A month passed inside the private wing. Time became a loop of soft light, warm blankets, Nadia's relentless schedules, and a baby who acted like sleep was a personal insult unless it happened on Chris.
Outside the wing, the palace had paced.
Rumors had tried to form like mold in damp corners. Nobles had attempted polite ambushes in hallways. Sahir had written three speeches, two prayers, and one resignation letter purely out of frustration.
Rowan had confiscated all of it.
By the time Nero was six weeks old, Chris was healing properly, and the suite no longer smelled like antiseptic as much as it smelled like milk and clean skin and that faint, stubborn sweetness that belonged to Nero alone. His pheromones had dimmed down to almost nothing, so low it was unfair, really, that the child who had arrived like a national emergency now felt like a normal infant.
Normal, in this palace, meaning still dangerous, just quieter about it.
