Chapter 13
Rikard
He’d barely cleared the landing, his legs aching from the climb and his mood soured by a two-hour dispute between a tanner and a gargoyle guard over the precise trajectory of an airborne carcass, when Hanna met him at the door with her eyes bright and her cheeks flushed from sleep.
She had the skein of blue silk clutched against her chest like a billet-doux. Which, he supposed, it was.
“Where did you find it?” she asked breathlessly. “The market stalls don’t carry this quality of silk.”
After what she’d done to her wedding dress, he’d had the improbable impulse to gift her something beautiful, something she would love as much as he loved her gesture.
He’d sent a keeper to a dozen shops before finding a fae merchant in the lower ring who agreed to import the lazuli silk from sources in the north.
It had cost him more effort and coin than he’d expected, but judging from the look on her face, it had been worth it.
“A shop near the south gate,” he said, as though the errand had been trivial.
“Thank you. I love it,” she said, eyes shining.
“It was nothing.” He waved away the gratitude, suddenly self-conscious. Her face fell. He quickly amended, “Nothing you don’t deserve. There is no need to thank me. Tell me about your evening.”
That fixed whatever he’d broken. Chatting merrily about her appointment with Old Aalis, she served him meat and mead, taking only bread and butter for herself.
He frowned at her plate. “You should eat more.”
She paused mid-bite, her cheeks flushing pink. “That’s what Aalis said, too. I can’t always stomach meat this early in the morning, though.”
“Fair enough, as long as you eat later.” He would be watching to make sure she did. For his heir, he rationalized. This child was his only chance.
It was then his parents stumbled in from the balcony, laughing, their wings tangled together. They must have just returned from a skyball or some other high-tier event, because they were wearing their finest. For once it seemed Cléa was the one in her cups.
“Oh, darling, you’re home,” she hiccupped when she saw Rikard at the table, sipping his mead. Then, spotting Hannalinde, she said, “Did you ask him yet?”
Hanna shook her head. “No. I will.”
“It’s almost dawn,” Cléa warned, leaning heavily on her husband.
“Not yet! We still have time!” Roul chortled and swept her off her feet, carrying her to their nesting chamber. As much as his parents bickered, they still loved each other.
Over the rim of his goblet, Rikard frowned at his mate, who was suddenly very interested in her bread, picking at it with her delicate, clawless fingers. Was she so prudish about the activities of a mated pair? “What is it?”
“Aalis suggested…” she began, then hesitated, chewing her lip. “I have been feeling…I don’t mean to be ungrateful. I am very happy here.”
He set down his goblet. “Go on, or you won’t get it out before I turn to stone. You can’t offend me if you have a complaint. I hear them all day.”
“I know,” she said miserably. “I hate to add to their number. I swore I would not trouble you if you gave me safety and your name, and you have done both those things. I did not even give you a mating gift.” She glanced at the skein of blue silk beside her plate.
He had not intended it as a mating gift, merely as a little luxury for her. Something to make her smile.
“You are no trouble,” he said firmly. “Tell me or I shall have to ask Old Aalis myself, and I’d rather not climb down to the rookery after mounting the ladders twice today already. That would be trouble.”
Hanna bobbed her head sheepishly. “I suppose I have been lonely while you and your parents are in daysleep. Aalis suggested I find a human companion, as the isolation isn’t good for the pregnancy.
A friend, perhaps, someone who can provide daytime help after the child comes, as well.
I was wondering if Carlijn might come and stay with us in the eyrie.
She’s my oldest friend, and she knows about…
our arrangement. She was there from the beginning. ”
He did not have a high opinion of Carlijn and her tendency to ignore Hannalinde’s good advice, but if the mason said it would help the pregnancy, he could not stand in the way. “Will it make you happy?”
The question surprised her. He could see it in the slight widening of her eyes, the pause before she answered.
“Yes,” she said. “I think it would. I have not asked her yet, but I believe it will make her happy, too.”
“Then invite her. I will leave it to you to arrange the details with the keepers.”
She exhaled, and the relief in it was so palpable he could almost taste it, like the mineral sweetness of water from a deep well. “Thank you, husband.”
“You thank me too much. You have not thought of where she will sleep, have you?” The eyrie only had three nesting chambers.
From the look on her face, she hadn’t. “She could take my room, I suppose,” Hannalinde said in a cautious tone. “It has enough room for her wardrobe. She’d be comfortable there.”
He toyed with the stem of his goblet. “And where would you sleep?”
The pause that followed was long enough to contain several unspoken sentences.
“It is not so unusual for a husband and wife to sleep apart, but it would look strange to the keepers if your wife shared a chamber with someone else,” she said stiffly, avoiding his eyes.
