Page 26 of Dragon Keeper

Chapter

Nine

“Mate?”

Tyr blinked up from the book he was pretending to read. The words were just swimming in front of his tired eyes. “Yes, love?”

“Do we have a basement?”

“A belowground? We have a cold storage underneath the kitchen.”

“Can I see it?” Sloan asked, and he nodded.

“Of course.” He rolled up, his back popping. He wasn’t sure why Sloan had felt the need to ask. This was his home too. There was nothing that was hidden from him. But Tyr would take him where he wanted to go.

They headed through the sunny little reading room that they’d been lounging in, back through the house into the kitchen and along to the pantry.

He opened the trap door in the floor, nodding to the ladder there. “It’s not a long distance down.”

Sloan climbed down and Tyr followed, lighting one of the lamps on his way to the bottom.

It was larger than he remembered, stretching back beyond the sacks of tubers and purple apples and glass jars filled with things he traded his honey for.

“This is spectacular.”

“It stays cool, and it’s a nice space to store foodstuffs.” He wasn’t sure exactly what Sloan was interested in, but he wanted to help.

“Cade told me that I needed to imagine what my spaces here at the house should look like.”

“Oh!” Well, that made sense. “Oh, of course. Do you like it down here?”

Tyr thought it was a little dark and enclosed, but everyone was different.

“Would you be opposed to having me expand down here?”

He shook his head. “Of course not. You’re welcome to do that, you know. Make whatever space you need.”

Sloan hugged him tight and kissed the top of his head. “I want this to be a place we both love. We could make big rooms or small rooms. Perhaps a pool? I like to swim.”

He chuckled, Sloan’s excitement energizing him. “Do you? So does my sister, very much.” His sister lived with her mate near the ocean, and he wanted to take Sloan to the ocean, but he had never seen Sloan so excited about something that wasn’t him.

This was the right thing to do, to encourage him to work on his own space down here.

“I think what I’ll do is start by making stairs down here. This would be far easier access and, if you have babies?—”

“When.” He wanted babies.

“I mean when you have babies, it’ll be easier to walk down. Ladders and pregnant omegas do not match.”

Those words made him laugh. “Well then, you should sit here and close your eyes and imagine what wonderful things you will create.”

“Yes.” Sloan sat right down on the ground in the cold storage and grabbed Tyr and plopped him on his lap. “And you know, dearest one, you can create it with me.”

“Oh, but—” He had created a whole house.

“I want you with me. This isn’t just about me. But it is something I want. I want a place to swim, if it’s possible without disrupting the bees and the plants. I want a safe place, just in case we need someplace to shelter from storms or attacks.”

He opened his mouth, but Sloan put a finger over it. They were facing one another, and he watched, laughing, as Sloan screwed his eyes shut tight. “That’s how I think. I want a place for a game room for me and my brothers, and a new place for the hoard so I can move it underground. What do you want?”