Porka smirked as she watched Lomi and Yelma toss the armfuls of wheat at me.

“Ha!” Lomi laughed as the two then darted away, feeling accomplished in their prank.

I sighed as I reached up to brush off the dozens of wheat stalks all over me.

“Funny that Yelma is the one to join her, usually Pelka is the prankster,” Porka said, proud of her daughters.

She and I sat alone on the outside deck under the patio of the second floor. Lomi and Yelma, the two who were now running away while laughing, were the only ones around. Porka’s husband Bjorn had taken the other children to the snake’s house, to help prepare for dinner.

“She’s gotten brave since we got here,” I said, gathering up all the wheat stalks.

There was no saving them of course, and there wasn’t enough to worry about grinding into wheat… but it kept me busy to gather them up into a nice little pile. A human might have yelled at the children for damaging good stock, but we weren’t human. Honestly even if they had been human children, I doubted Porka would have chastised them for it.

“Emboldened by numbers,” Porka said, happily watching her children.

I nodded, and glanced at the head of the family. She had a huge smile on her face, looking like the perfect representation of a proud mother.

She was beautiful. And not just because of her current demeanor. Porka had always been beautiful. Even as a child she could make people blush and stare.

Granted so had Trixalla at one time…

Thinking about it, that cat had been rather good looking too.

How was it that the women of our kind were always so fair looking, yet our men were always…

For a moment I thought of Montclair. The small pudgy man was a common sight amongst our kind. Windle, Lughes, Porka’s husband Bjorn… Most were either as average as can be, or looked nearly deformed in some way. Though that was most likely thanks to the non-human traits combating with the human ones within us.

Not that I had any room to talk, of course.

“Lomi shall be fine here, Vim. She’s a delight. Look, they may as well be actual sisters,” Porka said as we watched Lomi and Yelma started to chase a fat cat around.

The rotund orange cat voiced its complaint as it darted as fast as it could away from the two little terrorists… but Lomi and Yelma weren’t just any normal little girls. They were foxes.

Yelma caught the cat just before it had a chance to leap up onto the top of the fence that surrounded the yard. It meowed loudly, yet didn’t fight back. It went limp and let loose a low meowing complaint as Yelma and Lomi happily pet the animal.

“I’m surprised your colors are so different,” I said. Lomi’s hair and ears were auburn, while Porka and her children had a more yellow tinge to their fur.

“Only you would care about that,” she said.

“Wasn’t complaining about it…” I said, putting the very last stalk of wheat into the pile. The large stack next to me was far bigger than I had expected it to have become.

“If we’re lucky her and Horn will grow to become fond of one another,” Porka said.

“A little early for that kind of talk, isn’t it?” I asked. Picking up one of the wheat stalks, I started to twirl it between my fingers.

“Mother’s know these things,” she said with a smile.

“So I’ve heard,” I said.

“And I’ve heard you killed a monarch,” Porka said.

The wheat stalk I was twirling came to a stop. “I did.”

Porka’s eyes narrowed as she glared at me.

“Where’d you hear that?” I asked her. Not even Windle had known yet. Especially since I hadn’t told him.

She smiled and looked out to the yard. At Lomi and her daughter, who had abandoned the cat and were now chasing each other around. It didn’t take long for me to find the fat orange cat; it was sitting on the top of the fence near the corner, staring at the two girls with what could only be malice.

“Oplar visited last full moon, she told me all about it,” Porka said.

For a small moment my vision blurred as I quickly processed that information. That meant Oplar had gone straight north after that incident. That meant she had gone to the Cathedral first. Which also explained why Windle and Lilly hadn’t known… Oplar would not have dared to enter the Owl’s Nest alone.

That also meant it’d not be long until the whole Society knew of it.

Tossing the wheat stalk away, I sighed and wondered what I was going to do with that woman.

“I knew that’d annoy you,” Porka said with a small giggle.

“You have no idea,” I said.

“Oh but I do. We all know how much you hate it when we find out what you’re up to, and have done,” she said.

“It’s not that,” I said defensively.

