Aviva
The next three days are easy and full of conversation, food, and children dictating our every waking hour. I’ve grown attached to Maeve despite the knowledge of her abilities, one of which is lighting herself on fire. She’s beginning to seek me out in a room now, crawling as fast as she can to tug on my pants or my skirt, and enjoys just sitting on my lap watching the other children play.
Kenna watches us, not saying a word. Sarah has had a lot to say about it, however, going on and on about how there was finally another baby girl in the family but she wouldn’t allow anyone to touch her or snuggle with her… except for me.
I wouldn’t consider Maeve to be a snuggly baby. She much prefers sitting on my lap and chewing on my fingers with the two razor sharp teeth she’s cutting in real time.
All the while, Ryan floats in and out of whatever space we’re sharing with his family. He’s gone on a few outings with us and the kids, but he’s been quiet and a little grouchy, dropping back into the same slightly secretive and stern persona I knew when I first came to live with him in Silverhide.
I’m not sure what he talked about with his uncle in that office three days ago, but I have a hunch it was about me, and that’s why he’s being so standoffish now.
I shouldn’t have said a word that night.
I’m walking through the city with Sarah, arm in arm, without the kids for the first time in days. Kenna and Evander had to rush back to Veiled Valley for some reason, leaving early this morning without a word of farewell and taking all three kids with them. Without Brie bossing all of us around, Aris backing her up as her trusty, loyal servant, and Maeve clamoring for my attention, it’s been quiet.
We’re walking toward the castle now in the warmth of late afternoon sunshine, my arms laden with shopping bags. I bought gifts. A doll with a porcelain face for Lora. A leather knife belt with little toy knives in each holster for Shosh. Several spools of the most beautiful, silken fabric I’ve ever seen for Mercy, which I intend to give to her as a wedding present, and two bags of brightly colored yarn and thread for Freya, who’s going to freak when I give it to her.
I even picked up some new clothes for Dahlia’s baby with the help of Sarah, who I learned knows Dahlia well.
What I didn’t know was that Dahlia was there the night Ryan killed Hadley, and for some reason, that changes everything for me. I’d been so cold toward her, blanketing my own shyness and insecurities with an air of detachment when she tried to be my friend. Knowing that she was more than James's wife, that she knew Ryan before everything, well… I owe her an apology for my coldness.
“I love coming here,” Sarah says as we walk up the steps toward a side entrance to the castle. “I feel at home in this city, but that’s only because I’m a mystic, I think. I’d miss Shadowcrest so much if Sydney decided to move here, though.”
“Is that even an option? He’s the heir to Isaac’s throne.”
“Well, yeah, but that’s years away. Decades, honestly. Uhm, well, there’s been talk about us coming here for a year or two, just for him to learn more about Eastonia to more effectively rule in Crescent Falls when the time comes and for me to learn my powers a little better. Neither of the boys will be like me, we think, not entirely. But a daughter might. I want to be prepared for that when the time comes.”
“You were born here, right?”
“Moonrise? No. I don’t actually know exactly where I was born, but I’m from Eastonia, yeah. It’s strange.” She laughs, shaking her head, “I love Crescent Falls, but I come here and feel like I’m home. Honestly, I think that about everywhere I go with Sydney.” Her cheeks go a little pink.
I smile to myself, feeling those exact sentiments toward Ryan. He is my home. I remind myself that as he comes into view talking to Sydney beside one of the countless staircases spiraling into the upper levels of the castle. He looks stressed, but he’s looked like that for three entire days now.
“Where are the boys?” Sarah asks, looking around. “With Maddy, I hope?”
“Yes. She’s helping get them packed up.”
“You’re leaving?” The words slip from my lips before I can stop them. I really need to get better at that.
“Tonight, yeah. Sarah and my parents are going to Maatua first to visit our grandparents while I take you guys home.”
I turn to Ryan for an explanation. He hadn’t mentioned anything about leaving today. In fact, we’re supposed to leave in two days. “What happened?”
Sydney and Ryan exchange a look then turn from each other, Sydney guiding Sarah up the stairs while Ryan takes the shopping bags from my hands and tilts his head down one of the long, crisscrossed hallways. “Nothing happened. We just completed our business here and are going back to our lives.” He doesn’t sound like nothing happened.
I drag him to a stop. He refuses to even look at me. “What’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing’s wrong.”
“You look–you look like you’re either on the verge of tears or ready to break something in half.”
He runs his tongue along his bottom teeth, looking down at me with an arch of his brow. “Would you like to be broken in half? I could probably arrange that.”
I smack him on the arm. “I’m being serious. You’ve been moping around for three days. What’s wrong with you?”
He grinds his teeth before shrugging and walking forward again. I have to jog to keep up with him as we wind through the castle toward our apartment. He says nothing until we’re closed inside then turns to me, his hands planted on his hips. “My uncle Ryatt believes you’re part of some strange, ancient race of wolves.”
“Well, that means absolutely nothing to me.”
