“Things that need to be hunted?”

“Oh yeah.”

“Well, how can I not support that?” He shrugged. “Wait a minute. Is it dangerous? It’s dangerous, isn’t it?” Feeling worried about Keir’s well-being was a new sensation. I’d never had to spend a second thinking ill might befall an immortal sephalion.

I was on the way to getting worked up, when he said, “Stop before you get wound up. It might be dangerous if I went alone, but that’s what brothers are for.”

“That’s what they’re for?”

He chuckled. “We hunt well together. Almost like we can read each other’s minds.”

“Can you?

“Technically no, but close.”

“So, it’s not dangerous.”

“Not with Kill and Kagan.”

“Okay then.”

“I’ll be back before you know it.”

“Doubt that.”

“And you have these lovely, devoted fraighounds to keep you company.”

I looked down at the dogs that had flopped onto the kitchen floor.

The scratch at the mudroom door was my signal that Lochlan was outside ready for our walk. My pups didn’t wait for an okay. They raced each other to the doggy door.

I quickly cycled through playing pitiful about my mate going hunting. Pitiful didn’t suit me anymore, if it ever did. And nobody wants a clingy wife.

With a little shake, I said, “Duty calls.”

“Same here. Oddsmakers.”

I scoffed as I pulled on my modern version of a waxed jacket and tied an orange scarf around my neck. “Later.”

CHAPTER FOURThe Curse of the Beautiful Blonde

Blaes sat across the kitchen table from me. I waited as her magic notetaker was suspended in the air above her folio.

She looked at me and smiled. “Ready?”

“I am.”

“What’s it like being mother of the Irish queen?”

It seemed to me that I wasn’t very good at anticipating questions. I never expected that, though perhaps I should’ve.

“It’s just as wonderful as it was to be Evangeline’s mother when she was purely human.”

“So, you’re close?”

“Yes. Since she’s my only child, it’s the richest of blessings that we get along with each other.”

“Do you also get along with the king?”