“Shut up, lizard. Silas, heal the damn bite on her neck.”
Maven holds up a hand to stop the blood fae. “I want the scar. How else will other shifters know to keep their paws off what’s mine?”
Godsdamn, I love when she’s possessive.
I beam at her, proud as hell when the others finally spot the injury on my neck, too. “Don’t worry, baby. They’ll know I’m yours.”
Everett sighs. “I will never fucking understand shifters wanting to scar their mates.”
“That’s because elementals are holier-than-thou wimps,” I supply, still on Cloud Nine from two days in heaven with my mate.
But our keeper frowns, glancing around like she’s looking for something we can’t see.
“Where’s Crypt?”
“His markings were glowing, so I assume his disappearance has to do with Limbo,” Silas says, nudging Everett aside to kiss Maven’s temple and gently check her neck to see how it’s healing. “You should eat real food. Brigid is making?—”
“I heard that,” my mom calls from the distant kitchen. “Even if we’re family now, it’s Commander Decimus or Bael’s Mom to you.”
I laugh and lead them into the sweet-smelling kitchen, where my caster dad Ivan is carefully decorating cupcakes with Bran at the table. My mom is helping Oscar mix what appears to be a batch of brownies.
It never gets less funny to see that short commander next to my dad, who’s my height.
As soon as my mom spots me, she quirks a knowing brow and waves me over until I follow her out of the kitchen and into one of their spare bathrooms down another hall. She pulls three extra-strength packs of rut suppressants out of the medicine cabinet and slaps them into my hand, shaking her head at me.
“For gods’ sakes, use these next time. Your poor mate,” she hisses quietly enough that I know only Oscar can overhear from the kitchen.
“Oh, my gods.” I try to shove them back at her. “Look, it was just bad timing.”
“Bad timing? No, that’s called not using common fucking sense. You don’t just spring that on someone—especiallynot anon-shifter! If Oscar had caught me off guard like that before we were bonded, I would have thrown his ass into the Divide myself,” she scoffs. “I’m surprised your mate didn’t kick you out and?—”
She cuts off, eyes widening as they land on my neck for the first time. “Oh. Gods.”
I can’t help the elated smile that breaks free on my face. “Yeah. It’s official.”
I could almost swear my mom’s eye waters with emotion for a second before she sniffs in a no-nonsense way.
“Liquid silver? Brutal, but it’s also kind of…touching.”
“Brutally touching is Maven's specialty,” I grin.
My mom snorts and then gets serious, studying me. “You seem…different. Something about your dragon. My own inner dragon noticed it immediately.”
I shrug. “Just having a good day.”
She hums. I know she doesn’t buy it, but she gets business-like quickly. “You two missed New Year’s with the family. The rest of your quintet was certainly welcome, and all went well, but you’ll have to apologize to Quinn. She was in tears thatUncle Baelfire’s Ninja Matewasn’t around.”
“Sorry about missing that.”
She rolls her eye. “No, you’re not.”
I grin. “You’re right. I’m really not.”
“Don’t look so smug. You also missed a bunch of assholes trying to break into our territory.”
My smile fades. “Shit.”
“Yeah, shit. They came close to breaking through the wards until Declan rained fire down on them. That Douglas boy was there and insisted he just wanted to speak with thetelum. I told him to go eat shit,” she adds haughtily. “Still cannot believe he was stupid enough to try invadingourterritory. Although I admit…it was a close call for Declan.”
