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Chapter 19

Although Tarrin enjoyed being with all of his friends and family, gathered together to celebrate the birth of Keritanima’s son, the dark pall that had happened to Tarrin could not help but to cast a shadow over their celebration. Tarrin did everything he could to keep the focus of the gathering on Keritanima, not on him. Unfortunately, this was not easy, and the root of the problem began and ended with Phandebrass. The Wizard absolutely would not leave him alone. Every moment of every day, he endlessly harassed Tarrin about experimenting with his power, learning from it, studying it. Tarrin didn’t want to do that in Wikuna, he didn’t want to take anything away from Keritanima’s moment, but Phandebrass just would not leave it alone. His zeal for discovering the knowledge surrounding Tarrin’s unique condition overrode everything else, even such things as eating and sleeping. Tarrin had once mused that there was no solution that could hide from the usually scattered mage once it piqued Phandebrass’ curiosity, and unfortunately, that observation was proving to be entirely correct. Phandebrass followed him everywhere he went. When he wasn’t allowed in the same room with him--a fact that caused him nearly to lose a finger to Jesmind--he would stand outside the door and, if he thought Tarrin was within hearing range, shout out question after question until one of the females threatened to gut him if he didn‘t leave. But he was never very far away, having Chopstick and Turnkey keep an eye on him and report back any time he left his rooms, when he would swoop down with his journal and a million questions.

He had no idea how many times he nearly got killed in the two days after Shiika’s arrival. Tarrin almost killed him, Jesmind almost killed him, Jula almost killed him, Allia almost killed him, Triana nearly killed him about ten times, Sapphire nearly killed him, Dar almost killed him, and Keritanima almost had Binter execute him on the spot about five times. He was almost mindlessly persistent, until Camara Tal clubbed him on the back of the head with her fist, knocked him out, and had Koran Tal truss him up and stick him in a broom closet to give Tarrin a few hours of peace.

Despite that endless aggravation, however, Tarrin did manage a little quiet, quality time with his sister and his new nephew, but that wasn’t the only new member of the family he had to get used to. True to his prediction, Kimmie relented the next morning and accepted a Hellhound from Shiika, which she delivered almost a minute after she agreed. Shiika had obviously already brought the Hellhound to Wikuna and fixed it in anticipation of the proficiency of the nagging skills of Kimmie’s daughters. The Hellhound Shiika delivered up to Kimmie was a truly monstrous specimen that was virtually the same size as Shadow, and Tarrin had been quite surprised to see it. This Hellhound was the alpha male of the pack, just as Shadow was the alpha female. He was the size of a small pony, a huge animal that looked proportional standing beside Tarrin, but looked grotesquely oversized when standing beside nearly anyone else. The Hellhound’s head came up to Kimmie’s chest, and it weighed even more than she did. Tara and Rina could walk underneath the massive animal by simply ducking their heads.

“Wow!” Tara had said in excitement, jumping up onto the Hellhound’s back and sitting down, as if he was some kind of horse. The Hellhound endured this indignity with a proudly raised head, though his ears were twitching. “Can we keep him, Mama?” she asked in excitement.

“Get down!” Kimmie admonished the cub sharply, then she knelt before the Hellhound and put her paw on his neck. “Hello there,” she said gently.

Tarrin still smiled a little at the thought of that memory. The austere Hellhound then grinned like a misbehaving child and licked Kimmie’s face, grating his tongue all the way from the base of her jaw to her orange tabby-furred ear. The act caught Kimmie by surprise, making her sit down on her rump, which made the twins collapse into laughter.

“He needs a name,” Shiika had prompted her.

“Forge,” Kimmie then declared as she got up off the floor. “Your name is Forge.”

The Hellhound then nodded to her gravely and sat down.

“He understands Sulasian, Sha’Kar, and Torian,” Shika then told her. “He’ll only obey you and Tarrin for right now, Kimmie,” she added. “He’s as much Tarrin’s Hellhound as he is yours, just to warn you.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Kimmie told her, giving Tarrin a loving smile.

“And you told me no,” Shiika said to him with a delightfully wicked little smirk as she sauntered away, leaving Kimmie to get to know her new pet.

Tarrin couldn’t help but chuckle at that memory. In the end, she managed to stick him with a Hellhound after all.

Forge was a serious animal, with a highly refined sense of dignity. Tarrin had observed him as he got to know Kimmie and her children, how he endured the roughhouse play of the twins like a tolerant parent, those glowing red eyes of his always alert, always watching. Forge understood that he was a guardian as well as a companion, and since the twins were the children of his owners, that made them his children too. He let them play with him, occasionally played back just to keep them happy, but he always watched them and watched out for them. When Tara started climbing up the back of a chair, Forge’s teeth clamped onto her black furry tail and pulled on it until she let go. Not satisfied with that, he picked her up by her tail and carried her back to Kimmie’s feet, then dropped her on the floor and sat down.

Kimmie looked like he was a gift from the gods at that particular moment, threw her arms around his neck, and hugged him with the most profound appreciation.

Needless to say, Tara was not as excited about the idea of having a Hellhound for a pet after that.

What surprised him was the immediate and unusual relationship that Forge struck up with Fireflash. The little drake scampered down Tarrin’s arm and perched on his wrist and leaned forward to sniff at the Hellhound’s nose, and it snuffled the drake back in return. Then, to everyone’s surprise, Fireflash hopped over and seated itself on top of Forge’s head like it was Tarrin’s shoulder, and the Hellhound did not mind at all. Forge seemed very fond of the drake, and the drake seemed equally fond of the Hellhound. It seemed a very strange combination, but Tarrin did not mind at all. It meant that there wasn’t going to be any kind of friction between them.

No friction from the other females who lived in the house either. Jesmind and Jula liked the big brute, and Jasana was just as excited about him as the twins, repeating over and over that Eron was going to be so jealous that they had a Hellhound, but all he had was a desert fox. That was so typically Jasana. It was unfortunate that she didn’t seem to comprehend the fact that the Hellhound belonged to Kimmie.

When Kimmie introduced Forge to the others during lunch, he immediately went over and laid down beside Shadow, and Tarrin was certain then that Forge and Shadow had been the alphas of the pack. The litter that Shadow had had last year were probably sired by Forge. Tarrin asked Shiika if it was wise to take both the pack’s alphas like that, but she assured him that there wouldn’t be too much trouble. A fight over the new order had already begun, but they wouldn’t be fights to the death. And it was the size of the pack that triggered that homicidal response, since Hellhound packs were usually only around seven to ten members, not counting cubs and adolescents. Her pack had had fifteen adult members, too many for them to cope with it. One had been killed in a fight, she had given away one before coming to Wikuna, and with the three she’d given away in Wikuna, that dropped the pack’s size down to ten. That made the pack much less apt to violent, fatal fights.

