Bryce and Hunt: HOFAS Bonus Chapter

“There’s no way your mom will let us do this.”

“What my mom doesn’t know won’t kill her.” “Bryce.”

It was Hunt’s warning tone that had Bryce turning from the evergreen garland she’d spread across the kitchen table of her parents’ house, half of the pine needles blanketing the linoleum floor at her feet.

Her mate lounged against the pink plastic counter that hadn’t been updated since it was installed in the house a century ago. Bryce was sure any interior designer worth their salt would keel over dead at the sight of it-and the matching cabinets-but Bryce loved it. Loved every inch of this house, tucked among towering conifers on a hill just outside of Nidaros. Close enough to walk into the small town, but far enough away to avoid the snooping eyes and ears of any passing neighbors.

Which was pretty much everybody in this town. Bryce had no idea how her mother had survived it-the local gossips had lost their minds when she’d shown up twenty-odd years ago, a half-Fae toddler in tow, under Randall’s protection.

Well, she knew how her mom had survived it: by picking a house on the outskirts of town, shielded by those centuries-old pines.

“What?” Bryce frowned at Hunt. She motioned to the garland snaking across the chipped wood table- another thing that had come with the house. “She’ll love this.”

“You’re using her… babies”-Hunt choked on the word “to adorn a decoration for the temple.”

“So?” Bryce grabbed the hot-glue gun. “It’s free advertising for her.”

Hunt pushed off the counter, wings rustling, and picked up one of the offending objects. “It’s sacrilege.” “Is it, though?” Bryce surveyed the tray of tiny ceramic infants lolling in beds of lettuce or flower petals or little birds’ nests. “The Winter Solstice is all about the death and rebirth of Solas and his final embrace with Cthona before dying. Hence the baby.”

“Yeah, but that offspring is meant to be Midgard. Not… lettuce-babies.” Hunt eyed the figurine in his hand, a bald infant with arms and legs like overstuffed sausage links. “Some people might get offended.”

“Some people might also think it’s funny.”

At his pointed silence, Bryce sighed, setting down the glue gun. Hunt slid into the chair across from her. He wore his favorite white sunball hat backward and a thick green sweater that did wonders for his broad shoulders, but his face was stony, dark eyes wary.

Bryce angled her head to the side. “Don’t we all need something to laugh about?” She pointed to the brass-plated light fixture above the table. “We’re quickly approaching Firstlight Zero.”

In Nidaros-on all of Midgard-firstlight was used sparingly these days. Most people only turned on what lights they needed, in the room they were currently in. Charging phones: limited to a quarter power max. No TV. Unless it was absolutely, one hundred percent necessary, the majority of people on the planet were doing their best to conserve what firstlight remained while the scientists and engineers and magic-wielders

raced around the clock to find an alternate energy source. And some way to retrofit all their tech to use it.

Bryce didn’t want to think about it. Not for the three days she’d be here with her family. So she tucked it away, along with all the other thoughts that plagued her about what had gone down this fall, about what they’d been dealing with since she’d shoved the Asteri into a black hole.

These three days were for her and Hunt, for Cooper and her parents.

And Syrinx, lounging at her feet, snoring lightly, wearing a little red solstice vest that Randall had knitted for the chimera.

“Where’d you go?” Hunt asked, and Bryce blinked. “Huh?”

“You’re glaring at those … things.”

Bryce snorted and lifted a baby-one bawling from inside a peapod-and dangled it in front of Hunt’s face. “These things? Do they creep you out?”

Hunt winced away from the figurine. “Yes. Partly because they’re weird, and partly because your mom, of all people, makes them.”

Bryce dropped her voice to an eerie whisper. “They sing at night, if you listen closely.”

Hunt grimaced. “Don’t even start.”

Bryce chuckled, setting the figurine down again and surveying the garland. She’d only glued one baby on it before Hunt had intervened. “So you really think we should just bring this to the temple with no extra pizzazz?”

“Yes. I think you should do exactly what your mother asked you to do before she left.”

into

He was dead serious. Hunt had faced down the Asteri, jumped into space and careened toward a black hole, and yet he was still scared of Ember Quinlan.

Bryce supposed that made her mate a very wise male. And she’d be wise to listen to his warning, too. So she began placing the figurines back in the tray she’d grabbed from her mother’s workshop-more of an attached shed, really-the ceramics clinking delicately against each other. “We’ll leave that terror on there, and see if anyone notices tonight.”

