"I love you, I love you, I love you," Syd repeated in a voice she would never want soone like the emperor or the princes to hear. "Who's a pretty girl? Who's so pretty? Not you, you're gorgeous!"
Hope giggled in delight as she dangled in Syd's arms, her legs kicking the air in her excitent. Her toothless smile was as infectious as her laughter, and Syd happily grinned back at her adorable daughter. Bring her close, she kissed the tip of her daughter's nose before raising her high into the air again, drawing more gleeful squeals from the tiny Succubus.
"I think she grew. Don't you think she grew?" Syd asked.
"She has not changed since we saw her yesterday," Aila murmured in her usual cool tone, all of her attention focused on the table before her. "Hope is growing fast, but not that fast."
"I dunno," Syd drawled as she moved the little bundle of energy back and forth through the air, simulating flight. "I think Soteria might have fed her sothing to grow faster. Do Dryads have potions or biscuits or sothing to make children grow faster?"
"Potions, no," li answered from across the room. "But there is a biscuit for that."
"Wait, really?" Syd exclaid as she paused in her play. "I was joking about that."
"There is a mixture that can be baked into a hard biscuit that so Dryads give to their children to promote fast and healthy growth," li said from her position stretched out on a fur-cloaked couch. "Those who are fed on a steady diet of the biscuit often reach physical maturity faster than those who are not."
When Syd continued to stare at her, li blinked and clarified her explanation.
"The biscuits are for Dryads. We have decidedly different constitutions from other children of the gods. I do not believe the biscuits would be helpful to any being who is made from flesh and blood."
"Oh, I guess that makes sense," Syd said as she resud playing with Hope.
"However, my grandmother may have fed Hope so of the ingredients of the biscuits anyway, as they can be mixed into a sort of gruel that an infant such as Hope would be able to eat."
"Okay, we're double-checking that next ti we go to the grove," Syd stated matter-of-factly. "I know Acantha wouldn't let anything happen to Hope, but my daughter is a whole new species, and I don't want Soteria to feed her weird plants until we know how her little stomach might react. She doesn't normally eat food, and we don't want a repeat of the no-diaper incident."
A collective murmur of agreent ca from all present in the room. There were bound to be incidents when it ca to raising a child, but there were so experiences that no one wanted to go through twice.
Jadis was, as she so frequently found herself, in multiple places at the sa ti. Her Jay self was in deep conversation with Severina, who had only just that morning returned from her trip to Eldingholt. She had brought with her a large bundle of letters from the various parents and family mbers who lived and worked at the compound, as well as personal correspondence from Vraekae. Severina had quite a lot of news to share that she had purposefully not written down, much of which involved the attack against Fortune's Favored and Cobbler's situation. The justicar had already delivered her news to everyone shortly after breakfast, but Jadis had more to talk with her angelic lover before letting the exhausted Seraphim get so sleep.
While Jadis discussed so plans she had for next steps in the war against the Demons, her Dys self was eting with Senator Celsa and a few other mbers of the Voltonian senate. The fallout from the attack on Lyssandria's temple and the murder of so many, including Celsa's own trusted servant, had barely begun. That said, Jadis did not plan on reacting passively to the situation. With help from Celsa, she was already leveraging the success of the capture of so many cultists in her favor, as well as using the attack on the temple as evidence that the cult saw her and her efforts as a major threat. Jadis hoped that she could use the events to further cooperation with so of the senators who had been leery of trusting her and everyone else who had co from the empire. The more open support she could get, the smoother she believed the campaign against Kastoria would go.
Her Syd self, in the anti, was doing possibly the most important thing she could be doing in the mont. Naly, playing with her daughter. Jadis had retrieved Hope from Soteria's grove early in the morning, shortly after dawn, which served the dual purpose of also informing the Dryads of what had happened the day before. Fortunately, they had experienced no issues babysitting the infant for the day, and it seed likely that Desire and the cultists had no idea that Hope had even been at the grove.
As Syd lay on the floor, balancing her baby in her hands overhead, she gave careful consideration to what exactly she was going to do with her tiny daughter. Hope was a distinct vulnerability, one that her enemies would love to exploit given the opportunity. Jadis could dedicate any number of resources to protecting her baby Succubus, but there was no defense that could be absolutely perfect. Even if she chose to walk away from fighting wars to settle down sowhere remote with her wives and daughter, Jadis still ran the risk of being attacked by those who were seeking her, like Desire. Hope would always be in so amount of danger. The only question was, what could Jadis do to mitigate that danger as much as possible?
