Page 12 of Black Crown

Iflushed as Lani’s meaning sank in. I wasn’t sure how Phaetyn did their send offs, butthatwasn’t how I said my goodbyes.

“You’d both probably feel better if you had,” Lani said matter-of-factly as if she could read my mind. Then her brow furrowed, and she tilted her head, examining me. “You’ve had sex with him, right?”

Holy pancakes.Was I really having this conversation with a fake adult? I shook my head, staring at my pack as though it could save me from the entire situation. I could just crawl inside it and live there. “I’m not sleeping with anyone. I’m not ready to. How do you even know about . . .” I waved my hand and mumbled, “stuff?”

“I’m over fifty years old.”

“Look like eight.”

“Fifteen,” she insisted, nostrils flaring. “And we’re not talking aboutmysex life.”

Young Phaetyn got prickly about their slow aging. Kamini, Lani’s younger sister, was like that too. “We’re not talking about mine either.”

I wrenched open the drawstring of my deer hide pack and rummaged for some water. I uncorked the skin and guzzled the contents.

“Well, maybe we should. Sex isn’t something to be embarrassed about.”

I choked and spat water all over my pack. Not embarrassing? I could think of a bajillion different reasons I didn’t want to talk about maypoles and the potential dancing of them, number one being that I was tired and hungry, and rectifying those two things required my full and immediate attention.

“You’ve accepted him as your mate.” Lani took the skin and looked at me pointedly. “Mating is part of nature. Just the same as a plant growing.”

I rolled my eyes as she drank. “Yeah, thanks for that.”

“You do understand how it works, right? Do you need someone to explain where the parts go?”

“No,” I said in a strangled voice. “Please, no. I know where the parts go. My mother explained it all to me. Can we not talk about this?”

Lani said nothing, and as the minutes passed, I slowly relaxed.

Then she went and cleared her throat. “No, sorry, Ryn. I don’t feel right leaving the matter alone. Dyter was hinting at it the other day, but he doesn’t seem comfortable tackling it head on. Who would you prefer to talk to? Dyter or me?”

When she put it like that . . . At least Lani would be far away in a forest. “Kill me now. Okay, get on with it then,” I huffed. “I’ve got things to do.”

Lani peered around the empty mountain top but didn’t call me out on my comment. “Have you had a boyfriend?”

I thought of Tyr, but he—

“Before you found your mate, I mean. Let’s not include him quite yet.”

The only other friend I’d had was Arnik, and he was more friend, not boyfriend. “Kind of?” That was such a lie, but I didn’t want to seem uncool in front of the maybe-Phaetyn queen.

“He was at least a friend, right?”

I nodded.

“Great. Now, think about how you kept the friendship healthy and strong.”

I shook my head. “I didn’t really do anything. We hung out. Played pranks together.”

“Did you ever give him a gift?”

I tipped back my head and pondered a moment. “On his birthday, sure. Otherwise, not really. We were a little poor for gifts. I gave him an autumn leaf I’d pressed flat in my mother’s cookbook once.” I grinned and added with a touch of sarcasm, “Took me ages.”

But there were gifts, small things, like him walking with me to deliver soap. Sometimes, he’d find a pretty pebble and give it to me, and I’d saved plenty of honey-cakes for him over the years.

“Good relationships take effort to keep them healthy, and sex is a natural part of a mate-bond.”

Heat crept into my cheeks. “I knew that.”Kind of.

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