“I remember.” Drayke’s voice is thoughtful. “I remember thinking that was enough. That duty and discipline were all we needed. That wanting more was... dangerous.”
“It is dangerous.” I watch the stars, but I’m not really seeing them. I’m seeing Tamsin’s face when she told me she loved me. When she asked me to claim her. When she told me she waspregnant and I forgot how to breathe for a full minute. “Loving someone that much—it’s terrifying. The thought of losing them...”
“Worth it.” Zyphon’s voice is soft. “I lost Nasyra for three centuries. Would have lost her forever if the Relics hadn’t brought her back. And I would do it all again—every moment of that suffering—to have her now.”
Silence settles over us. Not uncomfortable. Just... full. Full of understanding, of shared experience, of the bone-deep gratitude that comes from finding something you never thought you’d have.
“I spent centuries being afraid to feel.” The words come out before I can stop them. “After Lyric died, I decided it was safer to be cold. To keep everyone at a distance. To never let anyone close enough to hurt me again.”
“And now?” Drayke’s hand clasps my shoulder. The weight of it is grounding. Familiar.
“Now I have a mate who makes me feel everything. A child on the way who already owns my entire heart. Brothers who refused to let me freeze over completely.” I meet each of their eyes in turn. “Now I understand that the fear was never about protecting myself. It was about denying myself the very things that make existence worthwhile.”
“Getting philosophical in your old age.” Rurik’s tone is teasing, but his eyes are suspiciously bright.
“Getting honest.” I let out a breath. “Something I should have done centuries ago.”
“You did it when it mattered.” Zyphon’s voice is steady. “That’s enough.”
It is. Somehow, impossibly, it is.
I findTamsin in our chambers, already in bed, one hand resting on her belly while she reads by candlelight.
She looks up when I enter, her smile soft with sleepiness. “The brotherhood bonding session is over?”
“It wasn’t a—” I stop. Reconsider. “Yes. It is.”
Her laugh fills the room as I strip off my shirt and climb into bed beside her. She sets her book aside immediately, turning into my arms with the ease of long practice. Her belly presses against my side, warm and round, a constant reminder of the miracle growing inside her.
“Good conversation?”
“Philosophical.” I press a kiss to her forehead. Her hair smells like the roses that grow in Valdoria’s rebuilt gardens—one of her favorite additions to the palace we’ve spent two years restoring. “I may have gotten emotional.”
“You?” She pulls back to stare at me with exaggerated shock. “The ice dragon? Emotional?”
“Your influence.” I capture her lips in a slow kiss. “You’ve ruined me completely.”
“Good.” She settles against me with a contented sigh. “That was the plan all along.”
“Diabolical.” My hand finds her belly again, drawn there by instinct I no longer fight. “Scheming witch princess, seducing innocent dragons.”
“Scheming witch queen,” she corrects. “And there was nothing innocent about you.”
“There was nothing about me at all, before you.” The truth of it settles into my bones. “I was frozen. Going through motions that looked like living but felt like nothing. Andthen you collapsed at my gates, half-dead and burning with determination, and I?—”
“Hated me?”
“Started thawing.” I pull her closer. “It just took me a while to realize it.”
She’s quiet for a moment, her fingers tracing the claiming mark on my chest. Fire contained by ice. Her flame wrapped in my frost. Two years later, and the mark still pulses with warmth when she touches it.
“I was so afraid,” she admits softly. “When I showed up here. Afraid you’d turn me away. Afraid Morrigan would find me. Afraid I’d spend the rest of my life running from everything I’d lost.”
“And now?”
“Now I have sisters who would burn the world for me. A mate who makes me feel safe and loved and wanted every single day. A kingdom that’s rising from the ashes. A baby who kicks me in the bladder at three in the morning.” She laughs, and I feel it vibrate through my chest. “Now I have everything I never dared to want.”
“So do I.” I press a kiss to her hair. “So do I.”
