Broken Dove (Fantasyland #4)(108)

Then I turned to facing front just as Élan asked, “Do you know how to make snow castles, Miss Madeleine?”

“No, honey,” I answered quietly.

“I’ll teach you,” she declared.

My lips curved up.

Hu…

Fucking…

Zah!

Chapter Eighteen

Brunskar

“Wake her, Maddie.”

I heard Apollo’s soft words and looked up at him standing beside the sleigh.

Élan was tucked to my side, sleeping.

From my experience, the days were always short in Lunwyn so it was dark. That said, it was also late.

And we’d made it to Brunskar, the Drakkar seat.

We’d been traveling for ten days through Lunwyn and I knew the distance was long and the errand important because our hours on the go were longer than when Apollo and I were away on our aborted journey to Bellebryn.

This meant we usually took lunch and dinner by stopping along the way. It also meant Christophe was near-on dropping from his horse (but he’d never do that, as his father would never do that and Chris, I’d learned, was keen to do everything like his dad).

And usually, at the end of the day, Élan was asleep at my side.

So when we stopped, it was to get a sleepy Élan and an exhausted Christophe to their baths (Bella oversaw this), take our own (Meeta and Loretta took care of mine) and hit the sack.

During our long journey I’d learned that Christophe liked studying math and also English (or the language of the Vale). He timidly shared that he liked to study the language of the Vale because he wrote stories (this timidity evaporated when Apollo straight up bragged about how great they were which meant I was able to talk Chris into letting me read one when we got back to Karsvall). Adding to his artistic bent, he liked to draw.

But best of all, he liked to shoot his bow and arrow (and that bulls-eye was no fluke, he practiced any chance he got, even in the midst of eating a sandwich, and I saw close up that he was good at it).

This last was because he also shared what his father already shared with me. He wanted to be a soldier, just like his father.

Élan, I’d learned, did not like any studies. However she did like “serving tea” (when this was described, I knew she was talking about tea parties since Bella, various maids at Karsvall and her dolls were the usual attendees). She also liked to make snow castles and snow witches (what were referred to as snow angels in my world, except you punched a hat into the snow when you were done). And she liked pretty much everything else under the sun.

When she grew up, on the other hand, she was determined to marry Frey Drakkar, “The handsomest man in Lunwyn,” she’d breathed. This was her heart’s desire and she didn’t care that he was too old for her. She also didn’t care that he was married to Sjofn, or Finnie, the Ice Princess of Lunwyn. How she intended to overcome these rather large obstacles, I had no clue and didn’t ask. She didn’t need to know how huge they were so I didn’t share. She would grow out of it and find her own (age-appropriate, single, I hoped) hot guy.

I’d learned all this because Christophe often rode by our sleigh and chatted. He also would take his lunch and dinner with his sister and me. Part of this, I thought, was that he was intrigued with me and not because I looked like his mom. Instead because I stabbed a man and hit another one with a branch and a woman doing those things in this world was intriguing, especially to a boy. But most of it was because his father took his meals with us and nearly always rode by our sleigh and Chris did what Apollo did.

And I’d learned all I’d learned about Élan because she rode with me in my sleigh, was extremely talkative and got excited at every snowflake, stand of trees or bunny who hopped across our path, and she felt I needed to share in her excitement.

I didn’t care if she talked my ear off.

I would listen even if doing it lasted an eternity.

Needless to say, our days in the sleigh were little snatches of heaven for me. I loved getting to know the kids, especially since they were bright, funny, open and interesting.

The nights were the same.

Little snatches of heaven.

This was because, without me asking him to do so, the first inn we stopped in for the night, Apollo ordered a room for each of us and kept doing this throughout the journey. This meant, if the opportunity arose, the children saw him going to his room and me to mine.

But once they were tucked away, he came and slept with me in mine.

Before he slept though, he made sure I came, repeatedly.

Suffice it to say, Apollo missed me too. The first night we were back together, he’d communicated this by holding me in his arms all night (seeing as I was still on my period). He communicated this the first night my cycle was done by not delaying in giving it to me fast and heated (though the second time that night had been slow, gentle and sweet, as had the third).

Since that night, he just gave me the slow, gentle and sweet.

And every night, in his arms, I gave him not-so-fun bedtime stories (though, he’d asked for them) of my life growing up, my mom, my dad, my (kind of) friends and school. Anything and everything he asked, I’d whisper to him as he held me, stroked me and I talked myself to sleep.

He had not yet coaxed me to talk about Pol.

But I knew that was coming.

He had also not shared much about himself.

But I’d see to that once I knew I’d given him what he needed from me.