn’t bear any upset between them.

She could tell him about the garlands hung across the ancient arches at the solstice. Could tell him how they’d once been the supports for the great cage that went across the top of the city, torn down during the revolt.

But she wanted to see the city through his eyes. Experience their first festival with moonstones glittering in heavy boughs all across the city sky. Enjoy the beauty of it, not have her joy polluted with talk of lesser men and their attempts to bring false meaning to what had been.

So she didn’t.

Pulled free the last of his knots and kissed at his throat, feeling his thoughts whirl and tug and try to decide if he should pry further or give in her attempts at seduction. They needn’t do it again. They’d already indulged earlier. And then they’d have to wash— again —and she really should sleep if she didn’t want her day to be ruined come morning, but it was so very tempting to do this instead.

“Do you have any more questions?” Orma asked, knowing she could say the rest of it. That no, her siblings would not sit at a table with the two of them if there was the chance of children. That they were hard-hearted, that they cared too much for power and station, with little room for even the Maker’s will if it interfered with tradition.

She could tell him she was sorry. That she would change it all if she could. That he deserved to be loved by her family for the whole of him. Because of who he was in all his parts, not despite perceived failings of birth.

There was much she could say, and perhaps she would, eventually. Because some things needed to be spoken aloud.

But there was time for that yet. And for now, she needed to kiss him. “Well?” she prompted, because she wouldn’t have him lying there in the dark, needing more answers. She would pry into the recesses of her memory if it would help him.

“I do,” Athan affirmed, one hand behind her head, the other coming to cup her cheek. “But I think they can keep.”

She’d talk of Lucian later. Remind him there was family they might visit that was kinder. Did not hold to the same traditions as the rest.

But for now, she hummed.

Smiled.

And this time, her lips met his.

And if she paid for it in the morning, so be it.

For now... they would have this.

◆◆◆

“We should stop somewhere,” Orma fretted, wringing her hands and pacing the kitchen floor. “Where does one buy food? Not ingredients. I know where those come from. But prepared things. How often is market day? Should we try there?”

Another lap. Brum raised his head and gave her a look, but she couldn’t bring herself to stop, even for him. Back and forth. She made to give another peek at the oven, but Athan halted her with a word.

“You let the heat out every time you do that,” he chided, with far more patience than she deserved. “And what does a pie need to bake?”

Orma’s throat tightened, giving the stove a worried look. “Heat and time,” she repeated.

First she’d watched.

Then, when she could name all the ingredients herself and their measures, she was allowed to practise, with Athan there to give advice over every step.

Then, was to do it herself. Without him there to stand over her. To point and correct when she went wrong.

Because she needed to build her confidence, not only her skills.

Which didn’t mean it had to be today. But Athan had suggested it. And talked a great deal about family and how proud he was of her and all she was learning, and that really wasn’t fair.

It was just a supper.

Well. It was. And it wasn’t.

It was supper at Lucian’s house. Because they were kin, and she owed him a great deal, and it had been too long since they’d visited.

Firen hadn’t met Athan at all. Which wasn’t fair, and weighed on Orma enough that Athan had pulled her into his lap and insisted he wished to meet more of her family.

She thought of her sister. Her brother. Of subjecting him to more judgement, and she couldn’t bear it. It would come later, she knew. But for now, she wanted something pleasant. Something nice.

Perfect, even.

Where she might offer him the family he lacked.

They could be the outsiders. The annex on a long and lauded family tree.

So there was pie. Made by her. Silently observed by her mate just in case she poison the lot of them.

They weren’t late, but she kept checking the sundial as if they were.

Or maybe it was to keep from opening the stove and checking on the pie. Which had been bubbling when last she checked, and it had been good she looked at it because the crust was browning too quickly and...

“Perhaps we ought to bring Brum,” Athan mused, and she glanced in his direction, horrified at the suggestion. He might be a fixture in their home, but that did not mean every house could accommodate him. Most especially since Firen and Lucian lived in lodgings provided by the Hall, and surely they had rules about half-wild beasts within their dwellings. Athan was leaning down in his chair, Brum sitting in front of him as he received rubs about his neck.

Her mouth opened, full of reasons the idea was preposterous, only to feel the flood of humour about the edges of the bond. “You jest,” Orma observed dryly, fighting down the urge to check. Again.

She wouldn’t go so far as to sit down at the table. Better to keep here, where she might smell if the edges caught enough to burn.

“I am,” Athan assured her, giving Brum’s head another pat. “Leave our home undefended? I think not.”

Brum’s tail made a loud swishing noise across the clean floor.

She did not ask who those invaders might be, and she didn’t need to. He’d distracted her, which was his aim, and she sank against the counter, fiddling with the cloth she’d grabbed to pull the hot pie from the oven—heedless of Athan’s warning it would not be ready so soon. “I want tonight to be nice,” Orma confessed, giving him a miserable sort of look.

“It will be,” Athan assured her.

“For you,” she insisted. “I want... I want you to like them. Because they’re the best family I’ve got, and if I can’t charm you with the best, then that just leaves the rest of them, and they make you worry about...” she stopped, her wings wilting.

Athan did not rise. Did not come and take her by the shoulders and tell her everything would be all right.

“Come here,” he said instead, more firmly than she’d expected of him.

