Veria giggled softly. “Man-hungry clutches.”
“Her exact words,” he laughed. “And all I could think at the time was how I would have loved to be drawn in by your man-hungry clutches.”
Veria threw her head back and laughed, louder than she intended, and quickly quieted herself to a breathy chuckle instead.
“If only she knew that I've loved you the entire time I've been engaged to her,” Andon whispered, stroking the thin skin of her neck with his rough thumb. “Then this might be easier. But I'm afraid it is going to come as a bit of a shock. A shock she doesn't deserve.”
Veria swallowed hard thinking of how much it was going to hurt Andon to have to hurt another person. A person that, even if he didn't love, he cared about and had been close to for well over a year.
“I don't want to leave you and Aleon for even a second, though,” Andon sighed.
“We will be just fine,” Veria reassured him in a soothing tone. “We practically have a live in physician now,” she added with a giggle.
“Veria, he has a whole wardrobe here,” Andon whispered with a conspiratorial grin. “And from what I gathered at last night's dinner, they have been having weekly dinners, just the two of them, for months now. So, he may be live-in physician and stepfather soon.”
“Grandpa Turqa,” she laughed. “Oh my goodness, when did this start? How did this start?”
“I haven't the slightest,” Andon shook his head and yawned. “Maybe they will tell us at the wedding,” he joked.
“Oh, can you imagine the lavish dress my mother would insist on?” Veria whispered.
“I am not making it,” Andon chuckled, closing his eyes, “I can tell you that right now.”
He fell asleep quickly again, and Veria drifted off to the sound of his deep, steady breaths.
-XI-
A full week passed before Andon felt comfortable leaving Veria and Aleon, and by that time, Veria was already back to her normal self as far as physical functions were concerned. They were both sleep deprived, but she was walking around the house just fine and felt relatively little pain, besides some pinching cramps in her lower abdomen when she nursed, which Turqa said was normal.
Turqa had also given Aleon daily checkups, insisting to both Veria and Andon that he was the healthiest early baby that he had ever delivered, and he was already noticing incredible improvement in his growth.
“You're doing an incredible job,” he regularly assured them. “Keep up the good work and by the time he's a year old, it will be imperceptible that he was premature.”
Even though she knew it had to be done, Veria's heart ached to watch Andon descend the steps and leave the house. They hadn't been apart for more than minutes at a time since she had shown up in the carriage, moments from giving birth.
While he was gone, Tanisca took the opportunity for some quality time with Aleon, taking him to the nursery and insisting that Veria rest as long as possible. She drifted off in her bed almost immediately and woke up to see the beginning of a vibrant orange sunset out her window, panicked that she had slept so long and no one had awakened her to feed the baby. Her heart pounded as she jumped out of the covers and ran into the nursery, finding him snoozing peacefully in his bassinet, with Irea in her bed napping next to him, while Tanisca rocked in the rocking chair, reading by lantern light.
“Don't worry, Via,” she whispered, as if reading Veria's thoughts. “Turqa cleared Aleon for a bottle of goat's milk. You needed the sleep.”
Veria sighed and nodded.
“Do you feel better?” her mother asked. “You slept for almost six hours.”
“A bit, thank you,” Veria replied.
“When will Andon be back?” Tanisca murmured. “I've told the cook to have dinner ready at six and I would love it if you both would join us at the table instead of hiding in your room with the baby.”
Veria shrugged. “He was going to Haleshore, which is quite a ways northeast. And then he mentioned going by Guyler to pack up his clothes to bring here.”
“My goodness,” Tanisca remarked, “it will be midnight before he gets back. Well, you can eat at the table with the rest of us then.”
“Sounds lovely,” Veria agreed with a nod. “I am going to go freshen up then, since it's nearly six.”
For the first time in a week, Veria put on real clothes—a dress instead of a nightgown and her dressing robe—pulling out the green tent dress that had been one of her standbys from after she had Irea and was still puffy and distended through her waist. She put a few drops of rose oil on her fingers and rubbed the musky, floral moisture into the skin of her face and arms and neck, then brushed her hair and wrapped half of it in a bun, letting the rest fall in curly tendrils down her back and over shoulders.
She left her room and started to make her way toward the dining room, but froze on the landing to the sight of Andon coming in the front door loaded down with luggage. When he saw her, rooted in place at the top of the staircase, he dropped the bags in his arms and stared.
“I should have made your robe in green,” he said finally. “You are ravishing, vina.”
“I wasn't expecting you back this early!” she said, a smile taking her whole face.
“I decided to go to Guyler first,” Andon explained, slowly moving up the stairs toward her, one-by-one, as he spoke, “to change into fresh clothes and get my packing done in the day time, so I would not disturb my father by doing it at night while he was trying to study or sleep. Emmandia was there looking for me.”
“Oh, Andon,” Veria sighed and frowned. “How did it go?”
He reached the top of the steps and took her hands in his. “It was quite awful, as the reason she had come to Guyler in the first place was for comfort following a death in the family. So after she finished telling me about that, I almost couldn't go through with breaking off the engagement.”
“Oh my goodness,” Veria uttered.
