The Golden Dynasty

Chapter Thirty-Three The Resurrection

Six weeks later…

“Circe! I just don’t know what to do with you!” Diandra cried, staring at me with unconcealed impatience and I lifted my hand to cup the dark head on top of the tiny sleeping body strapped to my chest.

“Diandra!” I hissed, “Shush!” My eyes slid side to side around the bustling marketplace me and my posse were wandering through. “You’ll wake Tunahn or people might hear.”

I heard a slight giggle and my eyes moved to Sabine who was standing very close to Zahnin and also by Narinda who had Isis strapped to her chest over her own little baby bump. Then my gaze moved through Claudine, Nahka, Anastasie, Oahsee, Char and Vuntus who quickly looked away, pressing their lips together, turning their dancing eyes and feigning avid interest at a stall that held a variety of leather straps men could wear across their chests.

Diandra got close to me and laid her hand on mine on Tunahn’s head and she hissed back, “I do not want to disturb your little warrior but I do not care if people hear! This cannot go on.”

At Diandra’s not-so-gentle questioning, I had hesitantly just shared with her (and my posse) that even after the touching scenes after our children were born, things had not changed between Lahn and me.

This was mostly because I was caught up in suddenly being a mother of two in a primitive world and deciding, even if I had slaves who could not wait to get their mitts on my babies, this would be hands on.

Not to mention, considering I was nursing them both, and Tunahn seemed to want to feed continuously, I had no choice for it to be hands on.

Therefore, I was exhausted, constantly running around and had one or two children in my arms (or attached to my body) almost all the time. Even half the night. And when this wasn’t happening, I was trying to catch up on sleep or bolting down food because nursing made you ravenous.

So I didn’t see my husband a lot, partly because I was busy and partly because I was doing my all to avoid him (thus wandering the marketplace with my posse and the many walks I would take with my kids to be amongst my people and to work off my baby weight) because when he was with our kids, especially Isis, the way he doted on her (and both of them, really, but early warning signs showed Princess Isis was going to be Daddy’s Little Girl) sent that warm sweetness through me so strong, sometimes it was a wonder I kept my feet.

And this didn’t take into account the way he doted on me.

Dax Lahn was proud of his family and he made no bones about it. As he would be mostly because I dug my heels in his shoulders as payback in the heat of the moment. I’d forgotten that my Mom’s Mom had been a twin and I’d researched this ages ago to discover what it might mean to my future and found it was the woman who was genetically predisposed to carrying twins.

So it was my fault-ish, or, more accurately, my boon.

I did not share this information with anyone and therefore everyone was crowing their Dax was not only mightiest but also the most virile, seeing as his other powerful sword sired two children on me. They had no idea it was me who was predisposed to it and released two eggs his swimming warriors could fertilize. They wouldn’t get it even if I tried to explain and, it must be said, Lahn himself seemed pretty freaking pleased with the results of our union so I didn’t have the heart to explain.

This was all also, I was not admitting to myself, my defense mechanism against a husband who had injured me deeply but whose unrelenting sweetness was healing a wound I had stubbornly refused to allow to heal.

But now, I had forgiven him and I just didn’t know how to tell him that. And the tables were turning. The longer I procrastinated, the more it was becoming less a matter of me telling him I forgave him and more me needing to be forgiven for my delay in letting my savage brute off the hook.

Why did I always do this?

God, I was so freaking stupid!

And now, because I was stupid, about three weeks ago Lahn’s sweetness started to hold an edge of impatience, that edge grew, spread, built and honed and now it was long and very sharp, like the side of his sword.

Yes. So. Freaking. Stupid.

“The Dax is in a foul mood,” Diandra snapped, pulling my attention from me being stupid back to her pointing out the results of my stupidity, “and this foul mood might come home with him but it also spreads and, being the Dax, when it spreads, it spreads far and it spreads wide. I can assure you that if he shares his frustration with you at home, you can take this a hundredfold at how he shares it with his warriors and anyone close enough to receive the lash of his tongue.” She leaned into me. “I can assure you of this because Seerim told me that King Lahn is surrounded by an aura of black and everyone, be they warrior, trainee, free man or slave, is giving him and his aura a very wide berth.”

Oh man.

Being Diandra, she kept at me. “And, I would say, that Dax being Dax Lahn it is a good possibility that lash might graduate to the tip of a whip or the edge of steel should you carry on much longer holding your grudge and withholding your charms. The man is practically begging for a challenge or some reason to unleash some of his impatience on someone and the only thing I know is that someone will not be you.”