She made a half-hearted gesture toward the oven, and he shook his head. Beckoning her toward him.

She sighed, not knowing why she felt a knot of dread, as if she was about to receive some sort of reprimand. Athan wasn’t like that. Never had been, and never would be.

Her lips twitched when he took hold of her wrists as soon as she was near enough to do so. Helped her negotiate around the Brum, who seemed perfectly pleased to have his charges situated so close to one another.

Then down onto his lap, where he tucked his arms about her waist and perched his chin upon her shoulder. “If they were beastly—which they won’t be. If they were wretched and mean and served only the most hideous meal for our supper, I would love you no less.”

“But...” she began, ready with talk of regrets and how much better he deserved.

“Not a bit,” he insisted. “And we would go to see them as long as it made you happy.”

A knot tightened in her stomach. “I want you to be happy,” she murmured, turning her head so she could look at him. “I want to give you what family I can.”

And that was it, wasn’t it? When she saw how sweetly he taught her. When he spoke with such reverence of his parents and his master, she could picture him with a child. One to help and guide. To teach about healing. To make sure there was someone as kind and compassionate for the future generation of Harquil.

“I shall have an apprentice one day,” Athan said after a moment’s consideration. “Perhaps younger than I was. And if that is not sufficient, we shall see about a mate for Brum. Or a host of little orphans to trouble him.”

His grip about her tightened, and his lips met her covered shoulder. “We will not want for family. This, I promise you. Whether by blood or by choosing, you will be loved. Will have someone to love.”

Her eyes watered. And it was the stress of baking, that was all. It wasn’t the way she warmed all over when he spoke to her that way. When he knew what she needed to hear and gave it freely. Not pretty lies to serve as a balm for now, a punishment for later. Always genuine.

He was happy to have whatever life, so long as it was with her.

She shifted further so she could wrap her arms around him. Could hold him to her and let the bond suffuse with all the affection she felt for him. “I’m happy for it to be you, for now,” she murmured. “And the Brum.”

His lips quirked upward, and his hands were soft as they smoothed up her sides and around her back. “How fortunate am I,” he observed, pressing her close. Breathing her in.

The old her would have snorted at that. Would have listed off all the reasons he was ridiculous, how much more he deserved.

But this Orma, the one that was loved. Loved in return...

She could nestle close. She could smile and accept his words as truth.

Because she felt entirely the same.

Then sat upright. Couldn’t even take time to glower as she lurched off his lap and hurried back to the oven. “My pie!”

While Athan laughed, and that really was wretched of him, but her heart was light even with her momentary panic.

And when she opened it, the fruits were bubbling nicely, and the crust was golden. A little lopsided perhaps, where it had swelled more on one side than the other, but no less appealing as she placed it on the counter and stared.

She’d done that. With her own two hands. With knowledge in her own head and skill in her hands, no matter how new it might be.

“Well?” Athan asked, still seated at the table. “Will it do? Or shall we venture out empty-handed?”

She turned, her smile wide and her eyes a little misty. “I made this,” she declared. “I did.”

His eyes were fond as he nodded. “I never doubted you.”

She had. Over and over. But he was steady and sure, and somewhere along the line she trusted his judgement beyond her own.

She fluttered back to his lap. Where she pulled him close and he was laughing at her enthusiasm, and that was all right, because she could quiet him easily enough when she tugged at his collar and kissed him.

Thoroughly.

Because he was right, and she had been very wrong, and it was easier to accept when they were kissing.

They could indulge. In a flurry of clothes and movement, there could be time enough. But she wouldn’t. She would simply celebrate her victory how she pleased. Would fly part of the way to Lucian’s, and walk the rest, so her hair and dress were smooth and tidy for when they arrived.

Her pie would be covered in cloths and tucked in a basket. Firen would open the door, because her excitement would have her peeking through the window for a first glance of Athan.

She would pull Orma aside. Whisper how handsome he was. And Orma wouldn’t shy away, but would nod and state her agreement. Would tell her he was clever, and wonderful, and she could want no better.

And Firen would cry just a little, because that was her way. Would hug her close and tell her how happy she was before she approached Athan and began asking him all sorts of questions about himself.

Which would leave Orma to keep Lucian from peeking inside her basket, and he wouldn’t listen, then would ask where she’d bought it because certainly she hadn’t made it herself.

Then she would smack his arm and accuse him of being horrid, because she most certainly had.

Because she was capable. And was more than a sickly creature confined to her bed.

Perhaps some days she would be. And that was all right, too. But on the others...

Whether for a day, or an hour, or simply a moment...

She had things to do. And the want to do them.

She had a mate to love. To be with.

A Brum to pet and sneak nibbles to when Athan wasn’t looking.

She had parents that loved her. That had done their best, and perhaps it had been inadequate. Perhaps there was more they might have done, or less or...

She did not even know.

And maybe it mattered. Maybe she’d talk with them one day about how they’d hurt her with their choices. With taking hers from her.

Or maybe not. As she flourished in the life she wanted, perhaps the past would fade. She might remember it, but not dwell there. Not when the alternative was to be here instead. Tucked in Athan’s arms. In her own kitchen.

That had only two storeys. Had an infirmary built at its side.

Not a tower. Not steeped in a history of bloodlines and greatness.

But was precious all the same.

Not only for what it was, but for who lived there.

And most of all, because it was home.