Taking her back to the compound in Eldingholt was a strong possibility. In fact, it was probably the best option, at least in terms of security. Eldingholt was far from the battlelines, had even more extensive security asures in place ever since the surprise attack during the winter, and there were a myriad of allies in positions of power, including the temples, the city governnt, and even the emperor himself. Even beyond those reasons, there was the fact that the Fortune's Favored compound was filled with the family of her loved ones. Hope would have literally a dozen motherly figures surrounding her, making sure that she was loved, protected, and cared for.
But the reason why Jadis hesitated to bring Hope back to the capital was the sa reason she had brought her child with her to Volto in the first place. It was just so damn far away. Even with her extrely enhanced flight speed, Jadis wouldn't be able to fly to Eldingholt and back again every day. Traveling that distance daily would take up too much ti, logistically speaking. Which ant Jadis would have to give up Hope's upbringing for an extended period of ti. She wasn't happy with that idea, and she knew Alex was even less so.
Keeping Hope in Thracina wasn't going to work out. Jadis had originally hoped to set up asures within the city, likely utilizing Lyssandria's temple, but obviously that wasn't going to work. Even putting aside the loss of the temple priesthood, Thracina was just too vulnerable to attack. By the sa token, there was no way they could bring Hope with them on one of the airships on the march to Kastoria. The ships were basically massive targets, and Jadis didn't want Hope anywhere near sothing that was going to be regularly attacked by hostile Demons.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
With those options excluded, the only true alternative to Eldingholt was Soteria's grove in the ruins of old Asteria. The main appeal of leaving Hope to li's family's care was the relative closeness of the grove to what they were doing in Volto. Jadis wouldn't have to travel nearly as far, and she could conceivably visit regularly, if not daily. She could even leave Alex and others of her group at the grove for a day or two, then bring them back to the campaign as needed. They might even be able to set up regular flights with the airships, going to and from the grove. Again, it was an appealing idea, one that Jadis personally leaned towards. The problem was, Soteria's little slice of paradise wasn't anywhere near as secure as Eldingholt.
Demons had just recently attacked Soteria's grove, doing extensive damage to their "garden" as it was called. li's brother had even died in the attack. While Jadis was confident that Soteria, Acantha, and even Kreios would do everything in their power to protect Hope, she wasn't as certain of their ability to do so. Short term, it wasn't a problem. But for a longer span of ti, when the cultists could potentially figure out where Hope was? The grove simply did not seem like as good an idea when she considered the ways things could go wrong.
Jadis had always known that parenthood would be filled with challenges; she just hadn't expected keeping her child safe from demonic attacks to be one of them.
"Alright, let have the little stinker."
Syd relinquished her hold on Hope as Kerr scooped the baby into her arms. While her daughter still seed tiny to her, Jadis had to laugh at the size difference on display when her therion lover held Hope. She looked almost comically huge in the archer's arms, and Kerr was not a small woman. The contrast was even funnier whenever Eir got her hands on the gray-skinned succubus.
"I don't know about the rest of her," Kerr said as she held the wiggly infant up. "But her horns are growing in."
"You think so?" Syd asked from where she still lay on the floor by the table.
"Definitely," the therion confird. "I wager the skin on these bumps will start to part in the next couple of weeks. Hopefully she has a better ti of it than . My horns ca in bloody, and I made a ss of my clothes for a while."
"Is that a common issue among your kind?" li asked curiously. "We Dryads have horns, but they grow no differently from our leaves, so we do not suffer from any health risks."
"Most of us don't have more than a bit of redness in the early stages," Kerr answered dismissively. "Doesn't even hurt. Itches like a bitch, but no pain. Sotis a few kids have a hard ti with their horns, but most don't. I was just unlucky. I'm sure Hope will be fine."
As Kerr sat down with li to discuss horns, Hope still in her arms, Syd let out a sigh. There were other things that she could be working on, such as helping with the cultist interrogations or Sabina's investigation into the soul-linked orb. However, Jadis wasn't in the mood. She already had her other selves hard at work; this part of her wanted to take a break. She was ntally exhausted from the experience of the past day and felt like she needed so ti to recharge. Besides, what was the point of having multiple bodies if she couldn't use at least one of them to goof off every now and again?