Oh man!

Before I could even open my mouth, she kept right on going. “What I’d like to know is, are you willing to be responsible for one of the trainee warriors not buffing his saddle to a deep enough shine and having his back opened up for this perceived mistake?”

No. One could say I didn’t want that, like, not at all.

Though I was surprised Lahn had his saddle buffed. I didn’t think a savage brute would care about something like that.

“No, Diandra,” I whispered and my hand curled tighter on my son’s head because, really, I was so… fucking… stupid!

Her hand dropped but she didn’t move out of my space.

“I understand, my dear, after you told me how he reacted to your being who you are and where you’re from… the words he said, how this would mark you. Words make marks deeper than fists; they last longer and sometimes never go away. But The Eunuch told you Dax Lahn stopped at nothing to bring you home and when he got you here, to keep you at his side. And I saw the fear...” her eyes narrowed on my face when mine widened, “oh yes, my dear, I didn’t miss it when you were delivering upon him your children and he thought you would be lost to him in a way no magic could bring you back.” She sucked in breath then kept right on going. “I love you, my beautiful friend, my golden queen, you know I love you dearly, but this has gone far enough. I know with the instances you and I have shared that you find it difficult to speak to those you love when you feel you have done them wrong…” Jeez, freak me out, she totally knew me. “But I also know that you are our warrior queen, your heart is as fierce as it is warm, and that you can pull up the strength to find the words to mend wounds and find forgiveness.”

Her hand came back to mine at Tunahn’s head and her eyes looked deeply into my own.

“Find words, Circe,” she urged gently. “Mend the wounds in your marriage, forgive your husband and let him forgive you. Do it for you, for him, for your wee ones and, by the gods, for us all.”

I bit my lip.

Then I looked through my posse.

Then my eyes lifted and, one by one, caught Zahnin and Bain’s.

Zahnin tipped his chin up. He’d heard. He agreed with Diandra.

No surprise there.

Bain grinned. He’d heard. His thoughts were already beyond the hard part and getting to the good stuff.

And one could definitely say I missed the good stuff.

So no surprise from Bain either.

I shook my head at Bain then dropped it and Diandra took her hand away as I rested my lips against my son’s fuzzy head.

Then I heard a flurry of movement, my head came up and my hand left Tunahn’s head to wrap an arm protectively around him as I saw Zahnin detaining a young boy with his big hand wrapped tight on his shoulder.

“The Dax commands his golden queen’s attendance. It is urgent. She is ordered not to delay,” the boy, out of breath from his run, rushed the words out.

Oh shit.

My eyes went to Zahnin to see him jerk his chin at me and then he moved as commanded, that is to say, without delay. My posse fell in and Zahnin took point, Bain took rear as we hurried through the marketplace and the streets of Korwahn up to Lahn and my house.

We all barely crowded through the door before I stopped, shocked to see Lahn standing, arms crossed, legs planted, face set in granite, in the courtyard. Beside him stood a woman who had to be older than time. Her hair was all gray, wiry and there was a lot of it shooting everywhere around her head, down her shoulders and chest. She was even more stooped and wrinkled than Twinka, who stood just behind her and Jacanda stood behind Twinka.

“Take the children, now,” Lahn barked, my body started at his tone and Twinka and Jacanda jumped forward (Twinka, by the by, still did not like me and still did not hide it but she freaking adored my kids, so much I had to keep an eye on her because I swear, the crazy slave would spirit them away in the night if I didn’t).

Twinka went to Narinda and Jacanda came to me, both moving to untie our wraps and take the children as Lahn kept issuing curt orders.

“The rest, go. Now. I want no ears.” His eyes sliced to Twinka. “The children will be cared for in your quarters, do not enter this house until you have my leave,” he jerked his head at Twinka who nodded and rushed away with Isis, Jacanda with Tunahn on her heels. “Zahnin,” Lahn finished, “you stay to escort the witch out when she is through.”

I blinked at the crazy-haired, stooped woman to see she was studying me and she had the skin and probably used to have the hair of a Korwahk but her eyes were bright blue.

Weird.

And she was a witch.

Weirder.

I didn’t know what to do with that. What I did know was that whatever she was doing here, Lahn did not like.

I didn’t think this was good.

