

A Demonworld Solstice

By Severine Wolfe

Demonworld Novella (Book 6.5)

Imprint: Fantasy Paranormal Romance

A Demonworld Solstice

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2017 by Severine Wolfe

First E-Book Published 2017

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission from the author.

All characters, places, and events in this book are fictitious or have been used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations are strictly coincidental.

Smashwords License Statement

This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Dedication

This is to every author out there who has written Christmas stories that I have enjoyed through my life. I love catching up with series characters at the holiday. Each of you have brought me happiness and cheer, and I re-read your books every holiday. Thank you.

From The Author

I started this last year, actually, but it didn't feel right, so I didn't put it out there. I wanted it to be a gift to my readers, who are the very BEST! As it happened, a story popped up in my mind and New Reality Paradox was borne when I had no idea of even writing another Demonworld book. After that was done I took another look at my story and thought, You know... And thus, I added and brought a few things into focus that I had been hedging on for a while.

I hope you like this slice of life tale from the Demonworld. We get to check in on our old friends and meet their growing families and answer the question of whether Seth ever leaves his mate alone. Ever.

The series numbering may be off because where I am publishing this doesn't allow for the "in-between) numbering.

It's NOT Christmas!

Cassie is tasked by a curious pantheon to create a Winter holiday. The witch in her loves celebrating at the Solstice, but the humans keep calling it Christmas, when it's really not. Even if you can give gifts... if you want. And, there is feasting and merriment and a time to reflect until the Spring Equinox arrives.

But, it's not Christmas. It's really not. Fir trees? Decorative!
CHAPTER ONE

"Honey, why is Arminius at our door?" Bax Clancy said, looking back into his house where his wife was entertaining their twins.

Cassie looked up as Bax led in a Demon who looked fierce and dour. Ariadne, her daughter lifted up her hands to her favorite "uncle" and the large Demon bent down and picked her up to toss her into his other arm, causing her to laugh and chortle as only delighted babies can. Both of her parents smiled with glee.

"She is happy here," Arminius said, handing the small one off to her father and looking down at her mother. "I would like to do this as quickly as possible so I can get back to Aliera."

Cassie stood up and placed the twins in a playpen she'd brought from Earth, and smiled. "Great! Once I see what I want I can place an anchor and take myself."

"What are you two doing?" Bax asked blandly as if he had no say in the matter.

"It's a surprise, I can't tell you," said his wife who was putting on her ski parka, then kissed his cheek and went outside where Arminius would take them someplace Cassie didn't know about.

He looked down at the two children she'd given him and realized that it didn't really matter because he loved surprises. Cassie having been the best one of his life.

*****

Cassie opened her eyes and saw a forested region on a world she did not yet know well enough to arrive at the thing she wanted with the pinpoint accuracy she prided herself in.

"Oh, Arminius," she whispered. "This perfect." Cassie felt almost like she was in a church.

"It is not far from Gareth's holding, you should have asked him," he said looking around.

"Oh, no, the baby is teething and Krys was called home late last night." She looked over at her companion and smiled. "I've put an anchor down, Arminius. Return to your mate and child."

"Are you certain you will be safe alone here?"

Cassie raised an eyebrow and smirked.

"I'm pretty sure I'm safe."

He smiled, knowing she was the most powerful witch any of them had seen in too long.

As soon as Arminius had stepped to the gate closest to his home, she let herself relax and looked up at the huge, coniferous trees that grew in this region. They looked much like the pines and firs of Earth. This was exactly what she had been looking for.

She was damned if she would give up Christmas. She'd had to go without Thanksgiving. Her dear baby, Ariadne simply could not go to Earth, even for a few hours with no control over her need to consume magic. Even with all of her magic relatives around, it would drain them dry in Earth's still diminished magical levels.

Hopefully, according to the books that her brother-in-law, Glenn had found for her and Bax, Ariadne should be able to begin learning to control her feeding on magic in a couple more years, with short trips to Earth to help her learn in between. Cassie lived with the real fear that she'd never be able to return to her homeworld and live a normal life, or as normal as it would ever be for her.

"I used to be an actuary..." she muttered as she began walking through the forest scoping out trees, looking for the perfect specimen for her own home. She had popped to her home realm the week before and hit all the Dollar Stores for decorations. It wasn't prudent to have anything fragile or expensive with so many babies around.

Cassie smiled at that thought. They had begun a huge Baby Boom on the Demonworld since they'd all come back. In this world that had not seen a happy birth in so long, having so many babies being born in so short a time, had placed a layer of love that was almost tactile. A layer of happiness and hope that perhaps the Demon race would not die out entirely.

It was insanity to believe that Pure Demons would be able to repopulate the world again. Humans and Half-elves were finding Demon mates and thus would the new world be born of other worlds. It made her happy that there was a chance that everything bad about the Demon race may have been eradicated. A fresh start was exactly what everyone was needing.

There were so many firs and conifers to look at and judge. Deeming which were worthy of putting in the house was not a decision to be made lightly. She also had to make sure the trunk would fit into the tree stand she'd brought over. As she spotted an animal that looked suspiciously like a squirrel in one of the trees, she made a note to check for squatters. She had seen movies...

Walking into a small copse she turned in a circle, taking in the forest and the snow and begun humming Winter Wonderland. And then she started giggling. This was like some kind of Christmas card. It was so hard to believe she was on the Demonworld.

Nothing on this world recommended itself to her. It was a learned bias that was based on her knowledge of how she had come into being. Knowing you were a child of rape was never an easy thing to accept. Knowing that your genetic donor was a murdering rapist, was even harder. Faisal was not her father. Her father was Jacob Lester. She was so happy to have him back, and knew that she was still his little girl. It kept her grounded.

Cassie stopped turning in circles and looked at her feet. The thought of her brother, Seth, and his daughter, Letha came to mind. If Seth was typical of the new fathers on this world, every daughter would feel valued and worthy of all excellence. According to her brother, Letha hung the moon and the stars twinkled just for her. He held her more often than not, even to the point that his mate, Brigid had begun making noises of Letha being a spoiled baby.

She knew it was also true of Gramish, the leader of the Demons, who had been exiled to the Elf homeworld of Era until they were brought back not long ago. He had twin daughters and gods forbid anyone even looked crossways in their presence. She'd heard from his mate, Ayalah, that he had bodily removed a petitioner who had sneered at the babies in his lap during a hearing. Evidently, his petition to be heard would not be considered until he recognized that females of any age had the right to be present anywhere they were desired to be.

She looked up at the sky as she felt snow falling from somewhere. It was a sunny day, so it wasn't sky snow. Movement in the tree next to her showed movement. A squirrel-like animal was taking berries or nuts into its nest. Cassie had to smile. Perhaps the squirrel was getting gifts ready for Christmas as well.

"They do not know of this holiday on this world, Cassie," she heard and turned around.

Her mouth dropped open and then she smiled.

"Siletha," she said and dropped to her knees.

The tinkling of small bells that was the laughter of a goddess, caressed Cassie until she felt like she'd been drinking champagne.

"Rise, my daughter," the goddess told her as she looked around the forest. "This is a very scenic spot," she looked back at Cassie. "I have seen the images and memories of your Christmas in your mind and I must admit I am intrigued. Even though it is a religious holiday for your people, but I see ways in which we might tailor it to fit this world as well. Between this holiday and your Thanksgiving, I think we might have a new feast day."

Cassie's smile brightened her already beautiful face. "I would love that."

Siletha looked around at the trees, the snow and smiled again. "I especially like the idea of the trees inside the houses, all lit up. It is a celebration of life that we all might benefit from."

"I miss home," Cassie said, her smile finally faltering.

Looking over at her chosen champion, Siletha gave her a small smile and reached out and put her palm to Cassie's cold cheek.

"You forgot your air spell to keep yourself warm," Siletha chided in her typical good nature.

"I wanted to feel the cold, the wet of the snow... I wanted to feel winter again."

"You are afraid that if you stay here that you will cease to feel?"

"I am afraid that if I stay, I will become as corrupt at Faisal," Cassie admitted for the first time to herself or anybody else. She took a step back at the shock of that knowledge. She suddenly felt herself pulled into a tight hug.

"You and Jyseth are the best things that ever came of this once-rotten world, and you are renewing it with your love and your energy... your determination to set things to rights."

"I feel guilty that I can't seem to find a way to be happy here with my family. I don't want to end up resenting Ari because I have to be here for her."

Siletha looked her over for a moment then nodded. "You must find your own answer to this problem, dearest Cassie," she finally said. "It is not that you are unhappy but that you feel that you should not feel happiness in a place that you feel has held such horrors and degradation for your friends and your own mother. Look to them, most beloved of all of my people. You will see that they are finding happiness here themselves and feeling no guilt over it."

"Bax says it's useless feeling guilt for actions that weren't mine, and yet I do. I'm still horrified by the things that went on here," she looked up at Siletha. "Every time we find an old, grown-over temple that was defiled I want to scream. When I hear the women speak of what they suffered here I want to go back and kill my father all over again..."

"But, you did not kill him, Cassie," Siletha explained quietly. "I did that through you. That sin is not on your soul, but his."

"I know that, in here," Cassie pointed her fingers at her own head. "But, in here," she pointed to her heart, "I don't feel it."

Siletha closed her hands over Cassie's fingers, sending her love and warmth.

"You need a penance for a crime which is not your own," she pointed out. "So, I will give you one. Get this holiday setup, the celebration, the feasting, everything. And, you will coordinate everything with Ayalah and the priests and priestesses that are now on this world."

"But..."

"You will do this not only for you, my daughter, but for everyone here, so that they may also get rid of any feelings of guilt they may have for surviving when so many others did not. This is survivor's guilt, and it does none of you any good at all."

"Others feel the same way?" Cassie didn't know what to think of that. She'd been carrying this around for several years and not comfortably. No one had told her they were feeling bad about being here, being back. In fact, most of the women she had saved had not come back to the realm. Dozens had returned to find work and some semblance of peace, but most of the women had chosen to find their families or their own way on Earth, with a few dozen asking for passage to the Technomage World. They had grown used to a world heavy with magic and knew their fortunes lay in using it.

"I will think of this as renewal festival, but not like the one we already have in Spring," the goddess shook her head. "This is for personal renewal. I don't think it should be religious in nature. I believe your people chose the Winter Solstice to hold this holiday because the season is a reflective time. It is needed."

The thought of that made Cassie smile. Bax would probably wax poetic about the history of the Winter holidays and how they had come into being.

"Now, return to your family. Speak to those you love and get this holiday started."

With that proclamation, Siletha popped out of Cassie's existence.

"Wow!" Cassie exhaled a breath she hadn't realized she had been holding, then a gigantic smile broke over her face. "Let's get this show on the road!"

Then she, too, blinked out of existence.

*****

Cassie went home and began sending a message out to everyone to meet at Gramish's hall the next morning to discuss establishing a new holiday.

"Have fun explaining Christianity to them all, babe," was all Bax had said when she told him about her visit to the forest.

"It's about renewal, Bax," she had countered.

"Springtime," he said quietly as she sat and opened a history of this world.

"Personal renewal, was what Siletha said."

Bax looked up from his book for a moment, his look contemplative, then he slowly nodded. "It fits."

Cassie didn't ask him what it was or what it fit. No, that way lay madness and boring lectures about Earth history what would have her crossing her eyes in three seconds flat. Even though she had to admit, Bax was dead sexy when he went into professorial mode. She looked at the ceiling of her kitchen where she sat her the table, making lists, and wondered how long the twins would nap, then smiled.

"Cassie!" Bax sputtered as she ripped the book out of his hands and jumped on his lap.

"Shhh," she said, laying her lips on his to quiet him further. "They're asleep..."

Bax let himself be led into their bedroom and sighed as he gave thanks, once again, for his beautiful, brilliant wife.