Hunt rolled his eyes. “I’ll pray to Cthona that you don’t get us chased out of town.”

“The pitchfork cabinet’s right next to the temple altar, you know.”

“Hilarious.”

“No, it really is,” she said, standing with the tray in hand, trying her best not to joggle it too much. If she destroyed the figurines, her mom might actually kill her.

Granted, her mom would have killed her for taking the dozen or so figurines from her workshop and gluing them to a garland, too, but Bryce had been willing to pay that price for her mom’s last-minute demand that she help with the temple decorations for the solstice ceremony.

After teleporting in late the previous night, Bryce and Hunt had awoken this morning to find her mom and Randall already out of the house, with only a note from Ember on the kitchen table.

We’re in town, helping set up for the ceremony tonight. Take Cooper to lunch-I know he wants to spend some time with you, and this holiday is a big deal for him.

That, of course, was no burden. At lunch, the teen had been a little quieter than the boy she’d come to know and love over the last few months, but she didn’t blame him. He’d lost his entire family, and though he’d been welcomed into a new one, the holi- day was sure to bring up painful memories.

So Bryce and Hunt had let Cooper be as quiet as he wanted while they grabbed sandwiches at the local diner. And pretended every patron and passerby on the street wasn’t gawking at them.

Save the world, get stared at for the rest of their lives. That seemed to be the deal.

But it had been the second part of her mom’s note that had prompted Bryce to see red.

Also, I volunteered you and Athalar for the temple- decorating com- mittee, so send that mate of yours to cut down some branches and tie them together into a

garland. The temple will expect you there around three to hang it up.

Randall walked Syrinx and gave him his breakfast.

And his second breakfast.

You’re welcome.

Hunt checked his watch-an analog one, since he didn’t want to waste phone battery. “We gotta head out. Done throwing your temper tantrum?”

Bryce glared at him over a shoulder and lifted the tray of fig- urines as she continued toward the pottery studio. “Keep it up, Athalar, and I’ll put one of these under your pillow tonight.”

His eyes flared with alarm. “You wouldn’t dare.” Bryce crooned in a baby’s singsong voice, “Come play with us, Hunt.”

Hunt flipped her off, but she noted his pale face with satisfaction.

“It was just a little surprise for the eagle-eyed,” Bryce hedged as she and her family walked down the snowy road to her parents’ house under a crisp, starry sky. Her breath curled in front of her, and even with a heavy coat and gloves, the cold seeped into her.

Ember stomped through the icy snow at Bryce’s side, clad in a red peacoat. “You’re lucky the High Priestess and Priest didn’t call upon Cthona and Solas to damn you.” Randall, Hunt, and Cooper, the cowards, kept a few paces back. Ember hissed, “I’ll never hear the end of this from Milly Garkunos.”

“Then finally tell Milly to shut the fuck up and leave you alone,” Bryce said, teeth chattering.

Ember’s eyes flashed. “Bryce Adelaide Quinlan. That woman has been very kind to you. When we moved to this town-“

“I know, I know,” Bryce said, slowing her pace to try to slip into the protective wall of males walking behind them. She could have sworn the three of them all slowed further. When she glowered at Hunt, her mate only stared at the night sky like it was the most interesting thing he’d ever seen. So Bryce recited to Ember, “When we got here, Milly was the only person who would check in on us, bring us food, supplies-“

“What about me?” Randall cried with false outrage.

Ember waved dismissively at her husband. “You didn’t count.”

Hunt clapped a consoling hand on Randall’s shoulder. Cooper just snickered.

Ember sniffed. “Well, what’s done is done, and we’re lucky the High Priestess and Priest thought it was amusing.”

Bryce threw Hunt a Told you so look. He stuck out his tongue.

Umbra Mortis, folks.

A small house with white siding and a half-sagging front porch appeared between the trees, a lone candle- the sacred candle of the solstice-burning in the window to light the home. way The tradition wasn’t particularly fire-safe, but most families scraped together enough money to buy a protection spell from a sprite so they wouldn’t come home from the temple to find their home in cinders.

Solas’s light had been extinguished with the setting sun, and that lone candle stood for the one kernel of him that survived. A kernel of hope, to be fully rekindled with the rising of the sun at dawn-with

Solas’s rebirth from Cthona’s dark embrace through the long night of her mourning vigil.

The symbol of that embrace was prominent all over the town at this time of year: the circle sinking-or rising-between two mountain peaks. Also known as Solas’s face between Cthona’s tits. Though Ember hadn’t been too pleased when Bryce had phrased it that way as a teen when describing the Embrace amulet her mother always wore.