My posse filed out. Zahnin took his place inside the front doors. And Jacanda and Twinka were long gone with Tunahn and Isis when Lahn dropped his arms and stalked into one of the rooms on the bottom floor which was kind of a living room but then again they all were, seeing as they all mostly just had rugs and cushions except the room that had a dining table.

When the witch and I followed, he slammed the door after we entered the room and wasted no time turning, planting his legs, crossing his arms and barking, “Deliver your message to my queen.”

My head jerked and I looked from my husband to the witch.

“You are Circe Kaye Quinn?” the woman asked in Korwahk.

I opened my mouth to answer but Lahn got there before me to bite off, “She is Dahksahna Circe, the true, golden warrior queen of Korwahk.”

The witch nodded to Lahn, a small smile tipped her lips and her eyes came back to me.

Then she lifted her hand, reached into a fold in her sarong and pulled out a folded piece of rough-edged, brownish-yellow parchment.

Then my heart leaped and my head got light when she announced, “One week ago, I fell into a trance and a message was delivered upon me by your father.”

“Oh my God,” I whispered, my hands clasping and coming up to my chest as my eyes stayed glued to her.

“It is in a tongue I do not understand. I wrote it down as I heard it and I will share it with you that same way. He expects a response and I have moved quickly through Korwahk to give this message to you for his spell has bound me and I am not at my own free will until I provide your reply.”

“What did he say?” I asked and she nodded, unfolded the parchment and started speaking in halting English.

“Circe, girl, this is your father. I’m guessin’ you’re gettin’ that I’m leavin’ you there for your own good and the good of my grandbaby. That asshole ain’t treatin’ you right, you tell whoever gives you this message and we’ll move heaven and earth to find a way to bring you all home. He is, you tell her that too and I wanna know my grandchild’s name. And he isn’t, you tell him I’m gonna find a magical way to kick his warrior ass. But I got all the hope in the world that you’re happy, darlin’. I love you, Circe girl, and I always will.”

I clenched my teeth and swallowed as I closed my eyes.

“I can assume I know what ‘asshole’ means,” Lahn remarked tersely and my eyes flew open.

He’d heard the message before, he’d understood it and that was why he was pissed.

Shit!

I opened my mouth to say something but Lahn got there before me, barking at the witch, “Leave now. My wife will give you her reply tomorrow. Come back after the sun begins its descent.”

She nodded, reading his mood (which was hard to miss) and got the hell out of there.

The door barely closed on her when I started, “Lahn –”

But I didn’t finish. This was because he lunged toward me, grabbed my hand in a tight grip and dragged me out of the room.

I was running to keep up with his long, angry strides and he was already at the stairs before I got myself together to cry, “Lahn! What on earth?”

“Quiet,” he growled.

Uh-oh.

Perhaps Diandra was wrong. Perhaps Lahn wasn’t going to find someone else to receive the sharp edge of his impatience. Perhaps that someone was going to be me.

He went straight to our room, pulled me in so hard I went flying in five steps when he released me. He came in after me and slammed the door behind him.

Uh-oh again.

I lifted a hand and started retreating as he started advancing.

“Lahn –” I whispered.

“Eight months,” he clipped and I blinked.

“Wh… what?” I stammered as I kept backing up and Lahn kept advancing.

“Eight months, my queen, I have not taken a woman.”

Oh my God!

I blinked again and in the nanosecond of that blink, this news hit me like a shot.

Oh… my… God!

My eyes stayed glued to him as my heart started beating fast.

I hit bed, skirted it and kept retreating.

Then I whispered, “Really?” and he jerked his chin up.

Then he spat, “Really.”

Oh man.

“Uh…” I mumbled, liking this, hating this (mainly because I wasn’t giving it up to him as I should as his wife and the woman who loved him), being thrilled by it and feeling massive guilt at the same time.

I hit wall and slid to the side, hitting corner and sliding down a new wall as he stopped and slowly turned his big body to keep facing me.

“My Circe told me it was important to her…” he leaned in and his eyes narrowed, “crucial,” he hissed, “that I use my body on no one but her. So I have used my body on no one but her.”

Oh… man.

My heart stopped beating fast and started thumping faster.

“Lahn –” I whispered.

“But she withholds from me.”

Oh shit.

When I’d cleared him, I came away from the wall and started to back toward the door.

Lahn came at me again. “She withholds her xaxsah. She withholds her golden honey. She withholds her claws. She withholds her spirit. And, since she bore my children, she withholds even her time.”