Andon sighed. “She took the rest of it better than I anticipated. She cared for me and was doing what her family had arranged for her, but she didn't love me and I'm sure she knew I wasn't in love with her. I just hated doing that to her enough already, let alone after she was so distraught. Not to mention the death she told me of could complicate matters for us, and I've been worried sick over it the whole ride back here.”
“What do you mean?” Veria asked.
“Veria, the death in the family was her second cousin, Lady Ambra,” Andon said slowly. “She died during childbirth three days ago.”
“With a second child, so soon?”
“No, she has lost several pregnancies before this, each one taking a serious toll on her health, physically and mentally,” Andon answered. “According to Emmandia, she wasn't expected to keep this one to full term, either, and she was in no shape to be carrying a child, let alone delivering one.”
“That is awful!” Veria gasped, and Andon pulled her in tightly.
“I don't want to think about it. I don't think I would ever recover if...I don't want to think about it.”
“What about the baby?”
Andon pulled her away from his chest a bit and shook his head, his face pulled into a pained grimace.
“Poor Rames,” Veria muttered.
“Well, I think poor Rames will be visiting soon, Veria,” Andon grumbled. “I am sure after losing both his wife and child, he will be coming to ask for your hand to legitimize Irea.”
“Oh, no,” Veria sighed, shaking her head. “He doesn't know yet.”
“He doesn't know yet, and he absolutely cannot know what Tanisca did,” Andon stated. “Word will spread around the kingdom, and when it gets to Browan, he will assume that she did the same to Aleon.”
“How do we tell him that Irea is yours, then?” she asked him, her tone distraught and desperate.
Andon shook his head again. “I don't know, Veria.” He pulled her back into his arms. “I truly do not know, but we will figure it out. I promise.”
“Tanisca want
s us to dine at the table with everyone tonight,” she told him. “Maybe one of them will have an idea.”
“Ah, yes,” he chuckled, jostling her head that rested against his chest, “genius Uncle Strelzar and his genius plans.”
Veria laughed into his chest, wrapping her arms completely around him and squeezing him tightly.
“What did you do today?” he asked, murmuring into her hair.
“I slept for six hours,” Veria answered.
“Mmmm...” Andon moaned. “I am happy for you but I am insanely jealous. But, I did figure Tanisca would take her chance for a whole day with Aleon.”
“I don't even think you had pulled away in the carriage before she was insisting on taking him,” Veria confirmed with a soft laugh. “I can sleep in the nursery tonight and let you get a full night's rest, if you like.”
“Oh, no, no, vina,” he protested softly. “I want you next to me every night for the rest of my life.”
A fire lit in Veria's core, simmering through her middle and up into her chest. “I like the sound of that,” she purred, burying her lips against his neck.
A growl rumbled in his throat and he pressed her body into his with his hands at the small of her back.
“I love you, Veria Laurelgate,” he murmured, pulling her face away from his neck so he could look her in the eyes.
“I love you, Andon Villicrey,” she responded.
He lowered his firm lips to her soft ones and took her into a passionate kiss. A rush of emotion and memories filled her and she melted into his warm body. He shifted his hands away from her face and wrapped his strong, lean arms around her, one around her back and one behind her neck, steadying her as she arched into him, letting her head fall back against his support. The kiss was desirous and fervent, but also slow and deep, the first time they had been engaged in this level of intimacy since their time together in Barril, many months prior.
Someone cleared their throat at the bottom of the stairs, interrupting their moment of passion. Veria didn't have to look to know who it was. She recognized the sound all too well.
“What, Strelzar?” she asked, pulling her lips from Andon's but not looking away from his face.
“Dinner is served,” Strelzar stated plainly. “And Irea is very adamantly inquiring as to the whereabouts of Dada.”
Andon laughed through his nose.
“We will be right there,” Andon said, not taking his eyes off of Veria.
“And after dinner would you be so kind as to move all your luggage?” Strelzar drawled in disapproval. “I feel like I live in a damn carriage house,” he grumbled as he left the foyer.
Veria and Andon suppressed their shared laughter with their foreheads resting against each other.
“How do you think Strelzar would like being the caretaker of Guyler Estate?” Andon joked.
“Honestly? I think he'd love it,” Veria replied.
“I'll offer him the master suite. Maybe tonight at dinner.”
“I hope you don't have any exceptionally pretty maids.”
“Oh, Veria,” Andon sighed, “that was going to be a selling point!”
“So you do have them?” she asked, cocking her head at him with a smirk.
“No, but he doesn't have to know that.”
Rames announced his visit not four days later, which had Veria questioning whether Andon had some latent abilities in seeing the future that he had chosen not to develop. She couldn't say she blamed him, if that were the case—the skill always seemed to complicate matters more than it helped, and took a toll on the mental health of the Mager.
Strelzar had not been the one to come up with an idea at dinner. In fact, his only contribution was morbid humor: “Wipe his memory,” he had said before downing several gulps of specially ordered Dranspor meade.
“I can't remove just his memories of Irea,” Andon had argued. “I would remove too many of his memories from the last year and a half with them.”
“From what you just told me, I think you'd be doing the man a favor.”
