Epilogue #2
“Gods, Stesha. You make me feel incredible,” Zenevieve pants.
“Good girl,” I whisper, laving the wounds with my tongue.
“Good Omega. You take me so beautifully.” I keep my weight on her, my knot pushing deeper, knowing that she needs to feel filled.
Locked to me. Lavished with praise. I’m the luckiest Alpha in the world.
After all we’ve been through, no one can make me believe otherwise.
I have her. I wrap my arms tight around Zenevieve. I have her, and I’m going to keep her.
Four days later, we emerge from Zenevieve’s nest, half starved, thirsty, and exhausted, but happy.
Zenevieve moves over to the window and pushes it open so that she can see out. “Nilak and her fledglings are enjoying the sunny day.”
As the sunlight catches my mate’s hair, I see something that I didn’t notice in the dark. I move closer and run the strands through my fingers.
Nilak’s hatchlings became fledglings a few weeks ago, and they’re all growing fast and learning to use their wings as they soar around the dragongrounds.
Zenevieve and Anuk spend every moment they can together, and she learned for sure that the black dragon was going to be her dragon when she heard Anuk’s thoughts in her head.
Zenevieve cried tears of joy that day. It brought back so many emotions for her, not just about Minta and Shar, but about her family as well.
She was fifteen when Minta chose her, and both her parents were alive then.
I asked her if she wanted to go to the Flame Temple and burn knot grass in their memory, and we went together.
She paid tribute to her parents, her brothers, and their families as well, who all died long ago at some unknown time and place.
Today, my smile is bittersweet and nostalgic as I caress Zenevieve’s darkening hair. She turns to me and looks up in surprise.
“What is it?”
“You’re bonding with your dragon, aash’lin,” I say, my voice roughened with emotion. “Your hair is darkening. There are flecks of gold in your eyes. How beautiful you look.”
Just as she did when she was fifteen, she runs to the mirror on the wall and looks at herself. With her lips parted, she turns her head from side to side. Her eyes meet mine in the reflection, and they’re swimming with tears. “Twice in one lifetime. I didn’t dare hope it could be possible.”
I come forward and wrap my arms around her. “The gods wouldn’t dare deny a treasure as you her happiness. Otherwise, your Alpha would have words with them.”
“I’d like to see that,” she says with a laugh.
I kiss the red marks on her throat. “Will you wear your hair up for me today, Zen? So that everyone may see the marks my teeth have made in your neck.”
“Yes, Alpha.” She smiles at me as she gathers her hair up in such a way that just a hint of my teeth marks is showing.
I smile, revealing my dragines. “Are you trying to make me go into another rut? Because I will, and we will be gone so long that everyone will think we have run away to live in the mountains.”
Zenevieve laughs and dashes out of the room, making me chase her all the way down to the dragongrounds.
Anuk bounds straight over to her, and the dragon chitters excitedly as she sees the changes in her hair and eyes and smells the end of Zenevieve’s rut. The other fledglings are not far behind. After Anuk, we named Garros, Aurai, Ninev, and Nirak. All of them are growing furiously fast.
“I’ve missed you all too,” Zenevieve tells them all, and then she turns to me. “I forgot to tell you. Kane has named the dragons who chose to leave with Auryn.”
I turn from greeting Nilak to looking at my mate. “Oh? How do you know that?”
“Ravenna and I have been writing to one another since the Battle of Lenhale. I give Isavelle’s sister, Anise, my letters, and the wingrunners make sure that Ravenna gets them.”
I nod in understanding. Anise is a trainee wingrunner, so she would be eager for any mission, especially one that takes her into the wild eastern parts of Maledin.
The wingrunners are the only members of the dragon army who are permitted to fly into the east. Zabriel and I decided it was safer for the dragons to stay away and keep the peace between the two flares.
It was a reluctant decision for me. If I were king, I wouldn’t be eager for a man like Kane to think he owned eastern Maledin, but as dragonmaster, I’m curious to see if the eastern flare can find their feet.
There are many dragons in the flare who still need riders.
“What names has Kane chosen?” I ask, wondering if he’s chosen stupid names like Beastbane and Savager.
“Aubren for the yellow Alpha, and Kasha for the Beta female.”
“Hm. I suppose they’re good names,” I admit grudgingly. I’m silent for a moment, thinking. “It’s interesting that the lady knows what’s happening in the eastern flare. I was under the impression that her village is many miles from Auryn’s dragongrounds.”
“Ravenna has her own wyvern. I suppose she visits the eastern flare.”
Zenevieve’s words hang significantly in the air.
There’s always been animosity and tension between Ravenna and her Alpha, but a mating bond is difficult to deny, if not downright impossible.
Perhaps the tension between the pair has boiled over into desire.
Unless Kane is foolish enough to willfully hurt Ravenna again, it’s none of my concern what happens between them.
I will hear about it if he does because Menelope won’t let it stand.