“Uh…” I mumbled again.

I hit door and didn’t even get close to finding the knob. Lahn moved fast, I was up, across the room and on my back in the bed, Lahn on top of me. I was winded, his face was in my face and he was beyond furious, he was seriously fucking pissed, him and the brutal, golden spirit that was shining in his eyes.

And he was something else. Something I didn’t get. Something I couldn’t read. Something that didn’t belong in his eyes. It was wrong there.

Cataclysmically wrong.

“I will not take you by force for I know you will use it as well as reason never to forgive me and now I know it to be true, from the name your father called me, that you never will.”

“Lahn –” I whispered again as what I saw in his eyes, held by his spirit, started to dawn.

He talked over me. “But you should know before I leave you to be my queen only for our people, my wife only to be mother to Tunahn and Isis and I let you go, that I suffered for my mistake, I suffered for it greatly when I found you left me.”

My heart thumped harder just as my belly melted.

Yes, I knew what that was in his eyes.

Defeat.

Oh God.

I had to stop this. Now.

“Honey –” I tried speaking softly, using an endearment he liked as I gently put my hands on him but I failed to break through.

“I spent five months agonizing that I had lost you forever, haunted in sleep and in wake with the vision of your spirit fading to nothing in your eyes, knowing I’d crushed it to death and I’d forced you to escape me. Me, your king, your warrior, your Lahn, yours, in the end being no better than Dortak.”

Oh God.

“Lahn –” I started as my body softened under his and my arms wrapped around him.

“And knowing with every day that passed when you didn’t return to me, you were never going to find your way back to me. And despairing as each day moved into the next with no word from Karrim that I wouldn’t find a way to bring you home.”

I slid my hands to his front and up to curl them light around his neck. “Baby, listen to –”

“My golden doe, gone. My child with her. Never to see her heavy with my seed, never to look upon my warrior or golden daughter, never again to feel her body at sleep in our bed next to mine.”

“Lahn, seriously, honey, please listen –”

“Then Karrim finds a witch to bring you home to me, we give her trunks of gold only for you to come back broken.”

God! He needed to shut the fuck up so I could fucking talk!

“Lahn!” I snapped urgently, my fingers digging into his neck but I still didn’t break through.

“And I did that, I broke you and the only hint you gift me with that there is a possibility my golden goddess lives on somewhere inside is when you found the strength to deliver upon me our children.”

Jeez, when my man got on a tangent, there was no shutting him the fuck up!

“Lahn, damn it –!” I shouted in his face but it was like I didn’t make a noise as he kept talking over me.

“But still, you remain lost, never to come back to me.”

And that was it. I’d had enough.

And to communicate that, with a mighty heave, I planted my feet in the bed, arched my back and shoved his shoulders, pushing him to his back but going with him so I was straddling his hips, my fingers curled into his shoulders, my torso pressed to his and my face an inch away.

“Will you… shut… up?” I yelled, his mouth closed and he scowled up at me. “Jeez!” I cried, looking over his head before I looked back at him. “The drama. God!”

“Circe –” he growled but I snapped, “Quiet, Lahn, I’m talking now.”

He closed his mouth and scowled again.

I glared.

Then I spoke. “You upset me, broke my heart, okay, I think you get that. That’s coming through loud and clear, big guy. You hurt me. But seriously, I mean, the shit I was telling you, it was whacked. Totally unbelievable. So I get that too. But I’m an idiot and I lead with my heart and do stupid shit all the freaking time. And I got so upset because I loved you so much it hurt so badly, what you said, that I did it again. I acted before I thought. I followed my heart, which hurt, and I did something really freaking stupid. So, okay, Pop calls you an asshole because he knows things didn’t start too great but… clue in, Lahn. He left me here. He knows I love you and he wants me to be happy. Yeesh!” I sat up, tipped my head back and looked at the ceiling. “For someone as unbelievably clev –”

I didn’t finish because I was on my back and my body was jolted violently because my sarong was yanked clean off.

Oh man.

I focused on his heated eyes just in time for my undies to be torn away… yep, torn away, my body jerking again as they went.

Oh man.

“Lahn,” I breathed as he rolled on top of me, I was already turned on because I suddenly found myself naked under my king’s fantastic, heavy, warm body and from the hot look in his eyes.

His big hands trailed swiftly down the backs of my thighs then they yanked up. “You forgive me,” he growled.

