Page 92 of A Kingdom of Magic and Rain

I glanced at Tom, who had his mother’s angular features and his father’s hazel eyes.

“No siblings?” I asked.

“No, I’m an only child.”

“That explains a lot,” I muttered under my breath, making Thea giggle.

Tom arched a brow. “I don’t have any siblings, but Gray is like a brother to me. That’s why I acted the way I did during your stay at Bradford Manor. Never in my wildest dreams, or rather, nightmares, would I have thought that he would fall for someone like you. A mortal,” he spat the last word out.

“And now your queen,” I said through my teeth to put him in his place.

“I’m glad that you have finally decided to act like one.”

When I couldn’t come up with a retort because the criticism wasn’t entirely baseless, I did the next best thing. I offered a slight smile. The strangest thing happened then—he smiled back.

“Aww, look at you two,” Thea crooned. “This makes my heart so happy.”

Tom and I rolled our eyes at the same time.

“Moving on.” I looked back down at the portraits.

“Right. You already know Lord Finnian,” Thea said, blushing, as she pointed at the portrait of the young man. “At fifty, he’s the youngest of the four lords.”

Finn was fifty? It was still difficult for me to grasp the concept of faeries aging at a much slower rate.

“If Finn is the youngest, how long have the other three lords held their positions? Were they alive during Oberon’s rule?” I asked as I didn’t recall Lady May’s journal going into detail about that.

“They were,” Tom concurred. “When Oberon became the king, he selected my father to run the Eastern province. Thea’s father was already the lord in the South, and when Lord Fenmyar passed away, Oberon appointed Lord Heiran to be in charge in the North.”

“Interesting. Can anyone be appointed?”

“Anyone can submit their name for consideration. The only stipulation is that they have to have been born in the province over which they wish to preside. Once they are appointed, the binding spell links their life force to their land, allowing them to draw on its magical reserves. The Argent line is bound to all four provinces, of course, which grants them the ultimate power.”

“Anyway,” Thea drew my attention to her. “The Dellari line.” She smiled as she pointed at the portrait of a beautiful Fae woman with flaming red hair and luminous green eyes. Thea’s father was depicted next to her. He was a fair-haired man with an exuberant smile. “Lord Alastair, Lady Loraphine, and Coradelle and I.”

She hesitated for a moment before moving on to the last set of portraits. “The Rolamin line. Lord Heiran and Lady Zarana.” Heiran’s thin mouth, peeking through his pointed brown beard, was twisted in a mocking smile as he stared back at me with dark, beady eyes. Zarana looked confident next to him, as she should, for she was stunning, with sleek onyx hair and calculating brown eyes. When my gaze slid to the portrait of their daughter, it became clear why Thea had hesitated. “Their daughter Daelana.”

“Adrian’s mate,” I said in a hollow voice. I had wondered before how she had been able to slip through the wards to show up at the ball at Bradford Manor, and now I had the explanation. Since she came from a prominent bloodline, she had been strong enough to pass through the weakening barrier as Tom and Thea had done.

“Yes, she’s Gray’s mate, but Emelin, he doesn’t want to be with her. He wants you,” Thea said vehemently.

“How would that even work? I thought the mating bond was undeniable.”

“Ignoring the pull is challenging, but not impossible, especially before you fully accept the bond and claim each other.”

“Claim each other?”

Thea’s cheeks turned pink as Tom cleared his throat, looking uncomfortable with the conversation.

“A rather archaic tradition,” Thea explained. “The mates exchange a few drops of blood to seal the bond. Their scents become intertwined, making it clear to everyone that they belong to each other.”

“That sounds…strangely beautiful,” I admitted.

“It’s the highest form of commitment. That’s why Gray had wanted to wait until he and Daelana were married. He never claimed her.”

“Even still, doesn’t he constantly feel the need to be with her?” I asked, though I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted to hear the answer.

Tom smirked. “He’s been a miserable bastard since the day he met you. Trust me, the need he feels is not for her.”