Forge was a pleasant distraction to the endless wrath of Hurricane Phandebrass, who endlessly sought to batter down his door and envelop him in the gale force winds of his overenthusiastic quest for answers. Tarrin very nearly started hating the determined Wizard by the first public display of Faalken, which took place in the half-built House of Hands, which was to be the seat of the Parliament which was now meeting in hastily converted offices across the city. The House of Hands was going to be a marble building with two wings and a large rectangular tower rising over the center that would have a sculpted relief on each of its four sides. The first side would be Keritanima and a caption about her being the First Queen of Wikuna, which embarrassed her a little bit. The second would be an image of a Wikuni sailor looking out over the sea, the third a series of smaller reliefs of the crests of each of the noble houses, and the fourth would be three Wikuni hands raised with palms facing. One was noticeably belonging to Keritanima, a fox‘s hand. It represented the three aspects of the governing body of the kingdom: the crown, the Parliament, and the Supreme Barristry, which would oversee both of the other branches and make sure they operated within the law. Tarrin found the idea a little ostentatious, but in a way, he understood that they were building it for posterity as much as they were for their current needs. Five hundred years from now, Wikuni could look at that tower and see where they had begun, a monument to the time when Wikuna changed.

That, of coure, brought up another irritation. Keritanima had named him and Allia as prince and princess, which was nothing more than an empty title with no meaning…at least to them. To the Wikuni, however, that was another matter entirely. He was now an official member of the Royal house, and that caused the commoners to treat him with a strange, mindless kind of adoration, the same adulation they showered on Keritanima. They had no idea who he was, but they were shouting at him with adulation and almost giddy cries of regard, and found this bit of hero-worship to be very unsettling. Jenna dealt with it every time she left the Tower and went out into the streets of Suld, but it was the first time anyone had ever acted in such a silly manner towards him.

The commoners crowded as close as the Vendari and the Royal Guardsmen would allow as Keritanima presented the new Crown Prince to the Parliament, and then turned and held him up so the commoners could get a little better view of him than they got the day before from the balcony. She allowed an artist there at the ceremony to draw pictures of Faalken, which were then published in the news publications that were sold from street corners the next morning. Tarrin got a hold of one of them and took a look, and he was impressed at how accurate the young mouse Wikuni had been in portraying Faalken. He got every detail perfect, right down to the grain of his fur, he even captured the dazzle in Faalken’s green eyes.

All of Wikuna went absolutely nuts over the new Crown Prince, a kind of hysteria Tarrin had never seen before. Reproductions of the original illustrations that the mouse Wikuna had made were converted into cloth screens and printed by presses, and they were sold in simple wooden frames that one could hang upon the wall. They were cheap, easy to produce, and in a matter of hours, it became the absolute must have item to own. A likeness of the adorable tiger Wikuni infant was suddenly gracing at least one wall in nearly every dwelling in the capital city. Some enterprising tailor got the idea to take a pattern of black cloth, sew it up, stuff it with raw sheep’s wool, and sew little sparkling red flints to the head for eyes, which produced a little toy replica of Shadow. He was suddenly inundated with requests for his little stuffed Hellhounds, just like the one that stood so sedately at the Queen’s feet when she presented her son to the kingdom. Nobody quite knew what Shadow really was, but it was big, it was exotic, and it was obviously the Queen’s new pet, and that made it instantly adored. Black dogs were suddenly treasured pets in Wikuna, and the price for one of them on the market quadrupled by morning.

It was insanity. Tarrin stood at the window that night and watched a celebration in the frigid Wikuna night with torches lighting a street that was filled with commoners who were dancing and revelling. The declared official holiday had boiled over into the next day, and then the next, as the citizens of Wikuna refused to go back to work, continued to celebrate, and the frenzied hysteria that surrounded Keritanima absolutely exploded into near worship. Tarrin had no idea that Keritanima was that popular with her subjects, and he had the feeling that Keritanima didn’t either. She seemed just as confused and amazed at what was going on out on the streets as anyone else, and Jervis had to ask her to issue a proclomation which was little more than a plea for the people to please return to their work and their lives and get back to normal. Businesses were hurting--at least those who hadn’t figured out a way to turn a profit off the situation--and cargo sat waiting on the docks to be loaded onto ships whose crews had not returned to them yet, they were so caught up in the celebration.

Much to his surprise, the proclomation had its intended effect. The calm request which was printed into the news journals and posted all over the city thanked the citizens for their support and their good will, and then requested that tomorrow, it would please her if the people put aside the partying and get back to normal. Keritanima had sacrificed the third day to celebration, to give the people one more day to enjoy themselves, and have that last day to have fun before getting back to business.

Tarrin spent most of those two days avoiding Phandebrass and pondering what was to come, at least when he wasn’t with his mate and family. He could come up with no solid ideas or plans quite yet, but he knew that it was going to take time. Phandebrass was quite determined to track him down, but Tarrin was much better at hiding from him and his drakes than they were at finding him. Phandebrass just wouldn’t give up, however, which caused Tarrin, Allia, and Keritanima to meet that afternoon and decide that maybe it was time for the reunion to come to an official end. If they didn’t, someone was going to kill Phandebrass. Besides, Allia needed to get Allyn home to prepare him for the branding, and Tarrin certainly had quite a bit on his mind. So, at dinner, Keritanima got up and announced to the inner circle that Tarrin and Allia were going home in the morning. And because they were the central core of their group, that meant that it was time for everyone to go home.

Phandebrass looked terribly disappointed, and there was a kind of desperation about him during dinner that warned Tarrin that he might do something rash. So he remarked to Jenna that he would be fetching Camara Tal the day after tomorrow and bring her to the Tower, so they could try to come to understand what had happened to him. That brightened Phandebrass up quite a bit, as he finally seemed to realize that Tarrin was still willing to allow him to study him, just not right now.

With Phandebrass suitably defused, it gave Tarrin time after dinner to spend with Keritanima. Instead of spending it with her surrounded by his family, instead he found himself surrounded by hers. Allia and Allyn were already starting his preparation, and most of the others decided to go down into Wikuna and engage in a little light revelling with the Wikuni, so Tarrin ended up with Fireflash, Blackfire, and Forge, acting as Hellhound babysitter as he spent the evening with Keritanima, Rallix, Jenawalani, the rabbit Wikuni Jervis, and the eternally present Binter and Sisska, with the new addition of the adolescent Kishaa. Keritanima was still staying with fashionable robes, for her belly was still a bit tender and she didn’t want to put on a constricting dress, and Rallix wore his customary plain blue doublet and black breeches. Jenawalani wore a cream-colored gown with little embroidering aside from a crashing-wave design embroidered along the neckline and a narrow belt made of beaten gold. Tarrin had spent many a night sitting in his favorite chair with Fireflash on his shoulder, but not often did he do so with Jenawalani in the room, and almost never with Jervis attending as well. Tarrin knew Jenawalani and Jervis rather well, but it was the first time he saw them interact with each other. He came close to accepting Jenawalani because she was Keritanima’s sister, but Jervis’ presence kept him reserved, an observer, silently watching them interact. Of course, just about all interaction revolved around Faalken. Keritanima had shown surprising nonchalance to nurse him in the presence of Jervis and the maids and servants that occasionally entered and exited, but then again, that showed the level of trust that she had in her Minister of Intelligence, and Tarrin watched and listened as Rallix held his infant son, receiving gentle instruction in the fine art of it from his wife, learning the first lessons of an education that would make him a father.

