Dragon Prince 01 - Dragon Prince
Page 61
“I think our hatchling is finished for the moment,” Sioned murmured. “Would you like to hold him?”
Rohan accepted Pol into his arms. Sleepy eyes blinked up at him and the child gave an inelegant burp. Rohan grinned. “He doesn’t seem too impressed by the honor.”
Sioned chuckled and tied up the laces of her bedgown. “You get quite enough bowing and praise from everyone else. The last place you’ll find such things is in your own family.”
“Would you believe me if I told you that’s a relief?”
“Of course—and I can hardly wait to see the back of all these highborns so we can be just ourselves again.”
“They’ll be gone soon. But it can’t be the way it was before, Sioned,” he warned gently.
“I know. Too much has changed—especially us.” She smoothed the hair from his forehead, where the silver circlet had left marks. “I understand what’s happened, but understanding isn’t the same as forgiving.”
“I can’t say I care whether Andrade forgives us or not.”
“Nor I,” Sioned admitted. “I love you, and that’s stronger than any faradhi vow I ever made. It frightened me at first. It still does. But I think the one who’ll have to do the forgiving is Pol.”
They put the child to bed in the next room where his nurse waited in the soft lamplight. The carved wooden cradle had been a gift from Chay and Tobin at the New Year. Pale green silk was draped over half the cradle, gathered above the baby’s head in the jaws of a benevolent ruby-eyed dragon whose carved wings spread out on either side to guard him. Rohan and Sioned stayed long enough to make sure Pol was asleep, then returned to their own chamber.
She sat down on the bed to brush out her hair. Rohan lay at her side to watch. Candlelight was soft on the graceful lines of her shoulders and arms, shone golden in her red hair. He was beginning to get used to the single emerald on her hand. Though Andrade had offered to replace the other rings, Sioned had refused. This had been a major point of contention between them, signifying as it did that Sioned, while a Sunrunner, was no longer to be ruled by those at Goddess Keep.
“Lleyn told me something the other day,” Rohan mused. “Andrade may have thought she was mating the powers of a prince to those of a faradhi—but he said that what she really did was join those powers in love. I think that makes us dangerous people, Sioned.”
“More dangerous than Roelstra and Ianthe?”
“Much. They found their power in hate. What if they’d won? There’d be nothing left for them to take their vengeance on. But for us, love—there’s nothing we can’t do, and nothing Pol won’t be able to do. And that makes us very dangerous indeed.”
“No wonder Andrade’s not speaking to me,” she said lightly. Then, setting the brush aside, she smiled and went on, “Now that you mention it, there is someone who’d give full appreciation to being held by the High Prince—dangerous or not. And with the hatchling asleep, there’s a Fire to be rekindled here.”
“My lady, it never went out—and it never will.”