Chapter 12
Chapter
Twelve
Evander met with his father and his two brothers a few weeks after the incident in the Land of Summer, having dragged a patio table and chairs into Corbin’s garden, which was now in both the human realm and fae.
The flowers looked different, though many were the same, but the colors came across wildly varied in the different lands.
He bowed to his father when he arrived, brothers in tow, and waved him to a seat. “Cosmo made snacks. Corbin is under the weather today and won’t be joining us.”
“Is he well?” Father asked, and he shrugged.
“He’s pregnant. Morning sickness is… a challenge.”
“Yes, I remember that well. All of you boys were difficult that way.” His father fluffed his robes before sitting, which was when the rest of them did as well.
“Have you heard from Alyster?”
“Not yet. I assume he’s staying a bit hidden to find out what he needs to.”
“Ah.” He certainly hoped that was the case, but he worried. Alyster was imminently practical, though, so he would be well.
Surely he would.
“Has anyone heard anything else?”
“There’s absolute hysteria going on about what your mate and his brothers did to the envoy.” Gregor shook his head, his lips tight.
Evander raised an eyebrow, a rush of anger hitting him. “Did you point out that it wouldn’t have happened if she hadn’t been vampiric?”
Kristofer rolled his eyes, his little brother so very dramatic. “Now the rumor is flying around that the reason that it happened is because they’re infected—the triplets.”
Father growled deep in his chest. “It’s all nonsense. Prejudice because they’re part dragon. So they can’t possibly…”
Evander rolled his eyes back. He was not going to listen to this bullshit. “Can’t possibly what? Defend us from the vampires? That’s what they’ve been doing their entire lives!”
Kristofer shook his head and sighed. “You know how hidebound we can be.” He looked at Gregor, arching an eyebrow. “Right, brother?”
Gregor blew out a hard breath. “I admit that I worried that our standing in the courts would be lessened by your mating.”
He understood that, even if he didn’t agree. Status was very important to Gregor.
“Of course, I explained to old and grumpy that having new magic just raises us.” Kristofer winked at him from across the little low table. “I personally am looking forward to teaching your new child all about the hunt and how to torture his father.”
“You are, are you?”
Kristofer gave him another naughty little glance. “I mean, it is going to be a boy child, yes? A Lord of the Hunt?”
Evander had to stop for a second, because he just assumed that it would be a boy.
What if it wasn’t a boy?
His clan court tended to throw males because, well, it was their place, but it didn’t seem to be an issue with dragons.
He pondered the idea of a girl child, a daughter, and he smiled. “If it is a girl, then I will adore her.”
“She will be fierce and a dragon lady of the hunt,” Father pronounced. “After all, she will be three-quarters fae.”
Evander chuckled. “You do realize that little Serena is half unicorn, a quarter dragon and a quarter fae, and she looks like a fluttering butterfly. Magic doesn’t work in such a way; you do know that…”
Father looked at him, the expression a mixture of frustration and fondness. “Yes, son. I am aware that magic works in its own unique ways.”
“Of course.” It was something amazing to ponder, though.
What would their baby look like? Would he or she be small? Large? He was large, but Corbin was small. Corbin was green, but then again Cullen was purple and little Serena was pink and neither Hawk nor Cosmo were rocks, and yet they’d managed a little gargoyle.
Magic was an amazing thing.
And then there was Isabelle, Elliot’s sister, who was the absolute opposite of a rock. She was more like a flame—full of energy and lightness and in constant motion.
“Whatever she is, she’ll be amazing.” Father’s voice brooked no argument. “And we will all adore her or him or them.”
Evander blinked at his father. “Them?”
“Yes, son. You do realize your mate is one of triplets? That means that the chances of him giving birth to multiple children is increased.” Father watched him as if he’d lost his mind.
“Neither of his brothers had multiple children at once.”
He had the sinking suspicion he just cursed himself.
Kristofer snorted like he was in full hunt mode, but the sound was full of humor. “You are more fertile than their mates. Unicorns mate so rarely and produce few children. And the other one…”
He scoffed. “You have not met Hawk. He is… impressive. Bigger than Bron.”
His father’s eyebrows flew up. “That’s impressive, son. I’ve never met a dragon bigger than Bron.” He shrugged. “Then again, I’ve really never met another dragon besides your mate and his brothers. They’re rather tiny.”