CHAPTER TWO

A message had come from Cassie that intrigued Krys. She knew of the Christmas holiday, of course. Her mother had been a human witch from Earth, and she had spent some years on the world waiting for a fire witch to show up. But, to celebrate it here on a world that did not know the religious symbolism of Christianity? She wasn't sure how that was going to play here on the Demonworld.

"Gareth?" She called out to her mate who was playing with their son on a huge carpet in the middle of the floor of the palace she used for the Elven embassy. "Do you have a renewal celebration here? For any of your still existing gods?"

Gareth looked up at her and his brows knit together in thought. "In the Spring we have a Renewal celebration and give honor to Klenit our god of Agriculture and growing things, but I don't know of any other holiday, no."

"Hmmm," she hummed to herself as she thought about it. "We are being summoned to Gramish's tomorrow morning for the coordination of a renewal festival for the winter solstice."

Gareth looked up from his son, Gladus, who was drooling all over the small, wooden sword his father had given him to chew on. "Winter Solstice? We've never had such a thing."

"Looks like you will now," Krys smiled at the two males who held her heart.

Gladus noticed his mother looking at him and smiling and gave her a delighted chortle and drooling smile while waving his wooden sword in the air.

Krys threw her head back and laughed, just as delighted with her son as he was with her. "A new holiday, my love."

*****

"What is my sister up to now?" Seth said and rubbed his chin that his daughter was determined to chew on.

"Letha, no, little one, chew on this," he said, handing her a teething branch that Demon children had been cutting their teeth on since forever. The small twig didn't splinter and cleaned the baby's existing teeth while helping alleviate that pain that came from newly erupting teeth.

"She thinks her Papa tastes better," Brigid said as she brought a tray of refreshments into the room. The room had once been the receiving room for Seth's father, Faisal. She had turned it into a place of warmth and welcome. They received all their visitors there and she had taken to calling it a parlor as soon as she'd taken over the house when she'd mated Seth. Today it was just their small family and it was snack time for Letha before her baby went down for a much-needed nap.

"Cassie wants to have a renewal festival at the Winter Solstice," Seth said, grabbing a cookie and giving it to Letha to chew on instead of his chin. Perhaps he should grow a beard?

"She misses Christmas," Brigid said, grabbing a cup of tea and a cookie from the tray.

Seth set Letha down on the blanket on the floor and grabbed his own tea and cookies.

"They celebrated that while I was on Earth, but I didn't understand the significance of it," he looked perplexed as he considered his memory. "Something about a baby?" He shook his head. "Many babies are born there and yet they are not celebrated as that one."

Brigid giggled into her cup and sent her mate a smile. "It's a Christian holiday, not everyone on Earth celebrates it, however, many do celebrate the holiday for the presents, even non-Christians."

Seth sent her a very confused look.

"I think Cassie is looking for a holiday that may be a mix between her Thanksgiving and Christmas."

"I loved Thanksgiving!" Seth said brightening. "The food was delicious. I ate myself into what Bax called a 'food coma'."

Brigid nodded. "I think it is a good thing," she finally said. "It lifts the spirit during the winter season on this hemisphere."

Seth bent down and kissed his mate breathless. "I know my spirits are already lifted."

"I don't think that's your spirits, love," Brigid laughed against his mouth.

"Can we put her down for a nap now?"

"Oh yes..." Brigid said as he pulled her out of the chair.

"Have one of the servants put her down," he breathed against her mouth.

Brigid managed to call one of the half-elf maids that Seth had hired so that Brigid basically had nothing to do, before he silenced her again with his mouth. It always amazed her how crazed he still became when it came to loving her. She would never tire of it or him.

*****

"I do not like it," Arminius frowned as he brought in wood for the fire to warm his home. He saw Aliera sitting in the big chair, nursing his son and smirking at him. "Celebrations! Bah! What for?" He continued to stack the wood so that Aliera would not have to go out into the cold and gather her own.

"We used to do it to break up the monotony of winter," Aliera informed him and she smoothed the hair along Hudar's scalp, and breathing his scent into her lungs. "It's a good time before the really harsh months settle in, and after the harvest.

Arminius stood, staring at Aliera, feeding their son and wondered that this was not some fever dream he was suffering in his cage on Era where he waited to be tortured anew by Elves. His babe suckled at her magnificent breasts, a babe that he had created with her in a miracle of sorts, since the Elves has done their best to make sure he was infertile. It had taken more Elven intervention and a lust spell to get him fertile again. He had nearly plowed Aliera into the ground, and blessed mate that she was, she did not hold it against him. He was so blessed by the gods of his world for he did not deserve a blessing such as she.

"You've got that look on your face again," Aliera chuckled.

"What look?" His brow wrinkled, confused.

"That look that tells me your thoughts have been ambushed by memories."

He grinned at her.

"I miss you," was all he said, and he saw Aliera's features slacken as she understood what he was telling her.

"He will go to sleep after he finishes feeding," Aliera told her mate with a twinkle in her eye.

Arminius just grinned at her and rubbed his hands together.

*****

Tal looked up at his wife, busying herself around their kitchen in their cottage while their young slept. His young... the thought still stopped him in his tracks. Small, incredibly fragile females who looked at him and Ava like they were their entire world and he wanted to give the entire world to them. He treasured them as much as his mate.

"Cassie wants to have a Winter Celebration," Ava said to him from the kitchen where she stirred a soup. She looked up from her pot and smiled at him. "I had quite forgotten about Christmas."

"What is that? A human celebration?"

"It's a religious holiday on earth for one of our religions," she looked up from her cooking again, and smiled. "But it sounds like what she is suggesting is a Solstice event, like the magic folk on Earth used to celebrate. Aliera would know far more about it than I do."

"I can't imagine that Cassie would suggest something that would offend our Gods," Tal sat up straighter as he thought about it. "She's Siletha's chosen..."

"Settle yourself, Mlegnan's chosen. I'm sure she would do nothing blasphemous," Ava assured him with her teasing chuckle. "But the thought of a Winter celebration is nice, something to break up the monotony." She looked around their cozy cottage on their farm. "It gets a little boring."

"You are bored with me already, hringa?" Tal snapped his head up and pinned her with a stare.

Ava laughed and walked over to him, sitting down on his lap. She rubbed her hand on his cheek.

"As if I could ever become bored with you, but it's not like we can love each other an entire season," and just as she said it there came wails from the room Ava had set up as their nursery. The both stood and walked back into the room where a small magelight hovered over the bed of Sentnay and Meher who refused to sleep in separate cradles.

"I'll get Sentnay, you get Meher," Ava said quietly. Their daughter, Meher, was a Daddy's Girl, according to Cassie. She was never content unless her father was holding her, cooing to her quietly. She got the feeling that if Tal could feed her, he would take that duty as well. She sighed as her Snuggle Bug, another Cassie term, Sentnay, rubbed her sweet face on her shoulder.

Tal had wanted to name the girls after females in his family to show they were remembered. Ava couldn't have said no to him even if she'd wanted to.

"They are a miracle," Tal whispered as he calmed Meher back into sleep.

"I think it would be good to create new traditions for our children in this new world we're building," Ava said, laying a now sleeping Sentnay back down. She watched as Tal carefully placed Meher next to her sister. Both girls settled back into sleep.

"Perhaps our children's parents can celebrate some old traditions?" Tal whispered to her as they left the nursery.

Ava looked back at him and winked. "Traditions are important." She got a saucy grin in response and she practically ran to their bedroom.

*****

"Don't put that into your mouth," Lauren said for the thousandth time as she pulled a dried leaf from the mouth of her son, Severin. She rolled her eyes. Anything, ANYTHING, was fair game to her boys. And sure enough, she looked over and Hrosh was putting a small twig in his mouth.

"Merl, I need the cage," she called out as she bent over to pick up her miscreants. Now that they were crawling they were into everything. Lauren found it hard to believe she'd ever wished for them to be mobile.

Her mate walked into the main part of their cottage with a wooden contraption that formed a pen to place their perpetually moving sons. He placed it on top of the pile of blankets where they had been placed initially, and quickly left as soon as their mother began tidying her home.

"My sons are very mischievous," Merl said with no small amount of pride. Lauren glared at him.

"They were putting leaves and twigs in their mouths that you dragged inside!"

Merl smiled and took Severin from her and held him up in the air. "You're just cutting more teeth, aren't you my son?" Severin gave his father a very wet grin and began to chortle to encourage his father to toss him in the air. Merl pulled his son back to him and placed him in the pen and then took Hrosh from Lauren. "They are being intrepid, hringa."

"They are dancing on the last bit of my patience," Lauren laughed as her boys grinned up at her, waving their toys at her. "But they are so adorable I cannot even get angry at all the disruption."

When the boys began fretting because they could not get out of the pen, Lauren set up a hologram of a dancing bear in the middle, which her boys delighted in.

Merl wrapped his arms around his small mate and breathed her in. She was his world, everything. He had nearly lost her during the birth of their children. The moment she had awakened from her travails, he had made her rebind her fertility to the earth and to never unbind it. He had two young and his mate and that was more blessing than any Demon could even wish for.

"What do you think of this Winter Celebration idea?" She asked quietly as they watched their boys begin to test the limits of their prison.

"It sounds like a nice diversion during our cold months, at least on this hemisphere," he said, nuzzling her nape. She kept her beautiful, silky hair bunched on her head to keep the strands out of the hands of their children who found nothing more fun than getting it tangled in their hands.

"It will be like the Noel celebrations when I was a girl," She turned her head and smiled at him. "But, I am sure it won't be religious, like it is on Earth."

Lauren watched as her boys pulled themselves up on the sides of their play area and grinned up at their parents.

"It will be a nice, new tradition for our young," Merl said, reading her clearly.

They both sighed and reached down for a child as they began crying for their parents' attention.

*****

"I'm not sure about this Winter Celebration," Gramish said as his daughter, Langi, tried to pull herself up from his lap by his nose and horns. It was her favorite game with her favorite toy.

Ayalah looked over from where she was holding the hands of Mondi, showing her how to spin in a circle. "I think it's a good idea, and Siletha likes it as well since most of us live in this hemisphere."

"I spoke to Bax about it and he said on Earth it's a religious celebration for their Christians," he grimaced as Langi lightly slapped his cheeks with her sticky hands, having just chewed on some dried fruit. "Siletha sees no problem with this?"

"Cassie is determined that it be a secular holiday here since there are so many from so many other worlds and faiths," Ayalah looked down where Mondi was turning in circles, not yet noticing that her mother was only barely touching her fingers to her small hands. "Siletha likes the idea of celebrating during the sleeping season."

Gramish nodded as he remembered what they called Winter on his world.

"We shall find out tomorrow," Gramish said and lifted his daughter to blow raspberries on her belly, loving the sound of her laughter. Bax had shown him how to do this and he had been so grateful. He adored his young females and would do anything to see them smile and hear them laugh.

Once again, he was forced to look at the stark contrast of now compared to the Demonworld that had been when he had left it for millennia. Daughters were cherished for themselves and not what they could bring to the family through the value of their wombs.

Ayalah pulled Mondi up into her arms and held her tightly, listening to her coos against her throat. "I am looking forward to this."

*****

The Demon Council was at their table on a dais while the leaders of the communities gathered to hear Cassie's plan. There was a tangible excitement in the room. This was the most people that Cassie had seen in the room since Tal had petitioned the Council to go to Earth and get Ava.

Gramish clapped his hands and the room became silent. He had only recently given up using a gavel to bring order to the Council Chamber. That tool now belonged to a new priesthood.

"Cassie, I give you the floor," he began. "Please tell us about your plans for a Winter Celebration."

Cassie stood and straightened her gown. When she was on Demonworld she copied their dress as she didn't want to make them feel uncomfortable around her because she thought she needed to make a point. She respected them and their traditions. Most of them had no idea that around her house she wore blue jeans and ratty old t-shirts.

