“I worried what it would be like to come back here once Thawra and Zana officially moved in. This was your home.”
“But now it’s not. It’s a home that I love. And I love that others will grow up in the safety of these walls. I love that Zana and Thawra will make this a living place again.”
“But?”
She laid her ear over his heart to hear the steady beat. “But my home is with you. Wherever we are. In a cave or in a five-star hotel. My home is with you.”
Though she’d held fiercely to her independence and Max had never argued, Renata had yet to spend a night away from him since they’d come together at Midwinter. She hadn’t needed to, so she hadn’t wanted to. No doubt there would be times in the future where they would be forced apart. They could have assignments that sent them to opposite corners of the world.
But she would always come home to him.
Always.
He was the sword at her side, her cleft in the rock, and her surest shelter in the storm.
THE END
Song for the Dying
When a letter arrives from a remote scribe house in Latvia, Leo and Max must return to their childhood home to face the father and grandfather they’ve left behind. Joined by their new mates, the cousins travel north, but long-simmering tensions rise to the surface as Leo and Max explore their history and reunite with the troubled scribes who raised them.
The past is inescapable, but can it be overcome? Is it possible to build a future of happiness from a foundation of pain?
Prologue
Maxim of Riga stared at the little boy across the table, narrowing his eyes and holding the measured gaze of his small opponent. Geron pursed his lips and leaned chubby elbows on the mosaic tile table, his face a study in concentration until the little boy let out an unexpected burp and burst into laughter.
Max felt Geron’s laughter like birds taking flight in his chest. “I won.”
“You didn’t, Uncle Max!”
He stood and scooped the boy up, placing him on his shoulders. “I did. I won. You have to help me in the garden now.”
“How?”
“See the apricot tree?” Max pointed to the old tree that stood at the far end of the garden at the Istanbul scribe house. The residence had been expanded the previous year when his cousin Leo had brought home a mate. “With you on my shoulders, we are going to be able to reach the very highest apricots.”
“The sweet ones?”
“Yes, my friend. We will get the first apricots of the season and eat them all.”
“I don’t have to share with Matti?” the little boy asked about his twin sister.
“Well…” Max considered how Geron’s parents would answer that, then shrugged. He wasn’t a parent; he was an uncle. Entirely different thing. “Is Matti picking them?”
“No.”
“Then Matti is on her own.”
Their watcher, Malachi, had overseen the expansion of the property when their longtime neighbor had passed away and the family had sold the house. They had taken down the wall between the two Ottoman-style structures in the Beyoğlu neighborhood and joined the properties. The neighbor’s fruit trees were only one of the benefits of the expansion.
Standing under the green leaves of the apricot tree in the first blush of summer with a wiggling, laughing child on his shoulders, Max thought about how different Geron and Matti’s childhood was from his own.
Max and his cousin Leo had been raised in the Riga scribe house among warriors and grief-stricken men recovering from the chaos of the Rending. There had been no playtime or laughter in his youth. He had been trained as a soldier from the day he could pick up a sword. The only moments of respite had been when Max and Leo could escape to the woods near the house and play on their own.
Even those moments had been brief. The two boys were rarely unguarded. As two of the few surviving children of the Rending, they had been watched over obsessively. Too many others had been lost.
Matti and Geron were growing up in a new world. Not only were they part of a family, they were some of the first children of a new generation of Irin, children born to a world working toward reconciliation instead of recovering from war.
Max felt the soft brush of a rosy apricot on his cheek.
“I got one, Uncle Max.”
“Good work, myshka.” Max put the apricot in his pocket and steadied the boy on his shoulders as Geron reached for higher fruit.
Bees thrummed in the late spring sun, filling the garden with their peaceful drone. Max could hear voices in the kitchen, good-natured banter between the couples and friends who filled the house.
Since he had mated with Renata, there were three women in the scribe house. He and Renata weren’t always there—they traveled in their work for the council—but Istanbul was home.
Home.
The first one Max had ever had.
Leo lifted his pen from the manuscript he was copying when he heard the front door open. The steps told him it was Rhys, likely returning from errands.
“Max?” Rhys called.
“In the garden,” Leo said. He stretched his arms up and out, flexing shoulders that had grown stiff.
Rhys walked in the library and tossed a letter on the table. “It’s addressed to both of you.”
Leo picked it up cautiously, looking at the return address.
Vienna.
Soldiers rarely received personal mail. Most Irin scribes and singers had taken to the efficiency and anonymity of electronic communication with ease. Paper communication was usually reserved for watchers like Malachi or academics like Rhys.
Leo turned it over. It was addressed to Max Iverson and Leo Pēterson, the names they commonly used on human legal documents. He could feel another envelope within.
“Renata?” he called.
His new sister-in-law walked in from the kitchen. “What is it?”
“Can you call for Max, please? There’s a letter addressed to both of us.”
The letter was heavy in his hands. He reached for the blade he used to sharpen his quill and opened the outer envelope. He slid out the second letter—the true message—and saw the names on the front. Saw the address.
