He wanted more of what they had shared the night before—wanted more of her.
He wanted it all.
Serek squirmed in her arms, whining in frustration, and closed his fist tightly on the tender flesh of her breast.
Leyloni winced and carefully dislodged his mouth from her nipple before drawing him away. “I am sorry, young one. There is no milk to be had. At least not from me.”
“You are unable to provide him with milk?” Arysteon asked.
“A woman produces milk when she is carrying young and continues to do so for as long as that baby feeds.”
Serek released a high-pitched wail, tears brimming in his eyes.
Leyloni held the young one out to Arysteon. “Could you change his diaper cloth for me? I will get his food ready and then…uh”—her cheeks pinkened—“clean up before we leave.”
Arysteon accepted the hatchling—baby, that was the term Leyloni had used—in a careful grip as Leyloni stood to perform her tasks.
Serek’s wails ceased abruptly, and he turned his eyes toward Arysteon, staring in silent wonder for several moments before reaching forward and patting Arysteon’s forearms with his chubby little hands.
The sound of those tiny slaps produced a huge smile on Serek’s face, prompting him to repeat them. Arysteon laughed, his own smile wide enough to make his cheeks ache. These two humans were his clan now, his kin, and he did not regret making it so. He’d do everything and anything he could to provide for and protect them.
As daunting as it seemed, he would not let the task of changing a soiled cloth give him pause. It would be helping his mate and Serek at the same time. Besides, though Arysteon himself had not changed Serek’s diaper cloths, he’d seen Leyloni do so many times over the last few days. It couldn’t have been that difficult.
Serek pressed his little lips together. His body tensed, his face turned red, and he grunted.
Arysteon’s smile died, and he clamped his teeth together to keep his tongue inside his mouth. Unfortunately, that could not protect him from the stench that had already befouled the air, malodorous enough to nearly make him retch. He turned his face away and extended his arms to put some space between himself and the doubly soiled diaper cloth, breathing in what bits of fresh air he could find.
“I see you are keen on doing me no favors, little human,” Arysteon said.
Serek squealed with laughter.
11
The grayish dawn light to which Arysteon had awoken was gone by the time he, Leyloni, and Serek exited the lair, having given way to the golden glow of midmorning for the first time since the storm had begun a few days before.
Water droplets clung to the surrounding foliage, occasionally catching the sunlight and refracting it in sparkling, gemlike displays as they made their inevitable journeys to the ground. The visible dirt was wet and dark, the carpet of fallen leaves sodden, and the standing puddles bore dark reflections of the forest canopy with flashes of blue sky between the swaying leaves.
Arysteon paused in a shaft of sunlight that was streaming through the tangled boughs overhead. It warmed his scales, chasing away the lingering chill in the air. In a few more weeks, that early morning chill—the last breaths of the past winter—would be forgotten.
Where would he and his humans be by then?
He turned to face Leyloni, who was just behind him with Serek in her arms. The sight of them made Arysteon smile; she smiled back.
Arysteon could not deny his excitement. So much of his life had been spent traveling, wandering, searching for a place, and he’d wearied of it long before he’d first arrived here. But so many years in one place, all alone, had been little better. With a new clan at his side, he was eager to go out again, to see the unknown and find a new place to lair.
His gaze rose from his clan to his lair, and his smile faltered. Though that entrance was at least three times his current height, it remained wholly familiar to him. He knew every one of the shaped stones that formed it, knew all the strange, timeworn carvings, knew which cracks had formed in the years since he’d come, and which had already been present.
Though his attachment to Leyloni and Serek was a thousand times stronger than his attachment to this place, this had served as his home for more than two centuries. He had dreamed of bringing his future mate here, of building a nest for their eggs inside,