“I brought a test,” Kodiak said. “I’m not even going to pull that cave-bear act and make you take it now. It’s best to take them first thing in the morning. Are you able to do that or do I need to spend the night here to make sure that you do?”
“I’ll do it,” I said. “You can find an appropriate healer.”
“Xenos and Barry are on their way. You can take your pick.”
“Why is all of stateside coming over here?”
“Because Sharon Claudis is still at large and the last time a crazy woman was given free roam of the territory she started a hate group and a war,” Pierce sighed.
“Yeah,” Kodiak sighed.
“How is she hiding so well?” I asked.
“She’s a witch who knows the gateway network well,” Kodiak said as the oven timer went off. “Looks like your food is ready. I’ll get it out and leave you to it, but take the test, Crilus. Yourdads will be relieved that Pierce isn’t a hostage but not so much if you’re pregnant and not taking care of yourself.”
“I’ll do what I need to do. I just haven’t had any symptoms,” I said, irritation digging under my skin.
“You won’t always,” Kodiak said, and I really wanted to lay into him about alphasplaining pregnancy to me.
He took the hint and left not long after that. Alone with Pierce it was so tempting to forget he had ever visited but I put the pregnancy test in the bathroom we used most mornings so that I wouldn’t forget about it.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Pierce
As soon as Kodiak was gone, I gulped down the last of my bloodshakes and immediately wished I’d asked him about talking to the store for me. Then I remembered what I wanted to show Crilus. First though, I had to follow him to the bathroom where we left the pregnancy test resting on the sink counter.
“I found something earlier today. Well, I think it was today, anyway,” I said. “Who knows? My sense of time is on vacation as much as we are.”
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“Your bird is up to something whenever we go to sleep. I’ve seen him sneak out of you.”
“Yeah, he can do that. Crow magic is different than other types of shifters,” Crilus admitted.
“I know but I followed him the other night up to the attic,” I said and Crilus’s eyes grew huge. “It’s probably exactly what you think it is,” I nodded and grabbed his hand leading him to the corridor with the drop-down staircase that led up to the attic.
“I’m not sure what I think,” Crilus said. “I sort of want to know what he’s stolen. He’s always been a little thief. Every few months I have to search the bar for stolen treasures. I usually forget about how he collects his little shiny things until someone is missing something expensive.”
“And he told Medwin to fuck his own tail,” I pointed out.
“Yeah, my crow doesn’t recognize any authority except for perhaps my parents and that’s even set on a randomizer. I think it’s a Crow King thing,” he shrugged. “This might not be his territory but we’re in our house. It’s okay to call it ‘our’ house, right?”
“That’s what it is,” I nodded, going up the steps before him just in case some unknowable threat had tiptoed by all our magic. I sniffed the air. Everything smelled right. Like old magic and blood with a little bit of elf, fur, and feathers thrown into the mix. Well, that and what I wanted to show Crilus. I only had a vague memory of finding it whenever I had. Heat often played with omegas’ memories and more than one alpha had lost time and place while their mate was in heat. If you added the magic in, it was a miracle I hadn’t forgotten about the discovery altogether.
Taking Crilus’s hand in mine I marveled at how our fingers interlocked perfectly as I led him around tables and old storage crates to the backmost corner of the attic where between two crates his crow had built a nest. Letting go of my hand, he stepped in front of me and squatted down for a better look. The nest was round and shallow, a little messy, but still easily identified as a nest. Mercifully it was still empty and not in the center of the blood pond on the other side of the attic.
Crilus sat down on the floor, and I thanked all the ancestors that I’d not been so shortsighted as to not have included a spell that kept dust from gathering up here. He was carrying my child and nothing unclean should touch him. He rested his elbows on his legs and stared into the empty nest. I rested my fingertips against his shoulders as he took in the sight and considered what the ramifications of such a find probably were.
“Has your carrier laid crow eggs before?”
“Not that I know of,” Crilus shook his head and patted the empty spot on the floor next to him for me to sit down.
I sank down next to him, and he took my hand. Shifter genetics were never plain and simple. Hardly a shifter alive continued to only carry one genetic line.
“I think Mori is right,” Crilus said after a few soft moments of silence “Only, I’m not sure the baby will be an egg. This mightbe him preparing for a baby the only way he knows how. Maybe he’s preparing to lay the crow counterpart to our baby. I think… No, I know we need to set up a little Crow King alter. I mean, if that’s okay. I don’t know – I saw an ancestor shrine in the library, and you have those little blood altars in almost every room. I’m not going to offend your ancestors by inviting that energy in, am I?”
“No,” I shook my head. “As far as I know my ancestors never held silly notions about mixing bloodlines. Anyone who works blood magic must acknowledge that a variety of sources of power create a stronger base to work magic from. What do you need?”