Her eyes shot to her mate and he nodded at her and it bolstered her courage. Who would think the most powerful magical being in the known universe would need a shot of courage? She who had faced elves, faeries and shadows? It took a monumental force of will not to break out in laughter at that thought. No one needed to know the many times she'd nearly peed all over herself in fear.

"I would like to start a new tradition on our rebuilding world," she said calmly, yet loudly, since there were so many packed into the chamber. "It will be secular, so no priests or priestesses will need to prepare any rites. There will be feasting," she paused as many cheered. Demons loved nothing more than a hearty feast. There were so many religious feasts during the year that Cassie was sure that they would someday all run into a perpetual feast celebration.

"I would like to do this on the Winter Solstice, as some of our people did back on Earth, but without any religiosity attached to it," she continued. "It will be a celebration of our lives and our new focus on building a better world. It will also be a time of self-reflection." She then sat and watched at the nodding Demons, half-elves and humans out in the crowded hall.

Gramish stood and the hall became quiet again. "Siletha's High Priestess, Ayalah, will now speak for The Goddess."

He nodded to his mate who sat in the seats reserved for the high priests of their pantheon that was also rebuilding. She stood and bowed her regal head, and all the Demons in the room did so as well. He watched as the High Priests of Himsu sat at their glowing table, away from the others, faces neutral as they always were when seated in council.

"Siletha is happy with the idea of a celebration during the sleeping months as it will be something to look forward to and a time for fellowship, reflection, and unity on our world. She is also happy that it is not a celebration of the Gods, but a celebration of us, that we are important to ourselves, for as we love ourselves, we love others and our lives." She then sat down quietly and looked back at her mate.

Ayalah missed her children. She took them everywhere with her, even though they had hired a half-elf caregiver, who was a wonderful female, but Ayalah had waited so long for children, that she was unable to give up one moment of their time. There was no promise of more, so she was one of the lucky ones who had been fertile as soon as she'd touched her home soil. She thought of her young, on the other side of their holding, with their caregiver, Elanil Farrona, who were probably getting into play and learning new things.

Elanil had confessed some months ago that she felt her wages were too much, as she rarely did much because Ayalah and Gramish did everything for their young. Gramish had informed her that they paid her for the peace of mind in knowing that someone they could trust with their young was there when they had to go off and solve problems at a moment's notice and Gramish was not sure it was safe to take the young. The young half-elf had shaken her head and laughed and said she was always on hand if needed.

It was something that was noticed by all of the people hired to look after young on the rebuilding world. Everyone had hired help, but if it was to do with the care of the young, those people were left with almost nothing to do. Ayalah knew that Elanil spent most of her time learning to read, since that was a skill denied her on her homeworld of Era because of the severe bias held by elves of their half-blood.

She couldn't pretend that Demons had treated theirs much better, holding most of them as slaves and battle fodder, when they had still gone to war, but that had changed. With so many Demons finding human and half-elf mates, all their young were Demis. Even the two original Demis had taken human mates and had beautiful young.

She looked at the two of them, upon the dais next to her mate. She was so thankful to them for having fought so hard to get them all back here, and sent up a silent prayer of thanks to Siletha for them. Cassie and Seth were the true blessings of their pantheon and neither held one idea of their import to their world.

Gramish stood again. "Are there any who would wish to ask questions or speak at this time?"

A short queue began at the lectern that Cassie had installed for speakers to the Council. She said that it provided a barrier of some sort in the speaker's mind so that they might speak more freely and therefore, honestly, to the Council, without having to pull out a truth stone or spell each time.

Gramish nodded at the Demon who had gotten to the podium first. "Delig, you may speak."

"Would this be held every Winter Solstice?" Delig looked up to Cassie who nodded.

"That is the goal, yes."

"What do you do on Earth for your Solstice celebrations?" Delig then followed up. Cassie could see he was genuinely curious, not being combative to the idea.

"It has changed over the centuries on my world, but I am told that it was started as a way to break up the monotony of the cold months by religious people, giving the people something to look forward to in the hard months after the harvest but before Spring. In one religion it was made into a religious holiday with the exchange of gifts as a symbol of that religion."

"But this won't be religious?" Delig pushed.

Cassie shook her head. "I see no reason why it should be, Delig. There are so many here with different religious beliefs that this should be one holiday where everyone has something to celebrate, regardless of their belief."

Delig nodded. "Will there be the exchange of gifts?"

The Councilors, all of them looked to Cassie who looked surprised.

"I don't see that it should be mandatory, no," she shook her head vigorously. "It should only be done if you feel like giving someone a gift."

"Why do Humans do it?"

Cassie looked blank. She had not been raised in any of the Earth religions, so her knowledge of them was lacking. She looked desperately at her husband, who was standing up. She was so relieved that she almost let it show.

"Delig," Bax began in his professorial voice. "On Earth, even those not of the Christian religion exchange gifts on this holiday, in fact, even atheists and agnostics celebrate the holiday. It's become less religious as time passes."

Gasps were heard all over the room when Bax mentioned atheists and agnostics. These were concepts that were so foreign to them as to be considered heretical. On their worlds, their Gods were not only known, but seen and heard, if not by the entire populace, then at least by their priests and at their temples.

Bax took a breath and began speaking again, taking on the tone that turned his wife on so much, and out of the corner of his eye he saw her smile.

"You have to realize that the Gods of Earth do not make themselves known to the people any longer, and in fact, most of them consider them to be a myth made up by our ancients to explains acts of nature and weather patterns. They also believe that they were created by ancient civilizations in order to keep the people moral and behaving. Humans do not experience the Deity as others do. In fact, their God believes in free will, that those who follow him do so because they choose to believe, not because they have to. There is a difference between knowing gods exist and having faith."

"But would their faith not be stronger if they knew?" Gramish had to ask this because it made no sense to him whatsoever.

Bax looked at him and shook his head. "I would imagine the faith of someone who doesn't know, but chooses to believe, is stronger."

Several of the people in the queue had taken their seats, their questions being answered by Delig's questions.

"So, this will be a secular holiday with gifts being exchanged by those who want to do so?" Delig looked up at Gramish who was mulling over what Baxter Clancy had said.

"Yes," Cassie said. "It is a celebration of life during the dead part of the world, reflecting upon own lives and actions of the past year, and looking forward to the Spring with the renewal of life."

"So, this is about life?" Delig continued.

"Can you think of a more important reason to celebrate during this time of year?" Seth responded quietly from his seat. He had spent the time quietly listening to everyone and taking it all in, his usual modus operandi. "We celebrate bringing in the crops we grow after the harvest. There is nothing else, except for a few holidays of the dead gods until the Spring Rites for our Gods to celebrate the renewal of the year." The Demon year began at the Spring equinox, and was celebrated by all the temples, all of the gods and there were three days of feasting.

Everyone nodded at Seth's good point and the motion passed unanimously, even with Delig frowning, but nodding.
CHAPTER THREE

"So, it's Christmas," Helen stated as she slowly drank the tea she'd made and tried to swallow the crackers that Brigid made for all the pregnant women on the Demonworld. It really only alleviated the worst of the symptoms, but it helped her get through her day, so she kept on swallowing them down. It would not do to show any weakness to her mate, Vadch, or she would be tied to a bed until she delivered.

Cassie shook her head. "Not, not Christmas at all, because there are no religious connotations. It's a completely secular holiday to help pass the winter months.

"But there will be gift giving?" Helen raised a brow, hoping that alone would carry her point.

Cassie fidgeted and ate a cookie she'd brought for the twins, but she nodded.

"So... Christmas." Helen's tone indicated that this was the consensus.

Cassie sighed and gave up.

"Happy Holidays, you harpie," she groused, then laughed as Helen turned green and ran to the bathing chamber.

"You and Vadch sure didn't waste any time after you went off birth control," Cassie called down the hallway.

Helen came back into her kitchen, softly wiping her face with a cloth and sitting back down, feeling completely devoid of energy.

"Sunny took the girls to Ava and Tal's for a couple of days, we had plenty of time," she reminded her supposed best friend. She then pointed a finger at Cassie. "And, don't think I haven't heard about your 'disappearances' during important meetings so that you and Bax could get it on like rabbits."

Having the grace to blush, Cassie concentrated intently on her cup of tea.

"I admit, that my sex drive was a bit... increased... During my pregnancy."

Helen laughed at that and felt better. The morning sickness was passing, thank all the gods. "You still do it, Cassie. You're just as bad as your brother."

Cassie nearly spit her tea across the table, swallowed and then laughed until tears ran down her face. She waved her hand and the mess disappeared. "No wonder Brigid makes so many healing and rejuvenation potions. She's got to be eternally chafed. I can't imagine getting that turned on that many times a day."

"They're making up for lost time. They have over one hundred years of suppressed desire to work out." A happy, dreamy look came over Helen's face.

Cassie rolled her eyes. "He should just wrap up his cock and present it to her."

"Dick in a box?"

Both women burst out laughing, which was how Vadch found them when he walked in from his workroom to check on his mate. He took Bax's advice and didn't try to figure it out, just enjoyed the mirth and his mate obviously feeling better than when he'd started working earlier that morning. His Helen lifted her face up to him for a kiss when he walked in and he could do nothing other than give her one.

"Ugh, you two," Cassie laughed harder. "Find a room."

"Says the woman who stopped a trade meeting with the Dragons to drag her mate off and was caught by her own brother in a guest room at Gramish's holding?"

"Hey!" Cassie cried indignantly. "He was looking to do some mating of his own once I took off with Bax," Cassie defended her actions. "Speaking of Bax," she grinned and popped out of their kitchen.

Vadch leaned down to Helen and deepened their kiss.

"Where are our girls? He asked, nuzzling her lips.

"Sunny took them to their witch lessons." Helen told him in between light bites on his lips. "Why?"

"Speaking of mating..."

*****

Bax pulled himself off his wife and lay back on his pillow, still breathing like he'd just run a marathon. Cassie had come home all hot and bothered and pulled him out of his office while he was studying some Demon tomes for information and stepped him up to their room, immediately vanishing their clothes and practically ravishing him.

He grinned when he remembered that he had always discounting the allure to the married state when his friends got leg shackled. Because the greatest wailing against the state was that as soon as the ring was on the finger, the soonest the sex stopped. He liked sex, couldn't think of a time when he didn't want to have sex. Especially sex with his wife who, to him at least, was the most beautiful being in all the universe. How she had kept herself a virgin before they met was a constant mystery to him, even though she readily admitted, she never wanted it before she met him, then ever since, it was an almost constant draw. When she had been pregnant and enormous with the twins, they had been extremely creative.

"I'm getting blisters, Cass," he joked as he listened to her breathing settle. He had to admit, this was the only cardio they got every day with the exception of chasing toddlers away from their attempts to kill themselves.

"Awww, poor baby," Cassie teased. "I'll have to get some healing potions from Brigid."

"Make your own, I don't want Seth smirking at me for even needing them," Bax groaned, knowing his brother-in-law would not be able to resist the urge to tease Bax. The great prat was infamous on the planet for how often he needed to take his mate. It had to be familial as Cassie would get the same look on her face that Seth got just before he would disappear with his mate.

Cassie just giggled and Bax grinned. He was incredibly satisfied in his marriage. He loved his wife and kids. He was able to research to his heart's content and he was more in demand as a guest lecturer than ever before, earning himself and Cassie a very nice living on Earth, as well as having more access to relics to sell to the remaining magical community and collectors there. They were set, except for Cassie's insistence on going back to do taxes each season.

"I was working on the research for creating the relic to charge with magic so that we can take Ari to Earth for extended periods," he finally said to his wife as his pulse settled and the afterglow warmed him.

Beside him, Cassie sighed a happy sigh. "It would be great to visit for more than a few hours before we're all worn out."

"What time are we going over to your parents' house?"

Cassie sighed next to him and he could hear her smile. "We have a couple of hours."