“Strelzar, we are not removing almost two years of a man's memories without his permission,” Veria had sighed.
“But if he asks?” Strelzar had held his upturned hands out to the side in suggestion.
In the end, it had been Turqa who had recommended that everyone wait and see how things went if he showed up first.
“It is highly unlikely he will come with a verifier, because he has no reason to suspect Irea is not his, nor could he have another fatherhood examen done immediately,” Turqa had explained calmly at the dinner table. “It would take him a full day to arrange such things, and then all Tanisca has to do is remove the deception on Irea and whomever he hires to do another examen will be telling the truth. He will naturally be upset, if that's the case, and I will simply tell him I was wrong. Which I was.”
“If he presses?” Tanisca had asked. “I think he'll assume tampering given his attitude towards the family. If you are forced to explain yourself, it may set off alarms with a verifier.”
“You can't say 'I don't know' or 'I made a mistake', for example,” Strelzar had explained, “as neither of those are true and any verifier worth his or her fee will know it.”
“Honestly, I think the best course of action is to talk to him as much as we can before he brings in others. Maybe he will see reason and not try to fight on the matter,” Turqa had said.
“I agree,” Andon had chimed in with a nod.
Which is exactly what it had come to: Veria, Andon and Turqa waiting in the den with a tray of wine, meade, and fine cheeses with herbed bread for Rames' impending arrival. They heard Tanisca open the door for him and greet him warmly, and her attempts at hospitality were met with a curt bark from Rames: “I need to speak with Veria.”
“She is in the den,” Veria heard her mother say in the foyer, and the pair of footsteps grew louder as they came toward her. As Tanisca opened the door for Rames, she added, “Please help yourself to wine and cheese. My condolences for your loss, Lord Rames.”
Rames was dressed entirely in black, dark purple circles framed his eyes, and his face was gaunt and shrouded almost entirely by an unkempt midnight black beard. Upon surveying the room and seeing Veria was not alone, but with two men who were clearly waiting for him, he went rigid and his expression turned vile and defensive.
“What is the meaning of this?” he snapped at the three of them.
“Rames,” Veria said softly, “I know why you are here, and first let me say how terribly saddened I am to hear of your loss.”
“Spare me the niceties. Tell me what this is about immediately, Veria,” Rames demanded.
“To put it bluntly, Rames,” Veria replied, stiffening her spine against his harsh tone, “Irea is not your child.”
“Don't be ridiculous,” Rames dismissed her statement with a wave of his black-gloved hand. “I stood upstairs in this very house when that man,” he pointed to Turqa, “whom I have on good word is the best physician in the kingdom, told me she was mine. Who else would she belong to, Veria?”
Andon crossed his arms and stood completely straight. “I am Irea's father, Rames.”
“I see,” Rames snarled. “I had heard that you broke off your engagement to Ambra's cousin, Emmandia, but nobody seemed to know why. Although, for the life of me I can't understand why she was engaged to you in the first place. I can understand for money, but a bastard, low-life foreigner?”
Andon narrowed his eyes at Rames but did not speak, or hardly move a muscle.
“I was wrong, Lord Rames,” Turqa said calmly. “I don't know what else to tell you, but please do not resort to name-calling or anger against Lord Villicrey. He has suffered in this, as well, missing the first year and a half of his daughter's life.”
“As did I!” Rames snapped.
“That was by choice!” Andon roared suddenly and Veria jumped a bit where she stood by the fire. “You had every opportunity to watch her grow up and you chose not to.”
“Are you saying I'm a bad father?” Rames barked.
“That's precisely what I'm saying,” Andon said plainly. “And even if Irea were your child, which thankfully she is not, there's no way in the Eternal Fire that I would let you marry Veria and take them from this house.”
“Excuse me, but who do you think you are, Villicrey?” Rames scoffed. “What position do you have in your life that allows you to lecture me on fatherhood or deny me what's mine?”
“What's yours? What—They're not things, Rames! They are people. One is a small child who needs constant affection and care and one is a far better person than you in every way imaginable,” Andon said, rage toward Rames evident in his crisp, gravelly, bellowing tone.
“Ha! I would never say that a woman could not be better than myself, but that one?” Rames laughed, gesturing to Veria with a jerk of his head. “A deceptive and treacherous common whore like her mother.”
Andon walked toward Rames slowly, menacingly, intimidatingly, like a prowling predator, lurking in for a kill.
“Maybe you've missed the news in our kingdom for the last year, Rames, and for that I wouldn't blame you, as I know you have had a rough time of recent. So, allow me to fill you in. Veria Laurelgate is the most talented and powerful Mager of our time. She is smarter than you, faster than you, stronger than you, more clever and creative and experienced and knowledgeable than you could even begin to dream of being in your lifetime,” Andon spoke slowly and clearly, and Veria felt self-conscious blood tinge her cheeks and turn them hot as she listened to his praise. “If she wanted, she could have you dead in three seconds, but she wouldn't do that, because she is a good person. Unless you tried to hurt someone she loved, because she is amazingly loyal.”
Daughter of the Diamond: Book IV of the Elementals Series Page 10