Though if Kane does hurt Ravenna again, the witch will probably murder him before Zabriel and I have a chance to arrest him. A pleasing thought.
Zenevieve settles down in the sunshine against her dragon, and Anuk stretches out on the warm ground. The two of them sleepily blink their eyes and then close them.
Smiling, I ask Nilak, What do you think of them?
Destrin’s grandfledgling, she replies warmly, which is her way of saying she thinks their bonding is wonderful.
I hunker down on my heels before my sleeping mate and the fledgling dragon.
Zenevieve’s hair will soon darken to a lustrous shade of black, just like it used to be.
Her eyes will grow golden and flash in the sunlight.
In a few weeks, the pair will take their first ride together, and my mate’s heart will burst with happiness.
I’ll see Zenevieve in the skies once more, which is where she belongs.
I reach out and stroke my forefinger gently over Anuk’s scales, silently thanking her for choosing my mate. She couldn’t have chosen a more deserving rider.
A few days later, Zenevieve and I meet in the Great Hall for our evening meal. I pull out an empty trestle and put my hand to the small of Zenevieve’s back, and then I freeze.
“I’m starving.” Zenevieve has already reached for a green bean and taken a bite when she notices me staring at her. Still chewing, she asks, “What is it?”
I wrap my arms around her and lift her up against me.
“Aash’lin,” I exclaim, and I feel heads turn to look at us. My lips seek her ear, and I whisper, “Your scent has changed. You’re carrying my child.”
“What?” She seizes my shoulders and pushes me back so she can look into my eyes. “Really? I’m pregnant?”
I nod. She stares at me for a moment, and then throws her arms around me, laughing.
We have skirted around the idea of us having a baby, talking about it like it’s a possibility we dare not hope for.
Neither of us wanted to take something so important for granted.
It might not happen. We might have to try for months.
Years. I assumed it would. Nothing for us seems to come easily, but in this, the gods have blessed us before I had even begun imploring them.
Slowly, I set Zenevieve back on her feet. “Will you come with me to the Flame Temple so that we may give thanks?”
She nods eagerly. I take her by the hand and set an unhurried pace, and the route I choose takes us past the royal table.
Isavelle looks around and breaks into a smile as she catches Zenevieve’s scent.
Zabriel gets to his feet and crosses the floor toward us, a grin spreading over his face.
“Am I right? I am right! Look at your smiling faces. Y’denris ol i fennar.
Y’denris ol Stesha fennar.” After squeezing Zenevieve’s hands and congratulating us about the baby, he turns to clasp my forearm, and I clasp his in return. “Did you just find out?”
“Yes, just now. I have been hoping, but it’s still a surprise.” I think I say other things, but I’m not sure. I can’t take my eyes off Zenevieve as she and the queen embrace.
After we move away from the king and queen, I walk Zenevieve past a table of dragonriders, who one by one recognize her scent and all get up from their meal to congratulate my mate and me.
Then there are the wingrunners along one side of the hall, and out in the courtyard, another group of dragonriders catch her scent on the breeze.
She’s embraced with squeals of delight from all the women, and I’m patted hard on the shoulder by my fellow Alphas and told it’s about time there were “little Steshas” running about the castle.
It takes over an hour for us to take what should be a walk of several minutes. Zenevieve can’t stop smiling from ear to ear and dabbing at her eyes as she confirms again and again that yes, she is pregnant, and yes, she just found out.
We’re drawing closer to the Flame Temple when I suddenly remember something very important at the dragongrounds, and we must go there at once. On the way, we pass even more dragonriders and some wingrunners as well, who all stop us and offer their congratulations.
By the time we reach the dragongrounds, I’ve “forgotten” what I needed to do, but there are more people who pick up on Zenevieve’s scent and are excited to offer her their congratulations as well.
Finally, we make it up to the Flame Temple, and by then our news has already reached those who reside within.
Zenevieve is greeted by Mother Linnea, who’s crying tears of joy as she pulls her into an embrace.
“After those dark times, I never thought I would see the day. Y’denris ol i fennar. Y’denris ol Stesha fennar.”
As we bask in the warmth from the Font of First Flames, I take Zenevieve in my arms and hold her tight. “We’re having a baby. Can you believe it, aash’lin?”
“Maybe a little dragonrider-to-be. I’m so excited.” She looks up at me with a smile. “I know what you were doing just now, Alpha.”
“Me?” I ask, mystified. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You walked us past nearly everyone in the castle so they would know I’m pregnant and give me their congratulations.”
Smiling, I lean down and kiss her. “What are you talking about? I walked you straight to the Flame Temple, just like I said I was going to. People just happened to keep getting in our way.”
Only Omegas perfume like this when they’re pregnant, and just about everyone realizes why right away. Zenevieve is happier than she’s ever been. She’s craved this special moment that someone so cruelly tried to deny her.
It’s a moment she’s always treasured, and so I had to give it to her. I am bursting with pride for my mate. My heart is flying higher than the heavens.
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