. . . my father.

The unspoken words hung between them.

Jillian saw Lucivar brace for a blow he couldn’t dodge. In that moment, despite the anger she felt toward him, she understood that if she said the words, it would shatter what was between them in a way that could never be mended. He would accept the line drawn by the words, and she would never deal with Lucivar again, the man who taught her to handle weapons, who listened to her, who laughed with—and sometimes at—her. If she said the words, he would distance himself from her, and she would be like almost everyone else in the valley and surrounding mountains, dealing with and answering to the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih.

Until that moment, she hadn’t realized how much it had mattered to her that he had treated her like one of his children rather than the girl who came over to help Marian by watching the little ones.

Until that moment, it hadn’t occurred to her that they were both about to fly into some stormy winds.

“. . . being fair,” she finished lamely.

The tension in his shoulders eased, but the bright temper in his gold eyes didn’t fade.

“I don’t have to be fair, not when being fair interferes with my vow to cherish and protect. If I see a threat coming at me or mine, I deal with it.”

“But Dillon isn’t—”

“Enough.”

Defeated, brokenhearted, she stared at the tear-blurred ground between them.

“Hell’s fire, Jillian. He’s just—” Lucivar turned away from her. He swore quietly but with frightening intensity. Then he turned back. “Go home, witchling. And stay home.”

“Yes, sir.” She blinked away the tears but was careful not to look at him. Crying in front of the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih was something little girls did.

She flew back to the eyrie she shared with Nurian. Once she was safely in her own room, she let the tears flow.

* * *

* * *

“What did Rothvar want?” Lucivar asked when he stepped into the kitchen.

“Jillian had left without the lobsters and shrimp she’d purchased,” Marian replied calmly as she cracked the shells of two large lobsters. “Rothvar wasn’t sure if she had purchased them for me or for herself and Nurian, so he brought the food here. I think she was intending to make a simple meal of seafood on a bed of greens, so I’ll shell one lobster and half the shrimp and take it over to her.”

He moved away from the kitchen archway, then back again, wings rustling, hands tightening into fists. She wasn’t afraid for herself—Lucivar believed what his father had taught him, that a Warlord Prince leaves his temper at the door—but she gave Daemonar a psychic tap and reinforced Lucivar’s earlier order to remain in the playroom with his sister and baby brother. That Lucivar couldn’t shake off the anger, had brought it inside their home, worried her.

“What was I supposed to do?” Lucivar snarled. “He had her in an alleyway. His hand was on her breast! Even if she could have used Craft, she wears Purple Dusk and he wears Opal. She couldn’t have held him off if he wanted to do more. And despite what she might have said to you, she was trying to push him away.”

Of course she was, Marian thought. It hurts to have a breast squeezed when it’s already tender from the onset of moon’s blood. The fact that Lucivar knew even the gentlest touch could be painful some days had to have fueled his temper when he saw Jillian with the young Warlord.

She stopped trying to prepare the midday meal, since the man she’d adored through decades of marriage filled up her kitchen with his temper and body, unable to stand still.

“Would you have been so angry if Jillian’s moontime hadn’t started moments before you saw her?” she asked quietly.

No one was ever quite sure if it was psychic scent or physical scent that alerted Warlord Princes to a woman’s moontime, but any female under the protection of a Warlord Prince was protected during the three days when she couldn’t use her own power and was, therefore, vulnerable. The annoying part was that those men were so attuned to the women who were a part of their lives that they usually knew before the women—and reacted violently to anything that might possibly be a threat. The men in Riada had learned long ago to treat her with special care during her moontime whenever she ventured beyond the family eyrie—and Lucivar had learned that nothing more than a snarl from him was needed to have every man backing away. But before he had learned to trust enough, there had been times when even the Eyriens who worked for him had felt his war blade resting just above their skin—a blade honed so sharp that just pressing against it by taking too deep a breath was enough to slice through leather and cloth to reach skin.

Jillian wasn’t a stranger to her moon cycle. She might have rolled her eyes at the required three days of rest at home, but she had never disobeyed that rule. She hadn’t disobeyed today either. This was just unfortunate timing, but Marian feared the conflict between Lucivar and Jillian would escalate if something wasn’t done. More than that, whatever lines were drawn with Jillian would also apply to Titian when she reached an age when boys became interesting as a different kind of playmate.

“I think we should get a second opinion,” she said.

“Why in the name of Hell should we get a second opinion?” Lucivar demanded. “His hand, her breast. I should have ripped off his damn arm instead of giving him a warning choke.”

Mother Night. “We need someone on the outside who can look at this young aristo Warlord without prejudice.”

“Fine. I’ll ask Daemon to come and look at the little prick-ass. Then he can help me bury that whelp in a deep, cold grave.”

“You’d kill him for—”

“I didn’t say we’d kill him.”

Marian swallowed, aware of every muscle that moved in her throat. For everyone’s sake, she needed to jolt Lucivar out of the fury that hadn’t quieted.

“I think we need someone who would make more of an impression than your brother,” she said.

That stopped him. He just stared at her for a long moment. “Hell’s fire, Marian. Who makes more of an impression than Daemon Sadi?”

NINETEEN

Surreal placed her underwear in a dresser drawer, then turned to face Marian. “Tell me again why I’m here?”

“Because Lucivar needs a second opinion.”

“Why doesn’t he ask one of the other Eyriens? They usually have opinions about everything.”

“In this instance, their opinions are useless, because they’re male, they’re Eyrien, and they work for Lucivar, so of course they will agree with whatever line he draws.”