"A couple of hours?" Bax smiled, finding himself at half-mast already. "Whatever shall we do?"

"I thought you were the experienced one," Cassie laughed as she pounced.

*****

Jake Lester sat in an armchair, reading a book his son-in-law, Bax, had recommended, and surreptitiously watched his wife clean up around the house. Lucky had stayed in amazing shape. He was a lucky man. For twenty-five years he'd been taken from her, and she'd never turned to another man, never wanted another. She had thought he was dead. No one would have blamed her for getting married again. But, she never had.

Their reunion had not been sunshine and unicorns as his daughter, Cassie, would say. It had been a very tough row to hoe, but luckily, he'd had previous experience in handling Lucky post-Faisal. Granted, this time had been much worse and had taken much longer. It didn't help that he'd been held on the Demonworld and had not aged a day since he'd been taken. Lucky, had aged naturally on Earth, but she looked nowhere near her actual age. In fact, if he knew anything about his wife, with their time on the Demonworld, she was... how could he put it? Firming up?

"Lucky?" He queried, watching as she straightened up from the dusting she was doing. His beautiful wife stood up, her dark hair falling into place around her beautiful face, her olive-green eyes shining brightly. She'd been humming.

"What is it?" She looked at him. Even after all of these years, she still hadn't lost her Greek accent when speaking English.

"I've been thinking..." he wasn't sure how he should couch his suspicion, because Lucky was still pretty fragile at times when it came to her experiences on this world.

Lucky Lester squinted at her husband. Was he trying to get her to make more lemon snap cookies? Surely, she had explained that Cassie had forgotten to bring lemons home on her last visit home. Jake was impossible at times.

Jake put his book aside on the end table, stood up, to his very tall height, and walked over to his little wife, smiling as she stood looking up at him, but her eyes held questions.

"I cannot make more of the cookies until the next time Cassie goes to Earth," she told him, shaking one of her delicate fingers at him.

Jake gently grabbed the finger and sucked it into his mouth. Lucky's eyes widened and her pupils dilated. Her eyes went from teasing to seductive in an instant, and Jake wanted to yell in triumph. Fear didn't even make an appearance. Shame hadn't either.

He took her finger out of his mouth and licked the end. He looked at her, a wry grin on his face.

"I've been thinking... It's been hours since I'd had you."

"Jake," Lucky breathed before he covered her mouth with his own.

Deepening the kiss, he picked her up, carrying her into the kitchen. His guess was that she didn't even notice when he set her on the table and began unbuttoning her shirt, and was rewarded with her braless state. He filled both of his hands with her soft flesh and she groaned, turning their kiss openly carnal. Her hands came up and began to madly pull at his t-shirt. He was undoing his own belt and jeans fly. It was Jake's turn to moan when her clever hand dived into his pants, taking control of his erection.

As she tugged and pulled on his cock, Jake pulled her bottom to the edge of the table, and saw she was wearing one of her thongs. God, he loved the way they looked on her body, but, sadly, this one had to go. He quickly ripped it off her, and pushed her back, while his cock lined up to her warm, moist center, knowing it was home. He gently entered her, knowing that she always needed that so the fear wouldn't come, and leaned down to take one turgid nipple into his mouth. She cried out and he felt her juices flow over his cock even more as her channel tightened around him. She would kill him, but what a way to go.

He slowly stroked into her until she urged him for more. Lucky was not a passive partner, not at all.

"Dammit Jake, faster," she demanded. "More!" Then she pushed her hips into his and he ground his pelvis down on her clit. She came apart, screaming her release. Jake was not far behind, calling out to her as he lost himself completely in his wife.

They lay on their kitchen table, panting, trying to find feeling in their limbs and clearly basking in the afterglow of excellent sex.

"You're pregnant, Lucky," Jake finally said and carefully watched her sated eyes clear, and then yes, there was the fear.

"Wha..." Lucky tried to sit up but Jake had her pinned. He was ready to leap away if she struggled, but wanted to help her come to terms with their news. When she didn't struggle, but only looked up at him, confusion filling her eyes. He bent down and gently kissed her, and his stupid cock began hardening inside her, ready for another round. God, he loved this world.

"You," Jake kissed her top lip. "Are," kissed her lower lip. "Pregnant," and then he kissed her softly but firmly and she opened for him, as she always had, and moaned into his mouth. He was rewarded when she began moving her hips up to him, taking him completely, fucking herself on him. Jake's eyes rolled back into his head.

"You're pregnant, baby," he whispered as he nibbled on her earlobe. Then he got back to gently loving his wife who was mindless in her passion. This time it took longer for the flame to build into an inferno, but neither cared, it felt too good to not appreciate it. Jake kept whispering his love to his wife and she was crying, until finally she could hold back no more and urged him to a faster pace. When Jake came, she let go and milked him dry.

He knew he was laying on top of her, weight on his elbows, but he was damned if he could get his legs to hold his weight. She'd totally sucked him dry, he was a husk of a man. The luckiest husk of a man ever born.

"A baby?" Lucky finally whispered in wonder. It wasn't that they hadn't tried after Cassie was born, they just hadn't not tried, and Lucky had never gotten pregnant again. Jake had finally gotten her to agree to see a medical doctor when he returned from his mission with Morris. That had never come to pass. His friends and family had believed him killed in a cave-in where they had been looking for relics. The cave-in had been caused by him trying to take out the Demon who had captured him just before stepping him out of the falling tunnel.

"Our baby," he breathed and kissed her cheek, which was all he had the energy to do at the moment.

"It's what we've always wanted," Lucky said, still in shock. "How did you know when I didn't?"

Jake managed a weak chuckle. "Brigid is a blabbermouth."

Lucky laughed for both of them. "I'll murder our daughter-in-law."

Jake smiled, so happy that she could accept Seth and Brigid, in fact, any part of this world considering the horrors she had experienced here. It showed him what a beautiful soul his wife had. Lucky, for him, was perfect. He kissed his way up her cheek, until he was staring her in the face. "What were you saying about the cookies?" His eyes twinkled as he saw a spark in Lucky's eye before she reached back and lightly slapped his naked ass, just before she squeezed it.

"You keep that up, lovely Lucky, and Cassie and Bax and our grandkids will walk in here to find us in a completely compromised position," he chuckled and managed to pull himself gently out of her body, his entire being bemoaning the loss of her warmth.

"And then we'll have to listen to how they can never eat at our table again, just like Rory and Drina have to listen to."

"And Morris and Seph," Jake laughed, helping his wife up, noticing she was not steady on her pins at all. Pride swelled in his chest. Yes, he could still make his wife weak-kneed.

"And Nestra and Glenn," Lucky tried to pull her shirt together.

"And Bax and Cassie..."

"We need to shower before they get here," Lucky said.

"Together. Save the planet," Jake laughed and dragged her into the bathing chamber.

A couple of hours later when they both emerged from their bedroom, a short nap was needed after their activities in and out of the bathroom, to find Bax and Cassie, with Ari and Jacob in tow, in their kitchen.

"Is that an ass print on the table?" Bax was stage whispering.

"Ew, Bax, no!" Cassie said. "Here's a rag, wipe it off."

"I'm not touching it," Bax balked, throwing the cloth back at her.

"Give me the damned dishtowel," Jake growled as he entered the kitchen and proceeded to clean the entire kitchen table.

"You two are such hypocrites," Lucky admonished as she walked in looking perfectly put together.

Cassie stared at her mother and then her eyes widened and her mouth formed into a perfect O.

"Jesus! Mom!" Then she squealed and ran to Lucky, embracing her tightly.

Bax just stared at them, then looked at Jake, who was grinning from ear to ear.

"What's going on? Did Lucky win the lottery or something?" Bax said, setting both of his children down so they could go play with the toys Jake and Lucky kept for them and their cousin Letha.

Jake smiled proudly. "We are pregnant."

It was then Bax's turn to have his eyes widen and his mouth drop open.

"But you're old!"

Jake and Lucky both burst out laughing.

"I mean, congratulations," Bax blushed. "But really, dude, I've known you all of my life."

Jake looked over to where his wife and daughter, heads together, were whispering, crying and laughing.

"It's a miracle, Bax. I, for one, refuse to question it."

He led his son-in-law into their living room where the children were playing. Cassie and Lucky stayed in the kitchen, preparing food for the meal they had planned on eating together. The family was together and it warmed Jake's soul to see his family together, his daughter, her husband and their children. It was a continuation and it comforted him in a way nothing else could.

In all the years he'd spent in Faisal's prison, never, ever letting them know about Cassie, he'd despaired. It had been impossible for Seth to get him out and back home to Lucky, and he knew it, so he'd just endured. He'd had to. There were times he wished he could have died, and Faisal was the expert at keeping him on that razor's edge, wanting to die, and nearly there, but always pulling him back. He'd kept himself sane by imagining Lucky and Cassie, and their lives on Earth. He'd made up stories where he and Lucky had children of their own and they had watched the family grow, and grow up into what he now had in reality.

Jake had to admit, his first year back home with everyone had not gone especially well. Lucky had been distant and had rarely let him touch her. He knew exactly what Faisal had done to her as the fucking Demon could not help but gloat, as a way to torture him further. He wasn't too proud to admit that when the Demon left he'd wept viciously bitter tears knowing she was in his grasp again. The only thing keeping him from complete madness at that point was not knowing what had happened to Cassie. He had held himself together in the hopes that Faisal had not captured her. Of course, Faisal had thought Cassie was a male, which really helped when Lucky had been taken.

There wasn't a moment that had gone by that he wasn't thankful that he and Morris Clancy had been able to track down the necklace with the pendant made by the First One's family in Bulgaria.

The family of sorcerers had captured a full blood Demon to make the pendant to hide her signature and he and Morris had found it and put it around Cassie's neck when she was so little herself. It had kept her safe until she'd come to this world in search of her mother. He had gotten his family back at that moment, and he had never looked back.

He hadn't resented Seth and Brigid for keeping him alive for Faisal. He thanked them for keeping him alive so he could return to his family and he had worked on Lucky and Cassie, both, to accept them for the help they were. Cassie had taken far longer, hating anything that she considered a part of the Demonworld, and only accepting Seth when she was forced to see him for what he truly was.

"You're full of it, Baxter Clancy," Jake heard his daughter say just before a dinner roll went flying across the table to smack the young Demon Hunter in the head.

Jake was about to say something but Lucky caught his eye and lightly shook her head. So, he would let this play out. Lucky was very good at knowing when Cassie was about to learn an important lesson about herself. Then, he had to wonder what he'd missed while he was lost in his memories.

"Look, Cass, all I am saying is that if you admit that Seth has the full mating pull that all Demons appear to have, you have to admit that is why I have to beat you off with a stick," then the pup had the cheek to wink and grin at her.

Cassie's eyes closed to slits and her mouth formed into a firm moue. "You're an ass, Bax. You've never even tried to tell me no. Ever." Was all she said, but the heat of anger was not in her voice. "I don't think you even know how to say no."

"An ass who's begging your sister-in-law for healing and rejuvenation potions to stave off the effects of your constant needs."

Cassie's face grew beet red, but Bax persisted. "And you continue to deny me my mating bond. That's all I'm saying, Cass."

Jake held his breath to see what Cassie would do. She was so firmly in denial about being a Demi that she rarely took her Demoness form.

Cassie opened her mouth, closed it, and then took a deep breath.

"Mom, Daddy, I am sorry that you had to witness my idiot of a husband's attempts at humor," she said and then sat back in her chair glaring at said idiot of a husband.

Jake suddenly realized that Bax was trying to force her to give him the mating bond, and because Cassie hated her Demon side so much, she denied both of them that completion. He had seen the good it had done Seth and Brigid, giving the Demi a steel in his backbone he'd lacked before, and it had made his little healer mate much braver than she had previously been. He wasn't sure what more his daughter or son-in-law could gain from a completed bond, but it must be important or Bax would not have brought it up in front of Lucky and himself.

