The King(176)
“I bring greetings from Wrath, son of Wrath,” the male said, still with that shit-eating grin on his face. “And I have a document he’d like to share with you all.”
As he took a cardboard tube out from under his arm and popped the lid free, the aristocrats gasped—like they expected a bomb to go off.
And mayhap there was a kind of one in there.
Rehvenge unfurled a parchment that had red and black ribbons hanging off its end. Instead of reading what had been inked upon it, he merely turned the thing around.
“I think you should do the honors,” he said to Ichan.
“Whatever have you…” The words dried up as the male closed in on what was displayed before him. After a moment, he said,“Tyhm. Tyhm!”
“Yeah, I think you’ll find that it’s all nice and legal. Wrath isn’t mated to her. He divorced her about three weeks ago—and I’m not a lawyer, but I’m pretty sure you can’t base a vote of no confidence on an issue that doesn’t exist.”
The tall, thin solicitor stumbled over and tilted in, as if ocular proximity would increase his comprehension of whate’er was on there.
And indeed, the expression on his face was all the translation that the crowd required: Disbelief turned to a kind of horror, as if an explosive had in fact been detonated right in front of him.
“This is a forgery!” Ichan declared.
“It has proper witnesses—and I’m one of them. Maybe you’d like Wrath and the Brotherhood to come over here and testify to its validity? No? Oh, and don’t worry. We’re not expecting a response from you all. There is none.”
“We leave now,” Xcor whispered.
If he were Wrath, the next move would be to attack the house—and there was not enough cover inside here, that dreadful art and the large open spaces offering little for use as shields.
As the voices of the aristocrats mixed and grew louder, he and his soldiers dematerialized out onto the front lawn. Bracing for engagement, they outed their guns.
Except there was no one there.
No Brothers. No attack. No … anything.
The silence was deafening.
FIFTY-FIVE
As with all great shifts in life, the sun and the moon paid no attention to the drama on the planet, their schedules unaffected by the changing destinies down below.
It was well past midnight when Wrath woke up next to his shellan in their mated bed, his arm around her waist, his hand cupping her breast. And for a moment, he wondered whether any of it had happened—the needing, that shit from the Council, the response.
Maybe it had all just been a fucked-up nightmare.
Cozying in closer, he kept his arousal back. He was going to leave the sexual instigation to his leelan, at least until they knew whether she was pregnant. And if she was … well, then he wasn’t sure what he was going to do—
Holy fuck, was he really thinking like this?
“You’re awake,” Beth said.
“How did you know?” he murmured into her hair.
She turned in his arms. “I just do.”
They lay there for the longest time, and fucking hell, he wished he could see her properly. Instead, he settled for running his fingertips over her features.
“How do you feel?” he asked.
“Victorious.” He could hear the smile on her face. “God, I love Rehvenge. He really took it to the Council.”
When he didn’t say anything, she sighed. “This is a good thing, Wrath. I promise you.”
“Yeah, it is.” He kissed her on the mouth, and then pulled away. “I’m starved. You want to eat?”
“Actually—no. I’m not hungry, but it’s got to be time for First Meal. Unless we slept through it?”
“I think that time is past. And you guys call it breakfast, right?” He got out of bed and went over to let George in from the bathroom. “I doubt anyone else is up. That party went till five in the afternoon.”
As he popped the door, the golden tackled him with the hellos, collar jangling, tail whapping into the doorjambs, Wrath’s leg, the wall as he circled, circled, circled, and sneezed from smiling.
“Wrath?”
“Hey, my man,” he said as he knelt down. “What’s up, big man? Who’s the big man—”
“Wrath.”
“Yeah?”
“Let’s go to work after you eat.”
“You trying to get me back on the horse?” He stroked that smooth head as the dog sneezed again.
“Yes. I am.”
He rubbed his own face. “Shower. Food. Then we’ll talk.”
“Work, you mean.”
The good news, he supposed, was that no one was going to want anything from him in the loo. And as he stepped under the spray before it went warm, he didn’t know why he was hurrying. That wife of his was going to snap his chain until he was back on the throne, pushing papers.