Bryce glanced at Hunt and found his attention now on the candle in the window. The one light in the darkness. His face was tight, eyes haunted.

She dropped back a few steps, and Randall and Cooper walked to Ember’s side, giving them privacy. When the others were far enough ahead, Bryce asked her mate, “What’s up?”

Hunt’s gray feathers fluttered in the frigid wind. “Just a bad memory.”

“Of what?” Sometimes he’d open up to her about things from his past that still ate at him. Sometimes he wasn’t ready, and she let him know that was absolutely fine. She’d be there to listen when- ever he needed her.

But Hunt slid his gaze to her. “Of you. In space.

Glowing against that black hole.”

Bryce blocked out the surge of memories, of old terror, and reached a gloved hand for his. “We have a lot to be grateful for this solstice,” she said, voice thick.

He squeezed her hand. “We have a lot to be grateful for every single day.”

Bryce paused Hunt with a tug on his hand, turning to face him. She cupped his cheek, his skin warming her fingers even through her gloves. “I’m grateful for you,” she said, rising onto the toes of her snow boots to press a kiss to his mouth. She pulled away just enough so that their clouded breath mingled between them.

Unconditional and unending love softened his eyes. “This is the first solstice I’ve had with a family – with my family – since… my mom.”

Her heart strained. She hadn’t thought of that. That this solstice was a big deal not only for Cooper, but for Hunt, too. And the way he called her and her parents family…

She kissed him again, deeper this time. “I better make it special then.”

He nipped her bottom lip. “I think we’re going to have to fuck out here, though.”

She blinked. “What? Why?”

Hunt kissed her again, a swift, wicked promise. “I can’t fuck you in your bedroom with all those Starlight Fancy ponies staring at me.”

Bryce laughed, and the sound rang out through the trees, bright as the silver bells the priest and priestess had rung at the temple at the ceremony’s end. Tonight, the High Priest and Priestess would have their own joining, to reenact the return of Solas to Cthona’s side. Hunt slid an arm around Bryce’s shoulders, tucking her into his side as they approached the house. Randall was unlocking the front door, Cooper hopping from foot to foot against the cold. Ember was watching Bryce and Hunt, though-and from the smile on her mom’s face, Bryce knew her mom was happy for her, scolding about the lettuce-baby aside.

And with her mate walking beside her, with her family now entering the dark house ahead…

Bryce realized she was happy for herself, too.

“I’m never eating another chocolate croissant,” Hunt groaned at dawn the next morning.

“I didn’t tell you to eat the whole tray,” Bryce said, nudging her mate with an elbow.

“You also didn’t tell me that Randall is a ridiculously good baker,” Hunt grumbled, folding a wing around Bryce. They stood on the front porch with steaming mugs of coffee-fresh from the fancy machine Bryce had shown her parents how to use again this morning-and watched the rising sun.

They’d all been out here fifteen minutes ago, coffee and pastries in hand, to salute the rebirth of Solas. Inside the house, Cooper was busy helping Randall prep a breakfast feast. An obscene amount of food, but Milly Garkunos was coming over, so Ember was in a tizzy.

She was currently vacuuming the living room for the second time that morning.

Bryce huffed a laugh.

“What’s so funny?” Hunt asked, peering down at her.

“I’m thinking about Milly Garkunos,” Bryce said, looking around at the snow sparkling in the morning sun. “If my mom is the only person who you’re afraid of in the entirety of the uni- verse”-Hunt didn’t disagree “then what does it mean that my mom is afraid of Milly?”

Hunt chuckled, his laugh rumbling through her. He took a long sip from his coffee. “Maybe we should have sicced Milly on Rigelus and the other Asteri.”

Bryce grinned. “They’d have jumped right into that black hole, just to avoid her.”

Hunt laughed, the sound dancing off the pines, the snow. “Would’ve spared us a lot of trouble.”

Bryce clinked her mug against Hunt’s. The scents of sage, pork, and garlic floated out toward them. Randall had to be cooking sausage. “Maybe I’ll send

Milly down to Crescent City to sort out all those shitheads.”

His amusement dimmed, as if he’d remembered what awaited them after this too-short break. “I don’t think those shitheads are ready for the likes of Milly Garkunos.”

Bryce winked at her mate. “I don’t think you are, either.”

“That bad, huh?”

