Chapter 457

Eris was shifting uncomfortably, and Lucien didn't blame him. They all sat, waiting, watching Helion and Ashk, and they were being met with silence.

"Has… something terrible happened?" This was Elain, looking to break the silence, and prompt further discussion. Lucien watched his parents both shake their heads.

"No…" Helion shook his head again, hands being wrung tightly together in front of himself. "Nothing to get… stressed… about. Nothing at all…"

"Well," Lucien forced the words out, trying to keep himself calm. "what is it, then?"

"I…" his mother looked from him to Eris and then back again, "I have wanted you both here." She began again, posture straight and looking as proud as she always had. "You are both my sons… my family…" her eyes came back to Lucien having glanced for a moment at Helion. The High Lord had shifted closer to her, one of his arms going around her. "I will not be going back to the Autumn Court…" This was not new information. They had known this.

"Yes," Eris said slowly, "That is why I named you Emissary…"

Ashk smiled at him, even as she leaned a little into Helion, and Lucien just watched the two of them avidly. He had honestly never seen his mother this way, and he had never expected to see her this way, after watching her suffer through her marriage to Beron for so long. She had always been warm to Lucien, as his mother, but this was a different kind of warmth he was witnessing, and it still surprised him. "Yes," Ashk agreed, "and I appreciate that."

"But?" Eris asked, and Lucien watched the way his brother's own eyes followed their mother's movements.

"I will not be returning…"

Lucien blinked, watching her. She meant at all. Even if Eris eventually appointed a new Emissary, even when that was no longer her position and a reason for her to be here, in the Day Court. She would not be returning to Autumn.

"You once told me that Autumn was in your blood." He said, and she nodded.

"It is, and it always will be." She smiled then, "And I will visit… but things have changed. That was where I belonged then, most of my family were there then." Lucien tried not to think about how many of her sons he had actually killed. They had all lived there then, and she had wanted to be close to them. There was just Eris now. He looked at her, bits and pieces sliding through his mind, trying to make connections that he couldn't quite figure out.

"Your family is here?" Eris asked, his gaze sweeping over Lucien to their mother and then to Helion.

Ashk was very still before she nodded slowly. "I am pregnant."

Shock slammed into Lucien so hard he wasn't sure that he had drawn a breath. He felt as if a bucket of hot water had been dumped over his head, and it took several long moments before he could even get his brain working correctly again. It all clicked together then. The way that Ashk and Helion were standing, the protective stance of the High Lord, and the way that his hands had continually wrung together. The way that Ashk stood also, so still and straight, but with one of her hands pressed to her abdomen. It was all so glaringly obvious now, Lucien didn't know how he had missed it. He thought that he had tried to say something, but he wasn't sure that actual words had come out of his mouth. Elain had turned to him, and he could see the shock in her eyes, but she was smiling and he thought that he was too.

"Congratulations." Eris was speaking now, and was also on his feet. The High Lord of the Autumn Court had wrapped his arms around his mother, and then Lucien was on his own feet. "I am so glad that you are happy here…" Eris bent and pressed a kiss to their mother's cheek and Ashk was smiling more widely than Lucien thought he had ever seen.

She turned to him then, and Lucien didn't know what to say, nor was he certain that anything that came out of his mouth would be logical, so he stepped forward and he hugged her as Eris had. Closing his eyes when her comforting arms came around him, Lucien could practically feel the excited joyful energy moving around inside of her. This was what she had likely dreamed of for centuries, he realised. All of those years suffering as Beron's wife, while she had wanted to be free to be with Helion had lead to this. Having him would have been a small comfort to her, a small part of Helion that she had been allowed to keep, but this would be even more than that. Finally, she would be able to be with the male she loved, while baring and raising his child in the same Court. They would be allowed to enjoy all of those moments together, and Lucien was so very thankful that his mother would finally be able to achieve that dream.

"I am so happy that you get to have this." He breathed, and her arms tightened around him. Lucien held her for several minutes before he let her go and stood back again. His eyes found Eris when his older brother moved away from Helion.

"Well," Eris said to him, voice low so that nobody else would hear. "Looks like everything has switched around for us."

"What do you mean?" Lucien asked.

"It was always you who was the half-brother." Eris said, "The one who found himself on the outside…" Lucien blinked looking at the older male, "Now it is me." Eris gave a small smile then, "You will be living happily here with both of your parents and a younger sibling with whom you share all of your blood… and I will be the strange one on the outside."

Shaking his head, Lucien just looked at him for a moment longer. "I don't think anyone else would see it that way."

"Yet that is the way it is." Eris slipped an arm around Nera's shoulders. "I am not unhappy about it." He said, giving Lucien another smile, "We are well beyond that. It's just a thought you might like to consider. A way to look at your new home."

Lucien watched Elain hugging his mother for a moment as he considered Eris' words. His brother was right. This really would be his home, and it would be somewhere he would have daily access to both of his parents, and now a new sibling he would be related to through both the blood of his mother and father. There would be no doubt he would belong here. The thought sent pleasing tingles through the pit of his stomach.