Then again, the servants were also an indication of that trust Keritanima had now. Before, no one was allowed in Keritanima’s private apartment, but now she permitted certain maids and servants to enter her private domain, those in whom she had placed a great deal of trust. She truly was not the same vulnerable, paranoid, defensive young girl he remembered meeting in the Tower so many years ago. Now she was a confident young queen that had learned to put her trust in others, though winning that trust could be a trying and long experience. There were some six servants that Keritanima allowed into her private domain, a lizard-like male, a pair of nearly identical raccoon females, Amber, a male jackal-like Wikuni, and a burly bear female. When not fetching and running errands, they kept the apartment clean, did the laundry, and anything else they could think of. All six were very loyal to Keritanima, a loyalty that Keritanima was careful to cultivate in them with generosity and care for their welfare. She paid them lavishly--almost obscenely for a servant, didn’t overwork them, and made sure they had plenty of time to spend with their own families, and in return she gained six servants who would literally die for her. They didn’t really talk to Tarrin, except for Amber, anyway, and he ignored them for the most part.

He watched as Rallix held his son, and it was hard to suppress a smile. Rallix had no idea what he was doing. Despite months of impending fatherhood, he seemed to have not learned a single whit of anything…that, or he was still in some kind of shock or wonderment. He looked down at Faalken with a mixture of surprise, love, awe, and not a little terror, overjoyed at the tiny bundle in his arms, but looking fearful that he might do something wrong. A single touch from Keritanima put him immediately at ease, and she leaned against him as they both gazed down upon their son.

That was a memory that would stay with him for the rest of his life. Keritanima cuddled up with Rallix, as they looked down upon their drowsy infant with such undisguised love gracing their furry faces. It was such a moment of serenity, peace, and togetherness that it struck him deeply.

Sometimes, it was the simplest pleasures which were the best.

Tarrin absently stroked Fireflash’s flank, his eyes lost in thought as he considered the vision before him, feeling so happy that his sister had found such peace and contentment, but unsure of what was going to happen to him now. It was more than just the gods on his mind, for he’d been totally honest with Shiika. He truly hadn’t gotten over the shock of it all yet. He was worried about his future, he was worried about his family, and he was also worried about what he would find out about his power. It frightened him, it truly did, and it had very little to do with the fact that that power was what had the gods out for his head. It was what that power meant that worried him most of all, the fact that it separated him forever from those around him. He belonged with his sisters, he belonged with his mates, he belonged with his friends and family, but he no longer truly belonged. With them, yes, but on Sennadar…no. His family and friends were the only real link he had with the mortal world now, and they were the only reason he wasn’t going absolutely crazy with fear and anxiety. Keritanima and Allia could probably tell that he wasn’t nearly as calm about all this as he appeared. He was very nearly afraid to go to the Tower and try to learn how this power worked, afraid to explore the limits of it. Not because he was afraid of the power….

He was afraid that it would make him drift further away.

Even now he could feel the two pools of fire in his back, aching to be released from their confines and reassume the form that they seemed to envision for themselves, but he would not let them. Even if they would let him fly, the price that he would have to pay would be too great. That price would be embracing that which would forever cast him out of the world of the mortals, would forever make him feel like he no longer belonged, even in that place which was uniquely his. His sisters, his family, they were all he had now, all that there was for him, aside from the possibility of a sympathetic ear in Shiika and the gentle love of the Goddess.

But even she seemed distant to him now. She was one of the Elder Gods, and that put her in the group that had the most interest in seeing him conveniently die. She had not spoken to him since she came to him in Suld, and even the sense of her presence seemed distant to him now. He knew that she loved him and that she wouldn’t abandon him, but her withdrawing from him the way she seemed to have done so still hurt. For a very long time, that gentle presence just within the Weave had bolstered the Were-cat, strengthened his resolve, provided comfort and strength to him when he needed it, but now it was not there. For the first time in years, he truly felt alone, for he knew that the Goddess was not there, was not looking down upon him. It was strange to think that that mattered so much to him now that it was all over, that she no longer needed to watch over him, but it did. It felt like the intimate link between him and her had been severed, and that he no longer held the place with her than he held before it all happened. He was adrift now, without guidance, without support, without help, and though he knew that it was utterly silly for it to bother him so much, it really, truly did. Always before, he had had that support, had had that sense of security, and now it was gone. All this time, he had been little more than a large child secretly craving the apron strings of his mother. And now those strings were gone, and he was thrown out the front door and left to fend for himself. It left him empty and bewildered, like a kitten lost in the woods, surrounded by a pack of hungry wolves.

Alone…even in this room with his sister Keritanima, he felt alone. And it was a terrible feeling.

At least she wouldn’t be alone. Keritanima had a husband she loved to distraction, who loved her as deeply in return. She had a son, the ultimate fruition of her marriage to Rallix, and the completion of her own family, of her own secret dreams and desires. All her life, all she had ever wanted was a family, people who would love her, people she could love in return, to fill the void left by the cruel upbringing of Damon Eram. Tarrin and Allia had filled that void in her life, but others also filled that space inside of her, the others in Tarrin’s inner circle. To her, Dar and Dolanna and Camara Tal and even Sarraya were family, but they were almost like in-laws, brought into the family by virtue of Tarrin’s relationship to them. But now she had her own family independent of Tarrin and Allia, her own little private circle. She had gained the family she had always wanted, and for that he could find nothing but happiness within him. She deserved it. After everything she had been through, no one deserved this more than Keritanima. She was Queen and ruler, she was wife and best friend, she was sister and aunt, she was niece and daughter…and now, now she was a mother. Her life was now complete, and he knew, deep inside, that she would want for nothing for the rest of her days.

As it should be.

If there was nowhere left for his life to go, then he would ensure that the lives around him that mattered bloomed and flowered. If he could never again be a part of their world, he would ensure that that world was theirs, and that it would surrender up to them everything he felt they were due. If he could no longer live, then he would live through them, and their happiness would become his.

For as long as his life lasted.

“Why so pensive?” Keritanima asked him with a toothy grin. “I’m not going to forget about you now that I have a son, Tarrin.”

Tarrin was quiet a very long moment, much longer than anyone else in the room would have comfortable with him being, as he did nothing but rhythmically stroke Fireflash’s scaled flank. “It’s nothing,” he finally said in an eerily calm, measured voice. “Just thinking about the future.”

“That’s always a good thing,” she said, gazing at Faalken lovingly. “There are all sorts of plans we need to make. The first of which is who you’re going to marry, Jen,” she said, giving her sister a wink.

“Hmph,” she snorted. “I’ve already got my mark down,“ she answered. “I’m just waiting for the right time.”

“Who?”

“Rigel Plantan,” she answered. “He’s the second son of Vora,” she explained to Tarrin considerately. “I like him, he’s cute, and the ties it would give my house to House Plantan are quite appealing.”

“We don’t have to do that anymore, Jen,” Keritanima told her.

“Politically, no, but it would give me some leverage on Vora in certain financial matters,” she said with a wink. “I think I could learn to love Rigel.”

“Want me to go drag him back here and make him buy you silver goblet?” Jervis asked seriously, which made all of the Wikuni burst into laughter. The humor of it was lost to Tarrin and the Vendari.

“No, but thanks anyway, Jervis,” she smiled. “I’ll take care of it. It’s more fun if I do it myself.”

“Well, Rigel is rather handsome,” Keritanima said speculatively. “I’m not sure how good of a brother-in-law he’d be. He’s a bit timid. Timidity is not a good trait in this family.”

“He’s shy, not timid,” Jenawalani told her. “If you can get to be his friend, he’s a very outgoing person.”

