Dear Diary,

"Children will be our future,

Of all the things I hold dear,

Children are most important."

Doctrine of Tabitha, Book of Children

Yeah. This is the big one. If some poor bastard force feeds me his whole career, and fucks every other bit up, but somehow gets this one right? I'm not sure I could really properly get my righteous rage on. Don't get me wrong, if they're fucking up Agency and Redemption and Egalitarianism, doing Vengeance wrong with absolutely un-Justified Homicide, and somehow doing a Bloodlust as their Passion and yet not enjoying it enough for Ecstasy? I'm still gonna have to take that poor fucked up bastard down. But maybe not so hard they can't ever get another chance. Maybe after doing some time in Tartarus or NiflHel, but still. Then again, that may be because I don't think somebody who's that messed up in head can actually be a good parent. A parent, yeah, but not a good one.

I might be wrong about that, sure. It's why I'm not gonna put that in my Holy Book. Give some parenting advice? Shit, absolutely. Probably gonna ask Sigyn and Loki about it. Fuck, I'm really glad they know I'm amnesiac, because I don't see me becoming anything like a decent parent without some mentoring. Given that they are, in fact, my adopted parents here, I'm gonna guess that they're the ones I got that mentoring from.

You guess truly, although you were doing fairly well before you came to us seeking guidance.

Really? Me? Little miss terminal fuckup?

Dad sounded oddly proud. Like, yeah, I get that he's proud of me, but this was like, over the top weepy proud. Yes, you, Daughter. You rescued your first daughter from Artemis, have worked absolute miracles with Conrad, and if Vulcan isn't precisely housebroken, he does at least know how and when to do as he's told. As for your newer daughters? You... You beat yourself to death to give one closure.

I what.

He went silent a moment. That's... not entirely unlike my reaction when you told me. But yes. You killed both of Maze's parents. When you found out, when she told you, you offered her Vengeance, then helped her take it.

Oh. She... she's okay with me, even though I killed her parents?

I got the sense of a shrug. Her absentee mother was the one who sacrificed Isnomi. Her father was a mercenary in service of Calverton who met you on the battlefield.

Okay, yeah, but still...

She's a remarkably composed girl. With your support, certain to grow into a remarkable young woman.

Yeah. Yeah, she is. Thanks, Dad. You're... I wound down, thinking. Pensive

Tabitha?

Yeah. Dad, am I different?

He chuckled. You're the Avatar of a mindless Primordial Goddess doomed to consume all of reality. In less than a year you've utterly restructured a major portion of the world, one which was incredibly influential in your world of birth. I'd say that's fairly 'different'.

I choked out a laugh. No, Dad. I mean am I different than I was before the Blessing. Like, am I a different person?

Are any of us the same as we were in the past? Are any of us the same as we will be in the future? I started to snark, but he cut me off. No, Tabitha, I'm serious. The Loki chained here centuries ago would not recognize the God I've become today. He might even try to strike me down, ashamed of what I've become.

Are you? Ashamed?

I said he would try. Not that he would succeed. Nor that he would survive if he did so here, in the prison you remade into a home for me.

I did that? How?

I felt his smile. Oh, I could say things like 'cutting a hearth out of the wall' or 'having your son make us furniture', or even 'bringing us little knickknacks and comforts'. But truly? The single thing you've done, over and over, without thinking about what it means? You've brought your family here. You've brought them not unlike Mortals from the world of their birth bring their children, their partners, to visit with beloved parents.

I mean, duh. You are.

He chuckled again, then sighed. Tabitha, I meant what I said. None of us are the same person today as we were before, nor the same as we will be. But if it matters, with the understanding that I do not blame your past self in any way, I think you are in fact a better parent than you were.

Wait, what? You just said I literally beat myself to death for Maze.

Yes. Yes, you did. But... how to say this. Before, everything you did you did because you enjoyed it, or perhaps felt some kind of obligation. But now you do those same things, and more, not because you enjoy them, or because you owe the children a debt, but because you are their mother, and you love them.

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But I do enjoy all those things.

Did you remember that before you started doing them?

Uh... no? No, I guess I didn't. I barked out a laugh. So, maybe I'm here to help Future Me become a better mom?

I think you're a lot more than that, Daughter...

I interrupted him. Nah, I mean, maybe, yeah, but it doesn't matter. If I am a separate person somehow, and that's the only reason I'm here, if that's my only legacy? That's enough. Hell, that's not just 'enough'. That's pretty fuckin' baller. Thanks, Dad. You're the best.

I know.

Yeah. Yeah, maybe that's why I'm here. If I'm a me, and not just brain-damaged Future Me. But yeah, if I'm some kinda weird Blessing transporter accident duplicate of myself, and my only lasting impact on the world is making Future Me a better Mom, I am absolutely down for that. And I am gonna write the hell out of this Book just for that reason. Let it echo through the ages that Tabitha Diaz, Goddess of the Alliance, is the Goddess of Children. Because even in a world where all are equal, and free, and there is no need for Vengeance, Bloodlust, or Homicide, Justified or otherwise, my Passion and Ecstasy will still be found in each and every Child that comes into my care.