“Uh… yeah, awhile ago. I’m just a –”

I didn’t finish because his mouth took mine in a searing kiss, a wet one, a deep one, a long one and a very, very hot one.

Oh yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

He tore his mouth from mine and I finished my sentence on a dazed, breathless, “Dork.”

“I do not know what that is, my doe, but I do not care,” he whispered against my lips as his fingers slid through the wetness gathering between my legs and then his lips slid to my ear. “I will try to be gentle but since I took my first at the age of twelve, I have never waited this long. Nowhere near. I do not think I can.”

I pressed into his hand, tugged at the ties on his hides, turned my head and whispered in his ear, “Don’t bother with gentle, honey, I just want to feel you again.”

He didn’t wait to be asked twice and there he was.

Oh yeah.

God, I loved the feel of my husband.

“Yes,” I whispered and that was all I could say, his mouth came back to mine, his hips drove in, hard, fast, uncontrolled, my thighs pressed tight to his sides as one arm held fast around his muscled back and the other hand pulled out his plait and slid into his my gorgeous hair.

I knew he struggled, I felt it but my Lahn, like always, held on until it hit me, hot, hard and piercing, and I cried out into his mouth, my limbs tightening then he let go, his growled release mingling with mine.

Oh yeah.

I was right there, right where I needed to be.

I was home.

After we both recovered, Lahn stayed planted deep as his mouth trailed to my ear.

“You love me,” he whispered there and my limbs tightened.

“Yeah,” I whispered back.

“Say it,” he growled and I closed my eyes and turned my head so my lips were at his ear.

“I love you, baby.”

I barely got the words out before his head came up and his mouth came back down on mine. This kiss was slow, gentle and sweet as well as wet and deep.

When he broke the connection of our mouths, he rested his forehead on mine and my hand slid from his hair to cup his bearded jaw.

“I’m sorry, honey,” I said quietly and he closed his eyes, the pads of my fingers dug in and he opened them again. “I left it too long and the longer I left it, the harder –”

“Okay, my Circe,” he cut me off, tipped his chin to touch his mouth to mine, he rolled to his back so I was on top and his arms were tight around me. “Okay,” he whispered in my ear.

Okay.

Man, I loved it when he said that.

Yep, I was a dork.

But I could not let it go at that. He was my Lahn and he deserved more so I lifted my head and one of his hands came up to pull my hair back and hold it bunched at the back of my head.

“I’m glad you think it’s okay, baby, but I need to know you understand I’m sorry,” I said softly.

“I understand,” Lahn returned, his voice as gentle as his handsome face.

I licked my lips and shared, “I missed you,” I closed my eyes, tipped my head and dropped it so my forehead was on his and then I opened them, saw the warm softness in his dark ones and continued, “I missed you when I was gone and I missed you when you brought me back.”

Lahn didn’t reply but his arm around me squeezed.

My hand still at his jaw, I swept my thumb over his beautiful lips as I said quietly, “I don’t want to be anywhere but here.”

His eyes closed slowly and his hand in my hair tipped my face so I would touch my mouth against his then he released me and I lifted my head away just an inch.

“Are we good?” I whispered.

“Yes, Circe, good,” he whispered back.

My thumb swept his lips again and then moved back over his cheekbone as my eyes watched.

“Linas, kah Lahnahsahna,” Lahn demanded quietly and my gaze shifted back to his. His eyes were warm, his mouth soft and his voice softer when his hand in my hair slid around to my face and his thumb pressed lightly under my eye. “There she is.”

I felt my smile wobble as my lungs squeezed and my eyes got wet.

“Did my Lahn resurrect her?” I asked softly and his hand slid back into my hair, pulling me down for another lip touch before letting me move away an inch.

And that was when I saw his brutal, fierce golden spirit burning bright in his eyes for me to see and I knew his answer before he gave it to me.

“Yes, my Circe, she burns bright again for me.”

“Dohno,” I whispered then kept whispering, “Now I know what I suspected to be true. My husband is a god. He can do anything.”

I caught his grin before he rolled me to my back.

Then he muttered in my ear, “Let us see if this is true.”

“Okay,” I agreed readily and listened to his chuckle as it rumbled against my skin.

Oh yeah.

I was home.

* * * * *

I watched Lahn walk back into our room after putting down Tunahn who I just fed.

