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Chapter Twenty-Three

T he journey to the dragon’s mountain proved to be far more complicated than Harm had expected. First the dragons flew them over the desert until they reached an oasis, where they landed, transformed, and entered what the dragons called an outpost library. It was certainly filled with enough books to put any library Harm had ever seen to shame.

In the outpost library, the dragons greeted the librarians, then led Harm, Val, and the mercenaries to a door set in the back wall. An Anywhere Door, apparently. When Tora had opened it, the Door revealed a white marbled hall that bustled with people even at that hour of afternoon bleeding into evening.

No sooner had they stepped through the Door into the hall—holding tightly to each other since only the dragons could actually use the Doors—than Tora shut the door, opened it again, and suddenly the Door led to a cavern deep inside a mountain. Just like that with a few steps, Harm found himself back in the Court of Stone, no days of walking or long flights needed.

Now he understood why it was such a big deal that Val and the other mercenaries couldn’t use the Anywhere Doors. He would have been delivered within a matter of minutes if Val had been able to go through the magical doorways.

They stood in a large cavern with the Door set into the rock wall behind them. A waterfall poured through a hole in the ceiling, sunlight casting rainbows through the mist. To their right, a large stairway led upward while to their left, an opening led to a long passageway. More doors and smaller openings ringed the cavern.

Beside the waterfall’s pool, two statues formed of a white marble that contrasted with the gray stone of the mountain stood on either side of the creek that cut across the cavern and down one of the branching tunnels. One of the statues was of a dragon with its wings outspread and its mouth open to show rows of teeth. Across the creek, a statue of a human woman, her rounded ears visible, stood with her eyes looking upward and a crown on her head.

Tora must have seen where Harm was staring because she smiled and gestured at the statues. “Our great-grandmother was a human.”

“I don’t remember if our great-grandsire commissioned that statue of her or if her village in the Human Realm made it.” Taran halted next to his sister. “I should have paid more attention when our grandsire talked about our history.”

“I know our great-grandsire stole that statue of himself from her village. Our great-grandmother teased him relentlessly about it.” Tora gave a little sigh as she gestured toward the dragon statue. “An epic romance, or so we’ve always been told.”

“Flight Clawstone already had a history of respecting humans.” Taran nodded toward the statues.

“But thanks to her, we’ve been rescuing humans even before the Wild Fae Primrose founded the Primrose League.” Tora grinned up at the visage of her human ancestor.

“Doesn’t make us the most popular Flight among the dragons. Or in the rest of the Fae Realm, for that matter.” Taran shrugged, then turned back to them. “Many of those who work here at the eyrie have human ancestors. If you’re considering settling down here in the Fae Realm, you’d be welcome here.”

Harm cleared his throat before the twins could keep speaking. “Thanks for the offer, but I must return to the Human Realm. My father and brother are still in danger.”

But if he arrived in the Human Realm only to discover that a hundred years had passed and his father and brother were long dead, then maybe he’d consider it.

Though, Val was a summer fae. She didn’t like the cold. Perhaps the Court of Knowledge would be a better option for a backup plan.

“Understandable. Although, we should…” Tora trailed off, meeting her brother’s gaze for a long, speaking moment .

After returning his sister’s look, Taran gave a nod. “Yes, I think we should.”

Footsteps echoed down one of the passageways before a fee?n man with dark, nearly black hair threaded with gray and skin a few shades lighter than Val’s but darker than the dragon twins’ strode out of the passageway into the light of the cavern. The man bowed to Tora and Taran. “Welcome back.”

“Have our parents returned from the Dragon Moot yet?” Taran glanced from the man to the large stairway.

“No, not yet.” The fee?n man’s gaze swept past the dragons to focus on Harm, Val, and the mercenaries. “I see we have guests.”

“Yes. Could you please prepare…” Tora glanced from Harm to Val. “How many rooms?”

“Six,” Harm said at the same time Val said, “Seven.”

Harm raised his eyebrows and held up his hand, the golden line glinting around his wrist. “We are married. For the first time this trip, it’s actually proper by Tulpenlander standards for us to share a room.”

Val sighed, her look disconcertingly flat. “And here I was looking forward to finally having a room to myself again.”

Harm’s stomach sank, and he hurried to add, “But if you don’t want to, we don’t have to. Not here and not in Tulpenland. It’s actually common practice for the consort to have her own suite.”

