The Day I Married the Fire God, Three Brothers Regretted It novel · Chapter 5 of 24
Chapter 5: The Cold Hearth
I woke up in the middle of the bed with a man's arm across my waist and a fire burning in the hearth.
For a moment I didn't know whose warmth it was.
Then Phlegon's breath moved against my shoulder, and I knew.
"Don't move," he murmured into my hair. "If I open my eyes, it might go out."
"Which?"
"Any of it."
I turned over and looked at him.
His hair was a mess.
There was a pale mark on his throat where I had bitten him in the night, and the gold line over his heart had faded to almost nothing.
"It's still lit," I said.
"I'm afraid to look."
"Then I'll look for you." I kissed the corner of his mouth.
He smiled, a real one, the first I had seen on him.
It changed his whole face.
"You will be asked to prove yourself today," he said. "The northern court is old and angry and it has been waiting twenty years for me to die. They will not welcome a sun bride."
"What do they want?"
"The custom is simple. The Fire God's bride lights the hearth in the great hall before the dawn feast." He looked away. "No one has lit it since I was hurt."
"You could have lit it last night."
"I could not."
He said it plainly, with no shame in it.
I got out of bed and found my under-robe on the floor.
It would have to do.
The great hall was cold enough that frost had grown on the inside of the windows.
Two hundred northern lords stood along the walls in black wool and grey fur, and none of them bowed.
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