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Orion nodded, chewed his bottom lip as he thought. “You and me both. The fact is, you’re welcome here and I’m…well, I guess I am too.”

Cullen liked that thought. He thought it was…hopeful. “I like your room. It’s pretty and it feels comfortable.”

“I grew up here. I’m sure if you looked hard enough, there’s a journal filled with terrible teenaged angsty poems about how my horn was never going to be as long, and my mane was never going to flow as easily.”

“Oh wow. Wow, man, that’s impressive.”

Orion blinked at him. “You don’t have one?”

He snorted, unable to stop his eyes from rolling. “Are you kidding? I have two brothers, one of whom is a seer. If there had been a journal of bad poetry? Trust me. They would right now be wallpapering the house with it, so that we could all see it, every day, forever.”

“Oh, you have a point.” Orion grinned at him. “At least you knew you were never alone, right?”

“Not even so much as a second. Privacy was not one of those things that we had, but you’re right, we had each other. That’s more than a lot of people have.” And he loved his brothers fiercely, just as they loved him.

“They’re good eggs.”

“Bawk bawk. I guess we should go back down?”

“Yeah. I bet my da has worked up a real batch of worry by now. Thinking I hate him. He’s the sensitive soul.”

“Sure. I got to say, Rigel is kind of intimidating in that god-of-thunder kind of way.”

“Oh, goddess, he was never one to let things go. Always thundering, for sure.”

Cullen stood and pulled him to his feet. “But he loves you. I can feel it in the stones here. In the air.”

Orion grinned at him. “Yeah, I can feel it. Come on, let’s go down. Let Da feed us. Then I’ll take you and introduce you to some of my friends.”

He let his eyes go wide. “You have friends? Are you sure?”

“Don’t make me hurt you.” Orion’s smile was wicked. “You’re pregnant and that would probably be looked down upon.”

“Yeah, I would probably let Corbin kill you.” Although, really? Cosmo was the hormonal one. Like seriously. “Come on, let’s go. I could totally spend the night here though. This room is stunning.”

“I used to lay in here and dream about meeting someone like you, you know? When I was here feeling so alone and so distant from the universe, I’d mope and dream about finding a mate and being madly in love.”

“How does it compare? I mean the reality to the imagination.” It took way more courage than he had anticipated to ask that question.

“The reality is nothing like I imagined.” Orion shrugged and leaned in, rubbing their noses together, a spark of magic passing between them. “This is so much more real than I had imagined. What I had fantasized was just a dream.”

Okay. Well, maybe he wouldn’t kill Orion because that was really sweet.

In fact, little pink hearts were floating up and exploding all around them in a wave of joy.

He stood up and rubbed his belly. “Come on, let’s feed this butterfly before she starts complaining.”

“Complaining? Our little girl? Surely you jest…” Orion took the book of fairy tales under his arm. “I’m going to take this home with us. This one can be hers.”

“She’ll love it, I’m sure.” He hooked their arms together, both of them heading out the door. He couldn’t wait to see what Orion’s fathers would invent for a meal. Corbin and Cosmo would be so jealous.

They loved food. All of them did. They had to keep the magic flowing, and that took a lot of energy. Hell, all the dragons in Lunastra had that in common. His mom ate like a bird and sipped a lot of flower tea, though…

“There you are!” Da greeted them when they came back down. “I have buns and cakes and little sandwiches.”

“Oh, that looks so charming.” Cullen beamed. “It’s so pretty. It’s like tea in Britain?”

“What are your favorite things? Have you started having cravings?” Da’s eyes were warm, curious, but not mean.