Tilting her head to the side, Syd saw Aila sitting in her chair at the table, working away at the cypher books she was studying. Without standing, Syd wriggled across the floor so that she was directly next to her lover's chair before calmly rolling the hem of the redhead's pantleg up her leg. Once the beautiful length of flawless calf was exposed, Syd leaned forward and lightly bit the pale skin.
"What on Oros are you doing?"
Syd looked up without taking her mouth off of Aila's leg. Her blue-eyed lover was staring down at her with an exasperated frown on her freckled face.
"I don't know," Syd mumbled with her mouth full. "Just felt like it."
"Stop chewing on my leg, please. That's very distracting."
With a small huff, Syd did as she was told.
"…stop licking my leg, too. I'm trying to concentrate, Jadis."
"Well, I'm trying to concentrate, too," Syd asserted between kisses and licks. "And this is just as important."
"Tonguing my leg is not as important as safeguarding our status sheet information. If you want to be horny, Kerr is right over there. Right now, I need to work."
Glancing over, Syd saw that Kerr and li were still deep in conversation. The archer had Hope bouncing on one knee, and between the baby and the Dryad, it looked like she hadn't even noticed what Syd had been doing to Aila's leg. For Kerr to completely miss an instance of semi-sexual play showed that she was completely wrapped up in her current discussion.
"Fine, I'll go find sothing to do," Syd let out an aggrieved sigh. "But I'm coming back for this leg later tonight."
"Your terms are acceptable," Aila said primly while giving Syd's head a quick scratch of her fingers. "Now go be weird sowhere else."
Syd did as instructed, rising from the floor and, rather than intruding on Kerr and li's conversation, left the spacious study. Sorcha and Bridget had also been in the room, sitting together on the far side away from the others, but they, too, had been engrossed in their own conversation and Syd didn't want to interrupt them, either. Instead, she made her way out into the hallway, not entirely certain of where she was going to go.
Ulya's temple was much larger than Lyssandria's temple, and while it had a far different aesthetic design, it still had a spacious and comfortable living space for Jadis and her lovers to occupy along with Tegwyn and his party. There was more than enough room for all of them on the third floor of the building they had been relocated to, mostly because many of the priests who would have normally been occupying the space were out in the field, helping with the war efforts. The only people who currently lived in the building other than Jadis' companions were the ten or so Lares who were quartered on the second floor, and they made for quiet roommates.
As Syd andered down the hall, thinking about whether or not she should seek out Alex to talk about where they were going to place Hope or if she should find Noll and force the old goat to give her so combat training, her thoughts were interrupted by a familiar voice calling out to her.
"Hey! Giant! Wait up!"
Syd ca to a stop at the T-intersection of the hall and turned to the left, where she saw the tiny feline form of Amarantha running towards her. Syd stopped and waited for the Lares to catch up, curious as to why the Mystic was in Ulya's temple rather than Charos' temple, where the Hero and his party were staying. When she reached Syd, Amarantha sat down and stared up at her with bright green eyes.
"Hey, I have a favor to ask," Amarantha began.
"Okay," Syd nodded without needing to hear more. "How can I help?"
"Well, you might want to talk with her, first, since I don't know how long my favor will take."
"Her? What do you—woah!"
Syd nearly jumped out of her skin when she turned around and saw Noct silently standing behind her. The dark-winged woman was wearing her usual ensemble of belts and chains, yet she had sohow snuck up on Jadis without making a noise. Noct wasn't wearing her helt, and her black hair covered her right eye, leaving just one red orb to stare unblinkingly up at her.
"Uh, hi Noct," Syd said after taking a second to swallow her heart back to where it belonged. "Did you need sothing, too?"
Noct silently gazed at her, then looked down at Amarantha, before looking back up at her. Motioning with one hand, she indicated for the Lares to go first.
"Proceed."
As usual, Noct had limited herself to saying as little as possible. Jadis still wasn't sure why the possibly-Valravn woman was so stingy with her words, but at least her intent was generally clear enough.
"I guess you go first," Syd said, turning her attention back to Amarantha.
"Hm, okay then," the small fiery feline said nonchalantly. "I need you to give so of your sen. At least ten drams worth. I brought a jar. Do you need to go get one of your lovers or can you knock a load out on your own?"
"…I think Noct should have gone first."
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