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“I was his third wife. He was…kind to me.” A wealth of unwanted memories lived in those words. She said, “Colum was just a little thing. He’d had a horse fall on him, crushed his leg. He spent most of his time indoors, in the library, staring out the window at his brothers and reading books.” Her smile was impossibly sad. “I think he was always a little in love with me – innocently, at first. And then…”

Amelia didn’t pry for details; she could see them writ clearly in the woman’s face.

“Nothing happened until well after my husband passed. Everyone expected me to marry again, but…” She closed her eyes, briefly, pained, and turned her face back to the fire. “I’ve tried, so many times, to convince him to take a wife. To live his life. He won’t.”

“He loves you.”

“What use is love?” Leda whispered, tears glimmering on her lashes once more. “It only ever gets in the way of what needs doing.”

~*~

Warm breath huffed delicately through slitted nostrils puffed against Reggie’s face, stirring his damp, freshly-washed hair, drying his scrubbed-clean cheeks. The chill of the early spring air cut through the thin shirt he’d put on after washing up, but heat radiated off the drake’s body, where she was curled around him, and her breath steamed in the dark, beating back the cold.

He wasn’t sure what had drawn him here, to the place where the drakes had bedded down in the long grass, flattening it all into a woven mat, but he’d been content to plop down cross-legged in the turf, not at all expecting Valencia to lift her head, trill a greeting, and come shuffling over to wrap herself around him. That was exactly what had happened, though.

And then Liam had showed up.

He yawned hugely, now, lying tucked into the curl of Lenny’s tail. “Did you kill anyone?” he wanted to know, in the same tone he might have inquired about the weather.

Same as with the drakes, Reggie wasn’t sure why he continued to entertain the child, but it was easier, somehow. Children and animals. Safter. The numbness of battle had given away to a surge of victory, of satisfaction…and also left a gnawing, hungry pit in the bottom of his stomach. He felt restless, too big for his skin, like he was shedding a poisonous outer layer long in need of stripping off. Deep down, he knew exactly what he wanted, what he needed, but he wasn’t going to acknowledge it, especially not with the bacchanal atmosphere that had turned the usual noise of camp to a hot-blooded roar tonight.

“What do you think?” he countered Liam, reaching to stroke absently at Lenny’s nose. She leaned into the touch with a low, contented hum.

Liam yawned again, small jaw popping. “I think my daddy did.”

“Well, I did, too,” Reggie said, before he could think better of justifying himself to achild. “I killed–” He bit down hard on the rest of the sentence. “Actually, I don’t think we should talk about that.”

“Baby,” Liam accused, on another yawn.

“Really? I’m not the one about to fall asleep. Who’s therealbaby here?”

“I’m five,” Liam pouted.

“Which means it’s far past your bedtime.” He softened his voice, insides softening as well at sight of that little pout. He was a cute bugger, he’d give him that. “Why are you out here? Didn’t Lady Amelia set you up in a manor house bedroom? With a nice feather bed?”

“There’s fleas,” Lian said, scratching his neck.

“Perhaps that’s justyou.”

He shot him a scowl that so resembled Connor’s Reggie nearly laughed…and then sobered at thought of Connor. Where was he tonight? Off with someoneready? Getting his dick wet, obviously; with the Lady Leda? Or, high from victory, had Amelia finally deigned to return his attentions?

The thought of Connor tangled with either of them so soured him that it must have shown on his face, because Liam said, “What?”

“Nothing.” He wiped his expression clean once more.

Liam yawned. “’Sides,” he said, returning to the earlier topic, “I don’t like it inside. There’s no sky there. And you can’t feel the wind.” He thrust a small arm into the air, as if to demonstrate, and the breeze tumbled down over Lenny’s back and doused them both with a blast of hair-flattening cold.

Reggie shivered and leaned back more firmly against Lenny. “I suppose that’s true.”

“And if you can’t feel the wind, and you can’t see the stars,” Liam continued, “how do you know what time it is? Or if it’s going to rain? How do you knowanythinginside?”

Reggie smiled. “I don’t guess you do, when you put it like that.”

Liam nodded sagely, glad to be right.

They lapsed into silence, and in minutes, the boy was snoring.

Reggie gave Valencia’s nose a final pat and stood, wincing at the soreness already setting in. “I suppose I should find the little rat a bed somewhere,” he said, though fondly.