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“I know,” I whisper.
He walks over, moving in behind me. His hands close gently on my shoulders, and his lips brush my ear. “Do you regret it?”
“No, Rue.” My answer is the same as ever, truer now than when I made the bargain. I know him better now. We’ve had time to move beyond lust, past the first blush of new love into something deeper, stronger. “I will never regret sacrificing everything I had to free you. As much as it will flay our hearts to do this, we will do it, and we will heal, and we will move on. Together.”
He can’t answer me. I hear the tears in the thickness of his breath. This is hurting him more deeply than I expected.
“This might be worse than what I would have endured from the King,” he confesses in a raw whisper.
“I could break the bargain,” I reply quietly. “I’d pay the price with my life, but you could keep her.”
“No!” His fingers clamp around my upper arms. “Fuck no, Juliette.”
I let out a sigh that cracks in the middle. Relief and pain.
“They will take good care of her,” he says, low and broken. “They’re good women, kind women. Devoted to each other, as they will be to her. She’ll be loved so wonderfully and so well. We know this.”
“We know this,” I whisper back, nodding.
A sound outside the inn, somewhere on the dark road below our half-open window. Hoofbeats. Two horses, I think.
My stomach drops.
Rupert’s grip tightens on my arms, and he buries his face in the curve of my neck. “Two more guests for the night,” he murmurs against my skin.
We opened this inn a few months after I freed him, with money from the sale of the mill. We have our home above the kitchen, a modest apartment with a living area, two small bedrooms, and a bathroom. The inn has ten rooms and a pub downstairs, as well as a bakery counter where all my best baked goods are on display under glass domes. My pies are the talk of the countryside, and no fine dinner is complete with one of my cakes for dessert. Our inn is located between Filliden and Vassela, on a popular route for travelers. Thanks to Rupert’s magic, which enhances the health of both our gardens and our stable of horses, the inn is fast becoming not merely an overnight stop, but a destination all its own.
I want to raise children here. But this child is the firstborn. She is marked for another life—a good life, but not one she’ll share with us.
I don’t know if Enthel and Lannau will ever tell her why I made this bargain. If they do, I hope she’ll understand why I gave her up to save her father.
Whether she understands or not, I made the right choice.
The hoofbeats have stopped. A door closes somewhere down below. The baby stirs, and when I sway slowly to quiet her, Rupert sways too, sliding his hands along my arms to embrace us both.
I think I will remember this moment forever. Her plump little body, a heavy warmth in my arms. His big hands slipping over mine. The three of us, breathing lightly together. Waiting.
A tap at the door, and Rupert relinquishes me to open it.
Bede stands there, her face tight with concern. Shortly before we opened the inn, I invited her to come work with us, and she’s been a valuable member of this place ever since. She manages the guests and supervises the other staff members, while I handle the food and Rupert cares for the gardens and horses. Rupert and I may be the owners, but the place couldn’t run without Bede, and we pay her accordingly.
It’s not her job to announce visitors, but I appreciate her coming up herself, instead of waking one of the maids.
They’re here, she signs.
“We’ll come down in a moment,” Rupert says.
With a nod and a sympathetic glance at me, she leaves.
He comes to my side and leans down to place a tender kiss on our baby daughter’s forehead. “Three months after a child of Elf-blood is born, they are given their true name,” he whispers. “I think Enthel and Lannau plan to do it, but the right is ours. Yours and mine. Do you agree?”
I nod, blinking back tears. “Yes, I do.”
“Then I give you the name I have chosen for you,” he whispers to our daughter. “You are one quarter Elf, so the name cannot control you, but it will be a tether between you and the one to whom you give it. May you choose wisely the object of your trust, Valynara.”
The moment he speaks it, the name fits her. It is her. I can’t explain it.
Rupert looks up at me. “We must not speak it again, but it will remain with her forever.”
