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Terese had thoughtfully left blankets in my sitting room, in addition to the stack she left in my bedroom. Perhaps she had thought that the healer assisting us would not want to sleep in the same room as the courtesans, or perhaps she simply assumed that nine women would mean overflow, even in a bedroom as large as mine.
Well, seven women were fitting, between the four on my bed, the two on my couch and the one on my wingback chair. But Mireia did indeed fall asleep on one of the couches in my sitting room.
As the only one awake, I went out through the french doors from my bedroom to my balcony. It was a warm night– the Month of Full Blooming is roughly June– and the fireflies were showing up in the rose garden below.
It was only the second day of the month, so the moons would only come up after sunrise. With the lights now doused in my bedroom and the mansion and grounds dark, a beautiful tapestry of stars blanketed the sky above me. Atius has mild light pollution, thanks to magical streetlights and a degree of city haze, but out here, in the countryside just beyond the edge of the suburbs, it’s nowhere to be seen. Except where magic or monstrous plants cast their muted glows for whatever reason they have, the land all around is pitch black to mortal eyes.
Not to mine, of course. Setting aside Fairy Sight and Vampire Sight, just my plain old normal vision can see well in much less light than mortals need. For my eyes, the stars above were more than enough to illuminate the grape trellises standing in rows out beyond the farmyard buildings.
Mother loved this scenery. It reminded her of similar views in the Dorian countries. Atianus is only barely warm enough to support proper grape production. Its climate is much more like the Champagne region of France or Germany’s wine country than like Italy or California. When Mother re-established Pendor’s presence in the Royal Capital, she disdained the idea of restoring the old uptown mansion that had crumbled into ruin during the last hundred years of my father’s rule, so when she learned that wine was grown on the west side of the capital, it became a certainty she would establish Pendor’s new capital estate there.
After the renovation and expansion of the existing mansion on these grounds was complete, Mother began having Tiana and the royal kids spend their weekends there, where the comfortable surroundings of an ordinary noble estate sheltered them from the pressures and crowds of the Palace and brought them into contact with nature. The mortal half of the family needed to slumber for durations unnecessary for her or her daughter, so during these visits, she would take Tiana on ‘fairy walks’ deep in the night through the orchards and the long rows of grapevine-laden trellises. They would also go for swims in the big mill pond.
Once Tiana could fly, those walks would also become flights to nearby properties of the estate, or even into the wonderland of the nearby underground meadows where Mother kept subterranean fields and fishponds.
I’m sure that if the boys ever became aware we were doing so, they would have snuck out at night to peep, since naturally Mother and Tiana were dressed like fairies in the wild for these expeditions (meaning, naked.) But if Mother ever noticed them doing so, I’m sure she simply smiled to herself, didn’t say a word to me and let them peep.
This sudden deluge of old memories brought a dull ache to my heart, as I remembered once again that the great presence that loved this place was gone. I touched one of the two amulets I was wearing, the one where I could feel Mother’s aura, and reminded myself of the mission Gaia had given me.
The resentment had started to wear off a little. Or perhaps more accurately, the idea was beginning to settle into my head. I had memories of bearing children in other lifetimes, so the prospect of childbirth didn’t frighten me the way it must frighten young mortal women. I knew it would be far easier for me than for them anyway. It had never been resentment of being forced to do it. Perhaps simply resentment over the way it had been tossed at me so effortlessly, as if it were obvious I would cooperate.
Okay, the woman telling me I had to do it happened to be working from the position that I was literally the only one who could. But, about that, I wanted a second opinion. Since I had a couple of serious questions bugging me.
Shaking my head, I brushed the other of the two amulets and called spiritually, Lucy, dear, come out.
“Out!” the mini-pixie declared as she appeared.
I smiled at her. I need to speak to Kanon. Contact the portal keeper of Sky Ocean and ask her to connect us.
“Call!” she promised, and then fell silent and began flying around the balcony, as if she had suddenly gone ADHD and instantly wandered off, forgetting the task.
But of course, she hadn’t. She just didn’t need to be present to handle her job.
From the air, or more accurately, from Lucy’s magic stone, came Kanon’s voice.
“This is Kanon. Is this the Commander?”
“It is,” I confirmed. “I have a favor to ask you.”
I described the situation with Mother, and the amulet, and the claim that she could only be reborn as an Elder infant, making it impossible for anyone but me to bear her.
“It makes me wonder about the various demigods,” she mused. “If one arranged for two of them to meet, or for one of the goddesses to come back to Sky Ocean to bear a couple demigoddesses, wouldn’t they also create strong infants?”
“Come back to Sky Ocean?” I echoed.
“Eurybia and Gaia have both come here to bear demigod children. The demigoddess Tenre was born here, for example.”
I had learned at some point Tenre was Gaia’s child, but I didn’t know Gaia had used my small world to give birth to her.
Gaia had made a statement that didn’t ring true, after all. I admit it took me a while to notice, but when I did, it became a real problem. How could I be the only woman who could carry a fetus with both magical and monstrous biology? Mother, a fairy, had carried the original Tiana, hadn’t she?
But I refused to believe Gaia had lied to me. I was missing something. It wasn’t something Kanon could help me resolve though, so I kept it to myself.
