“I was hurt, and she was having a bit of a snit.” Bron’s grin was wicked. “We were both in the human world. This was many, many years ago, obviously, but she found me when she was looking for new plants, new adventures, she told me. She healed me from my wounds, and as we learned one another, we fell in love.”
The expression on Bron’s face was one of peace, of wonder. “It was easy to fall in love with her. She wasn’t the queen of anything back then, of course. She was just a beautiful young fae with the brightest eyes I’d ever seen. And I was completely smitten.”
“The world was much wilder when we met, and we spent many years living and happy, but one morning, there was a huge cat that attacked her while I was out hunting. When I got to her, she was almost gone, and so I grabbed her up, and I flew as fast as I could to where I knew a portal was. I tried to take her home, to push her through, and she refused to go unless I could comewith her. She was willing to die rather than be without me. How could I not stay with her here forever? She’s my best friend.”
Evander’s eyes filled with tears, and all of them—his brothers and his father—nodded.
Evander had just heard those words from another dragon who was waiting for them back in the guardian house. The love these fae and dragons had for each other humbled him.
Finally, Corbin came to curl up with him, eyelids heavy. “Can I nap on you until we go back to the house?”
“Of course, lethean.” Ev wrapped his arms around his mate, letting him rest. Cosmo quietly took off with his two kids once Corbin was asleep, but the rest of them stayed until the evening started to cool and darken, and then they went back to the house, Bron once again carrying Evander’s sleeping mate.
Corbin’s color was once again vibrant and green, his scales sharp and delineated. Evander couldn’t be more happy about how today had turned out.
Now he just had to keep it that way.
Chapter
Twenty-One
Corbin hummed, repotting a houseplant that Cosmo had brought him. It wasn’t heavy yet, just a wee thing that had become rootbound, but it felt good to get his fingers in the dirt.
He felt like getting up and down in the garden now was almost an impossibility, though Ev made sure to carry him out to lounge a lot. The lovely thing was he was never alone. The babies sang to him all the time. Chattered at him. Made him laugh.
And if Evander was out, someone else was in, from Hawk to his brothers to his mother, who was keeping her eye on him.
Yarrow came in to bring him a pretty rock or a little wood carving,
He was feeling so much better. Elliot was fine. No one had tried to hurt him.
Even Cosmo had relaxed a lot on that front, not so vigilant now.
Not that Corbin didn’t keep the roses and ivy going around the front of the human-facing house as much as he could.
He did.
Thorns and grasping vines were always a good defense.
“How’s it going, bro?” Cosmo brought him a cold glass of decaf tea, handing it over to settle on the couch.
“Good. She’s almost in the new pot.”
“Good deal.” Cosmo glanced outside where the sun was fading quickly and shivered. “Evander’s out late.”
“He’s hunting. As the babies get closer and closer, I think the urge for him to go out and hunt gets larger.” It was instinctive.
“Oh, I can see that. I mean, I do have a big, fierce dragon mate of my own.” Cosmo rubbed his hands together. “He’s visiting Tyson and Zeke today. They were going to play sportsball.”
“Ah, the dragon equivalent of the World Cup, hmm?”
Cosmo shrugged. “I told him he was too old for that nonsense, but he just growled and left.”
“He’s a goofball.”
“Nah.”
They both grinned at each other, speaking as one. “Orion’s the goofy one.”