“Oh, one of those you have to befriend before you can go after them,” Keritanima chuckled. “That’s alright, then. Tiella is a bit shy.”

“No, Tiella is intimidated,” Tarrin said absently.

“So what’s so good about Rigel?” Keritanima asked, clasping her hands and leaning against Rallix’s shoulder, looking around him at her.

“He’s gentle and kind and sweet,” she answered with a distracted smile. “He’s also a poet and a writer.”

“No wonder I never saw him,” Keritanima grunted. “That kind of person wouldn’t get involved with noble intrigue.”

“Not at all,” she affirmed. “I went to a lot of trouble to get close to him. I want a husband that has nothing to do with politics. At all,” she said with surprising intensity. “I want to wash my hands of it for the rest of my life. Rigel would be the perfect husband for me.”

“And him being second son of Vora Plantan doesn’t hurt,” Keritanima winked.

“No, not really,” she admitted with a grin.

“I think our son is ready to be put to bed, Kerri,” Rallix told her.

Keritanima reached out and brushed her fingers lovingly against her son’s furry face, weaving that same Mind spell. “He is,” she answered. “Don’t get used to this, love,” she warned. “Newborns sleep most of the time, but soon enough we’ll be begging him to go to sleep.”

“I think I can live with it,” he chuckled. “Come with me and make sure I do this right, dear.”

“Certainly,” she said. They both got up and carried the infant towards the nursery, which had once been Keritanima’s study.

“So, Kerri said you’re going home tomorrow, Tarrin,” Jenawalani said to him. “You’re still training in Druidic magic?”

He shook his head. “I’m done with that,” he answered her. “I’ll be spending the next couple of months planning, and then I have a spell I have to create for Triana. I’m also probably going to be playing referee between Jesmind and Kimmie for about a month.”

“Why?”

“If I’m not mistaken, a woman named Anayi is in Aldreth right now waiting for us to come home,” he answered. “She wants to apprentice to Kimmie and learn Wizard magic. Jesmind won’t like that.”

“Why not?”

“First, because they’ll be in the house. Second, because me and this woman are friends, and Jesmind is extremely jealous.”

“Ohhh,” she sounded. “You think it’s going to be alright? I’ve never seen Jesmind mad before, but Kerri’s told me all sorts of horror stories.”

“They’re probably not far from the mark.”

“So it’s going to be an endless cat fight? No pun intended,” she said with a sudden chuckle.

“No, not really,” he told her. “Jesmind will get used to Anayi, so that’s not a problem. It’s just that whenever Jesmind feels threatened, she takes it out on Kimmie. There’s some history there.”

“What kind of history?”

“Jesmind was my mate first,” he answered as Jervis gave him an attentive look. “But when we went to Sha’Kari, she couldn’t come, because of Jasana. Triana didn’t want me to go alone, so she sent Kimmie as well.”

“I know that part, Tarrin,” Jenawalani told him. “You and Kimmie were mates.”

“Among Were-cats, you can be mates and hate each other, Jen,” he told her. “Kimmie loved me, and while we were mates, I fell in love with her too.”

“I--ohhh,” she said, her expression sober. “And Jesmind hates her because you don’t love her anymore?”

“I do love Jesmind, Jen. I just love Kimmie too. Jesmind’s forgiven me for falling in love with Kimmie, but she’s never forgotten. And I know she has some bad blood towards Kimmie too.”

“Ouch, now I understand the complexities of your house,” she grunted. “You live with a very jealous woman, and her main rival lives in the same house with her.”

“That about sums it up,” he agreed. “Jesmind keeps it under control most of the time, but whenever someone new comes around, her jealous nature flares up again until she gets a handle on it. She’ll be a bitch for the next month or so.”

Jenawalani laughed. “Tarrin, don’t talk about your mate that way!”

“Truth is truth, Jen,” he said levelly. “Were-cats don’t dance around the truth. Jesmind is a bitch when she gets her fur ruffled the wrong way, and Anayi’s going to majorly ruffle her.”

“I thought that the little races carried little wisdom, teacher,” Kishaa said to Binter in a bass voice, but not as deep as Binter or Sisska’s. “But the Were-cat speaks from the Holy Scroll as if he has read it.”

“Some races display admirable traits, student,” Binter replied. “The Were-cats understand the beauty of truth. The Selani understand the importance of honor. Ungardt understand the value of battle to improve one’s self. There is much to respect in other races.”

“I will be guided by you, my teacher,” Kishaa said humbly.

“I think I’m going to ask Thean to come around,” Tarrin grunted. “Jesmind’ll be much less cranky if there’s another male in the house. Besides, he wanted to come and study some of the artifacts I have in my library.”

“Why will she be less cranky?”

“Because she won’t feel as threatened,” he answered. “Especially if Kimmie’s smart enough to carry on with Thean while he’s there. And she is,” he added, rubbing his chin with his finger. Yes, that idea had quite a few points of merit to recommend it. Thean would be more than happy to do it, he knew he would. And since everyone liked Thean, even Tarrin, there wouldn’t be any friction anywhere.

“TARRIN KAEL!” an unimaginably huge voice seemed to explode from the very air, startling everyone in the room and sending Faalken into an instant storm of crying in the next room. Keritanima’s door seemed to flex, and then it absolutely evaporated under some kind of immeasurable force. Beyond that door was Shiika, and Shiika was not hiding her true form. The tall, blond, buxom Demoness stomped through that suddenly empty doorway, her wings actually smashing through the masonry to each side of the door as she marched inexorably through it. Tarrin was up almost immediately, and before he knew what he was doing, what was going on, his wings seared through his vest and snapped out, flaring out to cover the area behind him with their volume, keeping Jenawalani, Jervis, and the servants between them and the furious Succubus. Those servants were screaming in terror and running every which way, all of them except Amber, who stood there just beside and behind Tarrin and put both her furry hands Tarrin‘s wing, then pushed it down far enough for her to be able to see. Fireflash stayed on his shoulder, bristling and hissing at the Demoness, but the Hellhouds stayed right where they were, unwilling to engage their former mistress. A strange red light glowed around both of Shiika’s horns as she stormed into the room, displaying a terrible power that Tarrin had never seen before, and never wanted to see again, power that seemed to emanate from her in shimmering waves.

And Shiika was a weak Demon? He certainly didn’t want to see a strong one!

“You--I--We--rrrRRRRRRRAAUUGGGHHH!” she shouted in inarticulate rage, stomping a foot on the floor and snapping her wings fully out, as if to mirror his own. “Take it off!”

“Take what off?” he asked, sincerely confused.

“The geas! Take it off NOW!”

Tarrin gave her a blank, frightened look.

Panting, trying to regain her composure, she clenched her hands into fists and held them rigidly at her hips, head bowed, shoulders heaving, and a look of such baleful fury on her features that he honestly didn’t understand why she didn’t try to disembowel him with a loaf of stale bread. “You know damn well what I’m talking about! Take it off right now!”

“Y-You said you couldn’t attack me,” he stammered fearfully, and it was real fear. It wasn’t that he was facing an enraged Demon that frightened him so much. At that moment, he wasn’t facing a Demon, he was facing one seriously ticked off woman.

And between an angry Demon and an angry female, he’d take the Demon every time.

“I want to hurt you so bad I can taste it,” she seethed. “Now take off this geas so I can rip off your face!”

