She was carrying his child.

He closed his eyes and dropped his forehead to hers.

She truly was a powerful witch.

For he thought he was as happy as he could be.

But then she’d do something to make him even happier.

“Cass,” she whispered, lifting her hips to take him deeper. “Do you want a boy or girl? The ritual has to be done early in the pregnancy.”

He opened his eyes.

“No magic.”

“Sorry?”

“We get what we make.”

Her violet eyes melted.

“All right,” she said before she tugged on his beard to demand his mouth.

He didn’t make her tug hard.

He gave it to her.

He also took more ink eight months later.

When they had a girl.

King Mars

Second Floor, West Corridor, Catrame Palace, Fire City

FIRENZE

“Tril,” Mars called impatiently when his wife’s friend saw him and tried to duck behind the door of her room.

She, and his queen, had been avoiding him all day.

He did not like this.

Not at all.

And he knew the reason behind it, one his wife was hiding.

She’d had a visit from her mother that morning.

The woman lived in a grand manse a good forty-five-minute ride away.

He would prefer it to be forty-five days, but he did not often get what he wished in regards to her mother.

His Silence was kind-hearted and forgiving.

Though he did not fail to note when a message came from her mother’s manse sharing the woman wanted a visit, often Silence was most busy.

This usually doing something with his mother. Or Tril. Or Nyx. Or looking after Nyx and Lorenz’s son so they could have time together, like she was a fucking nanny. Or she was with Zosime. Or looking after Guard and Zosime’s child.

Or she was in the garden, reading.

Or off on a ride with Kyril.

Etcetera.

Further affecting his mood was that he had a missive to send to Aramus, but the servant came back sharing all the ravens trained to fly to Mar-el had been, that day, engaged by his queen.

There were bloody twenty of them.

When he’d asked after the message, the man had simply said she had called to Ha-Lah to get a communication to Jorie to make haste in visiting her in Fire City.

She had sent this same message twenty times.

He did not like her mother.

But it was him she would turn to if her mother distressed her.

Not her big brother.

“Oh, allo there, King Mars,” Tril said false casually, dipping her chin and not meeting his eyes.

Allo there, King Mars?

He swallowed back a growl.

“Is my wife in our chambers?” he demanded.

“Um…yes, she awaits you.”

“Tril?” he called.

“Yes,” she said to the floor.

“Tril,” he bit. “Look at me.”