The next few months passed unremarkably. Callida kept her promise and helped Skiasmenos to ascend the throne with minimal difficulty — a king who readily agreed that his brother’s demands for her to marry him were unreasonable — and through weeks of negotiations, the Griffin-Lion War ended in a tense but peaceful resolution. As a part of that resolution, the griffins buried the temple massacre and pretended that it never happened. Meanwhile, Callida passed another birthday and easily missed her two year anniversary with Rogue. He’s going to be so mad.
The march back to Astu Centralis felt surreal and somehow anticlimactic after a year of vicious fighting. Standard procedures suggested that all soldiers returning from war should pass through the palace military base before taking leave, but Callida found that a little ridiculous and dismissed soldiers as they passed through or near their hometowns with the request that they report to the palace base sometime in the next month either for honorable dismissal or reassignment. For the first time in decades, the Lion Tribe wasn’t at war (even though the Griffin-Lion War specifically had only lasted six years), so the Lion Tribe was probably looking at downsizing their military — something to discuss with the Lion King and his council.
They were down to the last few miles, and Callida’s eagerness to get home was only matched by those of her soldiers that had their own families — soldiers like Commander Vir who had a wife and two daughters (one that he’d never even met) — to get home to.
“Primordials,” Vir’s antsy shuffling made Callida laugh. “It just feels like forever! It’s been a year and a half since I’ve been home. That’s a long time for a small child, or for someone to raise two babies by herself.”
“I’m sure they miss you. Do you think Callida will recognize you?”
“I… hope so,” Vir grimaced.
“She’s almost five now?”
“Uh… yeah. You keep a better track of that than I do. I keep forgetting that you’re her domina.”
“It’s easy to do when I’m always absent,” Callida sighed in self-deprecation.
“No more absent than me,” Vir said a little bitterly.
“Hey, with the war over, that won’t be the case much longer, and I’m sure they understand. I know Ancora does, and she will be telling those little girls all about their brave daddy fighting to protect them,” Callida smiled gently and nudged his shoulder. “Are you excited to meet Valeni? She’s about a year old, right?”
“Yeah… and yeah — born a year ago…. What’s today’s date?”
“Uh, June 11th? I think?”
“Valeni’s birthday is tomorrow! Primordials! I get to be there for her first birthday!” Vir realized with a hand to his forehead in disbelief. And he was gone, lost in his own little world of fatherhood, trying to come up with a gift idea for his baby. Callida chuckled, a giddy sensation bubbling in her gut at the first glimpse of Astu Centralis entering their view as the army rounded a bend in the road.
Home.
Some of her men whooped with excitement, the collective pace quickening by degree with the promise of warm hugs, comfortable beds, and home-cooked meals just another two miles away.
What they hadn’t expected was that the city was waiting for them. The triumphal return of the tribe’s heroes was greeted by the celebratory roar of cheers and applause as the army funneled through the streets in an impromptu parade they hadn’t realized they’d signed up for. Callida spread the orders through the ranks that soldiers were allowed to break formation to greet loved ones, and each emotional reunion was met with localized explosions of celebration.
“Vir, isn’t that Ancora?” Callida pointed his wife out to him and joyfully watched as Vir ran to throw his arms around her and kiss his little girls. More cheering.
“Animo, I see my parents!” Arum said excitedly in her right ear.
“Well, go!” She shoved him, and Arum grinned, breaking into a jog to hug his mother first and then his father.
The march to the palace was a steady string of joyful tears, and Callida grew increasingly anxious for her own highly-anticipated reunions. They reached the gates of the palace, a prepared guard falling into step with what remained of the enormous army, guiding them not to the palace military base, but instead to the palace itself. Callida followed them irritably, just another side quest away from her home located on the base.
The great stairs leading up to the front doors of the palace presented themselves, palace guards lining the edges as a sign of respect. Callida looked up to see familiar faces — her good friend, His Majesty Verum Rex, beaming down at her, to his left his wife and queen, another dear friend, Flore Rex, and off to the side…. Callida’s heart stuttered.
Black, wild hair, and a playful smirk that made her feel weak at the knees for how badly she’d missed it — Rogue. She forgot that there was anyone else in the world and took the long flight of stairs two at a time in a sprint that ignored all conventions and all other people and ended with him. The inability to decide what needed to be said or done first resulted in frantic, desperate kisses that couldn’t focus on any one location of his face and tears she hadn’t known she needed to shed. And when kisses couldn’t satisfy, Callida settled into an embrace secured by her death grip around his neck where she sobbed, the release, the longing coming to a head all at once.
She couldn’t let go. She couldn’t make herself let go, and Rogue didn’t rush her with one arm holding her close so the other hand could gently embed itself in her hair. “I’ve missed you,” he whispered, his breath fluttering the stray strands by her ear, and Callida’s arms constricted just a bit more around his neck in reply, drinking in the scent of pine and medicinal herbs that she so strongly associated with him. “M’lady, look at me.” She pulled back just enough to meet his eyes, and Rogue looked her over, carefully soaking in every detail of her face. “Primordials, you are so beautiful.” Callida snorted. She couldn’t help it. With a scarred, currently tear-swollen face, and otherwise long, lanky, barely feminine features, Callida was anything but vain about her appearance, but she knew what he meant. This was his way of saying “I love you.”
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“I love you too.” Rocking onto the balls of her feet, Rogue met her halfway, and Callida soaked in every moment of the connection, finally relaxing into his gentle, steadying, but no less passionate way of kissing her.
“Ahem.” Callida unwillingly pulled away, turning around and finally remembering that they had an audience — a literal army of people watching them, the throat clearer only one of tens of thousands. “General, let’s make this brief, so you can get back to… that.” Verum smirked, his eyes darting towards Rogue.
