Chapter Eight
ChapteR
eiGht
Six weeks later
THE REPLACEMENT THRONE arrived with a scorch mark down the back.
I ran my fingers over the black line. "You bought us damaged furniture."
Thore stood on the soundstage in a tailored suit with a Guardian Risk badge clipped to his lapel. The company had acquired an office, a website, three employees, and a liability policy since the night he invented it.
"The mark is decorative," he said.
"It looks like a dragon sneezed on it."
"That's not what happened."
I looked at him.
He adjusted one cuff. "The throne wasn't easy to transport."
"Because a dragon sneezed on it?"
"Because I carried it."
My producer crossed the hall before I could ask why a man with access to trucks had personally carried a throne. She shook Thore's hand, thanked him for finding a safer supplier, and told me the network had approved my promotion to fight coordinator for the second unit.
I waited until she left before I punched him in the arm. "You knew."
"She told me five minutes ago."
"And you didn't warn me?"
He just smiled.
The promotion meant more money, fewer falls onto concrete, and the authority to fire anyone who used live metal in a stunt without telling me. I had accepted before the producer finished the offer.
Thore touched the inside of my wrist. The blade mark was gone. A thin black scar remained, small enough not to catch attention and useful to remember that some props bit back.
"Your council sent a decision," I said.
His expression didn't change, but heat warmed his hand. "You read my messages."
"The preview showed the first line. Did they restore your full guardianship?"
"It was never removed."
"Because my diagrams were excellent."
"Your diagrams frightened three elders."
"They asked how the carabiner worked."
"They didn't expect the demonstration to include their ceremonial table."
"It was pine."
Thore's mouth curved.
The attacker had been transferred to Thore's council and lost access to the relic vaults, along with several teeth. Despite my best efforts, they didn't invite me to that part of the hearing. Thore said the teeth were unrelated to my testimony.
He was a terrible liar.
I straightened his badge. "Are you done here?"
"Yes."
"Good. I have plans tonight."
"With whom?"
"A dragon. Very bossy. Questionable taste in furniture."
The red in his eyes brightened. "Should I be concerned?"
"Probably."
He bent to kiss me in the middle of the fake Viking hall. Crew moved around us carrying foam shields and extension cords, unaware that the safety consultant reviewing our weapons could grow wings large enough to flatten the set.
Thore had spent three nights at my apartment that week. I had spent the weekend at the mountain estate he guarded, where the guest room had become my room after I moved his collection of twelfth-century spearheads out of the closet.
I kept my job. He kept his guardianship. We argued about his driving and my habit of climbing things without checking whether they were cursed.
"I love you," I said against his mouth.
Thore went still.
I leaned back. "That wasn't a hard sentence."
"No." His hand closed around the back of my neck. "It was one I've waited a long time to hear."
"You've known me six weeks."
"I existed before I knew you."
I kissed him before he could make it worse.
"I love you," he said when I let him breathe.
"That's better."