“Then what? You know most men would love to be praised for their achievements,” she said.

“There’s nothing amazing about killing an old god,” I said firmly.

Porka was about to say something, but a ball bounced towards us. I lifted a foot to stop it, and stared at the two young girls who happily ran up to us, chasing after it.

“Momma!” Yelma greeted her mother as I reached over to pick up the ball.

It was heavy, and made of leather. It felt like there was… something solid inside. Maybe wooden. Someone must have crafted a wooden orb, and fastened the leather around it. The thing worked, as a ball, but it was heavy and hard. Not something a human child would happily kick around.

“What were you talking about?” Lomi asked, smiling at me.

Tossing the ball at her, she made an “Oof,” sound as she caught it… more so with her belly than not. “None of your business.”

Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

“We were talking about the wheat,” Porka said.

“That’s all anyone talks about,” Yelma complained, and then turned and darted off. Lomi quickly followed, and the two went to tossing the ball back and forth.

“Wheat is boring,” I agreed.

“But I bet you’d rather talk about that than the monarch,” Porka said.

“What’s there to talk about? A monarch woke up. It killed a bunch of people. I killed the monarch, now I’m being forced to watch wheat grow,” I said. “Or get plucked,” I added.

Porka happily chuckled, more than amused at my annoyed tone.

“Oplar said you looked very happy as you fought it,” she said.

Glancing at the woman, I waited until her eyes found my own before saying, “She sees any man smiling and instantly thinks it’s something perverse. Of course she’d say something like that.”

“Oplar is a little… odd… but she means well,” Porka said, smirking.

“One of these days she’ll means well to a beating,” I said.

“So scary,” Porka teased.

I huffed and leaned back, resting against the wooden column that held up the patio above us.

“All the same, I’m glad to hear of if Vim,” she said.

“Sure,” I said.

“Really. I am. All you did was make the world that much safer for my children,” she said with a gesture to the two girls playing.

“Monarchs are less a threat than anything else. It had been nearly a hundred years since the last one had awoken. It’ll be longer than that before the next does. Soon there’ll be no more at all. But there will be more humans. More diseases. More threats elsewhere,” I said.

Porka’s soft smile made me look away from her. I didn’t like that look. A lot of the Society looked at me like that sometimes.

Such looks of pity made me angry.

They were the pitiful ones. Not me.

For several moments we sat in silence, watching Lomi and Yelma. The two seemed full of endless energy… and really did play together as if they were siblings or lifelong friends, and not two children who had met only two days ago.

“You’re going to negotiate for us this contract, right?” Porka asked.

I nodded; glad to be on a different topic. “Yes.”

“Good. Bjorn would have had to if you hadn’t. The merchant lord is the same again. It should be the last year he’ll be the one doing it, but you can never be too safe,” she said.

“Indeed. Part of the risk of your situation,” I said.

“You helped create it, so I don’t feel like you have any right to chastise us for it,” she argued.

She was right… but at the same time, the only reason I had helped was because they would have gotten themselves killed otherwise.

“Can I ask a favor, before you leave?” she asked.

“Hm?”

She smiled at me, and I once again was reminded of her beauty. “Would you take Pelka out to hunt?”

I frowned. “Hunt what?” I asked, worried.

Porka giggled, and her bashful smile told me she knew exactly how I was misunderstanding her request. “Not men, that’s for sure!”

I smiled at her happy laugh as she went to giggling. It came from her belly, and sounded so happy it made her daughter and Lomi pause in their playing to glance at us. Luckily they returned to playing instead of coming over to us.

“She wants to hunt a deer. Or something like it,” Porka said, finally collecting her breath enough to speak.

“Why do I need to help her do it? Have Bjorn help her,” I said.

Porka’s smile, that had grown large thanks to her laughter, died a little. “She doesn’t want him to help her, she wants you to,” she said.

I sighed and wondered why this happened so often. Maybe it was the parent’s fault, for always telling their children so many stories about me. So many of them were as much fairy tales as the monsters within them.

