Page 72 of Kingdom of Death and Hope

“I never want to stop talking to him,” I say before I think about it.

Mother shakes her head. “You sound just like your father and I when we first met. Always wanting to be near each other and never wanting to stop talking. But we never had what you two have.”

“I don’t know how I would have survived if he and I couldn’t talk to each other through the bond,” I say honestly. “I think I would go a little crazy if I had to wait days in between just to see or talk to each other.”

Mother chuckles. “Eat this and then go lie down and rest. You need it.”

CHAPTER 25

“Adeline, we need to talk about what you said two weeks ago,” Kieran says.

“What did I say?” I ask, completely drawing a blank.

He gives me a pointed look. “You know what I’m talking about.”

“Kieran, I really don’t. So much has happened in the two weeks and I can’t keep track of everything.”

He can’t be talking about my pure blood Fae comment, can he?

No. It was a passing question I had, and we quickly moved on from it. But he did say we weren’t done with that conversation.

It’s been on my mind a lot since I asked that question. Kieran is the High Lord and I am a mere human. How are we going to have kids and the people be okay with the future of the race being ruled by halflings?

But it will all have to work out somehow or else Kieran wouldn’t be with me. Unless he decides to have kids with me and then have kids with another Fae so he has offspring for the throne.

No.

Don’t think like that. Kieran won’t cheat on me. He said he is mine and only mine.

“You know exactly what I am talking about. I can see it in your eyes. I have felt your worries in the middle of the night. I know you have been thinking about it a lot,” he says. “I wanted to give you time to come back to me and ask me the question again, but I know you won’t now and we need to talk about this before it becomes something too big and puts a wedge between us. We talk things out in this relationship.”

I take a deep breath and slowly let it out.

“Okay,” I finally say. “Let’s talk about it.”

“What was your question and why did you think of it?” Kieran asks.

I groan and look up at the sky. He is really going to make me ask the question again when both of us already know what it’s about? Why can’t he just explain how it’s going to work out?

“You were talking about giving me blood and then I thought about our future kids—” My eyes go wide and I quickly look away from him.

“Hmm, I like the sound of that,” Kieran purrs. “But we can talk about that later. Continue.”

I continue to look away from Kieran. We’ve talked about it before, but I said that way too easily.

“Sweets, it’s natural. We have talked about it before and we both agreed that we want kids,” Kieran says. “Don’t feel embarrassed because you said our future kids. Never feel embarrassed about it.”

“Sorry,” I mumble.

“You don’t have anything to be sorry for.”

I look back at Kieran and he gently runs his finger across my cheek, leaving a trail of tingles while also calming me down at the same time.

“Everything is going to be okay. I liked that it came out naturally and you are already thinking about them. In the future, I do want to have kids. Maybe we can even have ten.” He wiggles his eyebrows as my eyes widen. “But we’ll talk about how many when we are ready to have kids. I’m good with however many you want.”

My mind is swirling with him wanting ten kids. I’ve always wanted a big family but having ten kids and being in pain that many times is a lot.

“Don’t think about it too much. I want a big family, but if you don’t want to have that many kids, then we don’t have to,” he says gently. “Let’s get back to the question you had.”