“Sounds like a good way for you to be assassinated.” Val’s smile broke through with an edge of something dangerous and almost flirtatious. “I’m not letting you out of my sight. ”

“Then the seventh room?” Harm lowered his voice to change the timbre to something flirtatious back.

“For Daisy. So she doesn’t hog the bed.”

“Good point.” Harm rested a hand on her waist, tugging her closer.

“Ahem.” The fee?n man gave a cough.

Harm leapt back, his neck heating. He’d forgotten they had an audience.

With another polite cough, the fee?n man led the way down one of the passageways, pointing out rooms for each of them. He showed them to the kitchen and eating area, which had large windows giving sweeping views of the snowy, mountainous landscape outside.

Val grabbed a few items of food that the cook—a smiling fee?n woman with brown curls—set out for them. Then she all but dragged Harm to their bedchamber with its adjoining room for Daisy.

Once there, Harm sank onto the edge of the bed. He twisted his arm and looked at the bandage, a hint of red seeping into the fabric. With all the busyness, they hadn’t had a chance to tend his sword slice properly yet.

Val’s gaze dropped to his arm as well, her expression going hard. “Shirt off.”

Harm grinned at her, making no move to comply. “That does seem a little excessive, doesn’t it? It’s my arm. You can tend it with my shirt on.”

“Is that so?” Val sauntered across the room, halting before him. She cradled his face with both of her hands, tipped his head up, and met his gaze.

Harm rested his hands on her waist and tugged her even closer. “Yes. It seems like it might be gratuitous shirtlessness.”

Val raised an eyebrow at him, smirked, and leaned down to capture his mouth with hers.

Harm leaned into the kiss, losing himself in the feel and taste of her.

She pulled away a breath. “About the shirt…”

“Coming off.” Harm closed the distance and kissed her again. His wound had waited this long. It could wait a little longer.

This time when she pulled away, she stepped out of his reach and crossed her arms. “Stop stalling.”

Harm sighed and scrubbed a hand over his face to try to clear the kissing haze. Stalling was much more pleasant than letting her tend his wound.

Bracing himself, Harm untied the knot holding the bandage in place and peeled it off. The dried blood yanked at the gash, ripping open the scab and sending a fresh trickle of blood down his arm.

He worked his way out of the tatters of his shirt. As he discarded it, he grinned at the consternation wrinkling Val’s forehead. “What? Did you forget I was wearing more layers than an onion?”

Val huffed and dug into her pocket. “Whatever.”

Harm worked his way out of his leather jerkin, then his fae shirt, which sadly now had a rip and a bloodstained sleeve. Would the tailor in Tulpenwerf be willing to mend it?

Val assembled her medical supplies once again, including placing her pot in the fireplace to heat water she’d retrieved from the pitcher and basin on a stand by the door.

As Harm set aside his fae-made shirt, Val sat beside him on the bed and held out a vial with that familiar glowing green sludge. “Drink.”

“It’s just a scratch.” Harm took the vial, swirling the potion for a moment. “Is a high-grade healing potion really necessary?”

“You don’t know what monsters Diego has been killing lately.” Val poked at his arm as she inspected the sword slice. “Even clean, his sword wouldn’t have been sanitized.”

Right. Harm shuddered, thinking of the rotting desert and slavering monsters. He popped the cork out of the vial and downed the potion.

Val retrieved the now boiling pot, set it on the floor next to the bed, and took her seat beside him again. “I really need to get my hands on more healing potions. Now hold still.”

Harm gripped the edge of the mattress and resisted the urge to lean away from her. “Can we go back to kissing? I liked that a lot more.”

“No.” Val dipped a rag into the water by their feet, wrung it out, and set to work scrubbing his wound. “Do you want to get an infection? Lose the arm? Die a horrible death thanks to some disease you picked up from contaminated monster blood? We’ve already delayed far too long on properly tending this.”

“Uh, no.” Harm sighed and submitted to her ministrations.

Earlier that morning…

Harm perched on the boulder beside the fire and faced Val, trying to pretend his stomach wasn’t churning, his chest tight. This had been his idea, after all. He shouldn’t be the one getting cold feet, if that was what this was.

Tulpenland marriages were particularly binding. As, it seemed, were fae marriages. This wasn’t something to be done on a whim, even if it was the best plan. They’d have to live with the consequences for the rest of their lives.

But this was Val. He couldn’t imagine returning to the Human Realm without her at his side. She forced him to change and grow in a way no one else ever had.

He cleared his throat and pasted on a smile. “How does this whole fae marriage thing work?”