He looked down to the other end of the table and Lucky smiled, as if she'd just read his thoughts.

"I'm slow but I eventually get there, dear," he muttered, causing Lucky to chuckle.

"Cassie, honey," Lucky began, folding her hands under her chin. "Do you think that Bax has a valid claim?"

Cassie turned her head to her mother she nearly caused herself a case of whiplash.

"Mother!"

"Don't use that tone with me, young lady," and Steel Spine Lucky was there. Jake loved Steel Spine Lucky. "Answer my question."

Cassie looked over at Jake, her eyes pleading. It was clearly a Hail Mary from a child who knew she would be forced to confront something she didn't want to. Jake refused to hear her petition.

"Answer your mother, young lady," Jake said just as firmly as Lucky had. United! They had always been a united front for Cassie. She was never able to play one against the other to get her way.

Cassie gulped and stood up and got the twins out of their chairs, and put them down to play on the floor. After she'd cleaned faces and hands, she sat back down.

"You're all awful people, I want that on the record before we go any further," Oh yes, his daughter was fully in a petulant mood.

"Duly noted," Lucky said wryly. "Now spit it out."

Cassie looked around, chewing on the inside of her mouth as she'd always done when confronted.

"It's not that I want to deny you, Bax. I'm just afraid of what it means," she finally got out quietly.

"What do you think it means?" Bax questioned, never taking his eyes away from his wife's face. Jake then realized how much this did mean to the young Demon Hunter. Cassie must also be denying his bond to her, the bond that Demon Hunter's had with their mates, like the bond he had with Lucky. It would have destroyed him if she had denied that to him when they had first married... She never had. It had only been broken when they'd taken him from Earth, but instantly re-established the moment she had been, too.

Cassie's eyes filled with tears. "It means that I'm more Demon than human. It means I'm like... him." The last word came out in a harsh whisper and Cassie closed her eyes as if in pain.

"Cassie," Bax spoke quietly, patiently. "I am human and I experience that bond. Are you saying the bond makes me less human?

Cassie shook her head. "You know it makes you... more..." Her tears were falling now. "Demon hunters do not have a history of rape and degradation."

Lucky and Bax both got up and went to Cassie, embracing her. Jake stayed seated. His daughter was in pain, but this was not a hurt he could help fix. He had to be patient.

Bax was whispering to her as she cried. Lucky finally backed away and went over to Jake. He pulled her into his lap, holding onto her, because it hurt both of them when Cassie hurt. When Bax picked up Cassie, then sat in her chair, holding her in much the same way Jake was holding her mother, he sighed.

"Cassie?" he called to her to get her attention.

"What Daddy?"

"Have you discussed with Bax, his Demon Hunter bond to you as his wife, his mate?"

Cassie's eyes widened and he realized that Bax had not brought it up in the hopes that Cassie would twig to what she was doing on her own.

"When your mother and I married, it was not long after she had returned to Earth, knowing she was pregnant with you," he figured it would be easier to start at the beginning. "I knew from the moment I saw her that she was my destined mate. Demon Hunters get that in much the same way as Witch Hunters," he explained. "Your mother was in no state to accept me or the bond for some months, but eventually she accepted both and we have had a wonderful... a beautiful marriage, even with twenty-five years apart."

"But Mom was weird with you after you came back," Cassie was trying very hard to hang onto her justification for denying something both she and Bax had to be craving.

"That was more to do with what she'd experienced than the fact that I was back from the dead with an intact bond, Cassie," he chided her. "We worked on getting past it, together."

It was silent for some minutes with only the play of the children reminding them they weren't alone in the universe. Cassie finally turned to Bax and spoke quietly to him. Her husband nodded and stood up, putting her back in the chair. He walked over and sat down on the floor with his kids. He was in a position where he could still keep an eye on his wife.

Cassie stood and motioned to both of her parents. Jake got up and put Lucky on her feet and they walked over to Cassie who waved her hands and placed a soundproof ward over the kitchen. She then turned to her parents, her face a picture of the agony of the unknown.

"Daddy, how did you do it? How did you get past what Mom experienced here?" She asked. "Because, I have to be completely honest, I don't think I ever can."

Lucky sucked in a breath, her hand flying to her mouth. Her eyes flew to Jake's in an appeal he couldn't understand. He was confused, because he didn't know how to answer Cassie's question. Some facts should never be known between a parent and child.

"I love your mother," he stated firmly. "I loved her the moment I saw her, all scared and easily startled. I loved her the whole time I was here, and then when I felt her again when he arrived at Faisal's palace. I never doubted her or her love."

"Even after you knew what Faisal had done to her?" Cassie's voice was very quiet, very small.

"I don't understand what you're asking," he finally told her. "Faisal, his actions, his deeds, have nothing to do with what your mother and I share." Then an idea occurred to him. "Do you think that Bax will love you less if he had the bond and really, truly sees you, not just what you want to show him?"

"I'm honest with Bax!" Cassie protested. "Hell, he's seen me in the throes of morning sickness and labor. He knows me warts and all."

"Warts and all, but no Demon form, right?" Jakes asked finally grasping what her problem really was.

"Daddy!" she cried out and threw herself into his arms. Jake couldn't do anything but hold his baby girl to him as she cried in shame. "He says that he likes my Demoness form, but I don't know what to really think."

"Do you think he finds it unattractive?" Lucky asked her, smoothing Cassie's hair, trying to comfort her.

"Mom, I'm so horrible. I can't find a way to accept being here. I am so afraid I'm going to resent Ari for being here, for forcing all of us here, and sometimes I find it so hard to keep my human form here because I am genuinely proud of all of us."

Jake kissed the top of his daughter's head. She was the daughter of his heart if not his loins, but it mattered not to Jake Lester for he had accepted her the moment Lucky had accepted his bond to her and he'd never looked back.

"You feel guilt for not minding that you like being here and doing good work for people who deserve it because you think you should hate this world and everything on it because of what your mother suffered here," Jake guessed correctly.

Cassie gave him a watery nod.

"It would appear to me, baby," Lucky hugged them both. "That you are making yourself miserable by denying the truth."

"I don't know what to do, Mom," Cassie admitted. "I've made such a cake of everything."

Jake's laughter boomed out of him. "A cake?"

"Shut up, Daddy, I've been schooling a Southern Bell witch on Earth. It perfectly combines how pear-shaped I've sent everything."

"And trust me, Jake, she can't bake cakes," Lucky teased them both.

"You need to stop fighting yourself, baby," Jake said quietly, looking Cassie straight in her eyes. Eyes just like her mother's.

Jake and Lucky comforted their daughter until she'd stopped crying and actually smiled a genuine smile.

"Can you watch the kids?" She asked with a cheeky grin.

Jake stopped worry about his little girl, knowing that she would only be happy once she stopped denying the truth everyone else here had accepted.

"Take your man home, baby girl."
CHAPTER FOUR

Seth stood in his father's former throne room, now Brigid's parlor, glowering at his irrational mate. His beloved, cherished daughter was in her nursery, playing with a half-elf child, watched over by her half-elf care-taker. All so Seth could argue with his stubborn, obstinate, wrong-headed mate.

"I forbid it, Brigid," he declared, actually stamping his foot down. "You will not do this."

"I already have, Seth," Brigid said defiantly. Well, as defiant as his tiny mate could while sitting on one of her chaises, daintily sticking her needle into the cloth, time after time. She wouldn't even look up at him.

He was tempted to pull the hoop out of her hands just to force her to look up at him. He wanted her to see the abject fear he felt.

"You will not rebind your fertility to me, I forbid it."

"Yes, Seth," his wife sighed, clearly bored with his commands. "You've said so, but it's already been done."

"Then undo it!" he yelled to her, at his wit's end, and frankly greatly aroused by her defiance, but he couldn't touch her if she had already bound her fertility to him again. It was too dangerous. She had nearly died bringing Letha into the world, and he was not so greedy he would pray to Siletha for more than he'd already been given.

Brigid patiently put her embroidery hoop down and finally did look up at her breathtakingly handsome Demi mate.

"It's already too late," she quietly told him.

Seth gasped. "When?" He whispered. "WHEN DID YOU DO THIS THING?" He yelled, fear overwhelming him. If he lost Brigid he lost everything.

His mate just continued to look at him, patience written all over her face. "A week ago."

His mind raced, he was frantic. He wanted to shake her? Why had she done such a thing? Yes, he knew she wanted another child, but also knew how dangerous it was. Why? She could die! It was the one thing he found he could deny her.

He reached out and grabbed her and before she could catch her breath, they were at the main Silethan temple near Gramish's holding.

"Siletha! I need you!" Seth was screaming, his fear was very obvious.

Three priestesses came running out from the back of the temple.

"Seth," Janash approached him slowly. It was clear the Demi was almost mad with fear. "What is wrong?"

"She rebound her fertility to me. A week ago. She's only just now told me. Fix her!"

Beside him, Brigid just sighed. "I don't need fixing."

"You almost died," Seth turned to her and Brigid finally realized the true depth of his fear. It had been ridiculous of her not to realize just how terrified he would be.

"Janash and Aliera did not allow that to happen," she spoke softly to him. "Your goddess, Siletha, did not allow that to happen because of the blessed Demon life I held within me." She placed her palm on Seth's face. "Do you really think that she'd do all that work only to make sure such a beautiful miracle never happened again."

Tears began to fall down Seth's face. This was only the second time she'd seen him cry like this.

"I can't lose you, Brigid. I can't," and he pressed his face into her hand. "Don't leave me," he whispered.

"I won't" Brigid said and made the promise a vow, here in this sacred place. "However, I will allow Janash to examine me just to make sure everything is as it should be."

Janash took Brigid's hand and led her to the back. Brigid looked back at Seth who was standing there crying.

"It will be okay," she promised.

Seth rushed to the altar and he knelt, praying before his knees hit the floor.

He was suddenly on a plane, alone with his goddess, a place he recognized.

"Your fear is strong, Jyseth," Siletha called him by his full name. "Your concern for your mate strengthens me, but it weakens you."

"Please, don't let her die," Seth begged. "I can't live without her."

Siletha reached over to Seth and cupped his cheek in her hand much the same as Brigid had.

"What she suffered last time was not due to anything in her, and had everything to do with your daughter not wanting to cooperate with her birth as she was quite content where she was."

Seth looked into the eyes of his goddess, confused. This was not a subject with which he was familiar.

"Your Letha did not want to turn and enter the birthing canal so that she would be pushed out into the world as she was very happy inside the warmth of her mother. Even hearing your voice, which she loves, could not draw her out."

"So..." Seth was thinking slowly. "This was not due to any anomaly within Brigid, but with Letha being stubborn?" He could understand that. He was well versed in his daughter's stubbornness.

Siletha smiled at him and nodded. "I do not think that your sons will be quite as stubborn as they already love their momma quite as much as you do."

Seth froze, staring straight ahead. "Sons?"

"Yes," Siletha laughed. "And they will do great things for the Demon race."

Everything went black, and Seth woke up, on his side, at the altar with two priestesses trying to pull him up.

"Brigid!" Seth yelled and she came out from the back, a huge smile on her face.

"Twins, Seth!" she squealed excitedly and ran to him.

"Sons!" he whispered to her as he held her tightly, his joy totally washing away the fear that had consumed him just minutes earlier. He was just as happy and excited as when he'd learned that Brigid carried Letha.

"Oh dear, I recognize that look in his eye," Janash laughed as suddenly Seth and his mate disappeared from the temple.

"And, the baby boom continues," another priestess said.

*****

Lauren and Merl and their twin sons Hrosh and Severin stood at Tal and Ava's door, waiting for it to open.

"If he's taking Ava again, we could be here for a while," Merl sighed.

