Torion hadn't just created her with me. He hadn't just stood at my side. He'd scooped me out of the ashes of my past that I'd buried myself in. He'd brought me back to life with care andloveand patience. If the rut hadn't resulted in my pregnancy, I would still be deliriously happy, mated to a man who deserved the love he'd kindled in my heart. I owed Torion my loyalty, and I wanted Tylane to know that her mother knew how to love with everything she had.
"You won't lose," I said to Torion.
"If I am outmatched, I will surrender, and you and I will have to flee,immediately. Seamus will be on hand. But I can't guarantee Worthington won't insist on seeing me brought down fully to avoid further challenge from the dragonkin who might support me. We'll run in disgrace, but we may also be running into a life of hiding."
I was holding Tylane too tightly and I twisted on Torion's lap, trying to ease my grip on her, placing one hand on his chest and letting my fingers dig into his shirt. There was a ferocious, echoing roar of denial in my chest and heat in my throat, and I swallowed it down hard as I met Torion's gaze. "We will run if we have to, but you won't fall, Torion. If Worthington seeks to steal Grave Hills from you in this manner, then he isn't half the alpha you are. He doesn't have the fire in him to claim us. Tell me you won't fail."
Torion's eyes crinkled at the corners, a little line of worry between his brows. His gravity always surprised me, my young alpha who laughed with his whole heart and whispered sweet pleas in my ear at night and looked so startled when I was brave enough to answer his affection with some of my own.
"I can't refuse orders from you, mate," Torion said. "I won't fail."
I leaned down, grasping his jaw with a firm caress and planting my lips to his, sealing the promise with a kiss.
I pulledthe heavy velvet curtains closed in the alpha's suite, shutting out the cold wind that rattled the panes. I'd given birth to Tylane in the last gasp of summer, and in the less than two months since, the seasons had taken a sharp turn toward winter once more. It was almost a year since Torion's father had passedand he'd risen as alpha, and in all that time we'd never discussed the beautiful, towering rooms above ours, meant to be occupied by the alpha.
It was a bossy kind of surprise I'd fashioned for him, but he liked me bossy.
The rooms had been aired repeatedly over the summer, and I'd cleared them with Torion's permission months back. It'd been weeks since there were any lingering scents. When Torion had left yesterday to visit a northern conclave of betas—all descended from the same old laird who'd ruled as alpha centuries ago—Tylane and I stayed in a guest room as men of the keep dismantled and reassembled our bed in the alpha's suite.
Perhaps it was for Tylane's sake, so she would have her nursery and eventual bedroom in the same place Torion had, or perhaps it was my little ritual to defend Torion's right as Alpha of Grave Hills. It was his keep, his home, and his bed in the alpha's rooms. Someone might claim them from him someday, but it wouldn't be a lord of Skybern.
A knock sounded softly on the door, and I turned as one of Tylane's nurses appeared.
"She's in the bassinet," I whispered.
"Would you like me to take her down now? The alpha's just arrived."
I shook my head. "He'll want to say goodnight. Would you wait? It won't be?—"
"Brigid?" I heard the shout, not urgent but seeking, and I smiled.
The nurse ducked back into the hall, and I glanced around the room for any last second adjustments.
The main room had a sitting area and a table, so we might take our meals here when we wished. There was an arched opening into the bedroom straight ahead, comfortably large enough for the alpha but still close. I'd restored our nestmyself while Tylane had napped, putting the curtains back up, so that while Torion was inside he wouldn't even be able to tell we weren't in our old rooms anymore. Branching off from the bedroom was a bathing chamber and then a doorway into the dressing room which led back to the sitting room, so that staff could carry water to the bath without walking through our bedroom. I was already discussing the potential of getting pumped water up to our bath, and perhaps to a few chambers on the lower floors as well.
Torion had once said that I could claim any domain I wished to rule over—he'd been waggling his eyebrows up at me as I'd taken a seat over his lap—but I did like ruling over the keep, and no matter what changes I made, he'd never batted so much as an eyelash in protest.
"There you are," Torion declared, arriving in the sitting room, giving it barely a glance before marching forward and wrapping his arms around me.
I sighed, giving into the relief of being held by him for a minute or two before rousing myself to lean back and look up at him in expectation. He just smiled drowsily back at me.
"Well?" I asked, unable to pull my arms free of his embrace and settling for raising my eyebrows.
"It went well. They're quite enthusiastic about the prospect of mates, and?—"
"Not that," I said, managing to poke him sharply in his ribs. I jerked my head over my shoulder. "What do you think?"
Torion blinked and looked around us, at the tapestries I'd ordered of scenes of Grave Hills, the heavy blue and green curtains hanging from doors and windows, the fires blazing, and our nest glowing silver and white through the archway.
"Ah," he said, smiling. "Feels like ours now. That's good."
I huffed and freed myself. Men. "Say goodnight to Tylane for now. The nurses are going to take care of her so we can have at least a handful of hours of sleep to start."
"We'll be fine for the night, milady," the nurse assured me.
Torion snorted and went to the bassinet, lifting a wrapped bundle from within. "You will, but we might not," he told the young woman before kissing the crown of Tylane's head and releasing a long sigh.
"I bet you slept like the dead last night in the beta's keep," I muttered.