He chuckled because Corbin would hate to be considered tiny as a dragon. However, it was rather true. He had seen the dragons flying outside the window of the house, and the dragonlands. Some of them were massive.
“This is true, but please don’t ever say it to him.”
Gregor grinned at him, teeth white in his bearded face. “It is hard to be the smallest. You may tell him I sympathize with him.”
“I will, brother, I will. Your hunt form is still terribly impressive, you know.”
Gregor studied his nails as if he were being modest. It was clearly an act. “So the ladies tell me, brother.”
That had him hooting. He grabbed a cookie off the platter of sweets. There were sandwiches and pigs in a blanket, which were an intriguing snack that he had learned to love. And he thought he spied pizza rolls on one platter. Cosmo’s idea of appropriate snacks was amusing, to say the least.
He wanted more information about the fae that had been burned, but so far, no one seemed to know anything. If they did, they weren’t talking. “I wonder if it would be valuable for me to come out into the Land of Summer and question some of the people that surround Calla at the Flower Mound.”
That made his father snort. “Those people. I swear they would look down their nose at you and say that you weren’t fit to be questioning them about anything.”
“But we need information, and I’m getting impatient, Father. I want this settled. I have a child or children on the way.”
“Trust in your brother and in the representative that Calla sent off to the Court of Bells. If there’s information to be found about this woman that your dragon-fae partner immolated, they will have it.
” Father reached over and clapped his shoulder.
“I know you wish to hunt. It is our job and our pleasure, but there is no sense in flying off in all directions.”
“I suppose not.” He looked past his father toward the house, making sure no one was watching them from the windows.
He blinked because he saw his wolf coming toward them.
Obviously, she could walk out into the Land of Summer.
What concerned him was the little boulder rolling along next to his wolf friend.
“I think we’re about to be beset by Cosmo’s Elliot. He can smell snacks miles away. And I think he quite likes you, Father.”
His father let out a big booming laugh and stood, moving away from the table, opening his arms toward where Elliot was rolling along, gathering great speed. “Come to me, my little gargoyle baby,” he said. “I’m right here.”
A pleased sound rumbled across the meadow they sat in, and Elliot rolled right up to his father and then popped out of his boulder-rock form to hop into the air so his father could catch him.
“Grandpa Archer.” Elliot intoned in his stony little voice, and his father visibly melted, his eyes going gold and his whole body softening as he hugged that little boy. “Did you hear that, my sons? He called me grandfather.”
Kristofer rolled his eyes. “You’re not exactly related to him, Father.”
His father looked down at Elliot, who was plucking at his Father’s shiny robes, tracing the gold patterns of thread. “I am too,” he said. “I embrace all of these children; they are my son’s nieces and nephews, and thus they are my adopted grandchildren.”
Evander bit back his smile, because that was the most adorable thing he’d ever heard, and his brothers were looking as if they were terribly unimpressed. His father, though, had been after all of them to find mates and produce children for him, so this had to be a coup, a feather in his cap.
Soon enough they were joined by Tisi, who flew out to meet his cousin and Serena, who zipped over and swirled around their heads like a demented dragonfly.
Last to come out was Isabelle, her father carrying her, her little arms waving enthusiastically.
Father handed off Elliot to him and then embraced the flyers who zoomed in and crashed into his chest as if they couldn’t bowl him over.
“Sorry about all this,” Cosmo said when he reached them with his bell. “The kids really wanted to come out and see Lord Archer. I hope it’s all right.”
“All is well,” his father said. “I have a great deal of time today to spend with these babies. Isn’t that right, my sons?”
Kristofer nodded and sighed, then grabbed a pizza roll and popped it in his mouth. His surprised expression when he ate it had Evander laughing like a loon.
“This is amazing,” Kristofer said. “What is this, exactly?”
“It is called a pizza roll, brother. It comes from the realm of the humans. They come in a box, and you open it and put them in the oven to heat them up.”
“I like them.” Kristofer took another.
“I like these better.” Gregor grabbed a pig in the blanket and ate it in two neat, clean bites.
“Hey, I’m just glad you like the snacks. Ah-ah, Elliot. You cannot have a handful of those. One at a time.”
Elliot grumbled, but took one cookie, stuffing it in his mouth and munching. The sound was like two tectonic plates rubbing together.