“Gee-ahs? What is that?”

Her red eyes glowered at him for a long moment, then her wings relaxed. “You don’t know,” she said, then she laughed ruefully, scrubbing the back of her head with her hand just like he always did when he felt foolish. “Well, you didn’t do it on purpose. I thought you did. That’s why I was so pissed off.”

“Shiika, what in the hells is going on?” he asked in complete confusion.

“A lot more than I thought,” she grumbled to herself, then she blew out her breath and folded up her wings. Tarrin did the same, but he tensed up when she took a step towards him. “I was wrong. You do have some capability when you’re hiding your wings. You put a geas on me.”

“What?”

“A geas is a magical compulsion to either do something or not do something. It doesn’t stop me from either doing it or not doing it, but if I break the geas, it causes me pain. You geased me to not do something. Well, I did it to myself, now that I look at it,” she said in irritation. “And you’re going to take it off. Now.”

“I, I don’t know how,” he said helplessly, totally baffled and confused. “What did I do? How did it happen?”

“When I told you I wanted to be your friend, it put a geas on me,” she said in a seething voice, glaring at him. “Now I’m geased to uphold my promise to you! When I realized it was there, I got pissed off at you, and I wanted to punish you for it, and it broke the geas! Do you know how whacked out I’ve been for the last half a hour, Tarrin? And it’s all your fault!” she screamed at him.

“You’re in pain because you want to hurt him, but wanting to hurt him is what’s causing you the pain,” Jenawalani said in a clinical kind of manner, paused for just a second, and then she burst out laughing.

If looks could kill, Jenawalani would be so dead that even Death Herself wouldn’t have known what to do about it.

The reasoning behind it did seem a little…odd. And there she was, panting and raving and carrying on like a lunatic, and all she had to do to make it stop was calm down. But she couldn’t calm down, and that made it worse, which only made her even less calm. It was a vicious cycle, and Tarrin felt sorry for her that it happened…it was all an accident after all, he didn’t even know what was going on.

But Jenawalani’s laughter cast the entire affair in a new light, and in that moment, despite how terrifying Shiika had been when she made that rather dramatic entrance, he couldn’t help but find a strange humor in it. Her laughter echoed in his ears, and despite his best efforts, it infected him. Much to Shiika’s shock, chagrin, and humiliation, Tarrin burst into laughter himself.

“Tarrin! Stop it right now! I’m warning you!” she said in a furious hiss, but the threat had no weight. If the geas made her feel pain if she wanted to hurt him, then it would incapacitate her if she tried to actually do anything to him. Her indignation only made it that much funnier, and he laughed even harder.

To Shiika’s intense pique, she actually blushed, which sent Tarrin to the floor in helpless waves of laughter.

“Tarrin,” Shiika growled, “you’re embarrassing me in front of the mortals!” she said in a humiliated hiss, glowering at Jenawalani, who was still laughing.

“I--I--I’m sorry,” Tarrin said with a few snickers, managing to regain his composure with a deep breath. “How do I get rid of it?”

“Oh, my,” Jenawalani said between giggles, wiping her eyes. “That was classic.”

Shiika fixed the mink with an unholy stare, and much to her surprise, it had the exact opposite effect of sending Jenawalani back into throes of mirth.

“Just release me from my promise,” Shiika said in a low, fuming tone.

“I, uh, well, I release you,” he said uncertainly.

Shiika blew out her breath and put a hand to her flat stomach. “Thank you!” she said explosively. “Now then,” she said, stepping up.

Tarrin had no inkling that it was coming, so he didn’t even try to dodge. Shiika reared back and gave him one terrific slap, right across the face. She was a Demon, so her slender arm had hidden strength lurking within it, which made his head snap to the side. The sting only lasted the briefest of moments, and he turned his head back around to give her a surprised and not entirely friendly look.

“That’s for laughing at me,” she told him with an embarrassed glare, her gaze glancing at Jenawalani, who was still laughing. “And don’t do that to me again,” she warned.

“But what did I do?” he asked plaintively. “I don’t understand what happened.”

“You forced me to carry out my promise,” she said with a short look. “I forgot that you’re a god of duty. The geas must be that aspect of your power.”

“I, I can make people do what I tell them to do?”

“No, you can force people to do what they promise in good faith to do,” she answered with a flat glare at Jenawalani. “I meant it when I promised I wanted to be your friend, and that met the conditions. It put a geas on me.” He gave her a blank look. “Geasa require that the target be willing,” she explained. “You can’t geas someone that lies when he makes the promise, or doesn’t mean it, or makes it under coercion or duress. I willingly made the promise. You can figure out the rest yourself.”

“I had no idea,” he said in surprise, looking at her.

“I can see that now,” she said, seeming to regain her composure, crossing her arms beneath her breasts and giving Jenawalani an evil, narrow-eyed stare. “You’re about five seconds away from being my throw rug, Wikuni,” she said in an ugly tone.

“Leave her alone, Shiika,” Tarrin told her, retracting the wings once again. “It was kind of funny. At least afterwards.”

“Maybe to you.”

Tarrin couldn’t help but smile, but he was a little worried. He’d had the wings retracted when she said that to him, he remembered that clearly. He didn’t even know he could do that, put that geas on people. But, from the sound of it, it wasn’t all that dangerous. It wouldn’t force someone to do what he wanted them to do unless they willingly agreed to do it. In other words, it forced them to carry out a promise or agreed condition, like staying away from a certain area or something like that.

Shiika was wrong. He did have ability without having the wings out.

“How do I not do that to people?” he asked in worry.

“You wanted me to be your friend, so you must have geased me subconsciously,” she told him, then she gave him a roguish smile. “So. I wanted it enough to get geased, you wanted it enough to geas me. I take it that means we’re friends now?”

He gave her a look, then laughed helplessly. “I guess so,” he agreed lightly.

“Good. I hope you can do without that one,” she said, pulling out a single hand and pointing it at Jenawalani, who was laughing again.

“She’s part of a set, Shiika,” Tarrin told her. “If you kill her, you break up the collection.”

“You’re no fun,” she said in a dour tone as the mink continued to laugh. “I’m going back to my room. You,” she said sharply, whipping a finger out and pointing it at Jenawalani, “are on my list. Don’t make any long term plans. I’ll see you later, Tarrin.”

And with that, the Demoness turned around and sauntered out of Keritanima’s apartment as if nothing at all had happened, leaving behind a group of uncertain and confused Wikuni and Vendari. Two of them were hiding behind Tarrin’s favorite chair, the two raccoons, each peeking over the back of it with fearful eyes. Rallix and Keritanima stood in the door of the nursery, Keritanima just behind her husband, leaning over his shoulder and watching the Demoness go. Jervis was still sitting on the chair, looking like nothing was amiss, but the cup on the saucer he was holding was rattling audibly.

“My, that was, unique,” Jervis said nervously, his trembling hand setting the cup and saucer on the tea table.

“Welcome to another average day in service to Her Majesty,” Amber told the two twin raccoon Wikuni sharply, going to fetch a broom to clean up the jagged chunks of masonry and dust littering the floor. After dealing with Tarrin for so long, and also because she was one of Keritanima’s longest-serving maids, Amber had quite a tolerance for the amazing and magical events that surrounded Keritanima-Chan Eram.

