Page 23

The afternoon hadn’t gone as well as Rhaego had hoped. His mother had been occupied with none other than the king. He hadn’t even been permitted to set foot in her wing of the Eyrie, the females’ keep located high on the mountain where she lived.

He felt lost. His next opportunity to speak with her wouldn’t be until the following luncheon. What if Verakko had a breakthrough before then? How could he leave Tuva without seeing her?

The answer was he couldn’t, and that made everything even more complicated. His team wouldn’t like this at all, but he would stay firm. He’d already proved he was willing to sacrifice for this mission, but sacrificing the chance to at least say goodbye to his mother? In the state she was in? That was one loss too far.

Could Marsol wait another week? He didn’t know. But unless Rhaego received word that the male was close to death, he’d planned to insist they stay longer. He deserved that much, didn’t he? His frustration turned toward the king, and he flexed his claws.

Did King Yaskan always visit his mother this often? If so, she hadn’t told Rhaego. He couldn’t decide how he felt about the possibility. He pondered the odd situation while wandering through the shopping district, buying items for Aurora that he believed she might like. He didn’t know if she’d accept the gifts or not, but he wanted her to have them all the same.

A pair of gloves she could wear while foraging in the forest behind their den. A collection of matching hair-care items including brushes, combs, and pins inlaid with brilliant blue minoskep that he hoped she might allow him to use on her. And a golden choker.

The necklace was far too simple for a bride. The disapproving stare of the shopkeeper as he packaged it up and opened a display cabinet of fist-sized gems with a questioning quirk of his mouth told him as much. But he felt Aurora would appreciate the necklace, even if none of his kinsmen understood why.

As he and Phirdo waited at the grotto’s entrance, eyeing the squadron of guards manning the doors, his heartbeat began to speed. How could the mere knowledge he’d be setting his eyes upon her again stir such a reaction? Even his fever roused, bubbling excitedly.

“You tended her hair.”

Rhaego peered at Phirdo, surprise drawing his brows together. The male had spoken hardly a word to him all day, though he often drifted away to speak to friends as Rhaego meandered through the city. But Rhaego had caught the steward staring at him, an oddness to his expression.

That same oddness was there now as Phirdo waited for a response.

His fever rose defensively. “Yes.”

Phirdo’s jaw tensed. “She allowed it.”

It wasn’t a question—his musk on her hair told all within scenting range that he’d marked her, but the practice was unusual. Marking on the skin, the body wasn’t uncommon, though females didn’t usually allow it until the week before the heat, but the hair?

Tuvastans prided themselves on their hair, and allowing another person to tend it was deemed too intimate of an act. It was thought to encourage possessiveness, an emotion hot-fevered Tuvastans couldn’t afford to stoke.

Rhaego studied Phirdo’s tight expression. Was he chastising? Or was that odd tightness around his eyes…jealousy?

He opened his mouth to speak, but the doors swung wide and all focus whirled toward them. He barely noticed the stares the brides leaving the grotto aimed at him as they stepped forward one by one, waiting for their husbands to join them so their hands could be re-bound.

Were the stares critical? Curious? Disgusted? He had no idea, and for once he didn’t care.

Diana stepped out of the grotto, and ice pulsed through his horns, making his stomach twitch. His mind should’ve been focused on her, and part of it was. Marsol was suffering, waiting for her.

Their eyes met as the cleric refastened her binding. Her head bobbed in the faintest of nods, and her eyes burned with understanding.

She’d succeeded—Aurora had passed on his messages. He exhaled, relieved.

He didn’t have the chance to inhale again before Aurora appeared and every cell within him froze. Her hair was damp, the tresses puffing into a frizzy halo around her face. She scanned the crowd, and his heart squeezed when he realized she was searching for him.

Dread clogged his throat. What would she have heard about him in there? Would her eyes now hold a touch of fear? Disgust? Pity?

She spotted him and beamed.

Heat, the kind that sizzled and cracked, raced across his skin, flamed through his horns, and settled in his belly. Phirdo chuffed, breaking through the haze.

A loud rumble had him turning in place to find the source, but then he stilled. It was his own purr.

With a start, he realized expectant eyes were trained on him, waiting. Rhaego dashed forward, mortified that he’d kept her waiting and extended his arm. The elder cleric unfasted his clasp.

“Hello,” Aurora whispered with a soft smile as she unwrapped the length of ribbon from his arm and handed it to the young binding cleric.

“Hello,” he ground out, voice still threatening to tremble with his restrained purr.

Rhaego kept quiet as they set off back up the grotto steps, only speaking when they broke away from the crowd. “You went swimming,” he commented. His horn’s scent glands throbbed to life, spitting mad that the strength of his mark had faded.

“Yeah.” Her grin widened.

The thought of her dripping wet and clad in a clinging swimming gown had blood rushing to very inconvenient places. He attempted to erase the image from his mind.

“It was so cold but really invigorating. Diana and Maggie went with me.” Her narrowed gaze told him this was significant somehow, but with Phirdo lingering close behind, he couldn’t probe.

“Were you treated well by all?” he asked instead.

She shrugged. “Not all, no. A lot just wanted to talk crap about people I’ve never heard of before. And don’t get me wrong—” she held her hands up in front of her—“I’m not opposed to a bit of gossip, but some of the things they said were just…mean. Or weird.”

Rhaego’s throat closed. From her open expression it didn’t seem like she’d heard anything too terrible about him, but how could she not have?

Her brows lifted, concern seeping into her expression. “How was your visit with your mother?”

He tried to keep his smile from twitching. “She was busy, unfortunately.”

“What?” Aurora’s face fell. “Well…” She glanced around the emptying square, seeming to search for an answer. “Do we have a curfew?”

“A curfew?”

She pointed to the right. “Do we have to be back at the carriages at a certain time?”

Rhaego smiled and gently guided her lifted finger to the left with a claw on her wrist, ensuring she was indeed pointing in the direction of the carriages. “No. There is no curfew.”

“What if we go visit your mother first before we go back? Do you think she’d be free now?”

Rhaego’s jaw sealed shut. Take Aurora with him to see his mother? “Nooo.” The word emerged as a drawn-out impotent thing, but he couldn’t think what else to say.

“Why not? Don’t you need to—” Her eyes darted to Phirdo again. “Shouldn’t you make sure to visit her?”

It was true—the sooner he saw her the better, but…

“I’d like to meet her.” Aurora clasped her hands behind her back, peering up at him through pale lashes. “Tell her what a wonderful son she’s raised.”

Rhaego melted, knowing he was in trouble. When she looked at him like that, there was no chance he wouldn’t give her exactly what she wanted. Still…

“She isn’t well,” he murmured through a tight throat.

Her smile faded. “What do you mean?”

He traced the curves of Aurora’s face, seeing only tenderness.

Rhaego aimed to win this female’s soft heart one day, and he’d regret it if his mother never knew her. “She has the flare,” he explained slowly. “Her mind is volatile. Sometimes our visits are normal, and then there are days that are…bad. I worry what she may say to you.”

She reached out and laid her hand upon his wrist, squeezing lightly. “I don’t mind. Really. I’d like to go. We should go.”

Though he was torn, nerves alight with trepidation, this really was the perfect solution. At length Rhaego nodded, surrendering.