Page 17 of Fate

She leaned down anyway. Did not indulge. Did not press her lips to his, even as the bond thrummed and her heart pounded. “Are we agreed?”

His hands came up. Buried in her hair at the nape of her neck as they had on the stoop where they’d found one another. And suddenly she didn’t feel as tall as she had. Didn’t feel like the advantage was hers at all.

“Agreed.”

And then he kissed her.

Whichstillwasn’t an apology. And she was going to remind him of that in the firmest possible terms. After. When her heart stopped racing and when her hands stopped reaching for him. When she decided just what her lips were meant to be doing, how they might encourage him just to linger a little bit longer because this...

This finally felt right.

But that was the point of it all, wasn’t it? To get them to bed, to get them as close as two people could possibly be. To make more little fledglings that would fly about and grow until they would be thrust into much these same positions. Struggling and grappling with expectations and fantasies until all that was left was mouths moving and maybe hands too as they gripped and pulled andwanted.

It was petty. Except that it wasn’t.

Mama had said that the beginning mattered. That those initial disputes would be the ones you carried longest.

And she couldn’t... she wouldn’t... let this be one of them.

“Please be sorry,” she murmured against his mouth.

Felt him still.

Felt him pull away from her, which wasn’t what she wanted. Not at all. Not when her blood had turned to fire in her veins. Not when she felt as if she was beautifully, perfectlyalive.

But she blinked at him even as he studied her. Didn’t push him back and take his mouth and his bitterness and turn it into something lovely.

“Please don’t tell me you think I’m something less.”

He swallowed.

And that hurt.

That his reassurances were not quick. That he had to think about an answer rather than promise her it was all nonsense. That he was pleased with her, that he could imagine no other...

Sweet words. The kind that her father always made. Until Mama rolled her eyes and swatted at him with a dish towel and banished him back to his workshop.

“My family,” he began slowly, his thumb coming to touch her bottom lip. And that was something, wasn’t it? “Is an old one.”

Weren’t they all? Everyone came from someone. On and on it went, beyond memory or books or even the legends of white cities and eggs and creatures from the sea.

But she didn’t tell him that was ridiculous. Not when the bond wavered uncomfortably, and she had to take a sharp breath inward until it settled again.

“All right.”

If this tower was his home, then she supposed he meant it was animportantfamily. Perhaps his father was an arbiter. One of the negotiators when the trade ships came from foreign lands, wanting to settle or simply sell their wares at the market before taking to their vessels again. Some to return, others to take tales of winged folk and their fine city.

“A lawmancer,” he continued, trying to catch some hint of recognition in her features. Not just the keeper of law. But the crafter. That could sit and twist and poke at it until it was all orderly again, new and whole for a fresh generation, with all the complications therein.

Firen swallowed, standing straighter.

And he let her go. Let her stand and look down at him as he sat where she’d insisted. They studied. There would be rooms dedicated solely to books in this tower. And because his family wasold.Because the station had presumably been held in perpetuity, they’d grown lofty in their opinions of themselves.

“Mating is outside the law,” Firen reminded him, her voice a little too breathless, a great deal too tight. “Even a lawmancer could not fault a bond.”

Lucian nodded his head. “That is true. But he could fault a son for going outside of hisapprovedcircle. He could make his mate feel small and unwelcome. Could give away thisfinetower and all the knowledge within it, and leave us without funds or shelter.”

Firen nearly rolled her eyes at that. Perhaps Lucian was without skill in a trade, but she was not. No fledgling of hers would starve while her family lived, nor while she could craft a chain, practical or decorative.

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