Callida accepted his terms with a small nod, returning to the head of the army to distractedly hear but not listen to Verum’s very short speech praising the military and blah, blah, blah. She had but one objective, and as soon as Verum had said his piece and dismissed the military, Callida beelined back into Rogue’s arms, snatching his wrist to drag him home where they could continue catching up without an audience.
“Callida! Before you disappear,” Verum’s voice cut through the chaotic noise of a dispersing crowd, “well done. I’m glad you’re safe.”
“Thank you, Verum.”
“I’m not expecting to see you again until tomorrow for the standard council meeting and debriefing. I’ll try to keep things short,” he said with a knowing smirk and another glance in Rogue’s direction, “but we do have a lot of housekeeping to work through.”
“I’m aware,” Callida stated shortly.
“Of course you are,” Verum chuckled. “‘See you tomorrow.”
***
Rogue felt truly relaxed for the first time since Callida had left. Shyaam was basking in the afterglow of reconnecting with his Beta, and that radiating contentment left him feeling sleepy and fulfilled in a way he’d forgotten was even possible. He loved the way Callida got snuggly afterwards too, her slender frame finding every gap in his posture, filling the spaces and literally molding herself into the puzzle piece that fit his. And his contentment only grew with the citrusy scent of her hair filling his nose and the methodical and disciplined deescalating breathing pattern flush against his still erratically panting chest. It was in this moment that he was reminded why he had missed her so much and why it had hurt so badly to be separated. When compared to this blissful togetherness, the last fourteen months needing what was nowhere to be found had felt like a living hell.
Callida sighed heavily, releasing a deep breath that his own body mimicked, his palm moving to her sternum in the habit of letting Shyaam and Goldie connect in the still after-moments under less chaotic circumstances.
And Callida flinched.
“Callida?” Rogue withdrew with a sudden twisting in his gut, trying to meet and read her face. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry,” Callida quickly breathed an anxious apology, but Rogue couldn’t help but notice the way her breathing had once again accelerated. The twisting in his gut clenched with the arrival of a deep fear and the memory of a violent, unexplained panic attack that had rattled him to his very core and seemed to stem from some instinctive knowledge that Callida was in terrible, life-threatening trouble just a few months prior. Why that memory was surfacing now, he couldn’t explain, but something about it seemed to make sense in the ambiguity of his concerns.
He tried again, extending his hand more slowly, hurting that, while she didn’t flinch exactly, she remained tense as though bracing against expected pain. “Callida, what’s wrong?”
“It’s nothing,” she said, forcing a smile. “It’s just been a while.”
She’s lying! Why is she lying?! His wolf, Shyaam, growled anxiously, and Rogue was compelled to pull further away from her, propping himself up so he could look her more directly in the eyes. The inexplicable fear that he saw looking back at him had Shyaam in instant hysteria. Possessiveness, protectiveness, fury. Shyaam’s instincts were rarely wrong, and Rogue had come to rely upon them over the years, but for Callida to fear him in this moment of raw, vulnerable intimacy…. A hatred like none he’d ever felt before had him trembling with a blistering lust for blood. “Who touched you?! Who violated you?!” She turned away from him as her eyes filled with tears, that disciplined soldier's breathing returning in an effort to keep her emotions from surfacing. “Callida,” he hissed, struggling to tamp down his anger into something more benign, “what happened?”
“I can’t explain it,” she barely whispered, her voice hitching with the strain of keeping it even. “They, u-um…. Temple Guardians forced me into some sort of ritual involving a… um, a spiritualist.” A shuddery breath. “She was looking for something… i-in me.”
“She forced a connection,” Rogue snarled lowly. “She hurt you? Enough that now any connection makes you wary? Even a connection with me?!”
“I-I’m sorry,” Callida shook her head, “I’m sorry Qiangde there was nothing I could do and I can’t help it now,” she rambled in a sudden gush without any inflection to indicate syntax.
“You fought?”
“I did everything I could,” Callida nodded, her tears breaking free, ripping his heart apart.
“What was she looking for?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t get to ask. She, um, she died… immediately after the connection was severed. Her last words…. She called me the ‘Mother of Prophecy’, and that meant something to the rest of them. They planned to kill me, but my men got there in time to rescue me before they could.”
He studied her face, searching it, finding pain and trauma behind the measured calm and learned composure of a career killer, and he ached to comfort her, to take that fear and hurt away from her. “Primordials, Callida, come here,” he said, drawing her close, very intentionally creating a safe space where she could grieve and process without judgment, waiting until her tears had lessened before adding, “I’ve got you. Be still.” His hand moved to the space between her shoulder blades, and Callida instantly settled against the weight of his hand and the comfort he was offering her with his unique ability to soothe even the most worked-up animal spirit. While Callida’s body relaxed against his, Goldie too seemed to shudder with the release of trauma, and Rogue had to very consciously not get upset before his wife had a chance to fully settle.
But as soon as she was asleep, Rogue’s thoughts turned murderous. Shyaam was baying for blood, the fact that her assaulters were already dead somehow thwarting his need for vengeance. This contempt and utter hatred were new to him at these caustic depths. Never before had he wanted to inflict pain so badly, a realization that left him feeling a little unsettled for the conflict with his already well-established self-perception. He was a naturally gifted healer who had studied and experimented with ways to relieve suffering. Maybe he needed to adjust his identity to include the caveat of “healer unless you hurt my wife”. This bitter thought was chased by a callous smugness pushed forward by Shyaam: unless you hurt my Beta.