Val paced back and forth across what was left of their camp, as if triple-checking that they hadn’t left anything behind. With a sigh, she whirled and marched toward him, her face far too expressionless for someone about to get married. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

Was he sure? He took a moment to turn the thought over in his mind, thinking through the results, the alternatives, the future he could have with her versus the one without her.

That decided it. “Yes, I am. Are you?”

Val’s expression cracked, letting through just a hint of something warmer, as she sat next to him and took his hand.

As soon as her fingers touched his, both of their hands glowed with a golden light.

Harm stared at the sight. He’d nearly jumped out of his skin when their hands had brushed for the first time after they’d gotten the cord off the night before. “Still not used to that.”

Val held their hands up. “We have the start of a binding. Completing the marriage binding would be the wisest course. It’s never a good idea to leave unfinished bindings hanging.”

Harm lifted his other hand and brushed her cheek. “I didn’t ask if it was wise.” They both knew it probably wasn’t, but wisdom had jumped out of the canal barge the moment he’d turned himself over to her in that tulip field. “I asked if you’re sure. If you want this. We can come up with another plan.”

“And miss my chance to secure every mercenary’s dream and become immune to iron? Not a chance.” Now a smirk fully banished the blank expression, her hand not holding his dropping to her dagger.

“Ah, yes. Marrying me for my immunity. I see how it is.” Harm brushed his thumb over her cheek as he cradled her face. “So much more scope for stabbing in the future.”

“Exactly, assuming Tulpenland doesn’t turn out to be as dead boring as you make it out to be.” Val fished in her magic pocket a moment before she produced a long leather string. “Ready to tie the knot? ”

If it meant getting to adventure the rest of his life at this warrior woman’s side, then absolutely.

Harm grinned and dropped his hand from her face to take one end of the string from her. “Ready to spend the rest of your life keeping me from getting assassinated?”

“What am I getting myself into?” Val rolled her eyes, but her smile remained soft.

She positioned the middle of the string between their clasped palms, then wrapped their clasped hands with her end of the string while he did the same with his. They each repeated the fae vow of pledging themselves to each other, then they tied the ends of the string in a knot above their clasped hands.

As soon as the knot tightened, the string gave a brilliant flash so bright that Harm closed his eyes. When he blinked them open, the string had vanished. Instead, a golden line glinted around each of their wrists.

He scrubbed at the golden line with his free hand. It didn’t so much as smudge, nor did his skin feel any different. “Does this fade? Go away?”

“I’m afraid not.” Val frowned at her hand. “I’d forgotten about that part. Mercenaries so rarely marry.”

“I doubt Diego has forgotten. He’s going to know exactly what this means.” Harm tugged at the end of his sleeve. Perhaps he could hide the line under his shirt cuff—as long as he remembered not to let his wrist show—but Val’s sleeves ended on her upper arms.

“Here. This might work.” Val dug into her pocket again, fishing around for a long moment before she withdrew a leather bracer. “If I cut this in half, I can fashion leather cuffs. We can wear them under the threefold cord, as if to prevent chafing.”

Harm nodded. “I did get rather bruised from the grain sprites. Why weren’t we wearing something like this the whole time?”

“I didn’t plan to be tied by that cord more than a few hours.” Val shot him a sour look, as if that was all his fault. “Diego saw us at the faerie market, and he will probably notice the difference. Hopefully he’ll assume I got them at the faerie market before setting out on the long walk to the Court of Stone. I probably would have, if I hadn’t been so busy procuring clothes and a sword.”

While she set to work cutting the bracer, Harm turned his back to her to move the knife from his ankle to his arm. While they’d discussed the plan—and she even had a hidden sheath fashioned for the knife—she had yet to see it nor had he come right out and confirmed he had it. Just in case Diego questioned her.

Once the knife was secure, he tugged the tattered human shirt he’d worn during the scuffle with the wolf over the fae jerkin and shirt, hiding the knife before he turned back to Val.

She held out what looked like a leather bracelet with strings to tie it on. “Try this.”

He took it and fumbled to tie it on his wrist over the golden line. She reached over and tied it for him, then he did the same for her.

She pushed to her feet, glancing one last time at their campsite, nothing but sand and a ring of stones around the coals now that she’d packed up the tent. “I think that’s everything. ”

“Not everything.” Harm stood as well, resting his hands on her waist. “Tulpenland weddings are sealed with a kiss.”

“Are they now?” Val tilted her head as she wrapped her arms around him. “Then I suppose we should make it official.”

Harm didn’t wait for more of an invitation than that.