I sucked in a breath when Arim rubbed my belly. Had he heard Ravyn?
By the Dark, I hoped not.
Chapter 26
Lexa
Sava smiled at me with evil intent when I glared at him.
“Someday that’ll be us, Blue,” Arim’s rumbled.
That someday might very well be today.
Butterflies filled my stomach at thoughts of mothering. What did I know about parenting? Much of what Muri had taught me lay buried under the pain of her death, and learning about the right way to guide a child meant soul searching through the hurt that came with Muri’s memory.
Then too, any child of mine was bound to be confused. A Dark Lord mother and a Light Bringer father? And not just any Light Bringer, but the Guardian of Storm. We’d have to get rid of his Killer of Shadow moniker, especially if the babe was a Darkling —
What the hell am I thinking?
I must have broadcast my panic because Arim tightened his hold on me.
“Blue?”
Luckily, Darius interrupted. He walked arm in arm with Samantha, next to Marcus and Tessa, as they rounded on Arim. The others joined us, and I felt like a bug under a microscope. Everyone crowding, staring… Memories rose, the feeling of being judged and found unworthy present as I recalled another instance when Light Bringers had surrounded me.
“What the hell?” Cadmus stared from me to Arim and laughed. Aerolus joined in, shocking everyone. Cadmus snorted. “All that shit you gave us about marrying creatures of Dark, I think you said, and you go and fall for a Dark Lord?”
The others began smiling, though Darius and Marcus looked less amused and more suspicious.
I shook my head. “It’s not —” what you think refused to come because Arim interrupted.
“You will treat my chosen with respect. Because if you don’t, I’ll let her do whatever she wants to with you.”
Ellie elbowed Cadmus in the gut, and he bent over, gasping. “I, for one, am glad to have Lexa with us. It was only a matter of time.”
Alandra nodded, her cheeks rosy, full of happiness. “Me too. Balances out all the Light in this place.”
“Don’t look at us,” Tessa said, sharing a glance with Samantha. “We’re just poor xiantopes, women with no power but the stuff our husbands let us use.” She batted her lashes at Marcus. “And ‘let us use’ is quoting the esteemed Church. You’ll have to blame all the Light on our idiot husbands.”
“Tessa,” Marcus said with a sigh, sounding pained. His arms tightened around her as he brought her in for a sound kiss.
“I don’t know. I kind of like the idea of Darius changing diapers.” Samantha laughed at the pained look on her husband’s face, but her expression sobered as she caught site of Ravyn again. “It’s terrible to be happy when Ravyn’s not here with us.”
“She is,” Aerolus whispered, looking over our shoulders.
As one, we all turned to see Queen Ravyn glowing with the afterlife. She smiled and waved, then winked out of sight.
“I thought she couldn’t do that.” I wondered who kept making up these rules for the dead. What happened to Don’t tell Arim I was here?
The narrowed glance Arim shot me had me tense. His hand stilled on my belly, the heat of his Light filling my stomach with a drowsy, pleasant warmth. “We need to talk.”
“Yes, we do,” Sava emphasized, staring hard at me.
I swallowed, not ready to tell Arim what I suspected. “Right. We need to focus here. I’m not exactly your —”
“— wife, not yet,” Arim ended, addressing his family and me with a definite bite in his tone. “We’ll fix that soon enough. In the meantime, we have a whole new set of circumstances to handle. Sava and I will deal with Sin Garu. The rest of you must protect yourselves and Tanselm. We can’t afford to lose any more Storm Lords. No arguments,” Arim directed at Darius.
To my surprise, Darius agreed.
