Chapter Sixteen: Melody

 

 

They were lying together, skin to skin, half asleep, when there was a brisk knock on the door. "Hey, Melody," Ben called through the door. "Want to come meet your new baby niece?"

Melody sat bolt upright in bed, stark naked, her hair a tangled mess hanging in her face. "Coming!" she called, and then, hastily, "Don't come in!"

There was a soft laugh from the other side of the door. "Not planning on it."

Melody stretched and swung her legs off the bed. "C'mon." She prodded at Gunnar. "Get dressed."

"You sure I'll be welcome? This is a family thing."

"And you're family," Melody declared. "Mine. If anyone has a problem with it, they can take it up with me. Put some pants on and let's go."

She found clothes that fit her in the dresser, and decided not to wonder where they'd come from—if Tessa brought them, or if her father had taken to keeping spare clothes of hers on hand. She didn't recognize them, but they were in her general style, a soft kitten-gray sweater and gray slacks with a glossy pearlescent sheen. Both looked expensive. Probably Dad, then.

She expected to find Ben out in the hall—either that or to find the hall empty, Ben having gone back to Tessa and the baby. What she was not expecting was her dad, leaning on the wall, looking well put together and slightly bored in that typical Darius sort of way.

"Where's Ben?" Melody asked.

"He's gone to be with his mate. I, on the other hand," Darius said, "have been thrown out of the delivery room, unceremoniously thrown out in my own house."

"I truly can't imagine why," Melody said, tucking her fingers into Gunnar's hand. "So what does it feel like to be a grandpa?"

"I'm sure I'll survive it," Darius said mildly, the corner of his mouth twitching as if to suppress a smile. He raised an eyebrow at both of them. "And what is the prognosis of grandchildren coming from this direction anytime soon?"

"None of your business, that's what," Melody said primly, while Gunnar blushed.

The mansion's medical wing had changed utterly since Melody had last been there some twelve or so hours earlier. Now there were dim lights, candles, and music playing softly. Clearly Tessa had taken full advantage of having minions at her beck and call to do some redecorating.

Tessa herself was lying on a bed in a pile of blankets, with the baby bundled up in a soft pale-yellow blanket and resting on her chest. She looked exhausted but euphoric. Ben was next to her, holding her hand and looking quietly delighted. He kept looking down at the blanket-wrapped baby as if he couldn't quite believe it was real. Darius hung back discreetly in the doorway.

"I'm sorry I wasn't there for the birth," Melody said, hugging her friend carefully around the baby.

"I'm not," Tessa said, hugging her back. "The last thing I wanted was a bunch of other people underfoot, trust me. Ben and the OB/GYN were about all the company I could handle. Do you want to hold her?"

"I—um—maybe?" Melody said blankly, as Tessa put the little blanket-wrapped bundle into her arms. She hadn't realized newborn babies were so shockingly tiny. The baby weighed almost nothing. Her little red face was scrunched up and she had dark curls plastered to her tiny head.

Melody had never thought of herself as a person who was into babies. Only now, looking down at the tiny, fragile little newborn person in her arms, she found herself falling completely and utterly in love.

"What's her name?" Gunnar asked quietly. He'd stepped closer and was looking down at the baby with a soft, captivated expression that went deep into Melody's chest. What would his face look like, looking at a child of his own? She wanted, suddenly, to find out.

"We haven't quite decided yet," Tessa said. "We've known it was a girl for a few months; we just didn't tell anyone. I figured by now we'd have a name picked out, but ..."

"Do you have a list?" Melody asked, glancing up from the baby she was still shyly cradling.

"Sure we do, but it's fifteen names long."

"Darius is an excellent name," Darius said, from the doorway.

"Not for a girl, thank you."

"Daria, then. Very strong name, very traditional."

"She doesn't need a strong name, Dad, she's maybe two pounds at most," Melody said, looking down again at the tiny person in her arms.

"Six pounds, ten ounces," Ben said.

She weighed less than a gallon-sized carton of milk, Melody thought. She would fit inside a carton of milk.

"All the more reason to need a strong name," Darius said, unruffled. He turned at a discreet tap on his shoulder from Maddox, and the two men spoke quietly for a moment. "Ah, we've a guest."

"A guest?" Tessa said, sitting up in bed from where she'd been wilting sleepily on Ben's shoulder. "A guest, in here? I hope you don't mean in here, Darius."

"It's been some time, my Heart," said Heikon, bowing his way into the room.

