I didn’t hesitate.
Bringing my head down, I caught her lips and kissed her the way I yearned to. Deep and passionate and thorough. It was frenzied and full of need. Her bow dropped to the ground and then I felt her arms wind around me. Our teeth clattered together, but I tasted her tears and felt her smile and I thought it was absolute perfection.
I broke the kiss to embrace her, to bury my face into her neck, feeling the fur of her pelt brush my cheek.
“I love you,” I rasped into her skin. “I love you so much it hurts,rei thissie.”
“And I never stopped loving you, Seerin,” she whispered in my ear. I was bent over, she was on the tips of her toes, but somehow we fit together perfectly. “I’m sorry I ever made you doubt that.”
I groaned, hardly able to believe that this moment was real. It was all I’d dreamed about for the last month.Shewas all I’d dreamed about since I first felt her taking my soul.
“Enough,” she whispered to me. “Enough now.”
They were the same words she’d said to me the night I returned fromDothik, very possibly the night we’d conceived our child together.
I knew what she was telling me, in a way that only Nelle could.
We would move forward. We would put this behind us. She’d once told me, long ago, that she didn’t hold grudges. When she forgave someone, sheforgavethem.
What she was offering me was complete forgiveness, a fresh start. For us both.
“You are certain?” I asked, pulling back to look into her eyes, cradling her cheeks in my palm. “Certain of me? Of this?”
I saw her answer in her gaze before she even replied. “Yes, demon king. I am. Are you certain?”
Vok, I loved her. And though she offered me a clean slate, I would still spend the rest of our lives together thanking her, worshipping her, loving her for it.
What had I ever done to deserve someone like her? This beautiful, pure, hopeful being who constantly humbled and surprised and amazed me?
“Lysi,” I said, capturing her lips in a soft kiss. “I have never been more certain of anything in my life,rei thissie.”
Epilogue
“Iwant to show you something,rei Morakkari,” Seerin murmured in my ear.
I was sitting with Avuli and Nukri, who was the mate of Vodan, Seerin’spujerak. We were helping thebikkucook up a flank ofhebrikki. A handful of warriors had gone out hunting just that morning and returned with plenty of fresh meat, the first the horde had eaten since the frost feast. It would be a night of celebration, though we were still searching for our new encampment.
Dusk had just fallen over the beautiful valleys of the southlands. Though it was after the thaw, the air was still chilled at night and Seerin wrapped another thin shawl of furs around my shoulders as he helped me stand.
“I’ll be right back,” I assured Avuli and Nukri, who both gave me secretive, knowing smiles. I flushed. They thought my demon king was whisking me away for a private romp, considering we had been traveling for almost two weeks and there was little privacy among a traveling Dakkari horde. Seerin and I had to be creative in order to indulge in our sex life, though my husband had often growled into my ear that he couldn’t wait to have our ownvolikionce more.
But our home had not made itself known yet. We had come across multiple herds ofhebrikkisince yesterday, so we were close. And once we found a river, an accesible water source, we would begin resettling in that beautiful place. Seerin knew what he was looking for and the horde trusted in theirVorakkarto find a suitable base.
And Seerin had been right. I loved the southlands. From what I’d already seen, they held a foreign beauty that I had never experienced before in my lifetime. There were lush valleys and towering, thick forests filled with color and life. I’d even seen awaterfallas we passed through theHitrimountains, which had been equally impressive, if slightly frightening. A part of me could hardly believe that we were still on Dakkar because it was so different from the endless, stretching plains and blackened forests I’d known all my life.
The horde was resting for the night, settling down for a calm yet joyous evening of fresh meat and fermented wine. There was a hushed anticipation in the air, as if everyone else sensed we were close to a new encampment as well. While traveling with a horde had its excitements, I was more than ready to set up a more permanent base soon, if only to enjoy more privacy with Seerin.
My demon king led me over to the thick forest we’d decided to settle next to for the night, keeping his hand on my lower back the entire way.
I sucked in a breath when the baby kicked hard. “Oh, he is restless tonight.”
Seerin grinned and the sight of it made my heart stutter in my chest, as it always did. The healer thought it would only be a little over a month before he arrived, given his advanced growth. And I wasmorethan ready for him to come. Besides constantly feeling like I needed to relieve myself, the swollen ankles, the aching back, the heaviness in my breasts, Seerin and I were both eager for our child to begin in this world with us.
One night in bed, after the thaw had come and right before we’d left our encampment, Seerin had run his hands over my naked belly and pressed his cheek to my naval, feeling the baby kick and move. “It is a male,” he’d decided right then. “And he will be a great warrior for all the fighting he is doing within you.”
“Our little warrior is impatient,” Seerin told me now, through his grin, leading me into the darkened forest until I could barely make out the laughter and voices and the delicious smell of cooking meat that we’d left behind.
“As is his father,” I pointed out with a quirked brow and flushed cheeks. “All the horde will know what we are doing in here now.”
