It took a week before Nyota was willing to share Liam with anyone else, with most of that time spent discussing his travels. Though it took her several hours to recover after hearing about Sirin’s death. Absolutely insisting that she hold him in that time. It was a simple thing, but when his own tears began it became something else. Rivers of salt flowed down his cheeks, not ending for hours. All the while Nyota listened to him, combing his hair with her claws. And when the tears came so strongly he couldn’t speak she sung to him. Taking him back to the first day they’d met. Their private sabbatical was only interrupted by curious eclipsiarchs, which was somewhat often as curious cats found ways to eavesdrop. Though Nyota started spanking them when she found Lyra hanging off the windowsill, her dress waving in the wind for half of Greenhaven to see. Not even Saryn’s ceaseless patrols could keep her sisters away, but they helped substantially, and kept the umbraquins from fulfilling their natural inclination to infiltrate.

“-then we laid a road on the way up to Greenhaven, well, I guess we had Nora do it, so she could power up. Think Taloc did something to you eclipsiarchs, one of your levels is a far greater power spike than a human’s. She could probably pave Greenwood by herself now.”

“It’s cause we’re Taloc’s favorite.” Answered Nyota, a smile creeping across her face.

“No doubts there! You’re my favorite too.” Said Liam, landing a kiss on Nyota before rising from their bed.

He strode to the wall, pulling back a tapestry that concealed a secret tunnel.

“--eep!” Gasped Lyra, jumping in alarm so swiftly that her head bounced off the ceiling. “--Ow!”

“Curious cat-girl.” Grumbled Liam, catching Lyra and dragging her into the room. “They’re not gonna stop til we tell them.”

Nyota’s lips pursed, more than a little displeased at hearing this topic again. “No. That’s final. It will only hurt the ones who knew Liam, and confuse the rest of the world!”

“So what are we gonna do? Get married ag–”

He paused to heal Lyra’s head, then pushed her out the door. Giving her tail a good swat to make sure it didn’t get stuck in the doorjam.

“Maybe you can just be the Prince Consort.”

“Oh god, I’ve never been a fan of nobility. It seems like a good idea, but eventually the nepotism stacks up and brings the whole system toppling down. Plus, I’m an elf now. Immortals are born and grow up in a different era than their subjects. If I were to take the throne then my natural assumptions would eventually be out of date. No, immortals should not rule over mortals.”

“So I should cede my throne?”

“No, you can’t, Taloc made sure of that. Eventually you should retire and make one of your daughters replace you. I noticed you’ve already been putting them in charge of cities, nice touch.”

Nyota shrugged, finding her way into a proper dress and tossing pants at Liam.

“Thanks. Alright, we just won’t clarify anything. We’ll head to Blackwood Castle, but I want to see the woman Niana’s become. Then we’ll create a fortress in Avignon along the way.”

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

Nyota’s arms slid around him, pulling him close.

“I wish you’d never leave.”

Strong elven arms wrapped around Nyota, far stronger than Baron Green could’ve dreamt of. “Nyota, I came back. I’ll always come back.”

—

–The next day–

Wagons once more trundled along a quartz road, with Lyra, Nora, and most the earth umbraquins paving the way. First they pulled rocks and gravel from the surrounding forest to form a road base, a buried wall to prevent the ingress of roots and allow water to pass without washing out the road. Then Owen or one of his paladins created a layer of quartz three feet thick, and finally the weakest of magi, those few who could not cast without chanting, cut the road, leaving a seam in the quartz as the wagons passed.

All the while, Liam deforested the road, leeching all life from the trees and using that life to lay down woodchips. Quetz slithered along the woodchips, apparently finding the coarse abrasive to be ‘ticklish’. His action compacted the chips, further preventing any future growth from ruining the road. Day turned into night as the caravan marched, and at each evening they created a crystal waystation. It was similar to a pyramid, yet there was a central tower for the night watch to keep guard. While the base was mostly hollow, with doors that sealed and latched. Each door was latched by three quartz beams, making it far too strong for bandits to batter in, and far too clever for animals.

In fact, the paladins had come up with the design on their own, with no input from Liam. Leaving him to recline in the wagon and charge his rods. A process he was quickly nearing completion of. He hefted Owen’s staff, emptying the earth mana there into another staff before filling it entirely with lightning affinity. Earth was an odd affinity, unlike all others it seemed to require a substrate to work. Fire seemed to bring energy from nothing, a thermodynamic impossibility, but attempting the same with earth was mana prohibitive, even for Owen and Liam. An inequity that churned in Liam’s mind, water affinity created water, as did all other affinities, so why was earth so limited?--

–A tail swatted his nose, one of the sabertoothed servals climbing onto his lap. Unlike a common housecat these were lethal enough to survive outside of human protections, and were intelligent enough to know not to harm humans. But this serval was known to Liam. He lifted her by the scruff, meeting her ‘meow’ with a glare.

“I should’a guessed we would have a stowaway.”

“I got permission from mom.”

Liam’s eyes narrowed, jaw working the thought over. “You call her mom…”

“You called me mom. Is it any less true? We didn’t exactly get to pick where we were reborn.” Said Saryn.

Liam set down the staff, a bit scared he might bludgeon his daughter to death with it. Taloc, I get you have limited access to this world other than dropping bolts, and I know that you had a reason for selecting these bodies, what with Gene getting his fingers all up into our genetics, but cmon. A degree or two of separation would have been so much more humane!

Knuckles ground into the bridge of Liam’s nose, his second hand setting his daughter down.

“This is so fucked up. Really, what the hell Taloc.”

“Can we agree to a truce? For mom?” Asked Saryn.

Her words rattled inside his skull, constantly ping ponging between a lethal lie, and the truth. Yet, Sirin had never thought about anyone other than herself…

Had she?

He thought back to his time in Khereshetal, to the day he was born. From death threats, to never letting Liam go hungry. It had taken years to get her to think of a single other person, but now she claimed to be putting Nyota first.

“Killing you will only harm the woman I love. So we have a truce.”

“Yay!” Cried someone from the back of the wagon.

Nora, dark furred eclipsiarch burst out of a barrel. She bounded forward, somehow pouncing from inside the barrel all the way to the wagon’s bench. Where she wrapped Liam and Saryn in a hug, squishing her face between elf and serval.

“One big happy family! I told you it would work Saryn.”

Oh god, how many catgirls did I just adopt? Thought Liam, already catching sight of Lyra sprinting from her own hiding place behind Karnak.