“Well, you understand the main question. In general, it’s ‘am I really the only choice’?”
“I cannot answer that for you, Commander.”
“I know. But you can contact our mother and ask her, can’t you?”
A very long pause followed, almost until I spoke again to ask if she was still there. Kanon finally queried, “By ‘our mother’, you mean the great senior who is our immortal origin?”
“I do.”
I had encountered clues that she and Little Jia had interacted with Senhion’s immortal mother. Someone helped them improve the functions of Sky Ocean and expand the scope of their activities far beyond what I had expected, turning it into a Mortal Realm playground for denizens of the Immortal Realms. I never planned for them to do that. Someone powerful had also helped with particular exotic designs like Kanon’s Garden Pavilion or my Lotus Pavilion, and significantly expanded the capacity of the simulation network overall. It was thousands of times larger than what Senhion originally designed.
Maybe Oranos and the other gods could be responsible. But I didn’t think their thinking would have flowed in that direction. It would have taken someone powerful who had a direct connection to the place, a committed interest in it. The most likely candidate was Senhion’s Immortal mother, who helped her build it in the first place.
Kanon thought for a bit longer, then answered, “Whether or not Great Senior will respond in a timely enough manner is a great unknown, Commander. I don’t know if you have the luxury of waiting.”
“Are you familiar with what Gaia is doing for Mother, using the Lotus Pavilion?”
“Of course. She would never be so rude as to use it without informing us.”
“How long can she maintain Mother like that?”
Kanon mulled for a bit, then stated, “The limiting factor must be the amulet itself. She could use the Pavilion this way indefinitely. The amulet was only designed to hold down the much lighter original Tiana’s soul long enough for them to work the necessary miracle to restore her body if she died. It wasn’t designed to defy heaven and keep a soul like Deharè’s in the mortal realm for months. I fear you risk losing the souls if you wait even a single month.”
“Would I even be fertile within that time?” I demanded. Neither fairies nor vampires operate on a one month fertility cycle like humans.
“Gaia, the great mother goddess, has the ability to make you fertile at a time of her choosing, Commander. She’s quite good at manipulating complex systems.”
We chatted for a time more, in which I finally got my answer as to why Dilorè, Ryuu and Chiara had emerged– it had been a direct request from Oberon to send them out– and Kanon agreed to work on contacting our mother. Then I was left along again, or actually with Lucy still flittering about, on my balcony.
I think it was partly that I was stir-crazy from days of being a convalescent on bed-rest, partly that my libido had been greatly stimulated from tossing out orgasms like candy during the feeding I just finished and partly that I had just reminisced about my ‘fairy walks’ with Mother. Whatever it was that made me do it, I dropped my robe and stripped off my chemise, then grew my wings and launched myself into the dark night.
I flew naked across the farmyard and out past the mill pond, following the diversion canal to the nearby river that provides the water. I landed for a bit and waded in the starlight. It wasn’t a particularly large river. the flow was strong but the water didn’t come up to my knees.
Taking off again, I cruised across the vineyard fields, relishing the airflow on my bare skin as I skimmed above the grapevines. Just the simple freedom of being able to move around again felt amazing. You would think I had been stuck in bed for two months, not two days.
Picking a good spot, I settled to the ground between the vine rows, then walked for a while in my bare feet, watching the fireflies dance. The growers rotate between growing clover, beans or turf grass as ground cover between the rows– it has something to do with the vine health– and this section had fairly short grass.
Tiana had done this together with Mother as a child, but never after her body began maturing. Thinking about it now, I realized that Mother was probably sad when Tiana stopped going out on jaunts like this with her. Fairies don’t do such things to be exhibitionists, but because they dislike insulating themselves from nature. They love feeling the direct connection between their bodies and the environment, and Mother loved sharing that feeling with Tiana.
Now, I regretted not going for ‘fairy walks’ with Mother. I was realizing how happy they made her, when Tiana was small.
I dropped my wings so I could lie down on my back in the grass. I stayed there a while, luxuriating in the sensation of the grass beneath me as I surveyed the stars, and felt the breeze playing across my skin from head to toe.
Then I rolled over to feel the grass on my front, then rolled again and wound up laying with the leaves of the grapevine hanging over me, brushing me from above. I watched the fireflies play, sometimes flying close enough to light up my skin, and imagined bringing one of my Servants out here and feeding under the stars. Melione would be too timid to cooperate, but maybe Ceria…
The fantasy was a little too stimulating and for a short time I indulged certain urges as I lay there. But then I realized Serera or Dilorè might fly back here to check on how things went and catch me doing something embarrassing. I decided I shouldn’t continue.
I got up, regrew my wings and charted a course for Langram instead. I needed to retrieve the items that I lost when that proxy detonated. I flew nearly a mile before I remembered I was naked. For a moment, I thought about returning to fetch my chemise, then I decided to try something else. The watery raiment I had managed in Sky Ocean appeared around me once more.
Mhm. In the thinner spiritual environment, my raiment was definitely still too thin for daylight use. Looking down, I could clearly see my nipples through the ‘material’. But it would do, out here in the dark. Satisfied, I flew on.
