He and Rúnda circle each other in the clearing. Fog settles across his mountain nearby, sending the craggy twisted peaks into the purple-silver sky. The trees sway. Their people have gathered in a small round space where the forest breaks, near enough to the heart of the woods that its sleepy magic pulls at them, but not close enough for it to be dangerous. The trees are asleep, not calling to Iohmar, and his folk know never to stray where the mist is permanent.
Galen is playing his lute in the shade, the instrument giving off several tunes mixing into a gentle song. Lor sits between his legs. Blue flowers push up through the grasses. Rúnda twirls a stick in her palm, intensity in her smile. She does not carry a weapon as Iohmar does, though neither would consider drawing on the other. Iohmar finds a matching stick among the grasses and rolls his shoulders.
She strikes first, dancing around him as he deflects and keeps his defenses. Neither is aggressive when their people watch and compare the two leaders good-heartedly. Sometimes, in private, they spar for serious practice, but both their gifts are lent to magic rather than blades. Iohmar can practice with his kingsguard whenever he wishes.
Rúnda tries to dart behind him, to get his back open and vulnerable. Ducking, he swoops up under her arm to catch her off the ground. Her ankle hooks around his, rolling them both to the grass. Laughing, she slithers over him, a beam of light in the honeyed afternoon, hovering in a halo of hair.
“My sweet lord,” she says with a grin.
Dáithí laughs from somewhere over the grass, others joining. Iohmar smirks up at her—being bested by her in play is perfectly acceptable with the love between their people.
Rolling from under her, he adjusts his robe and flits out of the way before she can grab at his legs.
“Rú!” Lor takes off from Galen’s side for Rúnda at full speed, unstable on the lush woodland floor. He trips over clumps of moss and grass and bounces into her legs, two lithe twig arms wrapping around her left leg.
“Eeee! Hello, little sweet,” she says, sweeping him into her hold, nuzzling her nose into the side of his neck. He grabs her ears as he does with Iohmar’s horns.
The line of trees opposite the gathering is free of listening ears. Iohmar finds a space under a great oak where they won’t be seen by watching eyes. Slipping down shoulder to shoulder, Rúnda intertwines her legs with his. Now they’ve nothing interesting to offer, their folk return to their laughing and feasting and drinking and finding shady spots to do secret things. Galen watches them over the tops of the grasses for a moment, then focuses on his lute.
Iohmar keeps vigilant for wolves or other creatures lurking to cause mischief, but their little gathering is left alone. Only the creature he sometimes travels with pushes its long limbs from the vegetation, fur drifting in the breeze.
“He is lovely,” Rúnda says, releasing Lor to toddle between the trees, never out of Iohmar’s sight. “He will stay this age for quite a time, won’t he?”
“Most likely. He’s been slow to grow.”
She smiles against his cheek. “You love him this age.”
“Perhaps.”
“Hmm,” she hums, then laughs. “Does he still crawl into your bed every morning? I used to crawl into my mhamaí’s bed when I was small.”
Iohmar tries to imagine her as a little thing dancing about the top of her tower, calling to the winds to fly her away.
“Yes, of course,” he says, resting the side of his horns against the top of her head. He drank too much wine before they sparred—which didn’t help his chances—and sleep is calling.
Since he first learned to toddle, Lor has taken opportunity to follow his father wherever he goes. When Iohmar sits at his desk, Lor crawls under it. When he leaves his chambers, the boy waddles after. When last he received a guest to his Halls—a small group of fae who’d spent their time in the woods and wished to visit their kin in the mountain—their eyes were distracted by the child thinking he could sneak about where Iohmar wouldn’t notice.
Most endearingly, he crawls from his bed woven into the wall and hauls himself onto the blankets of Iohmar’s. If Iohmar is alone, Lor wriggles under the covers and within the soft shirt Iohmar wears to sleep until he’s tucked against his bare chest. In the cool warmth of the morning and solitary space of his chambers, Iohmar doesn’t mind the boy touching his scars. Not at this age.
If Rúnda is there, Lor squeezes himself between the two and giggles.
Rúnda pinches Iohmar’s darkened fingertips between hers and inspects his talons. He still hasn’t told her of how Lor came to be. Or of the woman in the tunnels.
Or of the illness.
He did explain how his fingers came to change color, about how he touched the shadows near his mountain. Like Galen, she did not approve but did not lecture him as Galen had taken it upon himself to do. Still, the desire to protect Lor’s existence, and the way he became bonded to Iohmar’s magic, has a stranglehold on his words. He trusts Rúnda. He wishes to confide in her. But she hasn’t pushed the topic, though she must consider it whenever she looks upon him and sees the difference in his features. What will she think of the king beneath the earth making such a foolish decision for a human child?
Iohmar sighs, and Rúnda drops his hand as if she’s caused it. He puts his fingers back over hers.
“What are you thinking on?” she asks.
Iohmar waits until Lor has presented them with a handful of lichens and returns to his scavenging. “I am wondering what you’re thinking on.”
She flicks him in the ear. “I’m thinking you’re worrying yourself into a knot over something and not telling me.”
“You’ve known me for centuries. I worry and complain. Have you only now noticed?”
“Actually, you don’t complain,” she mumbles. “Perhaps you should.”
“Don’t I? Perhaps it’s my own mind I’m complaining to.”
“Io.”
“My sweet queen.”
“Stubborn.”
“Meddling.”
“Hah!”
He leans his full weight against her until she collapses. Long grass obscures them from prying eyes.
Guilt nags at him, so he says, “I’m worrying over the shadows. They’re strange. I see them every so often and still cannot tell from where they came.”
“Do they approach you?”
“Not since last time.” He raises his darkened fingers.