Night had fallen but candlelight lit the room softly. If I was lucky and fell asleep quickly, I could maybe get four hours in.

Lahn got under the covers, stretched out beside me, shoved an arm under me and curled me to his long, warm, hard side.

Okay, fuck that. No way I was sleeping.

I lifted up on an elbow, rested my hand on his chest and looked into his dark, beloved eyes.

“Do you make trainee warriors buff your saddle?” I asked and he blinked.

“What?”

“Trainee warriors. Do you make them buff your saddle?”

His mouth twitched. “Warriors in training learn and do many things, kah Lahnahsahna. Buffing saddles is not one of them.”

My eyes drifted to his shoulder and I muttered, “Oh.”

“Something they do learn,” he went on and my eyes moved back to his, “is not to waste time performing deeds that are not worth performing. Like buffing saddles.”

I started giggling. Lahn’s arm gave me a squeeze as his lips tipped up into a smile.

I rested my chest into his, my arm curving around him, my face getting closer.

“Did you really lose your virginity when you were twelve?” I whispered and his eyes immediately shuttered so I shook his body with my arm. “Lahn.”

“Meena,” he said shortly.

“No joke?” I asked, eyes wide with surprise, he studied me then he shook his head.

“No joke.”

“Wow,” I breathed. “That’s kinda young isn’t it?”

He kept studying me. Then he stated, “A warrior’s trainer will decide when a warrior is ready to advance through all facets of his training. My trainer decided I was ready to take a woman at twelve. So I took a Xacto at twelve.”

I felt his gaze sharpen on my face when he said the word “Xacto” so I told him quickly, “Baby, I know you’re not going to step out on me. If a guy like you who needs it as often as you do and the way you do can hang on for eight months for me, I have no worries about you going to the Xacto.”

“No, my Circe, you have no worries about me going to the Xacto,” he said quietly.

I smiled at him.

Lahn smiled back.

Then he asked, “What is a… dork?”

I giggled again. Then I explained, “A kind of, I don’t know, it’s hard to explain. A person that does stupid shit, kinda klutzy, kinda bonkers, kinda foolish, not enough of any of those to be really stupid or harm anyone, just, I don’t know, a dork or…” I tipped my head to the side and grinned, “Me.”

Lahn wasn’t grinning. “My golden queen is not a dork,” he declared.

I slid in closer and said, still grinning, “Big guy, I lost it and spirited my pregnant ass home for five months, leaving you behind when I promised never to leave you at all. Then my Pop gave me a big lecture about leaving the man I was in love with, I got back, forgave you weeks before I told you I did, which was about the time Karrim told me you never gave up on me, then got myself caught up in procrastination, which, by the way, Pop also used to lecture me about all the time, so it got harder and harder to talk to you about it to the point where I pissed you off and made you give up on me. Calling myself a dork is being nice. I was way beyond a dork.”

“This is true,” he agreed so swiftly I blinked.

Then I stared.

Then I burst out laughing.

And I didn’t stop when I was pulled full on top of my husband, he rolled me to my back, covered my body with his, shoved his face in my neck and I heard his deep laughter rumbling against my skin as I felt it shaking my body.

And passersby, spies and those who were just plain nosy who were paying attention outside our house heard the mighty Dax and his rahna Dahksahna’s mirth and about forty-five minutes later, they heard something else entirely.

And all they heard was all over Korwahn the next morning.

* * * * *

The sun was touching the sky when something woke me. I felt disconcerted before it hit me.

I was not sleeping under Lahn’s warm body. I was pressed to the side of it, his arm around me, my cheek to his shoulder, my arm around his abs.

My eyes opened and I stared at my daughter, her rosy, chubby cheek pressed to her father’s brown, muscled chest, her eyes closed, her pink lips pursed in a cute, little baby pout, her sweet little fist resting light on his smooth, dark skin.

I felt my lips turn up and I slid my arm from my husband’s stomach so I could rest my hand on my daughter’s fat rump.

Then carefully, I tipped my head back to see my handsome husband’s sleeping profile.

I hadn’t heard her and this meant she’d probably woken and, as Isis was content to do, she just quietly took things in.

But my husband’s sensed her awake and went to go get his daughter.

That made my lips turn up deeper.

He either felt the slight movement of my mouth or sensed my eyes on him, his opened and his head turned to me. When I looked into their dark depths I saw they were somnolent and sexy and all the love he felt for me was warm, sweet and openly read in the depths of them.

