Page 219 of Golden Eagle

When the breeze touched his face, he felt the tightness of drying tears. When he swallowed, his throat felt raw.

Upset, she’d said, but he’d been unconscious and sobbing.

He reached up to touch her face; tucked a strand of honey-colored hair behind her ear. “An overabundance of brotherly emotions, that’s all,” he assured. “I’m fine.”

She frowned. “What did he say to you?”

A chuckle worked its way up his sore throat. “Good things, darling. I promise. I’m just a bit of a mess.”

Her thumb swept across his cheek, across a tear track.

“Can you walk?” Fulk asked, expression set in hard lines. “We should move before we attract any more attention.”

Val sat up, and his balance only wavered a little. Mia and Anna supported his shoulders on either side. Farther down the sidewalk, he noted two women huddled beneath an umbrella, watching them with troubled faces; one held a cellphone.

“Ah,” he said, heat suffusing his cheeks. “I’ve made a bit of a spectacle it seems. I’m sorry.”

“Nah.” Anna sprang to her feet. “We just told them you’d got hold of some bad ‘shrooms.”

Mia huffed a laugh. “No, we definitely didn’t.”

“You’re no fun,” Anna said with a big, pretend sigh.

Fulk held out a hand, and Val let himself be hauled upright; Fulk’s palm, he noted, was clammy, and not from the rain.

Poor mother hen.

They made their way back to the hotel; he didn’t voice it, but Val was glad to get back to their warm, dry rooms. The rain had lost all its charm after his talk with Liam.

He urged Mia to take the first shower – “Honestly, darling, I’ve already cried all over you on a public bench. Don’t unman me any more by letting me bathe first.” She looked on the verge of inviting him in with her, but then hesitated, bit her lip, and said, only, “Okay.”

He traded his damp jeans for sweatpants, and padded barefoot next door to Fulk and Anna’s room.

Fulk opened the door before he could offer his polite knock. His narrow face was drawn – and wasn’t it always? Val couldn’t say he’d ever seen him smile with anything like happiness.

He stepped back and opened the door in invitation. “Good, you need to feed.”

“Well, yes, thank you.” Val stepped inside and heard the water running behind the closed bathroom door. “But that wasn’t the intent of my visit. Anna’s showering?”

“Yes.”

“So is Mia. I wanted to speak with you.”

Fulk sent him a wary look, and then set off across the room. He’d shed his jacket and pulled a soft, threadbare velvet dressing gown on over his t-shirt; its patterns, and the intricacies of its unraveling stitches lent Val the impression it was an old garment, that it was something he’d carried with him for at least a hundred years, lovingly packed away for every trip. He’d been in the process of unbraiding his hair, Val realized, noting the way the unbound braid above his right ear slow unwound itself as he walked to the nightstand. A knife waited there, sharp and clean, glinting under the lamplight.

“Did you really go to see Vlad?” Fulk sat down on the edge of the bed, pushed up his sleeve, and reached for the knife. “Or is that just what you told her?”

“I’m wounded,” Val said. “Even now you doubt my honesty? Were the legends about me really that disparaging?”

Fulk sent him a flat look. “I thought maybe you were trying to spare your newly-immortal, incredibly young mate a bit of a fright.”

“Ah.” Val moved to sit on the other bed, facing him, their knees nearly touching in between.

Fulk smirked. Then his gaze went to the nightstand and he said, “Damn. We’re out of cups.” He set the knife aside and started to rise. “I’ll go and–”

“Wait.” Val made a staying motion, and the wolf eased back down. “I did go see Vlad. He’s preparing a mission to retrieve Romulus’s body.

“And I saw your old fellow Familiar.”

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