Ben scrambled to his feet and put himself protectively between Tessa and the rival dragon clanlord. Melody could sense his panther near the surface. Her dragon was bristling as well.

"My mate just had a baby, Heikon," Ben said between his teeth. "I don't know if Dad called you, or if you just decided to show up, but you're not welcome here. Tessa isn't yours anymore, to the extent she ever was."

"I'm only here for a moment." Heikon reached up to touch something on his shoulder, and Melody nearly jumped as a very small dragon uncoiled from around his neck. The little dragon was jewel-green, with glimmering green and copper wings, and there was something sparkly tangled up in its claws. "I'm told you have a baby girl. Where is she?"

"Uh, she's here," Melody said, curling protectively around the baby in her arms, "but I don't think her parents want you to hold her."

"I wasn't going to ask, and I won't be long." Heikon's glance at Tessa was fond and amused, even though Tessa looked like she wanted to strangle him. "Her family served mine faithfully for many years, and I promised a gift to her firstborn. It's okay, Feodran," he coaxed the little dragon, holding it against his chest. "Go ahead and shift."

The little dragon shifted suddenly into a small, cute child, with dark ringlets and large brown eyes. After looking quickly around at all the adults staring at him, the little boy turned his face shyly against Heikon's chest.

"You can give it to her," Heikon said, his voice soft and gentle. "She's here."

He brought the little boy to Melody, who frowned in puzzlement, but didn't back away. "This is my great-grandson, Feodran," Heikon explained. "Feodran, give Tessa's daughter what you brought her."

The little boy shyly unclenched his chubby fists and dropped a glittering gold chain onto the blanket-wrapped bundle in Melody's arms. A green stone winked up at her from the pale yellow blanket, embedded in a setting encrusted with—

"Are those diamonds?" Melody asked.

"Is that a real emerald?" Tessa said.

"She's two hours old, Heikon." Ben sounded somewhere between amusement and exasperation. "At least wait until she opens her eyes before showering her with priceless treasures."

"The jewel is merely a symbol," Heikon explained. "With this offering from our family hoard, our children are bonded in future betrothal, the greatest honor my clan can bestow. This child will be the woman you'll marry someday, Feodran."

There was a dead silence, then Tessa said, "Are you high? The gift you said you were going to give my baby is an arranged marriage?"

"It's traditional," Darius spoke up. "And it's a tremendous honor, particularly given your child's ..." He glanced at Ben. "... unusual pedigree. We don't even know if she'll be a dragon. Truly, it is a surprising act of good faith on the Corcorans' part."

"Whoa." Ben caught his mate as she started to climb out of bed, fists clenched, looking fully prepared to take on both the dragon clanlords who were now eyeing her with wary bemusement. "Settle down, honey. This isn't happening. You got that, Heikon? No way. We're not betrothing our daughter to someone else's kid before she can even walk."

"Damn straight we're not!" Tessa snarled. "This is the 21st century, not the Middle Ages! Darius, we are having words!"

Feodran whimpered and pressed his face into Heikon's chest. "Now you've upset the child," Heikon said.

"You're the one who dragged the child here!" Tessa said, but she softened and patted Feodran's back. "It's okay, sweetie, no one's mad at you. It's very sweet of you to give my daughter a gift. It's a very nice necklace and I'm sure she'll love it ... once she's old enough not to eat it," she muttered under her breath.

"As for you, Dad ..." Ben growled through his teeth as he gently steered his mate back to bed. "I can't believe you knew about this and agreed. Well, okay, I can believe it—"

"It's not as if it's the first time he's done this," Melody said. Everyone looked at her. "What? Dad tried to betroth me, too, when I was just a little older than this."

"Wait, he did what?" Ben said.

"Betrothed me. As I recall, it was to the son of the Lachlan clanlord, wasn't it, Dad? Who was fifteen years older than me, and, as I recall, turned out to be gay anyway."

"My intentions were good," Darius said stiffly. "It would have worked out if either of you had tried to make it work."

"Dad. He's gay. And also at least fifty by now."

"So? We can live for hundreds of years! What's a decade or two, counted against that?"

"What about fated mates?" Gunnar asked. He'd been hovering near Melody, staying out of the fight as much as possible, but she was aware of his solid strength against her back, there to back her up if needed. "You can't just decide who your kids are going to marry. It doesn't work that way for us—for shifters."

"Hmph," Darius said. "Fated mates. Fated nonsense, is what it is. Dragons aren't as concerned about such things as lesser shifters. I wasn't mated to the mothers of either of my children."

