Chapter 578: Married Life
Deep underground in the ancient fortress of the Vale of Mists, Nyrielle stood with inhuman stillness on a raised step while Zedya moved carefully around her with a needle and thread. The hearth in Nyrielle’s bedroom filled the space with uncommon warmth while dozens of oil lamps scattered about the luxurious room filled the space with their flickering golden glows.
"Will Lady Ashlynn be visiting you tonight, Mistress?" Zedya asked as she adjusted the lace accent draping over Nyrielle’s slender hip before pinning the dark lace against the midnight blue silk of the dress.
"As much as I wish that she would, she’s gone to visit Ollie’s vigil tonight. Now that he’s entering his eighth day, I don’t expect to see her again until he passes his trial," Nyrielle said with a trace of audible disappointment in her voice that surprised even her. "Why do you ask?"
"Because you’ve lit a fire in the hearth," Zedya said simply as she circled around to Nyrielle’s other hip to hang a matching piece of lace. "You don’t require the warmth, and neither do I. You could have left the room cold and settled for lighting the lamps, but you didn’t. You lit the hearth, so I assumed that you were warming your room to entertain Lady Ashlynn."
"Am I that obvious in my desires?" Nyrielle asked, turning ever so slightly so she could meet Zedya’s gaze. "Do you think I’ve become foolish like a maiden since Ashlynn..."
"No," Zedya said before Nyrielle could even complete her thought. "No, Mistress, you haven’t become foolish," she said, standing up straight so she could look directly into Nyrielle’s midnight blue eyes. "You are happier, less restrained, and forgive me for saying it, but more driven than I have ever seen you before."
"None of that makes you foolish," she said as she returned to her work, adjusting the lace accents on Nyrielle’s dress. "You have desires now that you didn’t have before, and you act on those desires, even if it’s something as simple as lighting the hearth in the hopes that Lady Ashlynn will visit your chambers tonight."
"Zedya, do you, do you mind answering a personal question? You don’t have to if you don’t want to," she added, her face heating slightly. "But I wanted to ask you something about Lennart and how the two of you are... adjusting, I suppose. To life together."
"Mistress, I have no secrets from you," Zedya said, smiling up at her suddenly awkward lady. "You can gaze through my eyes at any time, and I imagine you could do the same with Lenny’s if you needed to. I’ve never expected to hold anything back from you."
"This is different," Nyrielle insisted. "What you do in your private time belongs to you alone, and I would never intentionally intrude on your time with Lennart. But, how is he adjusting to sleeping through the day? And are you, are you sharing a bed when you sleep for the day, or do you withdraw from each other until night falls?"
"Oh," Zedya said, her face heating slightly as a shy smile formed on her lips. "At the end of his first night as my progeny, we didn’t want to be apart, so I brought him to my room and I held him through the coming of dawn. I had forgotten how frightening it was the first time I had to surrender to the abyss and take shelter in my memories," she said, her hands pausing in their work as her gaze grew distant.
"I told him to hang on to a happy memory as the sun rose, and he told me that I’d just given him the happiest memory of his life," she said, blushing with mild embarrassment as she thought of the memories she’d just finished creating with her husband on their wedding night. "When the sun set, I brought him to Kobir Village to feed for the first time."