Marquis blanched, mind momentarily torn from the letter.
“Indeed. I’ve never had it occur to myself, though I admit, in my age, I’ve needed the drug a time or six.” Nelson’s gaze hovered and moved once more. “Point being, it is fortunate that mages have good stamina. And even so, I’d suggest someone check in on the boy and make sure he stays hydrated.”
Marquis raised a brow, both brows, lips pursed. “Was he in heat at some point?”
Nelson shook his head. “Merely insatiable, I’ve been told. I was also informed it was rude to ask. I merely wanted to know if I should be on the lookout for a new property for RedSky. They’re outgrowing the hotel, and another child or pup may necessitate that move sooner than later.”
Marquis nodded. “They deserve better, but it’s what Rexford needed. Things are changing, but I fear that the coven may split soon. It’s time that Izohr and Leon take a coven. He should take Tack and Haze with him. I see a need for a mixed coven soon.”
“They won’t like that. They love Rexford.” Nelson sighed and flipped a page over, lips pursed judgmentally.
“And there are empty covens with land to spare and a covenmaster, an alpha with an omega mate, half wolf himself, fathering a child he gave his own spirit to. It is his duty to move on for the good of others. They will understand in time. We have very long lives. It is a long time to forget, to love again, to reunite. Our lives are as long as the trees we bind our wands to, and longer still if we have yet more to do. If my wand should die and I need another, if another tree wills it, I will share life again. And sometimes, our magic runs out. No tree will share with us, for the bond of wand and mage makes a tree live longer, stretch higher to the sky, and whether that is true or not is secondary to the fact that when a mage’s wand tree dies and they cannot find another, we know our days run slim.” Marquis pulled his wand out and stared at it. “So, when we must move on, we do so. Magic will always cross paths. Rexford’s and Izohr’s wand trees are close together. They’ll find one another again in one way, I’m sure.”
Nelson folded the papers and nodded sagely. “Doris wasn’t well by the end of it, was she?”
Marquis shook his head. “I put off reading it for a long time. In the end, it was nothing more than the final ramblings of a madwoman.”
“Still. It’s rather fucked up.” Nelson shook his head with a soft sigh.
“It is. But her wand tree died years ago. She never said anything, but part of me knew. I see the death of old trees in this world more now than ever.” Marquis blinked and rubbed at one of his eyes as if brushing away errant sawdust.
“Pardon, but why do mages not plant trees symbolically? As part of the birth of a mageling? Plant a tree and harvest a wand from it?” Nelson tilted his ring back and forth as he stared at it.
“The Arborae covens have tree-planting festivals. But, because mages believe that destroying one’s wand tree can harm a mage, we keep it secret out of tradition. But I like that. It’s not deadly, but it is an inconvenience.” Marquis frowned. “What should we plant for our little girl, you think?”
“If it were me? I’d buy deforested land and plant a forest. I’d plant old growth and tend them, so by the time she has children, they’re taller than houses and the start of memories and end of stories.” Nelson covered his ring with his hand. The initials on it weren’t his own, likely his son’s.
“We bury what is left of our mages at the feet of trees. Would you like to be put to rest with honors among our kind?” Marquis took the letter back.
“Can my son’s urn be placed with me? And will Meredith be buried with the mages, too?” Nelson spoke the words with a little edge that hadn’t been there before.
“If anyone has earned that honor, it’s her and you. And we do not ask a man go anywhere his own children are not welcome.” Marquis liked the idea, though, an entire forest, a new wave of mages. Perhaps along a river where those trees could give beautiful driftwood to come.
Chapter Twenty
Mads
He couldn’t lay on his front. That was the biggest pisser of all of it. Face down was his favorite napping position, and it’d been stolen from him yet again. He recalled that with Rexford it’d been much the same. And with little Morgana? From four months forward, he’d been deprived.
He groaned as he tried to lay on his side at a more forward angle, hand resting on his omega line. The damned thing burned the last weeks of pregnancy. Had done so previously and was no different this time. So much was familiar, and so much different. The nausea was different this time, more pronounced at the end. She liked to use his stomach as a kickboard. He was bigger this time, as a consequence of the ligaments already being relaxed from his first pregnancy. Not as many twinges.
He’d been alone for the better part of two days at that point. Marquis had found another omega and a den of Baron’s belongings that needed to be parsed through. For a male that had exhausted all of his finances, he sure had many storehouses filled with money and supplies. Mads had been instrumental in recovering some of it, vague memories piecing together to form images that helped them track down stores of things that likely even Baron had forgotten about. The last ten years had not been kind to Baron, on his magic or his mind.
On a whim, Mads shifted, kicking off his pajamas as he rolled over to lay on his front in raccoon form. The little shape of his babe within settled far easier that way. And, lacking fingerprints, he typed out the passkey for his phone and propped it on a blanket fold to scroll through baby items. Their nursery had been long since done, set up in pretty shades of lavender. Still, there was always more a nesting omega could add.
A polite knock came from the door and Mads gave a bark of consent, watching it swing open as a female that worked with the bearers of the coven, both omega and other females, popped in with a smile. Helena? The covenmaster’s house had a no-knock sort of policy where anyone came in, but Marquis’s bedroom and office was off-limits.
“Mads, how are we feeling?” Helena smiled, lips stretched into a wide sort of grin that held a note of pity in it. Mads gave a thumbs-up as best he could in his little raccoon form.
“Dr. Vans asked me to drop something off for you.” She held up an envelope, fat with papers.The DNA test.Mads sighed and sat up while she brushed dark hair off her shoulder and tugged her blouse to straighten it. “Up and off the keister! No more lazy trash panda party.”
He chittered with detest and glanced from his phone that he’d been idly shopping onto the envelope. Part of him didn’t want to know the results.
Mads waddled to the end of the bed where his pants had gone to and maneuvered his lower half into them to shift into the pants to spare her a glimpse of dingdong. Because if Mads couldn’t see his own junk, neither was anyone else. Even Marquis… Unless he wanted to do something with it… And even then, only with the lights out. Mads couldn’t make himself feelsexythis late in his pregnancy.
“Impressive.” She clapped her hands a little and Mads shot her a glare.
“Shifting into one’s pants is parlor tricks.”