“If she thinks I’m going to let her get away with this, she’s got another thing coming,” Keritanima said darkly.

“For threatening Jenawalani?” Rallix asked her.

“No, for breaking the wall,” she answered, reaching over her husband’s shoulder and pointing a finger towards the door. Tarrin felt her weave a spell that reassembled damaged objects, which caused all the debris on the floor to lift up and swarm back towards the shattered entranceway, reassembling themselves into the door and the wall that surrounded it.

“She’s not going to, to,” Jenawalani said after recovering herself, drawing a finger across her neck meaningfully.

He shook his head. “She won’t kill you,” Tarrin told her evenly. “I told her not to. But that doesn’t mean she won’t find a way to pay you back for laughing at her, Jen. I’d watch my back for a few months if I were you. Shiika has a very creative imagination, and she’s got a mean streak wider than the Sea of Storms.”

“Like I really needed to know that,” she grunted, but then she laughed again. “But the crime was definitely worth the punishment.”

Tarrin chuckled. “I’d have to agree with you. She was so mad it was funny.”

Amber came back from the small closet where they kept their cleaning tools holding a broom and a dustpan, looked around, and then growled and turned around and marched back. She returned without them a moment later, smoothing the apron on over her black wool dress. “That was rather brave of you, Amber,” Tarrin said with respect as she neared him, looking at the twin raccoon Wikuni who were still hiding behind the chair.

“I’ve been serving her Majesty long enough not to be frightened by little things anymore, your Highness,” she replied levelly. “After all, I’ve been your page for years now. Don’t you think that makes that little more than a curiosity?” she asked, motioning at the door with both arms, where Shiika had gone.

Tarrin looked at Keritanima, and she shrugged. “I’d have to side with Amber on that one, brother,“ she said honestly. He gave her a cool, almost tart look, and then they both suddenly burst out laughing.

Spending the evening with Keritanima had certainly lightened his mood. His sisters and Sarraya were the only ones that could really make him laugh when he was brooding--though Shiika had done a good job of it--and that was why he often wanted to be around them whenever he was feeling pensive or moody. Keritanima’s sly wit, Allia’s dry humor, or Sarraya’s cutting barbs and hijinks always seemed to make him feel better for some reason, even when he was the object of the Faerie’s verbal assault. He knew that she didn’t mean it, and quite honestly, much of the time she was rather amusing.

But the time with her wasn’t completely wasted. He had managed to work out a few troubling issues, and had reached a few conclusions, and Shiika’s interruption had been both educational and quite funny. He’d learned that not all his power was tied up in his wings, and at least it was a power that he didn’t mind all that much. It was harmless, it wouldn’t do any damage, and it required that everyone involved be willing in order for it to work.

It was the fire. Before he destroyed Val, he had become a god, and taken on aspects, spheres of control and influence, and fire was only one of them. He had also been a god of protection, duty, and to a minor extent, given why he had used the Firestaff, revenge. He had become a god to protect his family, because he had a duty to keep it out of Val’s hands at any cost, and quite honestly, because he wanted to kill Val, and becoming a god was the only way that that was going to happen. The aspects of duty, protection, and revenge reflected the reasons why he had turned himself into a god, but the aspect of fire was the energy or force that was most harmonious with his very being. That was what Mother had told him about what had happened. Fire was a destructive force, powerful, volatile, and unpredictable, but it also renewed in its wake and granted warmth and light. It was a destructive force when uncontrolled, but a constructive force when managed properly. That was a fair description of Tarrin’s core personality, and that was probably why fire had become his primary aspect.

The wings of fire were so visible, so obvious, that it dominated everyone’s thoughts. Nobody had even considered the idea that he might have abilities that reflected his other aspects. This ability to place geasa on people was most certainly an aspect of his former status as a god of duty. That meant that, if this worked the way he thought it did, he had to have a power dealing with his aspect of protection. But what that was and how it worked, he had no idea.

Not that he really wanted to find out. He was still afraid of his power, even if certain parts of it seemed harmless, or gave him the ability to fly.

Still, though, spending some time with Keritanima had uplifted him, and he felt quite good about the whole world when he returned to his own apartments with Forge and Fireflash. He felt quite content as he played with his children for a while, feeling quite normal, had a nice long talk with Triana and Sapphire as they interrogated him about the wings and his capabilities, then spent a little quality time with Kimmie and Jula as they watched Forge chase Tara around and drive the Were-cat cub crazy by absolutely refusing to let her get into trouble. Then, after that, he spent a very nice night with Jesmind.

It was that early morning when she finally seemed to start opening up about his wings and the changes in him. It was well before the sunrise that he found himself laying on his belly with her splayed halfway on his back, tracing the border between skin and flesh and living fire with her finger. It felt very weird when she did that, but he remained still and allowed her to explore this change in him, to come to understand it.

“What does it feel like?” she asked finally, prodding at the living fire, the fire-flesh lurking within the pit burned into his back, a hole in his flesh that was replaced by the living fire.

“It’s hard to explain,” he answered with a yawn. “It’s like the rest of me. I can feel it when you do that,” he warned when she extended her claw and poked it into the fire curiously. It bent a little, but did not allow her claw to pierce its surface. Soft yet strong, pliable but unyielding, that was the nature of that strange living fire, that fire-made-flesh that lurked within the holes burned into his back.

“Does it hurt?”

“No, not really,” he answered. “I can feel sensation in it, but I haven’t felt any pain yet. I really don’t know if they can.”

“If you can feel me touch it, then it can feel pain,” she reasoned in a logical voice. “Maybe I just can’t hurt it.”

“That’s possible,” he agreed.

“Well, if it’s a part of you, then it’s a part of you,” she said easily, rubbing the pad of her palm against the fire-flesh. “I was worried about it at first, but not so much anymore.” She slithered on top of his back, laying her arms across his shoulders, and the way they felt told him that she was propping her chin on her arms. “I’ve been thinking,” she announced.

“Uh oh. Should I run now?” he asked.

She slapped him on the back of his calves with her tail, hard enough for it to sting. “Ow!” he hissed.

“Don’t make me claw you up, Tarrin,” she warned, digging her claws into his shoulder.

“I was just joking,” he told her. “It was a weird night last night, it put me in a funny mood.”

“I noticed.”

“What were you thinking about?”

“About you, and me, and what happened to you,” she told him. “I want to know why you’re blowing off Phandebrass, love. Why won‘t you let him help you?”

“Because I don’t want to blow up Wikuna,” he replied bluntly.

She stifled a giggle. “There’s more there to it than that, my mate. I can see it in your eyes every time Phandebrass comes around. You don’t want him to help you. I think you don’t want to do it at all, and that’s wrong. This is a part of you now, Tarrin. You have to understand it, because if you don’t, it’s not going to be healthy for you.”

“It’s not that--” he began, but she cut him off, scooting up his back. He looked up as her face came into view over his head, and she looked down at him with a sober expression.

“Remember what happened when you when you became Were, Tarrin? You tried to ignore what you were, and it cost you. I’m not saying that this is going to drive you crazy, but it can’t be good for you. And it’s not like you to be afraid of anything, my mate. Now tell me, what’s troubling you?”