Heh. I wonder what Saffron would think of me adopting everybody in the Alliance. Like, I'm pretty sure given how she's, uh, more than cool with me doing Karen and anybody else who catches my eye, she'd be okay with me sleeping with all of them, but I'm not sure about adoption. Then again, I can't adopt all of them. Like, at this point I can't adopt Karen. That'd just be weird.

So yesterday after the kids showed off their decorated rooms, they showed us the rest of the East House. The dining room downstairs was basically the same size as our bedroom, but forty feet square instead of a forty foot diameter circle. Two doorways led from the kitchen into the dining room. The kitchen, or really kitchens, because the one big room was subdivided into smaller rooms by the tables already built into the floor, were forty feet wide and sixty feet long, with a big open doorway that led into a rear entryway, which connected to the stairway we'd bored into the mountain. Despite some whining by the kids, we did not actually explore the basement or the mines. Mostly because, y'know, mines, and not even modern ones.

Above the second floor were the 'guess rooms'. One long hallway ran from the front entryway about halfway to the bore, with doors every ten feet or so. That gave us ten guest rooms the same size as the kids rooms before the floor rose into a textured ramp that rose up about three or four feet, leaving only about eight or nine feet of ceiling clearance. 'Only'. Anyway, somebody'd scattered sand on the rock and glued it there. The doorway at the top of the ramp led to a forty foot wide, ten foot deep room which had every bit of wall space filled with what looked like cubbies. Y'know, the kind of thing you'd put your stuff in before jumping in a pool. The doors into the next room weren't wood, like the others, but a pair of stone doors that pushed back, then slid to the side. Like the doors into our bedroom and at the back of the kid's hallway, they needed a bit of a shove to get moving, but the moved smoothly. Inside, the room beyond had a row of little stalls on the near wall, then dipped down step by step into a depression.

"We've got an indoor swimming pool?"

Saffron laughed as Menace looked at me and said, "No, Mama. This the tub!"

"Tub." I held her out, looked at her, looked at Saffron, looked at the thirty foot by thirty foot monstrosity in the middle of the room, then back at Isnomi. "Tub."

"Yes! No more turns! Everybody at once!"

I laughed, snuggling her, and pulling Saffron into the hug. Everybody else glommed in, and I sighed as we all just stood there. "How are we gonna heat the water in this big beast?"

"There are Mana deposits beneath the Homestead; I'll be tapping into those to heat one of the cisterns. That and one other also can be heated with coal in some form of emergency that diverts the Mana. The bath itself will also be heated by those same Enchantments, although in the case of the bath there's no coal backup."

"Oh. No. In an emergency we might need to ration the bath water to get clean." I frowned. "Wait, how are we gonna keep this much water from getting nasty?"

Saffron nodded to the stalls built into both ends of the room. "That's what the showers are for, Goof. Wash the grime off before getting in the tub."

"Uh, so if the showers are for washing, what's the big tub for? Just what, lying around?"

Saffron rolled her eyes. "Marie, Maze, I think we need to remind her tonight." That... seemed weird, including Maze, at least until I thought about Kelpies and water.

Beyond the bath was another room with more cubbies, followed by another entryway into the Bore. At that point we'd spent well over half the day just walking around the new place, poking into rooms, admiring the kids' artwork, and just generally doing the 'new house almost done thing', so we decided to get ourselves back to Lancaster early. Okay, Maze, Marie, Saffron and Menace decided.

Got back, got swept into the bath room, where Saffron stripped me down while Maze and Marie heated up the kettles. And heated them, and heated them. Then Maze slipped into the tub with me, and Marie dumped what should have been scalding water over us. I tensed up until I heard Maze giggle, then I realized that wherever the water splashed, wherever it stayed, the pain from my scars just kinda melted away. Then my whole will to move and pretend to be an animate person followed. It took me like five minutes to realize that neither of us was holding our breath so much as not breathing. By then all my fucks had melted away, so I had no more to give.

So. Big tub for this?

Yes, Goof. Big tub for this.

Big tub good. I'mma sleep now.

Had to get up for bath time and dinner. Got right back in the tub again after and went to sleep with Maze lying next to me. Dreamt of lounging around with my assorted Kraken homies out in the Chesapeake.

The next day, the kids took us back to our bedroom. Where they proceeded to strip us down and paint us onto the walls around both sets of their silhouettes. Marie in a platinum white like her hair. Saffron in a deep, matte black that made me realize Menace's black was really a deep charcoal. Then me in a vibrant red the color of my gownless evening strap. Before we finished, we called Siobhan to join us. She tried to claim she needed to attend to our duties. I overruled her as Goddess. Saffron overruled her as Imperator. Marie just hopped back to her Academy and brought her favorite Healer back to our bedroom and handed her over to the kids. i swear, they got so much of that platinum white paint on her I thought it might completely obscure her blush. It wasn't until I backed up enough to see both at once that I realized the kids had actually somehow added just a little pink into the platinum white they painted her with.

As they did, I called Isnomi over. "Why don't we get clothes?"

She looked at me like I'd asked the World's Stupidest Question. "Becauth you awe Mamas." The Hell of Teeth was back in play, but that absolutely didn't make her answer any easier to understand. But then, sometimes you didn't need to understand your kids, no matter how much you wanted to.

You accepted them, nurtured them, protected them, and loved them. And hoped that was enough.