"Yeah, and how'd that work out for you, Dad?" Ben said in a tone that indicated his patience was fraying to its snapping point.

"I'll just leave you lot to this, shall I?" Heikon said quickly, tucking Feodran firmly against his chest. "It's past this one's bedtime." Leaning close to the baby in Melody's arms, he murmured, "Enjoy your necklace, little one. We'll talk about the rest of it when you're older."

"No you won't!" Tessa declared, struggling to get up again while Ben held her back. "There are no arranged marriages happening in this family, at least not in my part of this family. Darius! I'm going to strangle you!"

"I'll just walk you out, Heikon," Darius declared, and he and Heikon swiftly vanished.

"I'm gonna kill him," Tessa said conversationally. "If not today, then eventually. I'm going to stab that man to death with a tiny oyster fork in the middle of an uncomfortable family dinner someday. Melody, may I have my daughter back, please?"

"Uh, sure." The baby had been sleeping quietly in Melody's arms, seeming undisturbed by the quarrel going on around her. Melody carefully deposited her back on Tessa's chest. "What do you want to do with, um ..." She held up the necklace. Those were definitely real diamonds.

"I guess it'll be a good start to her college savings fund," Ben said, with a sigh. "I don't suppose you could put it in Dad's safe for me?"

"I'd be happy to." Melody folded it up in her palm. Although she didn't feel the covetous urge for sparkly things in the way some dragons did, there was something very satisfying about holding the gold and jewels, if only for a few minutes. "Is there anything else you two need? Er, you three, I mean."

"A restraining order to keep Darius a hundred yards away from me at all times," Tessa said grimly, and then yawned. Her eyelids were starting to flutter shut.

"He'll stay out of this room for awhile if he knows what's good for him," Ben said. "He has to take the doc home, anyway."

Melody gave her sister-in-law another hug, then Ben, and Ben and Gunnar shook hands. "Congratulations, man," Gunnar said. "I don't know much about babies, but she's real cute."

Melody and Gunnar left, hand in hand. "Were they serious?" Gunnar asked. "About the arranged marriage."

"I'm afraid so. Luckily, my dad does roll with modern times, in his own way, even if he won't admit it. Give him a little while, and he'll probably have convinced himself that breaking the betrothal was his idea, and pat himself on the back for how modern he is."

She let herself into her father's office, and then discovered that the safe no longer responded to the code she used to use. She tried the other passcodes that she knew of her father's, and none of them worked either. If she had been able to open it, she was willing to bet she would have discovered the little case with the dragonsbane had been moved somewhere else.

"Can't get it open?" Gunnar asked.

"No. I guess he changed the code." She placed the necklace carefully on her father's desk.

"I might be able to crack that safe for you."

"Thank you for the offer, but there's no need. It'll be perfectly safe here. No one is going to steal it from the depths of a dragon's lair."

"What if your dad mistakes it for one of his?"

"He won't. Dragons know every piece of their hoard by sight, trust me. He'll know what it is, and he'll keep it safe for her until she's older."

"You trust your dad that much?" Gunnar asked as they turned away, leaving the office to its shadows.

"It's not a matter of trust; it's a matter of honor. My dad has his flaws, boy does he ever, but if it has to do with his honor, you can trust him a hundred percent. He wouldn't steal his granddaughter's dowry."

Gunnar was quiet and contemplative as she locked the office door again. "Are you all right?" Melody asked him. "Is it about your brother?"

"No. Like I said earlier, Nils made his choices, most of them a long time ago. No ..." He gave his head a brief shake. "It's not Nils. I was actually thinking about something your dad said earlier, about dragons living for hundreds of years. Are you going to live for hundreds of years?"

She immediately understood why that was bothering him. "And you're afraid you won't?"

"I know I won't," Gunnar said. "Unless you know something about me that I don't know."

"It doesn't quite work like that." Melody chewed her bottom lip. "From what Mom told me, your lifespan adjusts itself to your mate's. I think that means you'll live longer than most bear shifters, and I won't live quite as long as an unmated dragon would. But that's okay. I don't want to be two hundred years old anyway. I just want to live out a normal lifespan with you, and watch our kids grow up and have kids of their own."

"Kids?" he asked quietly, taking her hand.

"If you want them," she said quickly.

Gunnar leaned in to take her lips in a gentle kiss, and then rested his forehead against hers. "I want whatever you want," he murmured. "Whatever makes you happy. Forever."