"No. It's just hidden, and the hunters have no idea how to find it. The church is their only point of reference," Valentine replied and took her hand. "This way."
Valentine led her down the street and couldn't help but hold back to see if she could see through the house's glamor or not. He shouldn't have worried. As soon as they drew close enough, the tall gates appeared in the ancient stone wall, and the wards lit up.
"I can see your handiwork and many others," Yelena said, staring at them with a magician's eyes.
"Do you want me to disable them? Or would you like a go?" he asked.
Yelena raised a brow. "Watch and learn, sorcerer."
Valentine expected her to do something amazingly complicated to unweave the protections, but she surprised him by biting the pad of her thumb and flicking her blood at the gate.
"Surely it..." he began.
The house wards flashed a haze of blue and white before opening for her.
"How?" he demanded, thrilled and confused at the same time.
Yelena smirked. "I am your mate, and the house knows it. It's designed to recognize family, is it not?"
Valentine couldn't resist kissing that smirk. "You are too clever for your own good sometimes."
"Try not to feel so intimidated by my brilliance," she said and pushed the gate open.
The lights in the garden lit up the path for them, and Yelena looked around with wide eyes. It was easy for Valentine to forgetthat the house was beautiful because every inch of it was so familiar to him.
Watching Yelena's reaction to it filled him with pride, and a warm feeling seeped through his chest. Yelena dropped her armor and hurried to look around, the sensors picking up wherever she was, lighting the gardens up for her.
"Can you feel it?" Yelena asked and sank to her knees. She rested her hands and cheek on the grass. "It's all around me, I've never sensed anything like it."
"What are you feeling? The magic?" Valentine asked, smiling at her enthusiasm.
"Magic, yes, but it's love. Everything is pulsing with love. Generations of it," Yelena replied, her voice dreamy and her eyes filling with tears. "The house loves you. The family loves the house, and it goes around and around."
Valentine looked up and saw the dark stone, the statues of dragons, and the stained glass, which he knew would shine so brilliantly in the day.
"Yes, we love it. A house that was built and lived in by generations of magicians is never going to be normal. You can't see the towers from the outside, but they are there," he replied.
Yelena got up off the grass, her smile so bright that it made his heart hurt with how much feeling and love pulsed through it.
"Show me everything, Valentine," she said breathlessly.
They left her armor, their weapons, and filthy boots in the mud room on the way into the house. A few weeks ago, Valentine's soul would have recoiled to leave them like that. A lot had changed in those weeks, him most of all. The house cleaning spells would tend to them. He didn't need to do it himself, so he could stop thinking about it. He no longer felt the obsessive need to control everything around him.
"You can wander the house as much as you like tomorrow. Fornow, I need to show you to the kitchen so I can feed you," Valentine said, guiding her down the halls.
"I don't know what I expected from your house, but I didn't expect it to feel so…right," Yelena commented, stopping to look at a painting of Cosimo's parents with him and his sister, Maria. "This feels so welcoming."
"It's because you are welcome, now and always. You aren't just a part of the wider family. You aremyfamily. A Greatdrakes. This can be your house as much as it is mine. You can even have the last name if you want it," Valentine assured her.
"I think I would really like to be a Greatdrakes," she whispered, as if she was scared to say it out loud.
Valentine recalled the wards around her tower in Faerie and the way those outside of Taranis and his knights had treated her. Had that ever felt like a safe place for her? Her blood family had abandoned her, too.
"You will be a Greatdrakes as soon as you want to be." Valentine took her in his arms. "You will never have to protect yourself here either, baby girl. No one and nothing will ever hurt or harm you. You are always going to be safe here with me."
Yelena pressed her face into his chest. "Thank you, Valentine. Thank you for choosing me to be your mate and loving me."
"You are easy to love, Yelena. I'm the grumpy bastard."
