Chapter 35
Chapter Thirty-Five
TORION
“How did it go?"
I stopped in my tired tracks and found my body lightening, my weary bones regaining energy, my scowling lips turning up once more. Brigid stood just inside the keep doors, her braid unraveling, dark circles under her eyes, and a wailing little beast of a beauty bouncing gently in her arms.
Tylane. My little sun, and unfortunately, the reason the local betas were causing me so much strife at present. Grave Hills had welcomed eleven sons by harvest. Eleven sons, and one daughter.
"Let me hold my girls," I rasped out, spreading my arms wide.
Brigid huffed, but she tucked herself and Tylane into my embrace. Within moments, Tylane's cries settled into little grunts of appeasement.
"She prefers you," Brigid muttered.
I laughed, and Brigid softened and rested her head to my shoulder. "She prefers when her mother is calm and content," I corrected, trying not to sound smug.
Brigid let me get away with it, making a similar little grunt as our daughter, which I took as some acknowledgement of the truth.
"Tell me how it went. Honestly," Brigid said.
I sighed, walking our little huddle away from the door and over to the fireplace, to the armchair where I'd first seen my mate. I drew them down to sit in my lap, taking turns kissing each of them on the temple, rewarded with two sighs.
"They asked a lot of questions I don't have the answers to. She's only a baby, she won't present a scent for years yet, if she is an omega. And we don't know her lifespan. That sort of thing."
"Why should they need to know her lifespan?!" Brigid cried out, and Tylane joined her in a quick yelp that we both hurried to soothe.
"They don't. Perhaps they just think it will help to define her in their mind. You understand why they're shocked," I reminded her.
She was quiet for a moment, eyes fixed with wonder and worry on Tylane, who'd seemed to take the opportunity of the warmth of the fire and our lowered voices to settle back into sleep.
She was already almost a month old. It had been a month without sleep, a month of wonder, of scrambling for answers to questions we hadn't anticipated.
A month of a love that left me breathless with a little daughter who'd grown and stretched and screamed and had left her mark in a number of ways on my heart…
and my plaid. A family plaid was not a good choice for a baby's blanket.
"I understand their shock enough to fear it," Brigid said softly, searching my face.
"I don't think you need to fear yet," I assured her, rocking my girls in my arms slightly. "Mairwen and Ronson did seem to help, as did making sure the omegas were in attendance. The young couples looked pleased with the idea of mating."
Brigid smiled at that. "The ladies want wings. They want to fly too."
"And the young men in love want their omegas to remain at their sides for a lifetime," I said.
Brigid looked up at that, and there was all the warmth I could hope for in her gaze.
My father had met my mother quite late in life.
Perhaps that was part of why he'd been so grateful for her, so determined to enjoy every moment.
I'd been outrageously lucky to find Brigid so young.
We'd have decade after decade together. We'd have as many children as Brigid might wish for.
If our children were as lucky as us, we'd meet grandchildren and great-grandchildren for years to come.
"I didn't change all their minds in one day," I admitted.
"You couldn't have," Brigid said easily, and her eyes blinked slowly. She was tired. Tylane was sleeping now, but it wouldn't last long. I ought to get them both up to bed.
"There's something else," I said instead, and winced. Now wasn't the time. Brigid slipped a hand out from under Tylane and hummed in question, stroking curls back out of my eyes. "The men investigating think the cottage fire wasn't an accident."
"Local boys, I've guessed," Brigid murmured. "Using the cottage for mischief or some like."
"They found oil on some of the high beams that didn't catch."
Brigid's eyes widened slightly, her stroking palm pausing against my cheek. "Oh. Then it was…very intentional."
I frowned, immediately regretting bringing this news up.
"I've spoken to all the surrounding local farms, and they're more concerned about you and your property.
I don't think you've any resentments from them to worry over.
And the men investigating are putting together a record of everyone who was seen passing remotely near the cottage. "
Brigid sighed and curled into me, and I stamped down the irrational triumph blazing in my chest.
"I almost hope we don't discover who's responsible," Brigid said.
I frowned. "Why not?"
"Things are tense enough as it is. If a beta is responsible, we can't overlook the defiance. It'll have to be answered with punishment, but retaliation may just burn resentments hotter."
I might've been inclined to agree with Brigid. It would at least allow for a false peace if we could ignore the crime. But I had my suspicions already as to the culprit, and if I was right, there was no question of a pardon.
"One day at a time," I said, staring down into our daughter's beautiful face, smiling as it scrunched and relaxed.
The truth was, if things in Grave Hills grew dire, if dragonkin couldn't accept Tylane, then Brigid and I would leave.
Seamus would help us, and if Mairwen and Ronson continued to win over Bleake Isle, we'd have somewhere to go.
But a divide in dragonkin, one that crossed territories, would foster even more strife in the long run.
Bleake Isle might offer somewhere for women to go to, but the other territories would resent the loss of their omegas if it came to it.