Yes, oh yes, I was home.

I pressed against Isis’s bottom.

“We’re going to have to talk about this,” I whispered.

I watched with fascination as he grinned.

I let that process through me as I grinned back.

Then I sighed.

Then I tipped my chin down and closed my eyes, deciding we’d talk about it later.

Tunahn would be hungry soon. I needed to get my rest.

* * * * *

Harold Quinn listened as he watched the old woman in a trance, her voice saying his daughter’s words, his heart breaking a little and mending a little more.

“Hey Pop. Get this! You’ve got two grandbabies. Twins! Can you believe that? Tunahn is our boy and his name means horse. They have a bunch of different gods here and the horse god is one. Lahn’s name means tiger and that’s a god too. He named Tunahn after the horse god because horses are strong, clever and loyal. Our other baby is a little girl. She has fuzzy, golden hair that I’m pretty sure is going to be just like Mom’s and mine. Tunahn, I forgot to tell you, has black hair like his Dad. Her name is Isis. I named her like you and Mom named me. Tunahn is already strong as an ox, no joke. He also bawls a lot but that’s because he’s a greedy, little monster and cannot seem to get enough milk. But he doesn’t have to bawl long. I can’t keep my hands off him. He’s my little warrior. He’s growing leaps and bounds. Isis is my golden baby; she rarely cries and is super sweet. Her Dad freaking adores her. If Tunahn wakes in the night, Lahn is cool with me getting up and feeding but he’s firm about Tunahn going back to his bed. If Isis does, Lahn’s all over letting her sleep with us. Don’t worry, I’ve nipped that in the bud. Well, kind of.”

The witch sucked in a huge breath and then kept talking, just like his Circe could do.

“You were right, as usual. I guess it sucks that I’ve learned that now when you’re a world away. The witch says that we can try to send these messages but they can’t be certain to reach their target. Though I hope we can, even if it’s only random. I’ll promise to keep trying and I hope you do too. But, like I said, you were right. Lahn and I worked things out. He worked hard at it and maybe I made him work too hard but I love him and I forgave him and now I’m happy. You don’t have to worry. It’s all good. He loves me a lot, Pop, and shows me he does. I’m happy, honestly, very happy. He’s a good guy and if you met him, it might take awhile, but you’d like him.” A pause then, “Oh, by the way, if you could do me a favor and not call him an asshole in your next message that would be cool. I taught him English and he figured out what that meant and he didn’t much like it.”

Harold Quinn grinned.

The witch went on. “If I don’t hear from you, or you don’t hear from me, I want you to know I miss you and I love you and I always will. Always, Pop. You’re the best Pop a girl could have. The… absolute… best.”

Oh yeah. There it was. That was his girl.

The witch kept talking. “Tell the guys I said hey and give Marlene a hug for me and let her and Circe know I’m all right.”

Another sucked in breath and then the witch went on.

“And I promise I’m all right, Pop. Promise. I’m… well, Daddy, what can I say? I’m home.”

The woman’s shoulders slumped, her head dropped then it shot up and she blinked, her blind eyes focusing on nothing but no longer hazed by her trance.

“Did it work?” she asked, face alight.

When Harold Quinn answered, his voice was gruff, “Yeah.”

The old woman paused as if attempting to sense his mood, the brightness in her face faded when she succeeded in this endeavor then she nodded.

Then quietly she said, “We’re lucky it worked.”

He nodded back though she couldn’t see him. He’d heard her. Communication with that world was difficult. Messages were received only randomly, messages sent might never be known if they were heard.

Tunahn and Isis and his Circe happy with her king.

Yeah, he was lucky it worked.

“You want to try again…” she trailed off and he nodded again even though she couldn’t see him, somehow he knew she sensed this too.

Harold was right for she smiled a gentle smile.

Then she reached out blindly, touched his arm and whispered, “I’ll never be far, father of the golden Circes.”

Then she turned and walked quietly out of his garage, her cane clicking on the floor as she went.

Harold watched the door close behind her before he walked into his daughter’s office and settled in her chair behind her desk after pulling out his wallet. He flipped it open, gently tugged out the oft-touched photo and looked into a pair of familiar golden eyes.

“She’s happy, Andie,” he whispered to his wife.

Andromeda Quinn did what she always did.

She smiled back at him, her beautiful eyes lit with that bright, golden light Harold Quinn loved so fucking much.

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