"I've put up a warm bubble for us so the chill wind will not bother us," Lauren laughed, hugging Hrosh to her. She kissed each of his horn buds, adoring her baby boys. She looked over to her mate and Merl was busy making faces at Severin, who was trying to grab his daddy's horns.

Finally, the door opened and a very exhausted Tal stood before them.

"I am sorry. Sentnay and Meher were up all night, teething," he explained and stood back to allow them inside. "Ava will be down in a moment, we both just woke up."

Lauren fiddled in the bag of baby things she always carried with her and found two teething sticks and handed them to Tal. "Here are some extras until you two can get into the village and pick up some more."

Tal gratefully accepted them and took them upstairs. He and Ava came back down a few minutes later with their twin daughters in their arms. Both the little girls were chewing on the sticks and drooling happily. The plant was great for teething gums and had a mild analgesic in the outer bark that helped with the pain. They were a godsend to all parents.

"They both were fussy, and we couldn't figure it out until Sentnay bit Tal," Ava explained, putting a kettle for tea on while Tal set up a play area for the children.

The two couples got together as often as they could in between working their farms and guard duty to Gramish and Seth. Lauren went into the kitchen with Ava and they began putting food together for everyone, but especially the babies. The two Demons watched their children closely. As Tal's daughters were just sitting up on their own, Merl was busy making sure his toddlers were not bowling them over.

"Thank you for the teething sticks," Tal said quietly. "I cannot believe I forgot them."

Merl chuckled at his lifelong friend. "Lack of sleep can do that," he teased. "We're not waking up like we did when they were younger, but the boys can get up awfully early, even on a farm."

Both males laughed at that.

"What do you think of this new holiday that Cassie is trying to start?" Tal asked when his mate put a cup of hot tea in his hand and his brain came fully online.

Merl inhaled the scent of his tea and drank a sip before answering. "I think a day of a non-religious celebration would be helpful to all of the non-Demons now here, the humans and half-elves. It is also during the Sleeping Months, so it will be a good time for any sort of celebration."

Tal nodded. He was a chosen of Mlegnan, the God of Dreams among the Demon Pantheon. He had been contacted as to what would be required of him.

"It should also be a time to look ahead, to the future and to voice our hopes for that future." Tal sighed and breathed deeply. "It will also be a holiday to celebrate for those who worship other gods and may feel left out of our religious ceremonies. It is the one event that includes everyone here, regardless of where they originated."

Merl looked at Tal, surprised.

"For what are our dreams but hopes for the future?"

Merl burst out laughing.

"You're not signing up for the priesthood, are you?"

"Never say so," Tal frowned at his friend. "It's bad enough I have to stop what I'm doing to attend some religious rite or council meeting."

The women called their men into the kitchen where they stood chatting and cooking.

"Come sit and eat and it will better your temper, Tal," Ava teased him as she always did. She said he was far too serious, far too often for it please her, and he lived to please her.

Lauren set their plates on the table and poured some fresh juice, then sat down herself.

"The boys ate before we came over," she explained and they all began talking about their plans for planting in the spring and for enlarging their farms as they ate.

"Do you think that this new holiday will be like Christmas on Earth?" Lauren finally asked.

Ava shrugged. She was Persian and had no knowledge of the Christian religion at all. Both Demons shook their head.

"That is a religious holiday on your Earth," Tal pointed out pragmatically.

"The gods have declared it to be a secular holiday, one for all the beings on our world so that we can find something to celebrate between the harvest celebrations and the spring consecrations," Merl said.

Lauren just nodded and rolled her eyes. "That's what is said, but, Helen pointed out, there will be gift giving, so it's Christmas to me."

Ava cocked her head to the side. "What is your word for Christmas, again?"

Lauren looked at Ava askance. "Noel. Why?"

"Then it's not Christmas." Ava waited for it to sink into Lauren's beautiful head. She burst into laughter when the French illusionist finally got it.

"You're not half as funny as you think you are, you shrew," Lauren sniffed in the face of her friend's laughter. "See if I buy your girls any of Vadch's wooden blocks! And then your girls will grow up ignorant."

Ava gasped. "Not my girls! You're a beast!" She cried, trying in vain to keep from laughing anymore.

Then both women fell into fits of laughter.

Merl and Tal just shrugged and dug into the breakfast. They were both used to the laughter of their mates and not at all upset to see them smiling and happy.

"Gift giving is not exclusive to Christians, though," Lauren finally said after a few moments of thought.

"I don't remember you taking gifts to your temple that one time we visited your village," Merl pointed out.

Lauren gave him a heated look. "You were trés beau in your human form, mon mari," she breathed.

"Gods, they're going to want the guest room," Tal murmured and got up, putting his breakfast dishes in the sink.

Ava giggled and gathered up the rest of the dishes and quickly cleaned up the kitchen.

"We'd better tell Cassie it's a go on the gifts," Ava giggled as she saw Lauren and Merl run up the stairs.

*****

Not many Demons came to Gareth's old family holding which was now the Elven embassy on the Demonworld. Demons and Elves did not get along well, especially when their brother had been abused for a millennium by those very same elves. Every time a trade delegation came calling or a Queen's messenger knocked on their door, it took all of Krys' tact and diplomacy to keep her mate from throttling said emissaries, especially if they had been making love at the time of the knock.

"Is it not bad enough they gelded my brother, but this?" Gareth threw his hands up in the air and his clothes appeared on his body. Krys had to admit, she liked it better when he did that and their clothes disappeared. She got up and dressed the old-fashioned way, laughing at her mate.

"Let's see what they have to say for themselves before we arbitrarily lop their heads off, shall we?" She looked at her mate's grim expression. "Of course, it's only a suggestion, but I'm not sure how I would explain it to Queen Arriana. Besides, we're rarely here, and you distracted me from my work."

Gareth rolled his eyes. "I will accompany you. They will not steal you back to their cruel world."

And there was the true reason for Gareth's anger. Fear made him angry. So, it was Krys' turn to roll her eyes. Her birth world had no more want of her than she had for it. It was mutual hate and distrust, only Krys had reasons, not bigotry to back her opinion up.

The delegation was waiting in the former receiving chamber where Krys did most of her ambassadorial work. They were to have brought fifty half-elves for this quarter and receive resources, but she saw no half-blood in the chamber. Krys did nothing more than raise a brow at the main emissary and he swallowed.

"We did not wish to pollute your home with half-blood, Ambassador," he said in a wheedling, unctuous tone that grated on Krys' nerves like a cheese grater.

"My mate is half-blood you half-witted moron," Gareth's voice boomed out from behind her. He stepped around her, peering closely at the emissary, then sniffing. "Ah, you're new. Enjoy your first and last trip here, idiot." Then he walked over to her desk and leaned his hip against the edge, taking out his knife and cleaning his nails.

"Actually, I rarely pollute my embassy with whole blood elves, sir." She smirked when he looked at her askance. "Your office is now complete. You may leave now."

The elf sputtered, his pale skin turning a bright shade of pink. "We have to collect our resources in trade!"

"You cannot sell beings," Krys said in a bored tone. This was not the first time an elf had made that mistake. "The half-blood were coming here anyway, you only escorted them. The trade is predicated upon the goodwill of the Demons for credits to be banked on the TMW for use by the Demons in trade. Read your contract." She looked up at him. "You can read, right?"

Gareth snorted. She had used her Valley Girl accent on the Elf.

"This is outrageous!" The Elf emissary raged. "The Queen will hear about this!"

"She already has," Krys grinned. "Goodbye."

The Elf and his party stormed out the door, where Gareth caught up with them and stepped them to their portal home, which he then locked.

He came back and Krys was welcoming the half-bloods to the Demonworld and explaining the few rules and laws they had. Other half-bloods came out of the embassy to show them to their rooms until it could be sorted where they would be needed. Most who came over had skills and opened shops to sell their skills or goods. The ones they needed the most were the ones needed in the far-flung reaches of their world to help them catalog their resources and husband their wildlife. Kyra called them foresters and gamekeepers. Gareth did not care what they were called, his brother was in charge of them.

When everyone was settling into their rooms Gareth found his mate at her desk in her office, concentrating on a piece of paper before her. She was frowning.

"What is it, hringa?"

She sighed and sat back in her chair. "I'm seriously peeved that the elves think they are selling us half-bloods for resources. I have to allow for Cadmus to come and retrieve what should have left with that asshole." She closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. Gareth stepped behind her chair and began rubbing the knots from her shoulders.

"They must be taught a lesson, Gareth, and I've put the queen on notice that no more resource exchanges will be made when the half-bloods come here."

"What was her reaction?"

"She hasn't responded yet, but she has been surprisingly understanding of most of my objections to the Elves she sends here. She told me she uses it as a diplomat test." Krys chuckled. "If they offend me, then she dismisses them from her service. The elf we sent back is trying to appeal."

Gareth shuddered at that thought. He knew Arriana was not a kind mistress to those who offended her.

They heard a cry and Gareth disappeared into the nursery in the room behind Krys' receiving area. He took Gladus from his half-elf nurse and held him to his chest and crooned to him an old Demon lullaby. Krys joined him, smoothing her hand over their son's horn buds and hair. It was as black as hers, and his eyes just as violet. Gareth loved them both to the depths of insanity.

"What's wrong with my little Gladus?" Krys whispered to her son. The boy turned his head toward his mother's voice and smiled. She laughed. "Oh, my little Demon was wanting some mommy attention, is that it?" And she held her arms out and Gladus jumped from one parent to the other.

Gareth laughed and it made mother and son smile. "I see the way of it."

Krys stuck her finger in her son's mouth then frowned. "Another tooth."

Gareth rooted around his pouch and pulled out a teething stick and handed it to his son who started chomping on it with gusto. After a few moments, his eyes began to droop and with Krys walking him back and forth and patting his back, the baby was soon asleep in his crib and the half-elf was sitting by his side.

Grabbing his mate, and stepping her to the room they used at this house, he pulled her into the room and shut the door, locking it, behind them.

"Now, where were we?"

"Krys laughed. "I think you were pleasing your mate."

"That is the order of my goddess, yes," Gareth said, most seriously as he disappeared their clothing and tossing Krys on their bed.

She held out her arms to him. "Then you'd best get to it, mate."

CHAPTER FIVE

All were gathered in the Council Chambers again, with Krys there in her official capacity. Most of the benches were full of Demons and others, anxious for news on the new Holiday. Cassie looked out on the small crowd, especially when she considered the overall population on the planet. It was a good representational cross-section when she considered it in her actuarial brain.

Gramish gaveled the meeting open and they went over some open old business items and were able to close out most. Then it went on to new business and Cassie felt the need to interrupt.

"If I may, Councilor Gramish, I would like to address the Elven business before we begin on the Solstice Celebration business, as I feel that will be more involved and require longer, more involved, discussion."

Gramish nodded and called Krys forward.

Krys approached the small podium and looked back at Gareth who nodded encouragement to her. For once Gladus was at home with his caretaker, as he'd been a very cranky Demi.

"As this body knows, I have long objected to the trade of agreed-upon resources occurring at the same time that the half-elves we brought here. I predicted that it would promote the idea that we were trading resources for half-bloods. That prediction has come true." She cleared her throat and continued.

"I have had to have Archmage Cadmus come to pick up this quarter's allotment separate from the half-elves being delivered to my embassy because the new emissary, once again, made the erroneous correlation between dropping off the new émigrés and picking up the resources we are trading for credits." She glanced at Gareth who nodded supportively and gathered her courage, knowing she was asking for a lot.

"As Ambassador from the Court of Queen Arriana of the Elves, I am respectfully requesting the building of a warehouse to store the resources contracted for with a portal nearby to conduct the trade separate from the emancipation of the half-elves." She then stopped and just looked upon the Council members.

Cassie cast a soundproof spell over the dais and looked to Gramish.

"It's not like we don't have space," he noted. "However, I do worry about an elven portal being in a place without anyone there to guard it." With that he looked to their magical expert, Cassie.

