Dear Diary,

Everybody wants a Catgirl Maid, but nobody wants hair in their food. Or throat.

Not really something that's happened with Marie, but I'd be lying if I didn't say she doesn't on occasion smell very Marie-ish. I mean, it's not bad, per se, and my monkey brain has associated it with pleasant things like food, clean clothes, and shenanigans, but it's definitely a thing that exists. I'm pretty sure I could smell her coming from quite a ways away from upwind. I guess I just find it interesting that a smell that I might be annoyed by if I got a whiff of it before making those subconscious connections does such a good job of releasing the happy brain chemicals now.

So after dinner Marie and Isnomi and I trooped up to our suite and got the bathtub full and hot; the two of us had been in the tub, Marie and I working on getting Isnomi clean despite her efforts to avoid us, when Saffron showed up. I moved to go gather her up where she stood kind of swaying, but Marie stopped me with a hand on my arm and a nod toward Isnomi. I mean, I don't think either of us thought the menace would drown, but it made sense for me, the already soaked one, to stay with her while Marie, the still dry one, went and collected Saffron. So I got to watch as Marie disrobed our asleep-on-her-feet Saffron, then carried her over and handed her to me. I lowered her gently into the tub as her eyes slid closed.

"Mmmm. That's nice."

I handed the Menace the sponge I'd been using to soap her up, then lay back with the back of Saffron's head resting against my chest. She never opened her eyes, and a few times when Marie focused on getting Isnomi slightly less sudsy, or on re-soaping the sponge, she even started snoring lightly. I got a weird idea and, after making sure I wasn't going to slide us both under the water, looked through her eyes.

She stood on a low rise above a beach. Without thinking about it, I walked up behind her and put my arms around her. She didn't startle or anything, just leaned back against me with a contented hum and purr. After we stood there watching the waves for I have no idea how long, we were inside the living area of a little cottage, me lying back across a sofa, her lying atop me, both of us looking out a wide set of windows that looked over the hill we'd been standing on. My hands wandered a little, but slowly, gently, with no real intent, just not quite still enough to let either of us forget about the other. Hers did the same until she rolled over onto her side, then closed her eyes and started snoring.

My eyes popped open to look down at Saffron where she'd lay her head against my breasts and curled up against me in the tub. I guess she really did dream about that little cottage by the ocean that she'd talked about. Literally. I definitely had to look into how to claim beachfront property when I had a second when the world wasn't about to end, with me being the only thing holding the line between victory and defeat. Or whatever; I'm not sure everybody dying of plague would be a victory for anybody, since from what I'd seen? Phileo didn't really have any overcrowding issues. The homes I'd seen in Camden Yards were on the snug side, some of them as full as our cell at the Academy, but no instances of 'twenty people living in a hundred square feet' or crazy bullshit like that. Which meant that the people were the scarce resource, not the buildings or even the land.

Eventually Marie decided it was time for us to get out of the tub, because Saffron had been asleep for a while, I was too comfortable to move, and Isnomi had about as much desire to leave the tub as a fish would. "Oi, Menace, you get out first." When she gave me a booger look about it, I quietly explained, "Mom can stay asleep if I'm careful getting out of the tub, but not if I've got to maneuver around you." That got her moving, and while Marie dried her off I maneuvered myself around until I knelt alongside Saffron, one hand under her shoulders and the other in the center of her back. When Marie finished with Isnomi and pushed her toward the bedroom, I rose as smoothly as I could, until Marie could reach under her with a towel and lift her from my arms without getting the towel soaking wet.

I went back to kneeling there in the tub while Marie gently bundled Saffron off to the bedroom. When she came back, raising an eyebrow at me still sitting in the tub, I looked up, smiled, and said, "do with me as you will. But close the doors first?" She did. Both.

Stolen novel; please report.

All of us slept well.

