Chapter 39
THIRTY-NINE
JUNIE
Two hours later, freshly showered and wearing a simpler gown that covered her throbbing shoulder, Junie slipped back into the garden with Leo at her side.
The celebration was still in full swing.
Fairy lights glowed in the oaks, music drifted from the small band Avine had hired, and the champagne was flowing freely.
The looks they received ranged from knowing (Avine) to amused (Theo) to scandalized (Elder Eamon Amell, who had clearly expected more decorum from a mating ceremony).
Junie kept her expression carefully neutral. Leo’s hand rested at the small of her back, and she could feel him—not physically alone, but inside, a presence at the edge of her awareness. The bond pulsed with his satisfaction, his contentment, his love.
So this is what it feels like. To belong to someone completely.
Not ownership. Choice. A choice made permanent, sealed in blood and magic and the ancient ritual of claiming.
Dahlia materialized at her elbow, pressing a glass of champagne into her hand. “You have a leaf in your hair.”
“That’s not possible. We were inside.”
“Uh-huh.” Dahlia’s eyes sparkled with barely contained laughter. “Inside, where exactly?”
“Nowhere with leaves.”
“The leaf says otherwise.”
Junie batted the offending foliage away and took a fortifying sip of champagne. Her shoulder throbbed beneath the dress—the mark still fresh, still sensitive. She wasn’t ready to share that detail with the world yet. Some things were for them alone.
But she could feel Leo across the garden now, even with her back turned.
He’d drifted toward his pride members, and she tracked his location without looking—a steady beacon that said there, he’s right there.
She’d never have to wonder where he was again.
Never have to fear waking up and finding him gone.
The thought made her throat tight.
Cassia appeared at her other elbow, a hurricane of dark curls and barely contained excitement. “So? How was it?”
“Private.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“That’s the only answer you’re getting.”
“Narla says the bond smells ‘crystallized.’” Cassia made air quotes. “Whatever that means. She’s being annoyingly cryptic about it.”
Junie found Narla in the crowd, the candle witch watching her with that knowing smile. They locked eyes, and Narla raised her glass in a silent toast.
She knew. Of course, she knew. Narla had known about Leo’s mate recognition before any of them, had watched the whole thing unfold with the patience of someone who’d seen this story before.
“He’s different.” Avine appeared at Junie’s side.
“Leo?”
“He’s talking to his pride like they’re people instead of employees.” Avine’s voice was soft with approval. “He’s smiling. Actually smiling, not that scary professional thing he used to do.”
Junie turned to look. Leo stood in a cluster of his pride members, gesturing as he spoke—actually gesturing, like a normal person who hadn’t been raised by wolves of the corporate variety.
One of his lions said words she couldn’t hear, and Leo’s answering grin was genuine, unguarded.
He looked relaxed in a way she’d never seen before they came to Haven Shores.
He looked happy.
“You did that,” Avine said quietly.
“We did it for each other.”
Because that was the truth of it. Leo had changed her as much as she’d changed him. Before him, she’d been content with her jokes and her potions and her careful distance from anything that might hurt. She’d called it happiness. She’d called it enough.
It hadn’t been either.
The wardstones along the garden’s edge began to glow, responding to the emotional magic saturating the air.
Flowers bloomed in their planters—roses unfurling, jasmine releasing its sweet perfume, moonflowers opening despite the hour.
The entire garden seemed to sigh with contentment, the ancient magic of Haven Shores recognizing the new bond in its midst.
Elder Sue appeared at Junie’s shoulder, looking unbearably smug. “I knew it would work out.”
“You knew nothing. You were as surprised as everyone else when he turned out to be my mate.”
“I was strategically reserving judgment.” Sue’s eyes twinkled. “But I had a feeling. These surges don’t happen randomly, you know. There’s always a pattern.”
“What pattern?”
But Sue smiled her cryptic elder smile and drifted away, leaving Junie with more questions than answers. Typical. The woman had been insufferably mysterious since Junie was a child, and claiming a mate apparently wasn’t going to change that.
A familiar presence approached from behind. Junie didn’t need to turn—she felt Leo coming, that new awareness guiding him to her like a compass.
His hand found the small of her back. “Ready to go home?”
“This is home.”
“I meant—”
“I know what you meant.” She leaned into his touch, savoring the solid presence of him. “Yes. I’m ready.”
They made their goodbyes—quick hugs from her friends, firm handshakes from his pride, a knowing look from Theo that said take care of her without speaking a word.
Beck caught her eye across the garden and raised his glass with a small smile.
Not the easy grin she was used to—a more complicated expression lived there—but genuine well-wishes all the same.
The night air was cool as they walked the familiar path back to the inn. Stars wheeled overhead, and Junie found herself memorizing the moment: the sound of distant waves, the scent of night-blooming flowers, Leo’s hand in hers. She wanted to remember every detail. This night. This beginning.
“What did Sue say to you?” Leo asked.
“Cryptic Elder nonsense about patterns in the surge.”
“Helpful.”
“Incredibly.” Junie paused at the inn’s entrance, turning to face him. “Are you happy?”
The question surprised them both. But it mattered—mattered more than she could articulate. She needed to know that this life they were building, this choice they’d made, was what he wanted. What he truly wanted, not accepted because his lion demanded it.
Leo cupped her face in his hands, his thumbs stroking her cheekbones. “I didn’t know I could be this happy. I didn’t know happy like this existed.”
“Me neither. And getting my grandmother’s book back just makes it all so much better. Thank you. I am deliriously happy. It feels strange.”
There were sections of it she still hadn’t decoded—whole pages in a cipher she didn’t recognize, formulas that seemed to belong to a branch of potion-work she’d never encountered.
But she’d cracked one entry the night before: a single formula near the front of the encoded section, written in a cipher layer she’d finally recognized as a variant of her grandmother’s own handwriting from forty years ago.
The formula described something called a recognition draught, brewed from sea-glass, moonflower, and three ingredients listed only by symbols she hadn’t identified yet.
The note beside it was brief and startling: For those who carry the gift without knowing. Reveals what blood has hidden.
Junie still didn’t know what that meant. But she intended to find out.
“I spent twenty years surviving. Going through the motions, building empires, convincing myself that success was the same as fulfillment.” His eyes held hers, steady. “You showed me the difference.”
“You showed me too.” She covered his hands with hers. “I thought I was happy before. I thought my jokes, my friends, and my potions were enough. But there was always this… emptiness I’d papered over. I’d gotten so used to it that I forgot it was there.”
“And now?”
“Now it’s full.” She smiled up at him, and the smile felt different somehow—lighter, freer. Like a weight she’d been carrying for years had finally lifted. “You filled it. Not because I needed completing—I was whole before. But because you added what I didn’t know I was missing.”
He kissed her—soft, slow, and full of promise. The bond hummed between them. Above them, Glimmer—who had relocated to a nearby tree branch at some point during the celebration—turned her scales a satisfied gold.
The snake approved.