Chapter 394: Chapter 394: Nadia Has Had Enough

Chris strolled through the corridor like the palace belonged to him.

Which, unfortunately for everyone else, it did.

The nursery was finished. The room had been transformed into something soft, safe, and expensive, the type of space that made employees whisper prayers under their breath as they arranged blankets. Light fell through the windows in clean sheets. The walls had been painted in calm, warm tones. The crib looked like it had been commissioned from an artisan who feared both Dax and the concept of sharp corners.

Everything was ready.

And because everything was ready, everyone’s anxiety had finally found a place to live.

Physicians appeared wherever Chris went, as if the medical wing had developed legs and decided it was his shadow. He could feel them watching him: not just eyes, but attention, like he was a bomb with a polite smile and a perfectly normal gait.

Chris found it entertaining.

He paused by one of the tall windows, hands resting lightly at the curve of his stomach, and watched guards change shifts in the courtyard below with the calm interest of a man observing a play he’d already read.

Behind him, a doctor cleared his throat.

Chris didn’t turn. “If you tell me to sit down, I’m going to start walking faster out of spite.”

There was a beat of silence as the doctor decided whether this was a joke or a threat, and Chris’s mouth twitched slightly, indicating that it was both.

He understood where their panic came from, and for once it wasn’t his husband’s and mate’s fault. It was the years after Chris married Dax without a child. The palace had learned how to smile politely through that silence, how to pretend it wasn’t counting months and whispers and tabloid headlines, and how to make it look like patience instead of dread.

Everyone outside the immediate circle of the royal couple had believed they couldn’t have children. That Dax was too old – even if, for a dominant alpha, forties were peak youth and not even remotely a problem. Or that Chris had become barren. Or that the gods had decided Saha didn’t deserve an heir and were simply dragging out the punishment to make it hurt more.

No one had considered the simplest truth: that the king and his consort had chosen this.

They had wanted six years of building first. Six years of stability. Six years of learning each other without a child becoming a political leash around their throats.

They had gotten what they wanted.

Now the palace was paying the interest on that decision.

Because now that there was finally a child, finally an heir, everyone acted like the universe might snatch him back out of spite.

Chris watched the courtyard, and the baby shifted beneath his palm in that quiet way that always startled him.

He inhaled slowly.

Someone stepped too close behind him, and he felt it before he heard it – the careful, over-respectful spacing of people who were terrified to offend him but more terrified to lose him.

“Consort,” the same doctor tried again, voice gentle like a man approaching a skittish horse.

Chris turned his head slightly. “Yes?”

“We would prefer if you returned to your rooms. There are…”

“People in my corridors?” Chris supplied smoothly.

The doctor’s lips pressed together. “Precautions.”

Chris lifted a brow. “You do realize I’m pregnant, not contagious.”

The doctor made a pained sound. “It’s not that; it’s just… this pregnancy is… important.”

Chris stared at him for a second, and something in his expression softened into understanding.

“I know,” he said, quieter. “You don’t need to say it like it’s a prayer.”

The doctor looked like he might actually cry from relief at being spoken to like a person instead of an obstacle. He opened his mouth again, because medical professionals are designed to keep talking until the disaster is avoided.

And then Nadia’s voice cut through the corridor like a door slamming.

“Chris.”

Not “Consort.” Not “Your Majesty.”

Just Chris, the way you said the name of someone you were about to save from themselves.

Chris closed his eyes briefly, as if savoring the final second of peace before his nurse arrived with violence and reason. Then he turned.

Nadia stood at the far end of the corridor, hands on her hips, expression set. She was not dressed like a court lady, and she did not move like one either. Behind her, half a medical committee lingered like nervous birds.

She looked at the doctor near Chris, then at the midwife pretending not to hover, then at Chris, who had the audacity to look innocent.

“What?” Chris said, mildly.

Nadia walked toward him.

The palace seemed to part for her without being told.

“I’ve been looking for you,” she said.

“I’m not lost.”

“You are,” Nadia replied flatly, “if you think you’re going to keep taking strolls like a tourist while everyone else is one heartbeat away from a nervous breakdown.”

Chris grinned. “They’re being dramatic.”

“They’re being realistic,” Nadia shot back. “Six years of no heir, and now suddenly there’s one? People are going to pray and panic at the same time. You know how this place works.”

Chris glanced toward the nursery wing, then back at her. “I just wanted to see it.”

Nadia’s expression softened for a half-second, just enough to appear human. Then it hardened again because she had a job, and her job was apparently to stop him from turning the entire palace into a collective medical incident.

“You saw it,” she said. “Now come with me.”

Chris blinked. “Where?”

Nadia didn’t bother with ceremony.

“The medical wing.”

Chris exhaled resignedly, as if he’d known this was coming and had simply been hoping to delay it.

“For what?” he asked, because it was fair to ask, because he wasn’t stubborn, and because he genuinely wanted to understand.

Nadia tilted her head, gaze sharp. “The delivery plan.”

Chris’s brows lifted a fraction. “We already have a delivery plan.”

“No,” Nadia said. “You have an idea.”

The physicians behind her collectively flinched, as if someone had finally said the forbidden thing out loud.

Chris stared at Nadia for a long moment.

Then he nodded, slow and calm.

“Alright,” he said. “Talk to me.”

The corridor exhaled.

Nadia’s expression didn’t change, but her shoulders loosened slightly, like she’d been bracing for a battle and had just realized she wouldn’t have to fight him.

“Good,” she said. “Because I’m done watching everyone tiptoe around you like you’re made of glass.”

Chris walked beside her as they started down the hall, and he glanced sideways at her, genuinely curious.

“Are you angry?” he asked.

Nadia snorted. “I’m tired.”

“That’s worse,” Chris observed, and there was something almost fond in it.

Nadia shot him a look. “It is worse. Now move. Before I pick you up.”

Chris actually laughed under his breath.

And then he went with her, because he could be difficult for sport, but he was not stupid, and he wasn’t trying to prove anything. He had just thought natural would be better, simpler, and kinder to his body.

If Nadia had a better plan, he wanted to hear it.

And somewhere behind them, the physicians followed like pilgrims who had just been told the gods might finally be listening.

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