AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“But—”
“No. Hush.” He placed a silencing finger on Sebastian’s lips. “I haven’t been feeling well lately, and it occurred to me that it’s been two weeks since you rescued me from that rascal, Hugh, and whisked me off to bed to celebrate a job well done. Do you remember it? It was the day of the children’s birthday party.”
Realization struck, and it felt like a shard of ice had been stabbed through Sebastian’s heart. “The day you thought you might go into heat.”
Perry hummed sadly. “That’s the one. I’d thought maybe my old injuries were flaring up and interrupting my cycle, as they do from time to time, but… the dates lined up too well, so yesterday I went to visit Everard at his office.” Tears began to pool on Sebastian’s chest, and without Perry having said anything, he knew.
It was happening again.
“Perry…”
“He confirmed it,” Perry admitted in a small and broken voice. “The testing he did was conclusive. I’m…”
“Shh.” Sebastian tightened his arms as if to shield him from the world. “It is enough. I know.”
Perry began to sob, so Sebastian did what he always did and held him until there were no more tears left to cry. Then he stroked Perry’s hair, shoulders, and back, until the omega went limp and his breathing slowed and became even.
“It will be different this time,” Sebastian whispered in a hollow voice to his sleeping mate. “I don’t know how, but it will be.”
Perry didn’t stir, and Sebastian was grateful for it, because no matter what he said, words were of little comfort after five hundred years of pain.
5
Perry
Present Day
When Perry woke, he was in the hoard bed at Sebastian’s side. He’d hoped, naively, that a nap would ease some of his inner turmoil, but it hadn’t. Life was seldom so forgiving, and today in particular, it was relentlessly harsh.
All of this was his fault, of course. He hadn’t been careful. He’d known his heat was on the way and he’d let Sebastian ravish him regardless. If he’d been more responsible, none of this would have happened, but it had been such an awfully long time since he’d last been kidnapped, and in the excitement of it all—
“You’re blaming yourself again,” Sebastian grumbled. “Stop it.”
“It’s my fault, Sebastian.”
“No. It’s not.”
“I—”
“It’s not your fault.” Sebastian’s voice rumbled like rocks crashing down a ravine. “I was the one who knotted you. Without my seed, there would be no child. You have no part in this. Which is why I will be the one who makes this right.”
Before Perry could object, Sebastian collected him in his arms and lifted him out of bed. Perry, long used to being carried, rested his head on Sebastian’s shoulder and sighed. There would be no reasoning with his stubborn dragon. Not now, at least. When Sebastian got an idea in his head, it was exceedingly difficult to get it out, and Perry had neither the physical stamina nor the mental wherewithal to set about extracting it. Perhaps tomorrow, once he’d rested. Or later this evening, after a long nap. For now, he’d let Sebastian beat his chest and roar at whoever might listen. It was better this way.
“Where are we going, Sebastian?” Perry asked as Sebastian carried him away from the bed.
Sebastian grunted and carried Perry through the door leading from the main hoard chamber into the adjoining bathroom. Following the Topaz attack several years back, Sebastian had decided it prudent to have proper facilities installed in the event Perry or the children had to take shelter there again. The addition pleased Perry, not so much for its future usefulness, but for how convenient it was in the present. Previously he’d needed to walk all the way upstairs to the master bedroom to shower, and while it had been a simple nuisance while their nest was empty, now that they had whelps again, it was a logistical nightmare. Perry did not relish the days he emerged from the hoard damp with sweat and slick with other, far more unmentionable things only to be beset upon by eight darling children.
His only regret was that they hadn’t installed it sooner.
The hoard’s bathroom, like everything they owned, was opulent, and was spacious enough to comfortably fit every one of Sebastian’s brothers and their mates, although it was perhaps not as big as Perry would have liked. Still, it was quite beautiful, and Perry adored it from the dome of its cathedral ceiling to its glittering inlaid diamond and labradorite floor tiles.
The lights blinked on as they entered, dim at first, but gradually brighter the more time passed. The marvels of the modern age were all so impressive. Even now, Perry could hardly believe that magic like this was theirs to command.
From the central powder room, they traveled through the arched doorway to the right, through which the bath was waiting. It was irregular in shape, more closely resembling a natural pond than a tub, and sunken into the stone quartz flooring. To further the illusion, the room was stylized to look like a cave, its back wall rounded and irregular, and made of the same solid quartz as the flooring. Decorative boulders and other outcrops of rocks took things another step further than that, although for the most part, they were hidden beneath lush, leafy plants that gave the room a much-needed pop of color.
While, like everywhere else in the bathroom, this room had excellent ventilation, a delightful natural humidity seeped into the air from the stone that Perry found soothing.
Sebastian set Perry down near the edge of the tub and ordered him to stay, then dropped to his knees to run the water and activate the tub’s interior lights. Soon enough the room was filled with steam and sweet perfumes—Sebastian had added something to the water. Lavender, if Perry’s nose was to be believed.
