Page 17 of A Drop of Venom

One thing Hazel didn’t ask about, and I didn’t volunteer, was why I’d left Izaelon and why I no longer had a clan who claimed me. I’d answer truthfully if she asked, but I preferred not to think of that period of my life. She must have sensed my reluctance, because sometimes she would tilt her head and look at me with those lovely blue eyes and then ask about something else related to my homeland, like a favorite food or drink.

Each night I told myself I’d tell her soon. Just…not tonight. Not quite yet.

Whenever her eyelids finally began to droop, I’d bank the fire and make my rounds of the caves and garden, turning down or extinguishing lanterns and making sure nothing seemed amiss while she changed into her nightdress. And then we’d retire to our nest, with me curled up and my sweet mate safe and warm in my coils after many wonderful good-night kisses and caresses.

Only after her breathing slowed and she slipped into dreams could I allow sleep to take me.

And so the days passed.

My good friend Aluc, the wizard Stosior’s apprentice, traveled on our behalf to nearby villages for the items we needed to transform our caves into a home as comfortable for Hazel as it was for me. We added more furnishings, more lanterns, and human necessities such as bowls, plates, and cutlery, along with little pots for all her dried herbs, a mortal and pestle, and hand tools for garden tending. She now had a small wardrobe as well to store her clothing and other items instead of keeping everything in one of my trunks.

To my great displeasure, she wouldn’t accept purchases of made-to-order clothing other than stockings and a good pair of boots, but she did permit me to buy bolts of cloth and everything necessary for her to sew her own dresses and underthings.

I was not allowed to choose the cloth she used after I’d had Aluc bring her fine silk that caused her to ask me, hands on hips and eyes twinkling with mirth, if we planned to attend a royal ball, or was she supposed to wear it to weed the garden? The cotton and muslin he brought her next seemed too plain, but I did not say so, being an intelligent male who wished to stay in his mate’s good graces.

She didn’t ask for a bed, and I didn’t offer to purchase one. Our current arrangement of curling up at night with her in my coils suited us both quite well.

My hunger for my mate grew by the hour, and the passage of days and then weeks allowed my devotion to ripen into love sweeter than the apples in our garden. She cared deeply for me too; that much was clear from her smiles, kisses, and touches, as well as the way she’d tease and sometimes even scold me. We’d become comfortable together. Our days began with smiles and kisses and ended the same way. My hearts were full and I believed hers was as well. She smiled almost constantly, and often sang gaily to herself as she flitted about the garden or our caves.

For many, many years, I’d lived quietly, save when Stosior or Aluc came to visit. Now any lengthy silence caused me to look around for Hazel to make sure she wasn’t frowning or hadn’t lapsed into a sudden gloom when an ugly memory surfaced. If it had, I gathered her in my arms and comforted her until she snuggled against my chest and smiled. Sometimes she told me what had plagued her thoughts and sometimes not, but as long as she found peace again, I was content.

Each evening she wrote in her bound journals by lantern light, biting her lip in concentration as she filled page after page with neat handwriting. I loved the ink that stained her fingers, and the sounds of her pen clinking against the ink pot and its nib scratching across the paper. Her joy at chronicling her past in one volume and her days in our home in the other was the most perfect accompaniment to my evening reading I could imagine.

This was truly the best and more perfect life I could imagine.

But she hadn’t yet accepted me as her mate, and the lingering worry that she might leave made my hearts feel as if they’d turned to stone in my chest.

My shelshi had given me no promises, and I had no right to ask for one or blame her for her wariness. She’d experienced far too many betrayals and broken oaths during her life to not be cautious with her heart.

I could only be patient and show her each day that I could be trusted with her safety, her well-being, and her love.

And wait.

CHAPTER NINE

HAZEL

I was falling madly in love with a kind and beautiful serpent-man.

Each morning, I woke ready for Terolon’s kisses. During the day, I felt a chill if I wasn’t in his coils. Each night, we talked long after the stars appeared. Every conversation felt easy and comfortable as if we’d known each other for many years rather than only a few weeks.

And in the dark we shared more kisses and explored each other, though his touches remained respectful and my hands never traveled further afield than his chest. I found myself both grateful for his good manners and miffed that he steadfastly refused to take any liberties despite his very obvious desire to do so.

In the days and weeks following his grand declaration of devotion and our first kiss in the garden, I’d waited and watched, eagle-eyed with every instinct on alert, for any sign that Terolon wasn’t the male he seemed to be. For all his pretty words, and for all I wished them to be true, life had taught me hard lessons that made trust seem impossible. But with each passing day, and with every kind and generous thing he did for me, he proved himself a male of his word. At no time did I feel any suspicion about his motives or that he’d been untruthful.

Terolon of Izaelon truly believed I was his athava and his shelshi. I accepted that in my heart now, a lunar after first waking in his coils.

And falling for him felt so easy…save two things.

Despite his openness about life in Izaelon, Terolon clearly didn’t want to tell me why he’d left his home and traveled so far away to a land with cold winters, where his kind were looked upon with suspicion at best and open hostility at worst.

He had wealth—that much was certain, because anything we needed, he quickly procured via Aluc, Stosior the wizard’s kind apprentice who left our packages at the garden doorway. But I didn’t know where Terolon’s money came from, and his reluctance to explain himself troubled me. I didn’t get the sense the explanation was a wicked one, but given he seemed honest about everything else, his visible discomfort anytime he seemed to think I might ask kept me from truly opening my heart to him.

And second, I didn’t know what was hidden beneath the hard bulge I often felt below his scales where a man’s member should be, nor how a coupling between us might work. Or even if it were possible.

If it were possible, could lying with Terolon produce children? The drawings I’d seen had portrayed serpentae begetting monstrous offspring on human women. I was now certain these stories and depictions were utter nonsense, but there might be a grain of truth at the center of the lies.

Sometimes I lay in the garden, either in Terolon’s coils or on the grass, and secretly imagined what our child—what the serpentae called a basiling—might look like. Could I hold a tiny version of Terolon to my breast or cradle him in my arms and look at him with all the love a mother should feel for her child?