Bryce drained the rest of her coffee, savoring its swift burn down her throat. “She has an angel fetish.”

Hunt stared at her.

Bryce patted Hunt’s arm. “She’s got the 35th’s charity calendar on her kitchen wall. Hunky Angels of the North.”

Hunt’s expression grew more horrified with every word out of her mouth.

Bryce yanked open the front door, releasing an enticing river of smells: sausage, eggs, maple syrup, bread. She drawled, “I promised Milly that for her solstice present, I’d get you to take your shirt off and do push-ups for her.”

“You didn’t.”

Bryce waggled her eyebrows. “Or did I?”

His answering growl sent her racing inside, laughing madly.

It turned out that Milly was so overwhelmed by Hunt’s mere presence that she barely said a word at breakfast, or during the exchange of gifts afterward. The gray- haired human woman only offered a few vague comments about the unusually cold winter and kept her mouth shut, sneaking glances at Hunt now and then.

It had been an absolute delight to watch Hunt squirm, trying to pretend he didn’t know the old lady was drooling over him. Bryce hadn’t dared look across the table at Cooper-it was clear that he’d burst out laughing at the slightest provocation.

Only Ember seemed relieved at Milly’s unusual silence, filling the quiet with chatter about the ceremony last night, the need for a new roof at the school, and wondering how many people would show up for the solstice luncheon at the rec hall that afternoon- an event Bryce was skipping, thank the gods.

Cooper had received no such mercy from Ember, and had given Bryce a pleading look as he, Ember, and Randall had headed off ten minutes ago.

Now, sitting cross-legged on the twin bed in her tiny childhood bedroom, Bryce surveyed the small heap of presents she’d gotten from her family and smiled. “They went all out.”

“A perk of saving the world,” Hunt said from where he lounged on the floor, idly flipping through the coffee table book Ember had gotten him: Human Pottery Through the Ages.

The gift, of course, had come with a note:

So you might have some more appreciation for your mother-in-law’s craft.

Bryce had refrained from telling Ember that craft was a generous way to describe the lettuce-babies. It was solstice morning, after all.

Bryce ran a hand over the album on the bed beside her. Cooper, Randall, and Ember had all gotten her a signed first edition of Josie and Laurel’s debut record, signed by the folk duo themselves.

It must have cost a fortune, and Bryce had been beyond words at the sight of their signatures scrawled there. “I should return this and give them the money back.”

She had more money than she knew what to do with now. Her parents had refused to take a single copper of it. Put it to Cooper’s college fund, Randall had suggested. So Bryce had. It had still barely made a dent in what she’d inherited from the Autumn King, even after what she’d already given away. And then there was every- thing Jesiba had left her. A total of assets so great that Bryce had needed to sit down upon hearing the lawyer read the amount.

“Your parents would be deeply offended,” Hunt said, shutting the book with a thump. “You’re their child-it brings them joy to give you things like that.”

She frowned doubtfully.

Hunt sat up, peering at her. “Maybe it’s something you have to experience yourself to get.”

“Is that your way of saying you want to start making babies, Hunt Athalar?”

Hunt tipped his head back and laughed, and damn if it wasn’t the sexiest thing she’d seen all day. “I don’t think Midgard is ready for our babies, Quinlan.”

She might have laughed too had a dark, glittering sort of sensuality not entered his eyes. “Are you?” Her heart thundered. They hadn’t discussed it yet-and both of them remained on their respective contraceptives.

He rose with preternatural grace and sat beside her on the bed, which she hadn’t realized was ridiculously small until they’d had to sleep in it these last two nights. She’d nearly shoved him to the floor last night just to get some measure of space to turn over.

And now, sitting beside him… gods, it felt like that first time they’d ever sat close, their thighs brushing, in the library under Griffin Antiquities.

Hunt said a shade hoarsely, “I think we should wait until after the firstlight situation gets sorted out.” He cleared his throat. “And you already have your, uh, flock to tend to.” He nudged her with a knee.

“Is it a flock?” Bryce asked. “Or a herd?”

“Flerd?”

Bryce laughed. Avallen would be their next stop, to visit the six pegasuses who were now its star residents. “Yeah, the flerd is enough for now. They’re a bunch of demanding assholes.”

“Well, I hate to add to the flerd, but…” He strode to his week- end bag and pulled out a shoebox-sized present. He tossed it to her. “Here you go.”

“I was wondering why you didn’t leave anything under the window this morning.” Another solstice fire hazard: placing presents under the candle in the window to open in the morning after the celebratory breakfast.

