Page 55 of The Storm
Ever faithful, always grateful
I will ever be yours.”
The magic surrounded them as they made love, and when they reached their release together, Max’s bright silvertalesmshone in the darkness as Renata’s gold mating marks lit and came to life.
* * *
“We’re one.”She drew in the scent of smoke and magic in the air. “I didn’t know what that meant until now.”
“My mate.” Max smiled and kissed her face, pressing his lips to her cheeks and her chin and her nose until she was giddy with love and magic and power. “My mate, Renata.”
“My mate, Maxim.” She could have brought a generator to life with the power of his smile.
They were lying in their bed carved with stars and flowers, enjoying the moonlight that bathed them from the window.
“Are you happy here?” he asked her.
She rested her chin on his chest. “I am happy with you. So I am happy here.”
“I worried what it would be like to come back here once Thawra and Zana officially moved in. This was your home.”
“But now it’s not. It’s a home that I love. And I love that others will grow up in the safety of these walls. I love that Zana and Thawra will make this a living place again.”
“But?”
She laid her ear over his heart to hear the steady beat. “But my home is with you. Wherever we are. In a cave or in a five-star hotel. My home is with you.”
Though she’d held fiercely to her independence and Max had never argued, Renata had yet to spend a night away from him since they’d come together at Midwinter. She hadn’t needed to, so she hadn’t wanted to. No doubt there would be times in the future where they would be forced apart. They could have assignments that sent them to opposite corners of the world.
But she would always come home to him.
Always.
He was the sword at her side, her cleft in the rock, and her surest shelter in the storm.
THE END
Song for the Dying
When a letter arrives from a remote scribe house in Latvia, Leo and Max must return to their childhood home to face the father and grandfather they’ve left behind. Joined by their new mates, the cousins travel north, but long-simmering tensions rise to the surface as Leo and Max explore their history and reunite with the troubled scribes who raised them.
The past is inescapable, but can it be overcome? Is it possible to build a future of happiness from a foundation of pain?
Prologue
Maxim of Riga stared at the little boy across the table, narrowing his eyes and holding the measured gaze of his small opponent. Geron pursed his lips and leaned chubby elbows on the mosaic tile table, his face a study in concentration until the little boy let out an unexpected burp and burst into laughter.
Max felt Geron’s laughter like birds taking flight in his chest. “I won.”
“You didn’t, Uncle Max!”
He stood and scooped the boy up, placing him on his shoulders. “I did. I won. You have to help me in the garden now.”
“How?”
“See the apricot tree?” Max pointed to the old tree that stood at the far end of the garden at the Istanbul scribe house. The residence had been expanded the previous year when his cousin Leo had brought home a mate. “With you on my shoulders, we are going to be able to reach the very highest apricots.”
“The sweet ones?”
