Page 101 of Treasured

SEBASTIAN

“Marius?” Hope infused Luna’s voice, and she squeezed her brother’s hand. “Can you hear me?”

The halfling groaned, his brown eyes sweeping over my wife. They were the same color Luna’s had been before I Made her. He was awake. It worked. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t at least a little shocked. I’d been alive for a long time, and I’d never witnessed such a miraculous event.

I released Luna’s shoulder. Stepping back, I leaned against the wall. I wasn’t relaxed, though. Far from it. My shoulders were tense and it was like a wire ran down my spine. This was a private moment, and all of a sudden, I felt like an intruder.

My brother-in-law licked his cracked lips. “Lulu?” His voice was hoarse, barely audible, but it echoed through the space.

Luna cried out, throwing herself onto her brother. Her shoulders shook as she hugged him, and immense relief and joy flooded through the Binding Mark. The halfling’s fragile arms went around her, and for a long moment, neither of them spoke.

Which left me watching them.

I felt… strange. Happy, certainly. Luna’s brother was awake, which was fantastic, and she wasn’t alone anymore.

But there was something else, too. Something I hadn’t even considered until this moment. What if Luna no longer wanted me now that her brother was awake? What if our connection wasn’t as strong with her love divided between two of us?

Luna’s affection for her brother ran deep. It was evident in how she spoke of him, in the letters she wrote him when we were first married, in her search for a cure.

To be loved by Luna was unlike anything else I’d ever experienced. To have her direct a seemingly endless supply of passion and intelligence towards you was to feel like the sun was created to shine only for you. Her love warmed me like nothing else, banishing the darkness of my soul. It made me want to be better, to be deserving of the way she felt about me.

I did not doubt her affection for me. I could never. But did she love Marius more?

These dark thoughts clouded my mind, threatening to bring me to my knees. What would I do if Luna’s sunshine was no longer a part of my life?

Before I could delve further into the murky pit of my depressing thoughts, Luna turned. She extended a hand to me. “Will you come here?”

I pushed off the wall and laced our fingers together.

“Marius, this is my husband, Sebastian.” Luna rose to her feet and stood beside me. “I love him. He’s my… everything.”

My brother-in-law studied me. “He kept you safe?”

“Yes.” Luna leaned her head against my arm. “He did.”

I echoed her words through our bond, pressing a kiss to her forehead.

“It’s nice to meet you,” Marius said after a moment. “Thank you for looking after my sister.”

“Always,” was my response. “She means the world to me.”

Color rushed to Luna’s cheeks. “He’s very good to me,” she assured Marius. In a not-at-all veiled attempt to take the attention off her, Luna asked, “How are you feeling?”

He blinked. “I feel… fine,” he said, sounding shocked. I’d feel the same way. When we first saw him, he looked like he was moments away from dying. “Better than I have in a long time.”

Luna smiled. “Good.”

“Can I sit up?” Marius asked after a moment, his brows furrowed.

The smile slipped from Luna’s face. “I… You can try, I suppose.” She held his elbow. “But if it’s too much or you feel any pain, you have to wait. We’re not exactly sure how quickly the healing process works.”

“I promise,” he said.

Luna helped her brother sit up, tucking a pillow behind his back and drawing the blanket around his waist. He looked a little better like this, less like a skeleton and more like a thin, too-small human. Still, though, he wasn’t a normal, rambunctious child. Not yet, but maybe one day, he would be.

Marius studied me with an intensity that did not belong in the eyes of someone so young before he turned to Luna. “I thought the Prince of Darkness was supposed to be evil? He doesn’t look all that intimidating.”

I barely held in a snort. For someone who had just woken from a comatose state, Marius certainly had a way with words. Luna’s mouthiness appeared to be more of a familial trait than I’d previously assumed.