He sighed, realizing that he should have expected Jesmind to see through to the heart of the matter. She knew him very, very well. He turned, getting her off his back, and then laid there on his side facing her and explained what he was feeling, explained his fears, in a way that he hadn’t been able to do with anyone else. She listened to him attentively, letting him explain everything without questioning him or interrupting him, holding onto his paw to comfort him and provide him with a tactile sense of support as he struggled to put into words the very complicated and intangible forces that wore at him mind. When he was finished, she was quiet for a long moment, then she gave him a reproachful look.

“That’s silly,” she announced, which made him start a little bit. “Afraid learning how this new power works will make you drift away from us? Tarrin, that’s totally ridiculous!”

“I don’t think so.”

“You’re not thinking, you big oaf!” she told him. “Did learning Sorcery make you drift away from everyone? Did learning Druidic magic?”

“That’s not the same.”

“It is the same!” she said with surprising vehemence. “Do you think I care that you’re half god? Do you think that anything you are or will be is going to matter to me? You’re my mate, and I love you! That love doesn’t come with conditions!”

“But what if I change--”

“You have to change!” she told him. “You need to learn how to deal with this, and that’s going to change you a little bit. We all know that, my mate. You’ve changed a great deal since we first met, Tarrin, but that hasn’t made you drift away.”

“When we first met, we were trying to kill each other,” he winked.

“Not so, love,” she said with a waggling finger. “When we first met, I started teaching you about our kind, and then you lied to me and cut that bridge to separate us. But the point is that you dealt with the change without letting it take you away from us. You just have to do that again.”

“I’m not entirely sure if that’s possible,” he sighed.

“Do you want to drift away?”

“No!”

“Then it’s possible,” she said with surprising logic. “It’s all up to you, Tarrin. If you don’t want to drift away, then don’t let it happen. And no matter what you are, or what you become, I’m still going to love you.”

“Yeah, just like you loved me when I was human,” he teased with a smile.

She blushed. “Well, I acted that way because I did love you,” she countered. “But you’re still here. And so am I. Just remember that, Tarrin, any time you feel like you are drifting away. I’ll always be here. I’ll always be your anchor to the mortal world, and I will always love you, no matter what. Remember that.”

Touched beyond words, he reached out and put his paw on her cheek. She put her paw over it and smiled gently at him, sharing a moment where words were unnecessary. It was times like this when he felt Jesmind was such a treasure. She cupped the back of his paw, the slid her paw up onto his wrist, playing with his fetlock, and then slowly traced her paw up his arm. “Now that I’ve done something for you, you can do something for me,” she said in a sultry tone, a naughty smile creeping onto her lips.

“Oh? And just what might that be?” he asked.

She hooked her paw around his shoulder and used it to pull herself up against him, curling her tail over his waist, then wrapping it around his own quite sensually.

“Well, I think I might be able to do something along those lines for you,” he told her with a slight smile. “Want me to scratch you behind the ears while I’m at it?”

“Mee-yow, baby,” she purred, then leaned in and kissed him quite seriously.

Jesmind amazed him quite a bit more often that he was willing to admit. She was so easy to underestimate, because she was so ruled by her instincts. But when the cards were put on the table, people who didn’t think she was all that smart found themselves quickly and thoroughly disabused of that notion. Though she was cranky and short-tempered much of the time, that was because she was so strongly dominated by her Cat instincts, much more so than most other Were-cats. She didn’t often talk about more involved or intellectual subjects, not because she didn’t understand them, but because they really didn’t mean anything to her. She didn’t have much interest in magic or science or theology or philosophy, and thus didn’t come across as a very smart person. She spoke plainly, spoke her mind, didn’t lie, and had a very simple, frank, almost childishly simple view of the world, a world of black and white, right and wrong, good and evil, with very little falling outside one of those two classifications. She was direct, blunt, and though she had an extensive vocabulary, she tended to repeat favored words rather than use more descriptive terms and leaving it up to her listener to puzzle out her exact meaning. Someone who knew Jesmind could do just that, by matching up her words with her scent, body language, and general demeanor. But to someone who lacked that understanding, Jesmind came across as a country bumpkin, uneducated and rather crude.

They would never understand just how wrong they were.

Jesmind was an amazingly complicated woman, a riot of instincts and deep personality traits that gave her that maddeningly simple presentation to the world while the mind of an intelligent, cunning woman lurked behind that inconspicuous shell. Tarrin knew her as well as she knew herself, so he knew that she had the capability to be quite profound. It was just when she unleashed that against him, managing to break down seemingly overwhelming problems into simple, almost stark terms and making him feel overwhelmingly stupid for not seeing it as simply as she did, that he had to remind himself about the rather amazing mind lurking behind that pretty face. Jesmind had taken an outrageously complex problem in him mind and boiled it down into one simple question, one simple decision. Yes, or no. Allow it, or don’t allow it. Allow himself to drift away, or force himself not to. It really did come down to that, after all the tangles hanging off the ball of string were clipped away. Despite how complicated it looked to him before, Jesmind had reminded him that everything else was just a distraction, extraneous, unnecessary, and all he had to do was focus on that one simple core question. Was he going to allow himself to drift away?

The answer to that was an emphatic No. If he didn’t allow himself to drift away from his friends and family, they wouldn’t allow him to drift away from the mortal world. They would indeed be his anchors, his lifelines back to the life that was once his, a life that he really could take up again if he so desired. Jesmind’s swift and effortless shattering of the mirrors that kept confusing him as he tried to work through the change in him and what it meant had freed him of much of his fear and worry over it all, for she was completely correct.

So long as he clung to his family and his friends, he would not drift away from the mortal world, and thus not drift away from his family.

That was a comforting thought. It was so comforting, in fact, that he looked upon the upcoming need to learn how his power worked with a little bit of actual enthusiasm. It didn’t seem half as intimidating or as frightening as it had the day before. He knew that that opinion might change, but it that was how he felt right now, and now was the only thing that mattered to a Were-cat.

He’d thought of that once before, but to hear Jesmind say it brought it back to him with a great deal more force, made it much less of a self-conceived ideal and more of an actual alternative. That someone else had reached the same conclusion made it seem to him that it was more possible. It wasn’t going to be easy, but he was going to try. After all, he didn’t really have much of a choice. Just like what happened with him being turned, he now had to quickly come to terms with a drastic alteration of his life.

That morning marked the first of these challenges. After getting up and getting dressed, Amber came to him and told him that Keritanima wanted everyone to get together and have a good breakfast before they left. This would be a public breakfast, served in the throne room on tables set up within it, like when she had feasts, and most of the nobles, the city’s mayor, and some of the commoners that served in Parliament were going to be invited. It was an official function, a formal farewell of the non-Wikuni Prince and Princess and a chance for any important Wikuni to have a chance to see them and come to the understanding that they were Royalty, so as not to cause any friction with them at a later time.

Tarrin wasn’t too excited about the idea, but he realized that it was an opportunity to test his resolve, and that resolve was to come to grips with the change in him. Since people in Suld had seen him, the stories and rumors of what had happened were going to reach Wikuni, if they weren’t here already, so this was a chance to openly display himself to the world and see how the world reacted.

It sounded like quite a good idea, at least up until the execution of it. Tarrin had sent everyone else down to breakfast, and had stood in front of the door of his apartment for a significant amount of time as the debate raged within, and the fear of it battled with the need to make it known, to allow it to be seen, or the myth of what happened was going to take hold and blow everything way out of proportion. He had to establish it in the minds of the people before rumor made them draw their own conclusions.