Bryce tore off the glittery white gift wrapping, and at the first hint of rainbow cardboard beneath-

The sound that came out of her was on the same register as a screeching teakettle.

“You didn’t!” she screamed, ripping away more paper to reveal, in its full glory, a mint-condition Jelly Jubilee-still in her original packaging.

“Where did you find this?” Bryce asked, gawking at the box, at her grinning mate, at the sparkly purple

unicorn-pegasus, her glossy lilac mane curled to perfection. Not like the hot mess her original JJ had become, thanks to years of hard play when Bryce was a kid.

Hunt grinned. “Fury. She knows a guy who knows a guy.”

“Who trades in rare dolls?”

“I didn’t ask questions,” Hunt said, his face beautiful, so full of joy at her joy. “I just handed over the money.”

Bryce cuddled the box to her chest, then winced and set it down. She petted the plastic cover gently instead. “This will be an heirloom for our children, and our children’s children’s children.”

Hunt snorted. “Sure. They’ll all fight over who gets the mint-condition JJ.”

“This thing has to be worth-” “Don’t worry about it.”

Her heart filled to the point of pain. “Thank you. This is…” She kissed his cheek, savoring the warm, soft skin under her lips. “Thank you.”

Hunt just smiled, and with that smile… Bryce bit her lip, scooting back on the bed, away from him. He watched her every movement as she spread out, legs opening slightly.

“And where’s my present?” Hunt’s voice had dropped an octave.

Bryce stretched her arms up, sliding under the pillow above her head, offering the entire length of her body in invitation. “Come and get it.”

Heat flared in his eyes, and her body tightened as he crawled over her. His wings blocked out the sunlight trickling in through the window. “Would you like me to unwrap-“

But Bryce had slid her hand out from under the pillow and was now extending it-what was inside it-to Hunt.

“I told you yesterday to look under your pillow, Hunt,” she purred.

Hunt jumped back so fast, he nearly tumbled off the bed. “What the fuck!”

Bryce laughed, holding out the lettuce-baby figurine she’d had her mother make specially for him. “It’s your present.” She sat up, blinking innocently. “You didn’t think that sex was your only present, did you?”

He looked torn between laughing and running out of the room. Away from the small monstrosity in her hand. “Is that…”

She kissed the head of the figurine. “A little sunball hat. Turned backward.”

He paled. “And are those-“

“Little gray wings, the exact right shade of storm- cloud gray.”

“You turned me into a fucking lettuce-baby?”

Bryce cast her voice into a mocking falsetto, tilting the figurine this way and that as she said: “I’m the Umbra Mortis. Enemies cower before me!”

With that, Bryce tossed the figurine to Hunt. He caught it, but gingerly. Like he was scared it’d bite him. He cringed down at his face, turned into cherubic serenity. “This is the most disturbing thing I’ve ever seen.”

She grinned. “A successful solstice present, then.” Hunt gaped at her, then burst out laughing. She had no warn- ing before he leapt onto her, burying his face in her neck. “I love you, you sadistic asshole.”

She wrapped her arms around him, stroking his feathers. “Right back at you.”

His lips found her throat, and he pressed a kiss there. Every muscle and nerve in her body came alert. He noted it—probably the shift in her scent, too-and pressed his hips into hers. Let her feel what was hardening between his legs. “How long’s that luncheon at the rec hall?”

“They’ll be back in two hours,” Bryce said, blood sparking.

“Good,” he said with dark promise, and drove his lengthening cock against her again. She bit her lip to keep from moaning.

“I thought you didn’t want to fuck in here,” Bryce said breathlessly.

A storm wind blasted through the room, turning all the Star- light Fancy dolls-none of them good enough to come with her to Crescent City but all still too precious to throw out-toward the wall. The lettuce- baby-Hunt slid under the bed. “Problem solved.”

Hunt’s hand slid up Bryce’s stomach to cup her breast, to knead it through her cream-colored sweater.

“It’s a solstice miracle,” she whispered.

Hunt lifted his head, his gaze finding hers. Only love shone there. “It is,” he said thickly, and Bryce knew he wasn’t talking about the toys.

This-them. Being here, together. That was the miracle.

So Bryce kissed her mate with all the love shining in her heart. No matter what waited ahead, no matter what trials and hardships… they’d face it together. And that was a gift she’d be grateful for every single day for the rest of her existence. “Happy Solstice, Hunt.”