When we finally stirred in the morning, it was to polite knocking on the suite door. Marie got dressed and to the door faster than I thought possible. She opened it, I caught some masculine murmuring, then she nodded and closed it. By the time she strode back into the room, I'd propped myself up on my elbows, jostling Saffron and Isnomi both just a little. When she got to us, she announced, "Breakfast." I didn't think she'd said it all that loud, but Isnomi nearly leapt out of the bed toward her clothes, and the suite definitely wasn't cold enough for that to be her reason for hurrying. I chuckled at her and half rolled over to free an arm to lay a hand on Saffron's shoulder. "Time to get up, Kitten."

A smile stretched across her face. "I know that, Goof. The knocking woke me, I think. Either that or Marie getting out of bed."

"Yeah, my bet's on the knocking. You okay to have breakfast here?"

She made a cute little moue. "Whether I am or not, I think I will, at least today." So it was we all wound up devouring our weight in Lancaster House waffles. Okay, I did, and I'm pretty damn sure the menace did as well. Saffron enjoyed them as well, and I think I even saw Marie sneak one off the tray and disappear it into her mouth on the way to the table. Not, like, absolutely sure, because that Maenad has some fast fuckin' hands, but she definitely had that 'cat that got into the cream' look a couple times as she approached the table.

When it finally hit me what she was doing by playing the whole 'maid' role here, it hit me hard enough I had to stop eating for a second. Kitten?

Yes, Goof?

Is she doing that on purpose?

Is who doing what on purpose, my love?

Is Marie doing the butler's job to not just show them that a woman can do it, but to show she can do it better than them, and, like, do it while being too fuckin' scary for them to even think about complaining about it?

I'd hope so, since she asked me about it one of the nights we didn't come over here.

I've got to remember that no matter what she says, I'm the slow one out of my funky little family here. Thanks, Kitten.

Consider it assistance with your tertiary mission here.

Uh, I've got a tertiary mission?

She looked across the table and met my gaze. Correcting some of Lancaster House's worst excesses. I can count on you to do that, right?

Oh, fuck yeah, I can do that for you. Hell, Larry's made a good start on it already.

And who exactly has spent the last six months or so beating good sense into his head whenever possible?

I chuckled around my waffle. Message received and mission accepted, Imperator mine.

After everyone at the table had nearly eaten themselves into a food coma, because the waffles were just that good, and the two of us who would be running just plain needed the calories, Saffron, Marie, and Isnomi gathered up for hugs and kisses. Isnomi actually ran around giving everybody hugs before leaving, while Saffron, Marie, and I just stood there watching. Right before Saffron jumped them back, she thought, remember, tomorrow you're due at the Academy for a certain scamp's birthday party.

Once they'd left, I walked over to Lancaster and said, "I'm thinking we start at the south central farm, head east until we find Linus and Fred, then hop over and check up on Angel and Bill."

"I suspect you've got at least some intent to check the sides of our clear roads as well, yes?" When I looked at him with my head tilted a little, he sighed and said, "to see if there is any evidence of my cousins returning."

I nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, I think we really ought to. They should be back by now. I just can't see all of them standing and fighting to the bitter end if they wound up stumbling into the entire Calverton Army."

"While I agree with your assessment, it's still possible that, in their arrogance, they've bitten off more than they could collectively chew."

I nodded, lay a hand on his shoulder, and stepped us both back to the central south farm. We didn't catch up with Fred and Linus until we hit the southeastern farmstead, although we spotted their first unit as we left the central farmstead, so at least our southern border had guards all the way across. When we finally did catch them up and I explained the new plan, Fred caught on immediately. Carruthers, not so much, but he seemed fine to follow Fred's lead.

Larry and I spent the rest of the day hopping around checking out roads. Bill and Angel had made a good start on clearing the central east-west road toward the west. Other than that? No joy.

Missing Heroes did not bode well. It really pissed me off, too, since it meant I had to either skip Isnomi's party to hunt them down, or leave them MIA while I attended.

I swear, either way I was gonna see to it they didn't pull this kind of loose cannon shit again.