“Sorry,” I say. She’s got me there.
She rubs Lucian’s back while he feeds, and when I lean in to get my face closer to the two of them, her tail comes around and pops me in the back of the head.
“Ah—damn.” I rub the spot.
“That wasn’t me.” She keeps her eyes on Lucian. “That was her.”
“Alright.” I glare at the tassel, hovering now, pointed straight at me. “I see how it is.”
I scoot in closer anyway, one hand still on the back of my head, then give up on dignity altogether and lie down with my head in her lap. I look up at the two of them—my son’s jaw working, my woman looking down at me with her whole face gone soft.
“What are you doing?” she says.
“I’m trying to calm down.” I close my eyes, then open them on her. “You walked into the Glen with me, baby. You walked in and never once looked back. I keep waiting to understand it, and I never do.”
Lucian’s tail finds my face and starts batting at my nose, little taps, and I let him. I’d let that cub do anything.
Mara’s free hand drifts down to flick his tail gently away, then stays, stroking down the side of my face, warm—her grown king, sprawled in her lap getting beat up by a baby.
“I’m glad you got it ready for us,” she says. “The Glen. I think it would’ve been harder, coming into the dead version of it.” Her eyes hold mine. “You gave us somewhere whole to start.”
I roll onto my side and press a kiss to her belly, where our son grew, then leave my mouth there before I look back up at her.
“I want another one,” I tell her. “I mean it. The whole thing, start to finish, with none of the distance this time. I want to be there for all of it. I want to watch you grow round with our baby and not miss a single day.”
“Ohhh.” She laughs, tipping her head back. “I am taking a break, sir.”
“Fair enough.” I catch her hand off my cheek and kiss the center of it.
“Besides.” There’s a new light in her eyes, the look she gets when she’s been sitting on a secret. “Ellie says I can teach. Interspecies studies, at the Academy. The witches and warlocks are practically begging for it.” Her tail gives a pleased little flick. “They want me, Aaron.”
I sit up so fast Lucian loses the rhythm and fusses, and the wrong words are halfway out of my mouth before I can catch them. “You’re a queen, baby, you don’t have to?—“
Her tail flicks up, the tassel aimed dead at me.
“—of course.” I choke on the rest of it and start over, quick, since I’d like to live. “Of course you should. I think it’s brilliant. The best idea anyone’s had all year.”
“It would be good for them, having me there,” she says, letting me off the hook. “And good for Lucian. He needs to watch how we live among our people, not above them. He needs to see it’s something you do with your hands, not something you sit on a throne and announce.”
“You never stop amazing me,” I tell her.
“So.” She shifts Lucian to her other side, my girl. “While you’re off figuring out what to do about Henry and keeping Wintermoon in one piece, I’ll be right here, getting our son ready for the day this whole realm is his.”
I lean in and kiss her, nothing behind it but everything I’ve got. “I love you,” I say against her lips. “You know that? I don’t say it enough for how much I mean it. You’re the whole reason any of this exists, all of it.”
“I know.” Her forehead comes down on mine. “I love you too, Aaron. I chose you. I’d choose you again right now, today, knowing every hard part coming.” She pulls back just enough to look at me, her thumb moving over my cheekbone. “You made an honorable king, just like they all said you would.” Then, firmer: “So stop bracing for me to leave. I’m not going anywhere, Aaron. This is my home now too.”
That undoes me, and I have to kiss the top of my son’s head just to have somewhere to put it.
Lucian finally pulls off her with a sigh far too dramatic for someone his size. Mara tucks herself back into her nightgown and slumps against the pillows.
“This boy.” She yawns, wide. “Always hungry. Every hour of the day and half the night. I swear he gets that from you.”
“Give him here.” I’m already reaching, gathering him in, that warm sturdy weight settling against my chest. “Sleep in. I’ve got him from here. You’ve earned a few hours, baby.”
“But—“ she blinks up at me, losing the fight as her eyes go heavy.
I lift him off her and Lucian squeals once in protest, a sharp little sound of betrayal—he’s a mama’s boy down to the bone. Then he gets a lungful of me, coffee and sandalwood and home, and the protest drains right out of him. He goes heavy and boneless against my shoulder, burrowing in.