We needed to be united if we were going to successfully move forward.
I wanted to serve my people. I wanted to draw dragonkin forward into the future, a future where our women didn't flee, but I would never risk my family.
"Are you very tired?" Brigid asked, her voice turning soft and syrupy slow.
"No more than you, I'm certain."
"Do you think you can manage it?" she asked, and I looked down to find her eyelids drooping. "Carrying us both up to bed?"
I snorted at that and shifted my mate in my arms. Tylane was a feather of an addition, and it troubled me not at all to hold Brigid, even when she was just to the point of giving birth.
I proved as much by rising with them cradled, babe atop mother, and carried them with the utmost gentleness up the stairs to our room.
Brigid was fast asleep before I reached the bed.
"The benefits Skybern offers us, offers the betas you're responsible for—"
"I am responsible for the Hills, for our dragonkin, yes.
I am not responsible for Danielson's gambling debts, or McKinney's mismanagement of his own fields.
Honestly, Keane, you know this as well as I do.
You also know what we risk by giving Skybern this grip in our territory.
" The sun was low in the sky, and I was exhausted, and this damn meeting was going nowhere.
I never should've agreed to hear Keane out again, but I hadn't expected an exact rehashing of issues we'd presumably put to bed several times over already.
"What I know, what every dragon I speak to agrees, is that your priorities lie in the wrong place now, my lord. As evidenced by—"
Sam Cameron cleared his throat at my side, his eyes narrowed on the older dragon. "Be careful what you say next. As for the alpha's priorities, it's clear you're speaking to your own circle and not the majority of the Hills' betas."
I couldn't let myself release an outright sigh, but I took the brief reprieve from the council's focus to breathe out my nose, trying to force some of my tension out as well.
Keane's feathers were ruffled, and he shifted in his seat, staring down his narrow nose at the younger man. "While you might be very grateful to the alpha for your recent elevation—"
"Are you saying there's some superiority between us outside of he who rises as alpha? Can you point to it, sir, so I might recognize it too?" Sam bit out.
I raised my hand and Sam settled back into his chair, glaring daggers at Francis Keane.
On Sam's other side, another of the younger betas clapped my friend on the shoulder.
The council had grown contentious as of late, I admitted, but there was a balance in the arguments.
Unlike my father, who had surrounded himself with the same men all his life, I was hearing all of the betas' differing opinions, not just those of my own generation.
That didn't stop me from having a preference as to the opinions expressed.
"MacIntyre, you tell him. You're the only one he listens to," Keane bit out, narrowed eyes turning to my old friend, the closest figure I had left to my father.
It was a punch to the gut to think he might've been won over by the likes of Keane—Keane, who wanted to sell us, our land and dignity, to the highest bidder.
"You think we should sell?" I asked, baffled. Had Ned fallen on hard times without me realizing? If so, it was true he was the kind of man who would be too proud to say so directly.
"It's not that," Ned said with a quick roll of his eyes in Keane's direction.
"But I…" He scowled and looked around the table, shooting me an indecipherable look.
Ned had always given me his truest opinion in private.
He rarely attended council meetings like this, and he'd once referred to these settings as packs of wild dogs waiting to snatch food from each other's mouths.
"Go on, Ned," I said, voice low but without growl or censure.
He sighed. "You know I've concern for where your first interests lie. You…you push dragonkin to your liking, lad."
"I push you forward, you mean," I said.
He shrugged. "'Forward' is only defined by the man holding the map.
You can't herd men like sheep, la—I mean, milord.
My concerns are what happens when you let too many slip through your grip.
" His eyes slid toward Keane for a moment.
His words were meant to be a warning to me, the advice of a friend, not just a reprimand.
But the advice was to keep the status quo rather than challenge my people to grow.
Ned was more afraid of giving offense than of what would happen by risking our women's lives and happiness.
More afraid of refusing men like Keane than of what happened when those men finally died and there was no one in a position to carry their place to be a new leader.
I took a deep breath and circled my gaze around the table, bracing myself for the blow as much as the men who had the guts to raise their eyes to meet mine.
"I will not coddle the fears of men who seek to keep us in the dark ages.
We can grow, if we are wise enough to do so.
We can protect our people, if we are brave enough to do so.
And we can meet the changes ahead of us, if we have the sense not to hide in the past.
"I refuse to allow Grave Hills to be bought out from under its own people," I continued, pulling my gaze from Ned and turning onto Keane, who no longer bothered to hide his malice.
This argument wasn't over between us. He'd found his way into Damian Worthington's pocket without my realizing.
They'd made up their mind to give Skybern a grip in Grave Hills, and my refusal wouldn't stop their scheming.
I'd never wanted to be the kind of alpha who planted spies in other dragonkin territories, but I might need to call in comfortable favors now. Worthington wouldn't show his hand until too late, and if it held any serious force, I needed to be ready.