Peteris of Kurland
Dunte, Vidzeme
Watched by Riga
Leo dropped the heavy linen paper to the table, barely registering the wax seal of his father’s clan or his true name on the front of the envelope. Leontios, son of Peteris. Maxim, son of Ivo.
Max walked in a second later and put a hand on Leo’s shoulder. “What is it?”
“A letter from my father. Addressed to both of us.” Leo looked up.
Max looked as confused as Leo felt. “From your father?”
“I haven’t heard from him since I received my first assignment in Riga.”
Max muttered, “Peter was never a talkative man.” He nodded at the letter. “Open it.”
Leo shoved it to Max. “You open it.”
“Fine.” Mouth set in a firm line, Max broke the wax seal on the envelope and unfolded the letter. He read for a few moments, then set the letter down in front of Leo. “I’ll tell Renata and Kyra to pack.”
Leo picked up the letter. It was only a few lines, which was all he would expect from the coldest, most silent man on the planet.
Leontios and Maxim,
Artis is dying.
Come home.
Peteris
Chapter One
Riga, Latvia
Kyra was never sure how she would be received when she visited an Irin scribe house. When she was in Istanbul, she was home. Leo was her North Star. Ava and Renata were her sisters. Max, Rhys, and Malachi the teasing, protective brothers who made life familiar. She’d been raised with her brothers, often the only woman among dozens of men. Her father, the archangel Barak, had other female children, but he kept them apart. It was part of the illusion the Fallen created to convince their daughters, the kareshta, that they were frightening and unstable.
It was a view shared by many of the Irin race, which was why Kyra was never sure of her reception. Renata was welcome anywhere. As one of the revered Irina singers—and a warrior no less—Renata was the hope of the future and nostalgia for the past wrapped in a confident, beautiful package.
Kyra was other. Traveling always made her keenly aware of that.
Max and Renata walked ahead of them in the airport, practiced travelers in almost any situation. They walked with their arms around each other, dark and light, a perfectly balanced couple.
Kyra and Leo walked behind them, following their lead as they passed through customs and immigration. Her paperwork said she was married to the man at her side. In the human world, Leo was her husband and a native Latvian. The officer looked at Kyra. Looked twice. Blinked and looked down at her paperwork one more time before his eyes went to the giant standing behind her.
She was beautiful—even those who hated her admitted that—but she was feared and distrusted by most in the Irin world. With her luminous skin and otherworldly golden eyes, she wouldn’t be mistaken as human by anyone with even a drop of angelic blood. She was marked as other by humans and Irin alike.
Except for Leo.
After they passed through immigration, he slipped his hand into hers and pulled it to his mouth, kissing her knuckles before he pressed it to his chest. She could feel his heartbeat, feel the magic of his talesm alive on his skin. His need for her centered Kyra and refocused her attention. Being nervous was an indulgence. This trip was about Leo.
“How are you feeling?” he asked her.
“I’m fine.” She squeezed his hand. “Don’t be concerned about me. Are you worried?”
“About you? Always.”
“No, not me. About your grandfather.”
“Not worried.” His deep blue eyes were fixed on some point in the distance. “I’m… sad.”
“When was the last time you saw them?”
“Over one hundred years ago.” His voice dropped. “Max and I didn’t come back after we left the academy and received our first assignment. We had each other.”
Max and Renata stood at the luggage carousel. “They didn’t expect us to come back,” Max said. “They had raised us and trained us. We had duties to fulfill. I’m surprised Peter even wrote us about this.”
Renata passed Kyra a look that told her exactly what the other woman thought about that. Even to Kyra, whose family was the opposite of functional, it sounded heartless.
Kyra asked, “Do you know any of the men at the house here? Are any of them the same as the ones when you were young?”
Leo said, “A few.”
“More than a few,” Max said. “The watcher is different, but most of the soldiers are men we know.”
What did that mean? Kyra sensed no anticipation or expectation of homecoming from either Max or Leo. They seemed to be on autopilot and had been since the day the letter had come.
Based on their home in Istanbul, Kyra had assumed Irin families were stronger than the fractured bonds between children of the Fallen. Perhaps she’d been wrong. Perhaps nothing would be what she expected. She gripped Leo’s hand more tightly.
Whatever came, Leo was hers and she was his. Of that she had no doubt.
Renata was trying her best not to let the anger she was feeling bleed into Max. They were mated, and Max was unusually perceptive of her moods, often identifying what she was feeling before she did. It was part of the reason they worked so well together. But for this trip he needed support, comfort, and strength, not anger.
She wasn’t angry at him of course. She was angry for him. She’d known his childhood hadn’t been a happy one. Unlike Renata, Max and Leo had grown up after the Rending. They had no memories of a balanced home with Irina influence. They had been little more than valuable child soldiers to the Riga scribes. Max had once casually mentioned sword training at the age of six.
Renata’s head had almost exploded.
They walked outside and waited for a minivan to taxi them to an address on the other side of the city. Max loaded their luggage in the back of the van, then slid next to Renata, reaching his arm behind her to pull her close.
“Okay?” she asked.
Max only nodded.