Should he do it? If he did, there would be no going back. People would see, would know…but if he didn’t, they would know anyway, and what they thought they knew might be far, far from the truth. Not that he was going to tell them the truth, but their vision of him and his power might be totally different than the image that he had to create, that of a benign power, not a rampaging destructive force. They didn’t have to know the truth of his condition to understand an effect of it, and that that effect didn’t make him a monster.

Monster…. He such a history with that term. He had fought so hard to try to not turn into the monster he knew was lurking within, only to find that his attempts to avoid it had caused him to become exactly what he had fought so long to avoid becoming. He had been a monster of the worst sort, the kind that would kill and destroy and not show any emotion at all. When Goblinoids revelled in their destruction and murder, people could understand it. It made them fear them, but they understood the reaction. But back then, when Tarrin killed or destroyed, it was as if it meant absolutely nothing to him…and that was more terrifying than any kind of pleasured reaction a Goblinoid would have. That was cold, ruthless, calculating evil, exactly the way Kravon had acted when he sent Jegojah after his sister, when he had sent Jula to Dala Yar Arak to cause Tarrin problems and slow him down in his search for the Book of Ages. He and Kravon had actually been two sides of the same coin back then, both cold, ruthless bastards who would kill or or destroy anything that got in their way. But the Goddess had sent him into the desert, Fara’Nae had worked her magic on him to show him the true path once again, to help him reconcile the hurt and the betrayal he had suffered and again achieve a balance of sorts that eased the extreme extent of his feral nature. Fara’Nae had healed a tortured mind and soul, and for that he would be forever grateful.

But it still wasn’t easy to even think about it. To step through that door to him would be to admit to himself what he was and admit the truth it represented, and those were things he did not want to do. He looked forward to exploring his capabilities, but that would be in the presence of his friends, where they would be there to remind him who he was and what they meant to him. But here, now, alone, he found himself…afraid. Just like in the desert, when he was right there and had the opportunity to try to fly, but he didn’t. He had created that fire over his paw, though. Perhaps, in his mind, that was a little thing, where doing something like flying would be a major admission.

He found himself afraid. Not afraid of what others would think of him, but afraid of what he would think of himself.

To admit fear was only smart, his mother would have told him. But to let it rule him would be the coward’s excuse. The bravest men in the world weren’t the ones with no fear, they were the ones who could act despite their fear. The door represented that fear inside of him, and to step through it with the wings out for everyone to see would be the bravest thing he had ever done, for one simple reason. He had faced some terrifying things in his life, and he had rose to the challenge, but each and every time, he was always acting out of fear for others. He had faced Jegojah alone to protect his friends. He had fought the battle of Suld to protect the Goddess. He had fought the dragon out of fear of those who would die after him if he failed. And he had turned himself into a god and sacrificed himself to protect his daughter. But this time, this act, this event, it had nothing to do with anything other than him. There was no one to protect this time, no friends or family to watch over, no fear of anything other than the fear that came from within and was directed no further than at himself. There was no one to hide behind this time.

There was only himself.

Was he going to let himself drift away?

“No,” he said quite adamantly as the wings seared through his vest and bloomed out to their full, normal size. “I will not,” he told himself as he put his paw on the handle, shivering his tail and folding the wings behind him. “I will hold the rope that anchors me. I will not let go,” he chanted to himself, then he blew out his breath and opened the door.

And he found himself almost paralyzed with the fear of the idea of stepping through it.

“I am who I am,” he told himself in a quiet, serious voice. “I am who I choose to be. I can be who I want to be, no matter what happens to me.”

The open doorway remained before him, mocking him with its yawning mouth, almost seeming to laugh at him.

“I am who I choose to be,” he said in a defiant tone, bringing an image of Jesmind to mind, of her laying on the bed on her side, paw propping up her head, looking at him and uttering those words that seemed to echo within his mind, his very soul.

I’ll always be your anchor to the mortal world, and I will always love you, no matter what.

With a grim, steely expression, Tarrin lifted his foot of the floor and pushed it into that mocking portal, then forced himself across the threshhold. Where there was no turning back from the path he had just set for himself.

Unseen to him, unseen to all in the mortal world, hidden from them--and him--by magicks both so powerful that they could turn aside the notice of a god and the subtlety to prevent the power behind it from drawing notice, five ghostly images watched the winged figure wrestle with his fear, then spit in its face and deliberately put his foot on the path he had chosen for himself. Four of these spectral visages were decidedly feminine, the fifth overwhelmingly male. Two of them seemed to dwarf the other three in every manner possible even while all five seemed curiously consistent.

I see you still have sway over him, sister, the one known as Niami seemed to communicate, though she used no words.

His mind is deep and complex, but I know its paths well, the one addressed answered, who was known as Fara’Nae. Fortune smiled on me. He was so distracted by the passion of his mate that it allowed me to touch his mind unawares. When he gains more experience, I think, I will not be able to do it again without him sensing it.

I find that more than acceptable, the male force declared. He was known as Karas. I do not like the idea that we can manipulate him. Vykar would try to do so to wreak greater destruction.

That is why it goes no further than us, the second overwhelming force ordered. She was known as Ahiriya, and she commanded the other four through both custom and protocol. But in this one case, I can find contentment in your urging, Fara’Nae. He needed a kick to his pants to get him going. He can be stubborn as a mule.

I’m fully aware of that, sister, Niami offered with amusement. What do you see for him, sister? she asked the fifth divine force curiously.

The winds of possibility are changing, this fifth entity answered, who was known as Kikkalli, and was the only god of them all who could read the lines of probability of what might be and predict likely outcomes. In the short term, they are very jumbled, but the long term is focusing into one of two outcomes. Which could change, of course, she reminded them. The likelihood of them depend on what he does in the near future.

What do you see? Karas asked.

One path leads to his destruction, she answered him, then became silent.

What of the other? Ahiriya pressed.

That path…leads to our destruction, she replied with worried eyes.

Bah, Ahiriya related shortly. The visions of next year are too far ahead to matter. By this time next month, those paths will be different.

Where he is concerned, that is most likely true, Kikkalli agreed. The winds of change swirl about him like a tornado, and he changes the future of everything he touches, which in turn change his own.

Try to focus on one thing, Ahiriya told the force which was Kikkalli. Answer me one question.

If I can. What do you want to know?

Does he start trying to learn how his power works soon?

The force which was Kikkalli was silent a long moment. From what I see at this moment, sister, yes, she answered. Most paths of potential converge on that event. I’d say he starts on it within the end of the ride.

Excellent, Ahiriya announced, rather smugly. That’s what all this was about, kicking his butt and getting him going towards that goal. Ignore those distant visions, sister. They’re going to be changing.

I hope so, Fara’Nae seemed to sigh.

Have faith in my kitten, sister, Niami assured her.

My faith in his ability is not in doubt, sister, she answered. It is my faith in the wisdom of the other gods which worries me. They will see him learning how his power works as either a threat or an opportunity to take measure of him. Either way, it leads down a violent path.

That’s exactly what I want to happen, Ahiriya announced. Trust me. Right now, I want the other gods to be very, very afraid of Tarrin Kael.

Why is that? Karas asked.

Because it will keep him alive, she answered grimly.

Everything was just perfect.