“You propose to move into my nest?”
“If you do not object. I notice you never sleep in it.”
Of course he did not. The nest was for mating and raising young, not sleeping.
“The nest is yours. I’ll have the keepers bring fresh furs.
” He was aware that his voice had gone rough at the thought of her sprawled out in his nest in some state of undress.
He was as degenerate as the moths claimed, apparently.
But she could not object if he roosted in his own chamber, and then he could watch her the way he’d been watching her for weeks… but closer. Much closer.
He swallowed hard, adding, “Do not thank me. It is your nesting chamber as much as mine.”
Hanna was still picking at the bread. A flush had crept up her neck, visible even in the lamplight, pink against her pale skin. “I will ask her, then. She may not agree. But if she does, I’ll have the keepers move my things while you’re—”
“In daysleep. Yes. You won’t disturb me.” The lie tasted like ash and honey. She would disturb him greatly. The nest would come to smell like her, and he would roost nearby every day, both unwilling and unable to look away.
“Good,” she said.
“Good,” he repeated.
They finished the meal in silence, but it was charged with something new. For the first time, he wished they had a true mate bond so he knew what she thought and felt.
The next night, Pudding was already in his office when he arrived.
He hadn’t seen her since before the mating ceremony. He’d thought of her occasionally, but less and less as the days went on. Most of his attention had been occupied by the upheaval in his household and the mundane tasks of his office.
But here she was, a basket over her arm, smile wide, settling into the visitor’s chair with the easy familiarity of someone who’d sat in it a hundred times. She propped her elbow on his desk and her chin on her hand.
“You look different,” she said cheerily. “Less miserable.”
She was flattering him. He was well aware that his expression was frozen into a perpetual grimace by his scars. “Do I.”
“I take it you liked the little gift I sent you.” She cocked her head, her butter-colored curls falling to one side. She laughed at his utter bewilderment. He had received no gifts from her or anyone else. “You said you needed an heir.”
His tail snapped behind him in surprise. “You sent Hanna to me?!”
Pudding nodded smugly. “Came to me with that little problem of hers. I thought of you right away.”
A storm of emotions stirred up. Annoyance at being manipulated, for one. She had no right to meddle. But he had involved her, hadn’t he? He’d asked her to sate his needs…ones he knew she couldn’t fulfill. He should have known that Pudding, ever a professional, couldn’t rest until she had.
“I suppose you want coin for your efforts, even though I didn’t ask for them.”
She pursed her full lips. “Doesn’t everyone need money, even the wealthiest? But I meant what I said. She was a gift to you, so I don’t expect compensation.”
“Then why are you here when I didn’t call for you?” he asked bluntly.
Pudding lifted her basket to the table, peeling back the linen covering to reveal another carved phallus. This one was larger than the other and decidedly inhuman, with the ridges and knot of a gargoyle. “I just picked this up from the bonecarver. Thought you might want to see me ride it.”
Rather than stirring up his depravity, the reminder of his impotence chilled him.
Why, though? It was a simple fact, one he’d lived with for years.
He supposed that these past weeks with Hanna had softened him.
She did not want nor need his cock. He’d forgotten that it was a failing that his didn’t work.
He shook his head. “I’m afraid not.”
She pouted at him, leaning forward so her breasts nearly spilled out of her bodice. “Are you sure? It wasn’t cheap, you know. I went to a lot of time and effort to find a carver willing to make it.”
He searched his desk and found a small purse of silver coins. Pushing it across to her, he said, “For your trouble.”
Pudding took the money and smiled, and it was the kindest, saddest thing he’d seen in a long time. “All right, then, it’s yours. Good night, love. I won’t come again unless you ask.” She rose and turned to go, leaving her basket behind.
“Pudding.”
She paused, head high.
“I am grateful. She is indeed a gift.”
“Don’t make me cry. I’ll charge you by the tear.” She winked, and then she was gone.
He stowed the basket under his desk as the keepers brought in the next human.
He barely heard the complaints today, just recorded them while his mind was elsewhere.
More specifically, while his thoughts dwelled with his mate, while she slept on the seventh tier, perhaps for the last time in her own nest.
He wanted something.
He wanted her. Not her body, though the thought of Hanna’s body did provoke his mind in a way he had no business entertaining given the state of his equipment.
He wanted the look on her face when she gazed out at the city.
He wanted the small, startled laugh that escaped her in unguarded moments.
He wanted the quiet of their meals together and the scent of her roses.
He wanted to see her smile when he came home.
In a world that had stolen so much from her, he wanted to be the reason for her happiness.