“Changing the world one ward at a time,” Casimir finished, his green eyes warm with admiration.
Their praise washed over me like sunlight, filling me with a happiness so bright, it almost hurt.
I wasn’t worthless. These three men wereproudof me. Theysawme. Theyvaluedme. And for the first time in a very long time, I was proud of myself, too.
“Thank you,” I whispered.
Not just for their praise, but also for rescuing me, for loving me, for giving me the safety and support to become the person I was meant to be all along.
I couldn’t say all that around the tears clogging my throat, but judging by the way they tightened their arms around me, they already understood.
24. All For Her
Zane
Seri was going to lose her moon-damn mind, and I couldn’t wait to see it.
Our first chance to celebrate Seri publicly! Seri in the limelight instead of the shadows! And fuck, yeah, I was going to make it a whole thing!
Two hours ago, this place had been just another pretty spot on our property. Now? It was a wonderland of celebration waiting toexplodethe moment our little witch arrived.
And cruor, did she deserve it. Creating an anti-siphoning ward wasn’t just impressive; it was revolutionary. I knew we needed to make a spectacle out of celebrating her achievement. Go big or go home, right? And since we were already home, we had to goabsolutelymassive.
Enter Zane Cimmerian: Party Maestro.
Brumous trotted by, sporting his tiny black top hat. He looked ridiculously adorable, and I crouched down to adjust the hat to a more rakish angle.
“Looking sharp, Brumster,” I told him before he licked my hand and bounded off.
The guest list for this shindig was small, but significant: Mrs. Wentzel and Addison and Kaori, with whom Seri had grown surprisingly close through their video calls. Same with Sebastian, who’d been to Evermere so often since we found her that Seri had started referring to him as her “big brother.” It made all of us happy that she liked Seb and he liked her, since he was so important to us.
Unfortunately, that meant we also had to invitehim.
I grimaced. I still couldn’t wrap my head around how easily Seri had accepted Lucian, calling him Papa and actually hugging him like she cared for the old leech. But if having him here for one night made her happy, my brothers and I had agreed we could suffer through it.
“I say wedon’tinvite him,” Ko had muttered when I mentioned it.
“Already texted him. Besides, this is for Seri.”
“This being the draft of his invitation?” Cas had held up a yellow sticky note that read,
Yo, Pops,
Come celebrate Seri tomorrow night. Lakeside at dusk.
Hugs,
Your Wayward Sons
“Yeah, why?” I’d shrugged as Ko had barked out a laugh and Cas rolled his eyes. “What? This is her debut as the most precious thing in the fang-rotted world, remember?”
And of course, Foster was coming, too. Not only had Brummy claimed him as part of our‘ohana, Fosterino was Seri’s first real friend. In fact, he and Seri were at a nearby town right now, off on an exploring adventure, which was our cover story for getting her out of the house.
“Zane!” Koa’s deep voice pulled me from my thoughts. He was standing by the refreshment table, clipboard in hand, checking items off. “The banner just arrived. IsThe Great Suck No More Galareally the name we’re going with?”
“I refuse to let the whole siphoning pun go.” I hurried over to inspect it.
“What aboutThe GreatDrainNo More Gala? Semantically, it’s more accurate.”
