“Hey, little mite.”He placed his hand on her head.“Wake up.”
Brown eyes dark with sleep blinked up at him, and she reached her arms out to him.He picked her up and hugged her tight.
“Did you have a nightmare too?”he asked softly.
Opal nodded against his neck.“I want Rogue.”
Must have been a very bad dream for her to want to go out to the stables in the icy dark of night.
“Why don’t we go to my den and wait for the sun to come up?Then, we’ll go see Rogue.”
“Kay.”
As always, an anxious part of him settled as he entered the office that was once his father’s.He’d loved the room then and hadn’t wanted to change it except to make it functional for his personal duties.Everything else—the books, collections, the worn desk—he’d left exactly how his father had it.
The sitting area took up half the room and made the rest of it feel a bit small, but he loved the space as it was.His father had done more work out of these chairs than at his desk, and the worn leather and deep grooves in the rug showed it.
Working in what he thought of as their space was comforting, reminding him of good memories.Letting him sit with painful emotions in solitude or purge any lingering nightmares from his mind.
He had plenty of both tonight.
Starting the fire in his den, he settled into one of the two large chairs in front of the fireplace.Opal curled against his chest.Her breathing steadied and eventually slowed as he rubbed her back.
“I want to go home,” Opal said quietly.
“Back to Eldridge?”He doubted she meant the orphanage where she’d been raised.
“Veda.And Daya.On their mountain.”
Connor’s heart staggered and stopped for a painful moment.He forced words out he didn’t want to admit.“Our home is here now.”
“Can’t we have two homes?”she asked innocently.
“I suppose in our hearts we can, even though we live here.”
“I still think we belong with them.”The stubborn whisper barely reached his ears as she drifted back to sleep.
Taking the necklace out from under his shirt, he rubbed the polished stone.Glimmers of color flickered in the firelight beneath his fingertips.Listening to the crackle of flames in the quiet night, Connor wrestled with the truth.He wanted to be there with them so badly.But they’d agreed on what was right: him here in Calderre, fulfilling his responsibilities and making the world a safer place for Opal and Veda.
And then there’d been the sense of rejection, of not being worthy enough, that he’d felt at the mountain during the healing ceremony.The remembered feeling was like a lash to his aching heart.That strange interaction had changed him in a way he was still trying to admit, let alone define.Only here in his sanctuary was he even willing to let his mind consider it.
Needing solace, he pushed aside the thoughts and intentionally sought out the shadowed wisps of memories that lingered in his mind.Brought the memory of playing hide and seek with Daya and Ember to the front and let it soothe away the last remnants of the nightmares and the upsetting direction his mind had veered.
Daya’s hands pressed to his chest.Green forest around her.Her leather armguards shimmering with dark glints of embedded minerals.The whisper of wind rustling through the trees as she laughed, looking at him with hints of magic in her eyes.The scent of sunshine and lentha nectar on her skin.
Mesmerized by the flames, he began to relax and let his mind drift.Daya’s armor was a thing of wonder.Unusual and surprisingly beautiful, like her.The material was impenetrable, yet the softest, lightest armor he’d ever seen.A guardian secret, most likely, though she’d only smiled mysteriously when he’d asked about the armor.
A pop of flame startled him, and the image of Daya was overshadowed by another, more distant memory.
“That’s not mother’s armor,” Connor told his father as he hopped into the big chair in the den.
The piece of armor his father was oiling caught the firelight as he turned it.Black, blue, purple, and other dark colors shimmered like magic dust had been sprinkled over it.He blinked tiredly, but the sparkles stayed.Really there, not his imagination.
“Good eye.”His father smiled without looking up from his task.
Connor settled more comfortably in the chair.It was dark and quiet.The rest of the keep was sleeping peacefully.He couldn’t.His mind looping round and round with worries.He eyed the familiar pile of armor in front of the fire.
Father always double-checked mother’s armor before she left on a mission.He said it made him feel better, to look out for her since he wouldn’t be with her.Connor wished he could feel the same, somehow.