Renata’s childhood in the mountains of northern Italy had been one of stories and adventure and indulgence. As the only daughter of two librarians, she’d been surrounded by Irin history and lore. Imagination and creativity had been cultivated. From speaking with Rhys and Malachi, she knew they’d had similar childhoods. Protected and indulged in Irin communities until it was time to start training at thirteen.
Max and Leo had started at six. Possibly earlier. They had been raised to be soldiers by hardened men. The only family they had had cast them into war as soon as they’d reached maturity.
If Renata bit her tongue any harder, the tip would fall off.
It was after rush hour, but the days were long in Latvian summers. Cars zipped by them as their silent taxi headed northeast from the airport to the Mežaparks neighborhood.
It was Renata’s first visit to Riga. Max didn’t keep a home here. She’d never heard him mention going back, though he’d had an apartment in Oslo as long as she’d known him. As far as Renata had been able to tell, Riga was a quiet and safe city, so Max would have little reason to visit.
Mežaparks was a thickly wooded neighborhood of large homes and gated estates seven kilometers north of the city center. The sky was still a pale grey-blue when they pulled up to the old house and parked by the gate. Renata could hear dogs barking in the distance, but no one waited for them.
Leo buzzed the keypad on the gate as the taxi pulled away.
“Did you call anyone?” Leo asked.
“No. They’ll be expecting us. They’re the ones who sent the letter from Peter.”
It was telling to Renata that Leo did not call his father by any title. Max didn’t call him uncle. He was Peter. Their grandfather was Artis.
Leo shoved his hands in his pockets. “Maybe we should have called.”
“I told you—”
The speaker on the keypad crackled. “Yes?”
Renata looked around the entry, but she could see no cameras or modern surveillance equipment.
Max bent down. “Tell the watcher Maxim and Leontios have arrived from Istanbul.”
“Along with our mates,” Leo added.
“A moment.”
A buzzing sound signaled their welcome. Renata pushed the gate open, reaching for the bag she’d hastily packed.
“We were expecting you, brothers.” A different crackling voice. “We did not know you were bringing your mates. They are most welcome.”
The speaker went silent, and Renata held the gate as Max, Leo, and Kyra grabbed their luggage. Leo, as usual, was treating Kyra as if she were made of glass. Renata tried not to roll her eyes. Her sister-in-law was a capable woman with a strong mind. She’d fooled Renata on first meeting but had quickly revealed an iron will and an excellent understanding of human nature. Renata approved of her new sister wholeheartedly. The two women were as different as night and day, but then so were Leo and Max.
Leo cosseted his mate, but Renata couldn’t find fault. They were too happy. Too adoring of each other. Kyra had lived most of her life with a wolf at her back. If it gave Leo pleasure to pamper her, Renata would never criticize.
Max grunted beside her as he threw a second backpack filled with books over his shoulder. “What did you pack in here? Is this my bag or yours? I don’t remember packing anything this heavy. Why aren’t you carrying this?”
Ah, her doting lover. “I packed your travel desk and the manuscript you were working on in Italy. You haven’t had time to work on it since we got back to Istanbul.”
“You think I’ll have time here?”
She slipped her hand into his. “We are here until he is gone, aren’t we? In times of waiting, it is good to have things to do.” Renata could feel Max’s eyes on her. “What?”
>
“I love you.”
The warm weight of his words settled in her chest. “I know.”
They walked up the driveway through an alley of linden trees, taller oaks dotting the property. The house was set back from the road, three stories tall with golden windows shining in the dusk. The front door opened and two figures appeared in silhouette.
“Is that Volos?” Leo asked.
“I think so.”
“He cut his hair.”
Renata said, “Well, it has been roughly one hundred years. He might have wanted a new look.”
Both Leo and Max looked at her as if she were speaking a foreign language. Only Kyra offered her the ghost of a smile.
“He is coming,” Kyra said.
The scribe that approached didn’t say a word. He appeared middle-aged, and his face was lined. His hair was a rough crop of grey and brown, and he wore a trimmed beard. He paused a few feet before he reached them and stared, first at Renata and Kyra, then at Max and Leo.
“Volos,” Max said. “It is good to see you well.”
Volos nodded to them, then he bent down and reached for Renata’s suitcase. He hoisted it over his shoulder, then reached for Max’s bag. “I’ll get the others if you want to leave them here,” he muttered.
“It’s fine,” Leo said. “Thank you, brother.”
Volos nodded and turned back to the house. Max took one of the bags from Leo’s shoulder and kept walking.
“He’s a talkative one,” Renata said.
“Just you wait,” Max said. “Compared to the rest of them, Volos is a comedian.”
Kyra studied her plate as she ate, resting a hand on Leo’s leg under the table. Her mate was uncanny at understanding when she was uncomfortable, and Kyra had been uncomfortable the moment she walked through the door.
None of the scribes had said anything rude. None of the scribes had said anything at all. But they watched. She could feel their eyes examining. As Max and Renata engaged the new watcher of the house—a friendly Dutch scribe named Levi—Kyra and Leo ate on the other side of the table. The meal was simple, a bowl of lamb stew, bread, and fresh milk. It smelled delicious, but Kyra barely tasted it. Five other scribes joined them at the dining table.
The Storm Page 13