"I can build it with a lock like at the embassy, but, like you, I would prefer there be a permanent guard there in the event they get someone without Cadmus' ethics to try to unlock it from the other side. As you know, there is a provision at the embassy portal so messages can get through, but no bodies."

"Our problem would be manning a guard post there," Seth pointed out. "We are still very limited on our population, even with the humans and half-elves coming to our world in droves."

"I have several guards here that I could assign there, we could build a barracks and they can always step to the closest gate or portal to get back to civilization."

"Actually," Seth put in, rubbing his chin around the area where the teeth marks were prominent. "I have an old property that could easily be re-purposed for a barracks and warehouse. Cassie could easily build a portal there, and she and Krys could shield it so that they could not leave the area once they were on our side."

Cassie nodded. "That would work." She looked at her brother. "I would need to work with Cadmus to build the locks and such, just like at the embassy. Could I get permission to have him visit the planet and go outside the embassy boundaries?"

That was a strict law for the elves only. Cassie's hatred for the race was deep and abiding. As much as she had worked with Cadmus, she didn't trust any full-blood elf. Her hatred for the Faerie was even more toxic. They were not allowed to step foot on the Demonworld at all, and she had closed it down so they could only gain access via a World Walker, and Cassie was one of two World Walkers left in their universe and the other rarely worked off Earth.

"I think it would be the best course," Gramish spoke. "How long will it take to get this property in order, and where is it?"

"It is on the edge of the Desert Region. It was abandoned early on, but it has the buildings necessary."

"Can you and your sister deal with the cleanup and reinforcing necessary?"

Seth looked to Cassie who nodded.

Gramish nodded as well. "Let's tell them."

The soundproof ward came down and Gramish let them know what had been decided and found it sat well with the people that the gathering of resources would no longer be tied to the freeing of the half-elves to this world. They also liked the idea of full-blood elves being kept enclosed while they gathered those resources.

The gavel came down and the business was done.

"Now, on to the Solstice Celebration..." Gramish intoned. "Have we come up with a name yet?"

Everyone looked to Cassie. "I think Solstice Celebration covers it, don't you? It's also easy to remember."

The murmurs throughout the hall showed that the other agreed.

"What about the gift exchanging?" Seth asked. "Who do we give to? What do we get them?"

Cassie put up her hand. "Hold on a moment. I have spoken to many about this and I would like to point out, we don't have to give gifts to anyone or to everyone. It's customary on Earth to give to family and friends, small gifts to co-workers or employees, things like that, but it's not mandatory. You give IF you can, and IF you want to, and to whomever you wish. For most, a lot of thought goes into the gift, as you want to give that person something they want or need, something that is personal to them. Children get toys, things like that."

"You gave me a Nerf bat the Christmas I spent on Earth," Seth pointed out to his sister.

"That's because you wanted to hit me, so I gave you something you could hit me with," she stuck her tongue out at him and they both laughed.

"Would you be willing to take people to Earth and the TMW to get the things they desire to give as gifts?" Gramish asked. He never just assumed Cassie was available and wanted to realm walk.

Cassie shook her head. "Shopping? Are you kidding me? When do we leave?" She laughed. "Plus, that portal can be opened and closed by anyone with magical ability, but I must remind everyone that it must be locked once you are through." She looked at everyone in the Council Chambers.

Every portal on the Demonworld had a guard standing at all times. They were the ones to lock and unlock the portals, but the gates used for planetary travel weren't locked and could be used by anyone at all.

"And it will be held on the Winter Solstice day, with feasting?" Delig asked from the audience.

"You think with your stomach," Seth chuckled.

"You're right, I do," Delig stated proudly. "I can out eat many Demons."

"And many planets," Cassie whispered and threw the old Demon a smile.

"We have two weeks until the Solstice, so we'd better get shopping planned," Gramish hammered the gavel. "Anyone wanting a ride, see Cassie."

They went on to other business, the new Temple to Himsu being built, and both priests of the god, who also happened to be Himsu's champions, were present to go over their needs. Once the foundation was finished it would receive its first consecration. Arminius and Vadch gave an update on the work and showed the finished plans. Every Demon was impressed. A god of Justice was just the thing that was needed for everyone on the planet, Cassie thought. Justice had been denied here for far too long, and with its new inception, she felt more comfortable taking her Demon form, less shame, for it no longer represented what it had.

She looked to Bax who was smiling at her like a loon. She couldn't help herself, she smiled back. She had loved him in her Demoness form the previous night and it had turned him on like nothing else had done in the years they'd been married, even though he admitted to her it caused his Demon Hunter radar to vibrate his entire body. It had been a very explosive encounter and she couldn't help but smile thinking about it.

"You're not disappearing with your husband," Seth whispered from his seat next to her. She turned and glared at him and he chuckled. "You don't scare me, little sister. I still have the Nerf bat."

They both began laughing and couldn't stop. Gramish gave them a disgusted look.

"It looks as if this meeting has ended," he groused and gaveled the meeting to a close.

*****

Vadch quickly stepped home to check on Helen, which was all he could do recently, since her sickness had started. He gave a prayer of thanks that they would only be having one child. Their females were fearless and they had to be on constant watch so they did not inadvertently harm themselves.

Helen did not want to know the sex of the coming child, even though she could tell herself. She had told him she wanted to be surprised.

Since she had become pregnant, her healing duties had taken a back seat to her physical condition. With it being so cold and people were stuck inside most of the time, all of the healers were seeing more injuries that had come about due to boredom than anything else. Helen was only sent the worst cases that needed a true healer. He made sure she got enough rest, kept her feet up, and ate when she could keep it down. It was almost a sacred duty to him to care for her.

He held his breath as he walked into their home and saw her asleep at the kitchen table. He walked to her and picked up her cold cup of tea and placed it in the sink. Sunny must have taken the twins away for a play date with Gramish's daughters. Those four girls loved to play together. He and Gramish would have their work cut out for them as they grew up.

"Vadch?" Helen whispered as she jerked her head as she came out of her doze.

Taking her in his arms he carried her back to their bed. "Quiet, hringa," he whispered into her ear. "I'll let you get some rest and rub your feet." He'd heard from Tal and Merl that their mates had loved to have their feet rubbed when they carried their young.

Helen hummed as he lay her on their bed and then he stepped back to look at her. She and their females were such a miracle to him, and he never took her for granted. She was quickly becoming the preeminent healer on their world, and he held a position as champion and High Priest of the new god, Himsu, God of Justice. They had their duties to others, but they always made time for each other. If he grew distracted at the site of the new temple, she would walk his midday meal to him, and eat with him while listening to his tales of the building. He would care for her each morning and each night, showing her with deeds and his body how much he loved and cherished her.

"I love you, Helen," he said quietly before turning to the door, to go get some new orders started for the Solstice Celebration.

"Love you so much, Vadch," she said with a smile and fell right back to sleep.

She was more than he ever could have imagined as his mate. She was everything.

He had been busy in his woodworking shop and heard the door open and females all coming into the house. Sunny's laughter, the chatter of his twin females, Merry and Kendra.

"We're back," Sunny informed him, sticking her head into the shop.

"Would you mind fixing dinner?" He asked Sunny, looking up from the picture of an elven deer-like animal someone had requested. "Helen fell asleep and is still sleeping."

Sunny nodded, still smiling. "The first three months are an exhausting time."

Vadch just nodded at her, getting the feeling there was more to that statement than just female observation, but he didn't delve further, as his curiosity bade him. Sunny did not talk about her past on his world. He respected that. His head came up, though. "Did you see Zie up at the big house?"

Sunny's mouth flattened out and she shook her head, turned and left the room. He shrugged and went back to his work. He'd have to work night and day if he was to get all of the requests fulfilled before the Solstice.
CHAPTER SIX

The kitchen at her brother's house was a warm, inviting room that Cassie preferred over Brigid's 'parlor'. Both women sat at the large table in the middle of the room sipping tea. For once, Brigid's half-elf nanny was earning her pay for more than it took Seth to drag his mate into a private space. Grimacing, Cassie gave herself a mental shake, so not needing to think of her brother with her friend.

"So, he took it well?" She asked Brigid, who was mixing up the dough for a fresh batch of crackers for all of the pregnant women on the planet. Gods, once the Demons got back amongst females they got busy. Now that many of the Demis who had escaped were seeing that Cassie could give them fertility, they were slowly trickling back as well, also vying for mates among the females who came here seeking fortune and mates.

Brigid blew out a breath and looked at her sister-in-law. "He went ape-shit and stepped me to a temple post-haste, then fainted at the altar. We're having a boy, by the way."

Cassie nodded and bit into a cake that Brigid had sliced for her. Bax and Seth were looking through dusty books so she had hied off to the kitchen in search of adult supervision, finding it in Brigid.

"I really feel that he will build a wall, this time," Brigid finally said quietly, putting the finishing touches on the herbs that went into the crackers and infusing them with a spell that helped quell the nausea due to morning sickness that hearkened a pregnancy. "Nothing has threatened me since before Letha was born, and yet he continues to think of us as constantly under attack." She sat down in the chair next to her and used a cloth to cover the bowl before she began spreading the dough out on a pan to bake in the oven.

"You worry about how long he can sustain that level of alertness?" Cassie guessed rightly when she saw Brigid nod.

"It's stressful for both of us and everyone surrounding us," she stood up and grabbed at the stack of cookie sheets she had stacked on the counter behind her. She began spreading a light coating of oil on the bottom before throwing some dough inside and began flattening it out. "Frankly, it's driving me crazy."

Cassie smiled up at Brigid, and wanted to giggle at the red curls that were escaping the band that Brigid had placed on her head to keep her hair out of her face while she worked.

"My mother is pregnant," Cassie was fishing and knew she'd gotten a strike when Brigid nodded.

"I confirmed it to Jake, but I did not tell her."

"Nah, he told her and evidently they celebrated all over the kitchen table," Cassie laughed as she bit into her cake. "Bax was scandalized."

Brigid looked up then cracked a smile, shortly before she sat back down, laughing so hard she was nearly doubled over. Cassie couldn't help but join in.

"Considering the places you two have been caught going at it..."

Cassie nodded and continued to laugh.

Both women wound down and Brigid stood up, grabbing a pitcher of juice and pouring more for them both.

"Are you going to go back to Earth for the taxes?" Brigid spoke of Cassie doing taxes to earn money for the Earth accounts, as she'd continued to do since they'd brought the Demons back.

Cassie shook her head. "I've got so much to do here," she finally said, quietly.

Brigid took in a breath and decided to come to the point she'd been trying to make quietly for ages.

"Cassie, you are a child of two worlds. You've spent the last few years tearing yourself in two because you are accepting guilt for something that has nothing to do with you."

The Demi's head snapped up as she speared Brigid with a dirty look. Brigid just sighed, having recently dealt with Seth's anger over the new pregnancy had happily prepared her for Cassie's temper.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Cassie demanded.

"Your mother wound upon this world through no choice of her own, twice. You are the product of what happened the first time. Again, nothing to do with you. You have taken on guilt for something you had nothing to do with."

"My mother was raped here," Cassie cried out, banging her fist on the table and her eyes filling with water as they always did every single time she thought of the horrors her mother had experienced.

Brigid just stared at the outburst.

"So was I," she said when the silence forced Cassie to put a lid on her outrage. "And, yet, I returned and have found a rewarding, wonderful life in the same place I was raped and degraded beyond thought." Brigid decided to push further, no longer at peace watching her friend suffer. "And, as your mother has with Jake."

Cassie's mouth opened as she began to say something, then slammed it shut, a mutinous look in her eye. Brigid shook her head, knowing that Seth did the same thing and neither liked being reminded that their father tied them together.

"The things that happened on this world, in this house, have nothing to do with you. I hold you no more responsible than I do Seth. We all did what we had to do to survive, and we did. We have lived, and we are thriving. You deny yourself and Bax when you deny the bonds you have to give each other, when you deny that you are something good that came of that awful world, and you are changing it now to reflect that good."