“If I must, I guess. But then I’ll have to do the same for the rest of the kids won’t I?” I asked. Though maybe Lomi really didn’t need it, since I had hunted a few times on our trip here. But even still she’d ask to join us.

“Pelka’s the oldest. And she wants…” Porka went quiet, and I could tell by her expression what she didn’t want to say aloud.

“You can’t stop those who wish to try,” I said to her.

“Can’t I? Pilma is gone,” Porka said stiffly.

I didn’t need to be reminded of that. Her first born daughter had left without permission. Before I had arrived to help her on the beginning of her journey.

Considering I had spent some time looking for any traces of her, and finding none after all these years... I was led to believe that the worst had happened.

“She might return still, Porka. Journeys throughout the world can take a lifetime, depending on where one goes and what they are trying to do,” I said gently.

She smiled, but I could see the pain in it. “Yet you traverse through dozens of nations, accomplishing all you do, in a few mere years. You may have helped deliver me, Vim, but that doesn’t mean you can still baby me,” she said.

“I helped deliver you?” I asked, smiling at her.

Porka sighed, but her smile became a little more real. “Seriously,” she complained.

“You whined a lot back then too,” I nodded.

“All the same. Please. Take her hunting… but also discourage her. I beg you,” Porka said.

For a long moment I watched Lomi and Yelma. The two had stopped kicking the ball to each other, and were now kneeling near the fence. Looking at something. Probably some kind of bug, based off the way they were poking at it.

“You know I believe in free will,” I said.

“I’m not asking you to tell her she can’t… just…” Porka paused, and must have realized by my expression that I’d not do what she wanted.

She sighed, looking away from me. To the kids in the distance. “At least don’t encourage it. Please,” she whispered.

“That I can agree with. For the same reason I wouldn’t discourage her, I also won’t encourage it,” I said.

“I just want them safe, Vim,” Porka said.

“As do I.”

A tiny whine drew my eyes to my right. A small cat, probably a year or so old, jumped up onto the porch. The little white and black coat was unique around here, most were brown or orange.

“That’s Pain,” Porka said.

“Pain?” I asked as it casually walked towards me, stepping around the stack of wheat stalks with careful steps.

Pain… looked fine. Didn’t look deformed, or have any scars from old injuries. It was looking around carefully, side glancing everything like a cat usually did as it meandered towards me.

So…?

Glancing at Porka, for maybe a hint or reasoning behind the name, I watched a huge smirk plant itself on her face… and then felt it.

Looking down, I found the cat with a mouthful of my wrist. Biting hard.

“I see,” I said.

“Hm. No fun when it’s you. Should have expected that though,” Porka said with a chuckle.

Pain continued to bite me, and although I understood completely now why they named it what they had… I couldn’t understand why it was doing this.

It wasn’t attacking out of rage, or malice… it looked calm and composed, even as it chomped down again. This time with a little more strength.

After a few moments its eyes then went upward, and its long pupils widened as it stared at me for a moment.

It then released me, and with a faint meow went still. Staring at me as if frozen in fear.

“Hm. Realized it bit the wrong thing finally, hasn’t it?” Porka asked.

“So it seems,” I said, and then with the hand that it had bitten I went to petting it.

Pain didn’t move even as I continued petting it, at least not until a few moments later. It began to purr, rather loudly, and then started to nuzzle and walk into my pets as if to make them more efficient.

The small cat happily crawled onto my lap, purring as it got comfortable. “Pain is a very loving thing,” I said.

Porka sighed, shaking her head at me. Yet her smile told me what she was really thinking.

“I’ll at least tell her of the dangers she could potentially face,” I said as Porka and I watched the fence’s gate open, revealing Bjorn and the other children.

The kids ran in, running to Lomi and Yelma, to join them in playing. Bjorn smiled and nodded at us, more so his wife, as he went to closing the gate.

“Thank you Vim,” Porka said gently.

“Hm…”

“For her too,” she then added, as Lomi turned to hurry towards us. Most likely to tell us what she had just been told by the other children.

Dinner was ready.