Page 37 of The Gathering

“Why didn’t you tell that story when last you were in town?” Hagen asked.

“Because you would have called me a liar,” Draven said.

Hagen raised a sly brow in Aydra’s direction. “You also failed to mention this one,” he said with an upwards nod to her.

“Again,” Draven chuckled deeply. “You would have called me a liar.”

“Mate,” Hagen laughed. “I’d have ridden here just to see if you were full of it. The Venari King consorting with the enemy Queen….” He paused and shook his head. “I wondered what was wrong with you last time.”

“What do you mean?” Aydra asked.

“He was shit beside himself, wasn’t he?” Hagen said to Dag, and Dag nodded in agreement. “Never seen him pound iron so hard.”

“When were you last there?” Aydra asked, head tilting at Draven.

Draven rubbed his neck, eyes avoiding hers a moment. “It was before you came to the forest the second time,” he said solemnly.

Aydra dropped her fork as she remembered him riding off in the middle of the night from the council meeting that she’d ignored him at.

“Draven—“

But he shook his head and brought her hand to his lips. “You were worth it,” he assured her, and Aydra sighed as he entwined their hands together atop his knee. A small gesture, but one that warmed her heart and made her chest swell, a reassurance that they were in this together.

“How’s Kat?” Draven asked Hagen then, and Hagen held his friend’s gaze for long enough that Draven’s lips lifted high once more.

“What’ve you done now?” Draven mocked.

“I left her in charge,” Hagen said, shifting against the wall. “She’ll have half the town beheaded by the time I get back. Perhaps a new council.”

“I like the sound of her,” Aydra joined in.

“You’d like her,” Draven told her.

But Hagen didn’t respond and instead looked at Draven for an extended moment, his lips twisting. “She wants wolf pups,” he grunted.

Draven stared at him, clear that he was trying to hold in laughter at the news, going so far as tears rising in his eyes. Hagen scoffed heavily and shook his head.

“Let’s have it,” Hagen said with a gesture of his hands.

Booming laughter filled the terrace with Draven’s bellow. Laugh so hard that he almost fell over from the railing he was leaning against. Dag grinned at Hagen, clapping him on his shoulder as though Hagen had just announced he was going to be a father.

Draven continued to howl in bellows, making some of the other Blackhands turn towards them and even making Dorian turn and look at Aydra with a confused look on his face. But Aydra shrugged, hardly able to tear her eyes away from her King, and she swore she would memorize that laugh.

“You could ask Naddi,” Draven said once he’d recovered, still holding his side from laughing.

“I’m not asking that shit for anything—“ Hagen’s expression faltered. “He’s coming, isn’t he?”

Draven looked up at the sun. “Should be here in an hour or so. He had to stop by for the Nitesh.”

“A little far out of his way, isn’t it?” Hagen frowned.

“Said he was taking the river,” Draven replied. “Gathering horses there and coming around the north of the mountains through Ganit.”

“Mortis Lunar during the crescents?” Hagen remarked about the path and moons’ cycle. “Suppose it could be worse.” He crossed his arms over his chest, another chuckle leaving him. “I hope he’s had a rough time of it. Maybe something ate him.”

“Are you talking about Nadir?” Aydra asked.

Hagen’s eyes widened as he looked at Draven, and Draven met Aydra’s gaze with a shake of his head and a low noise from his throat that sounded like a growl. As though her mentioning that she knew him was something she shouldn’t have done.