Page 170 of Ironling
Merrick leaned down to kiss his daughter and granddaughter. Rosie laughed up at him, grabbing for his beard, which she always loved to play with.
The gathered crowd held their breath as Merrick and Hakon stood on either side of Aislinn and Rosie. Hakon recognized many faces—Mayor Doherty and many other town elders; all the guild-masters had come; Morraugh, Starley, Burgoyne, Holt, and many more vassals; Allarion and his bride, manticores, half-orcs, and harpies and their human mates. And at the front stood Orek and Sorcha, surrounded by their family, their own new baby boy tucked safely in Sorcha’s arms.
Sharing their pregnancies had only strengthened the friendship between Aislinn and Sorcha, as well as Hakon and Orek. Sorcha’s son Fionn had arrived just two weeks before Rosie, and Hakon suspected they would be fast friends as they grew.
The crowd was full of halflings of all kinds, the Darrowlands home now to dozens of otherly folk and their human mates. A village of them grew on and expanded from the land Hakon had traded to the manticores, and all were fiercely loyal to the liege and heiress who’d provided them with a chance.
Hakon looked upon Aislinn, his heart swelling with pride atthe sight of her holding their daughter. Her expression was still pensive, but her shoulders were back, her spine straight. Rosie gazed out at the crowd curiously, assessing her people.
In the first days after Rosie’s birth, Aislinn had cried with her worries over the life Rosie would lead. Would the people of the Darrowlands truly accept their green-skinned daughter as heiress and eventually liege?
“I, Merrick Darrow, Liege Lord of these lands, have the honor of presenting my firstborn grandchild. I recognize her as Roslinn Darrow, blood of my blood, heiress apparent of the Darrowlands.”
The crowd gazed in wonder at Aislinn and Rosie as Merrick paused to let his declaration resound.
“Who here will pledge their fealty to my daughter, blood of my blood?” Aislinn asked, her clear voice ringing to the rafters of the great hall.
Without hesitation, Hakon knelt. “I do swear.”
Like the tide rolling across the shore, one by one, every knee in the great hall bent.
In those dark hours, when exhaustion and worry for their daughter hung heavily around Aislinn’s neck, Hakon had pulled her close.
“They have loved your father. They love you. And they will love Rosie, too—for your father, for you, and for herself.”
And as Hakon gazed out at the great hall, at the Darrowlands kneeling before his mate and little green daughter, he knew what he’d said was true. The Darrowlands loved them.
But not half as much as he did.
