Page 72 of The Sorcerer's Alpha

Sycamore’s heart was beating very quickly. “We could never return to Chedi, you know. Not ever, for the rest of our lives.”

“Are you asking me for my opinion? Or my permission? You have it. Wholeheartedly, without reservation.” Marut’s eyes cut sideways toward him for a brief moment. “My love. Let’s herd sheep and grow old together.”

Sycamore laid his cheek against Rhododendron’s nose. His heart slammed against his ribs. At the end of the row of stalls, a guard stood watching them. Sycamore said, “Give me your knife.”

Marut shifted his body to hide what he was doing as he drew the smaller knife from his belt and offered the hilt. Sycamore palmed it as discreetly as he could. The guard didn’t move.

“One more thing,” Sycamore said, and waited for Marut to look at him. “I’m pregnant.”

The look on Marut’s face was everything he had hoped for. He was laughing as he plunged the knife into his thigh.

* * *

A warm breeze blew,gentle through his hair and against his skin. He clung to Rhododendron’s neck, his head spinning and his leg burning. As his vision cleared, he saw grass: an endless rolling plain of green grass, and the sky above it, pale blue and strewn with clusters of white clouds.

“Sycamore,” Marut said, his voice ragged. He coughed a few times, then leaned over and spat onto the ground. He shook his head sharply. “You did that on purpose!”

“I’m sorry.” Sycamore painfully eased himself down to the ground and pressed both hands into the grass. Hello, he said to the earth. Do you remember me? “I couldn’t resist.”

Marut sat heavily beside him. He leaned forward and rested his forehead on Sycamore’s shoulder. “Are you really?”

“Yes. From my heat in Banuri. It’s very early still.”

“Oh, ancestors,” Marut said softly. They sat there for a while, recovering, not speaking. They didn’t need to speak. They each knew exactly what the other was feeling.

When Sycamore felt somewhat less like he had been dragged behind a runaway horse for half a day, he used Marut’s shoulder as a support to rise to his feet. His thigh was still bleeding, but not heavily. Bunny and Rhododendron were grazing nearby, unfazed by their abrupt change of locale. They were at the top of a low hill, and down the slope, in a broad valley dotted with poplars, a string of Sarnoy tents lay along a stream.

“How was your aim this time?” Marut asked.

“That remains to be seen,” Sycamore said primly. “But I believe we’ll know soon enough.” He pointed, and Marut turned to see the herd of sheep coming over a nearby rise, followed by a Sarnoy child in a red coat.

“That’s Arban,” Marut said, after a moment. “That’s one of my students.”

“Then it seems I did a passable job,” Sycamore said. He pressed his hand to his thigh and healed the wound with a thought. It wouldn’t even leave a mark.

Marut stood then and kissed him, his hands holding Sycamore’s face. Thank you, he was saying through the bond, and Sycamore said it back to him: thank you for giving me the courage to choose you. Thank you for showing me the way.

“I don’t think I’ll survive being this happy,” Marut said when they broke apart.

Sycamore smiled at him and reached up to stroke his beard. “We have many decades of marriage ahead of us. I’m sure you’ll grow weary of me at some point.”

“No,” Marut said. “I don’t think I will.”

He went to gather Bunny and Rhododendron. Together they walked down the hill toward the camp.

CHAPTER27

All of Twin Rams came out to welcome them. Children and dogs ran up the slope toward them with so much shrieking and barking that even patient Rhododendron put her ears back. “Marut, Marut!” one of the children called, and Marut swung her up onto Bunny’s back, where she kicked her feet with glee. That was how they greeted Bayarmaa, in a chaotic swarm of small, exuberant creatures, and the adults coming over to laugh or scold in accordance with their natures.

“Well,” Bayarmaa said as she looked them up and down, her gaze lingering on the bloodstain on Sycamore’s trousers, still wet. “Here are two people I didn’t expect to see.”

“Can we stay?” Marut asked in his simple Sarnoy.

Bayarmaa reached down to shoo a dog away. “Come visit with me and have something to eat.”

She led them not to her own tent but to Temur’s. He was waiting for them on the bench outside and struggled to his feet as they neared. “I can hardly believe it,” he said, and Sycamore was shocked to see tears fill his eyes.

“You were right about everything,” Sycamore said, and Temur embraced him and held him close for a long minute before he let go.