He exhales deeply. “He made it sound like it could mean a whole lot, Aviva, and he wants you to stay here in Moonrise. There’s a historian in Veiled Valley with this thing–this magic little dog bowl that can test your blood, categorize you into specific area of magical powers–”
“I’m not staying here. I’m going home with you.”
He sinks into a chair, rubbing his face for a moment. “I told him that.”
“When did this conversation take place?”
“Right after you so conveniently let it slip that you know not only how to speak but read and write the Firestone language, which makes you invaluable.”
“There’s others that can read it. Hell, most ten-year-olds in Endova can read it. That doesn’t make me special.”
“What this means is that all of the sudden, the Deadlands are very important.” He hangs his head in thought. “I’m going to have to go talk to your father and possibly send someone who can read the language here to Moonrise.” He shakes his head.
“Why does it matter? Do they need something translated?”
“I didn’t ask.”
“Why not?”
“Because quite frankly, it’s none of my business. My business is in the Deadlands, in Silverhide, where our pack is currently preparing for another long, cold winter, and I’m here drinking cocktails and fucking my wife on a four-poster bed.”
I roll my eyes to the ceiling and kneel, laying my cheek on his thigh. “You love your family.”
“I know.”
“They’re just weird. It’s all right to be frustrated.”
He chuckles, finally breaking out of the haze of his terrible mood. “They are pretty weird.”
“Well, so are you. You can turn into a big beast with fangs the length of my forearm, and now apparently, I have special gifts. I fit right in. That doesn’t mean we have to be separated.”
“I wouldn’t have let that happen. But… if you do have powers–”
“I would have known by now, wouldn’t I?”
“Yeah. I think you would have figured it out, given your propensity for getting in life or death situations on a regular basis.” He smooths his fingers through my hair in a way that makes my spine relax and skin tingle. “Shit.”
“What?” I lift my head.
“I forgot to ask Kenna about those contraceptive potions, and she left this morning.”
“It’s a little late now, isn’t it?”
His cheeks flush a soft pink, but he frowns, a flash of guilt pinching his brows together. “We never talked about it.”
“About having children?”
He nods, sliding off his chair onto the soft, carpeted floor beside me. We stare at the wall, at a mostly empty bookshelf, lost in a few moments of companionable silence.
I say the first thing that comes to my head, and it feels incredibly selfish, but I have to get it out before it festers again. “I don’t want to die like my mother did.”
“I wouldn’t let that happen to you. We’d come here for the birth.”
“I’m not sure I’d be a great mother.”
“I’m not sure I’d be a great dad.” His fingers knit in mine, warm and solid.
“You would be. The best, I think.”
“I don’t think you give yourself enough credit, Aviva, for the kind of mother you were to your sisters.”
“I was barely around, and when I was there, I wasn’t… I couldn’t give them everything they needed.”
“You didn’t want them to see you grieve.”
Tears sting my lower lashes. I blink them away, shaking my head. “Do you want children?”
“Yeah,” he whispers, as if it’s a secret he’s never shared. “But with you. I didn’t start thinking about it until I met you. Shortly after I met you, actually. I thought–that woman pointing an arrow at my head is going to be the mother of my children if I can somehow convince her to make one with me.”
“So you were just thinking about getting me in bed?”
“Oh, Goddess, you have no idea,” he laughs.
I feel warm and fuzzy all over as we sit side by side, surrounded by shopping bags, none of our things packed for our journey home tonight.
“I guess we’ll find out,” I whisper, leaning my head on his arm and close my eyes.
Later, we share a final dinner with his parents, his brother, Sarah and the boys. Ella is there, too, of course, but Ryatt is notably absent.
Maddy gushes over us for the millionth time, and Ryan promises she can come to the harvest festival to see us get married, for real this time, even though no one but me really understands the significance of our upcoming nuptials.
Goodbyes are said. Ryan wrestles with Blake and Liam, telling them they need to work on their moves for the next time their family gets together, which sounds like it will be a few months from now, in mysterious Maatua, which I can’t even picture in my head based on their descriptions.
And when Ryan takes my hand, lacing his fingers in mine, I’m almost prepared for the feeling of my body spinning out of control as Sydney claps him on the shoulder.
My stomach pitches and whirls, but the next moment I’m standing in our house in Silverhide, and Ryan is dropping our things on the floorboards, and Sydney is disappearing again in a flash of golden light.
I fall to my hands and knees, pinching my eyes shut against the spinning sensation threatening to pull me into the abyss. Ryan hands me a thermos he’d brought back from Moonrise full of the magic tea Kenna gave me the first time this happened, and I happily drink it before curling into the fetal position on the floor.
“I’ll be back in a little while,” Ryan says softly as he carries me to our bed, laying me on the firm mattress that smells like him, like us.
But I wake to several male voices talking over each other in the living room. It’s night still, and I can tell I haven’t been asleep longer than an hour, maybe less.
I open the bedroom door and step out to find Andrew and James standing next to Ryan, who has his back to me. His shoulders are rigid, though, every muscle tense.
Dread washes over me as he turns around.
“What happened now?” I ask, my fingers tingling to get my hands on my bow.
“We’re going hunting,” Ryan says gruffly, anger draped over every word.
I arch a brow. “For what?”