Brigid sighed and then threw down the big gun. "If you keep going on as you are, I will only have to presume that you think less of me and your brother because we embrace this world where we were thrown together and found love." She pinned Cassie with a look. "That you think less of your mother for finding happiness here."

Tears streamed down Cassie's face and she shook her head, unable to give up the rage and anger over what had happened to her mother. She had watched over the years since as her father had to coax her mother back to life and living. It suddenly occurred to her that her feelings kept her concept of her mother in that victim status, and never acknowledging the wonder and hard work that went into the woman she knew today who was giddy over expecting another child with her husband.

Cassie started as she felt Brigid's arms come around her and hug her tightly. She'd never even noticed the woman walking around the table.

"You had less than nothing to do with anything that happened to any of us, and you cannot be angry on our behalf if we are not for ourselves," the canny healer explained. "You are our undisputed champion, but you cannot fight our inner battles for us." Brigid let Cassie go and took a step back, brushing some hair out of her face.

"Bax finds you very attractive when you take your Demoness form. He is not turned off by it at all. Only you are conflicted about that. You hurt him each time you refuse to let that bond form and cement within you." She looked sad a moment. "I don't get to feel that bond with your brother, although he feels it and I feel his joy for it through the bond. I experience no bond myself. You and Bax get to share that, and you don't even know how lucky you are. I would give anything to share that bond with Seth, but I must be satisfied with what I do get. Wishing for more profits me nothing."

Cassie sniffed and took the handkerchief that Brigid handed her, feeling awful, but still have a hard time coming to terms with letting things go.

Brigid took a breath. "It's what this holiday is about and I think the gods here are very brilliant for suggesting it. Part of giving thanks is accepting that there were things and situations that could have gone another way and being thankful that things broke your way."

Cassie gave her sister-in-law a watery chuckle. "You watched way too much TV on Earth, Brigid."

Brigid smiled.

"You have to accept who you are and your own deeds, Cassie. Don't take on the crimes and sins of others that had nothing to do with you. It's weighing you down and it's affecting everyone around you whether you see it or not."

Cassie nodded. "I know it in my head, but in my heart, it hurts." Her fist beat twice above her left breast. "Every time I think about it, it's like ripping a scab off a healing wound."

"The thing is, Cassie," Brigid pinned the woman with her stare. "It's not your wound you're ripping the scab from."

Cassie gasped and her hand came up to her throat.

"Oh, God!" She cried out and just collapsed on the kitchen table, sobbing. "I never meant..." she began and couldn't stop crying to get it out completely. Brigid took Cassie in her arms again, being strong for the woman who seemed the strongest to all around her.

"We never do, Cass, but it happens all the same, when we concentrate on our own pain, real or imagined."

The Demi continued to cry, devolving into sobs and hiccups, and Brigid's apron was soaked.

"I don't know what to do," Cassie said after a few minutes and she began to calm down.

"Oh, Cassie," Brigid shook her head. "You know what to do, you just wish you didn't know so that you could stay exactly where you are."

"I don't want to hurt..." Cassie began to argue.

"And here you are hurting everyone around you!" Brigid cried in frustration. Cassie was being so obstinate. "With your refusal to accept reality, what is, instead of this fantasy, you hurt everyone around you including me, your brother, your parents and your mate! You are holding us all back now because you've dug in your heels, refusing to move forward."

"That's not fair!" Cassie stood and yelled at her friend. "I think about it every day, every hour! You have no idea."

Brigid shook her head, sadly. "No, Cassie, the point is, YOU have no idea. I have every idea of what happened here. I lived it, you did not. If I let it go, why do you grasp onto it so tightly?"

Cassie gasped, outraged that Brigid would tell her that she had no right to feel as she did. She had every reason, as her mother had suffered here. Suffered so much. Didn't she have the right to feel outraged about what her mother had gone through?

"Your father's sins are not your own, Cassie. Your mother's horrors are not yours. You don't own them, you can only steal them to use for whatever purpose you devise. You saved the women here. You've saved Demis and Demons who wanted no part of that world. Why will you accept credit for that yet take on sins that are not yours? Ask yourself that, and perhaps you will solve your own problem." Brigid slammed the pans in the oven and walked out of the kitchen.

Cassie stood in the kitchen, tears streaming down her face. Then she ran to her best friend, needing Helen's brand of friendly advice, because she sure wasn't getting it from Brigid.

Bax and Seth walked into the kitchen a little later to see Brigid sorting out crackers. She looked up and smiled at her mate.

"Cassie's left, I don't know where, before you ask," she told the men. "She was not happy with me and some hard truths."

Bax scowled at the healer, but wasn't angry, when he had been arguing with Cassie about the very same thing. This was getting out of hand.

"Seth, I think the kids and I need a ride home," he looked over at his brother-in-law who was staring lustfully at his mate and rolled his eyes. "Can you help a brother out?"

*****

Helen lay in bed, where Vadch had placed her when he found her asleep at the table, watching her best-friend pace a path in her carpet.

"How could that cow have said that to me?" Cassie growled, her fists swinging by her sides. "How dare she?"

Helen looked at Cassie who was suddenly staring a hole in her.

"Answer me! This was not a rhetorical question."

"Do not yell at my mate, Siletha's Chosen," Vadch growled from the living room, playing with the girls.

Helen giggled. Then she sighed and patted the bed next to her, so her friend would stop pacing, putting a crick in Helen's neck looking up at her. Cassie huffed a sigh, but came and sat down, taking Helen's hand.

"I can feel any way I want. Brigid had no business saying that to me."

"Yeah, it was much better coming from your husband, parents, brother and best friend," choosing the honest truth, Helen refused to budge because she could see the damage done to her friend.

"What if I become like him by making that bond with Bax?" her friend whispered and Helen closed her eyes. Here was the unadulterated truth, at long last.

"Why would you even think that, Cassie? Faisal never bonded with anyone."

Cassie's eyes were desolate. "I love Bax so much, Helen. If anything happened to him I don't think I would even want to go on without him. He's my entire universe. The bond would multiply that to the nth degree."

Thinking for a moment, Helen hit upon a good parallel to get Cassie off the wrong track.

"Remember in eighth grade when we started thinking of boys differently and thought that maybe holding hands wasn't such a horrible thing? That maybe they weren't so gross?"

Cassie chuckled and blew her nose. Helen smiled, Cassie didn't get pretty when she cried. She looked horrible.

Helen clasped Cassie's hand. "Remember those girls who made the cute boys their everything, dropping their friends to spend all their time with their boyfriend?" Cassie nodded. "We swore we would never be like those girls. Remember our vow?"

Cassie did laugh then and nodded. "Oh yeah, Seven Minutes in Heaven with Kurt Lutner, the grossest boy in our class."

"We made that promise based on complete and total ignorance. I made Kyle my everything in college. You made Bax your everything a few years ago." She made sure Cassie was looking at her. "Vadch is my everything, our children, our family. I love you, but I would easily dump you for a night of playing with them rather than watching chick flicks with you."

"We think action films are chick flicks because of the male real estate exposed in them," Cassie pointed out.

"Do you know what happened to Kurt Lutner after high school?" Helen grinned and Cassie shook her head. "He was a swimmer in high school and college and got discovered by some modeling agency and made a killing wearing his panties in public and is now on some TV show with every woman in America seriously trying to get into those panties."

Both women burst out laughing and Helen could almost swear she could feel her mate smiling in the living room.

"So, now you have to go make out with Kurt Lutner," Cassie giggled. "You broke our vow first."

Helen's expression got very serious. "Honey, Bax is your everything, as are your children, your family. You need to ask yourself why you deny yourselves something that will only make what is already fabulous even more fabulous." Her brow wrinkled. "Fabulouser?"

"What about my mom? She's still shuttered sometimes. I razed the place she was taken when Faisal brought her here. I want no reminders for her here."

"And you think that you are not?"

Cassie's nose wrinkled. "Not what?"

"A reminder."

Cassie gasped. "I'm not..."

"Surely you know she is thrown right back to that time every single time she sees you or Seth, right?" Helen felt awful, but Cassie was being unusually stubborn.

"She does not!" Cassie cried out. "Does she?" It was such a pitiful question and Helen felt for her friend.

"No, she doesn't" she shook her head. "She looks at you and she sees love, her life, and Jake. She sees Seth and she sees that he gave her all of that and is grateful to the last molecules in her eyebrows."

Cassie snorted then laughed. "Really? The very last molecules?"

"Perhaps even to the atomic level. I kid you not." Helen smiled. "Do you think that I see Kyle and the horror he made my life when I look at my girls? I don't. I love them too much to pin his sins on them. Your mom is not doing that to you either. You cannot take on the weight of her experiences, Cassie. It's stupid and futile, but you can be there for her if and when she needs it and your dad isn't there." She rolled her eyes. "Faisal and Kyle must bear the weight of their own sins. They are not ours and I refuse to take them on, the same way I refused to take on Kyle's gambling debts. It's why I ran."

Cassie shuddered, remembering how she had found her friend cowering in that dingy motel room and grimaced.

Helen nodded her head as she realized that somehow this was getting over Cassie's mental transom. Then she gasped. "You don't have to bite him like Vadch bit me, do you?"

Cassie's head snapped up? "I've never seen the men with marks like the women. You don't think that the women bite their men...elsewhere... to mark them, do you?"

Both of them started giggling.

"Hold on," Helen said and called for Vadch. When he popped his head in the door she smiled at him with such an adoring look that Cassie felt like a voyeur.

"Vadch, do female Demons mark their mates?"

Vadch smiled. "Do you wish to mark me with your blunt teeth?" He looked so hopeful that Helen had to seriously think about it. "They mark their mates on their chests, just above our hearts."

"Thanks, babe," Helen winked at him and he closed the door. She looked at her best friend.

"So now you know."
CHAPTER SEVEN

Cassie popped back to Seth's, only just having realized she'd left Bax and the kids there. She was ready to receive their wrath, but found only a half-elf servant who told her that Master Seth had taken her family home. She hung her head in shame as she realized that she was being a selfish brat. Brigid was right, this was affecting every facet of her life and it was killing her. But how could she just let go? First, she needed to apologize to Brigid for being such a bitch.

"And where is your Mistress?" Cassie asked. It was no good telling the half-elves not to address them so, because it was so ingrained in the horrors they had endured on Era.

The half-elf blushed, his pink complexion reddening. "I believe she and Master Seth are inspecting the linens."

Cassie chuckled, she'd hit Brigid up later. Evidently, Brigid's pregnancy made Seth worse than before.

She closed her eyes and found herself outside her home staring at the front door.

Why wasn't she bursting into her home, ready to ravage her husband, mark him and accept his bond? Why was she fighting letting go of so much baggage that wasn't hers to carry? She walked over to the small bower she had started last Spring and sat on a concrete bench.

"Perhaps, it is because you feel that the baggage keeps a barrier between you and finally accepting your role in this world," she heard Siletha right next to her and she looked over. Yep. Her goddess was making a house call.

Cassie sighed. It was pointless to lie to her goddess as well as herself.

"I'm afraid," she admitted. "I love Bax, but I'm afraid of losing myself to him."

Siletha chuckled and it warmed Cassie all the way to her soul.

"Do you see Bax allowing you to do that?"

Cassie shook her head. "He doesn't want a love-bot," she grinned.

"Do you think that he doesn't accept you for who you truly are?"

That was the crux of it, too.

"He really enjoyed my Demoness form, it seriously turned him on," she admitted.

"So, what is your real argument for not accepting his bond and extending your own to him?"

"What if I forget about Earth?" She asked. "What if I forget me?"

"You still have responsibilities on Earth, Cassie. None of us here forget that for a moment. But, you also have your family to remind you, constantly, of who you really are. I think what you are really afraid of is that you are beginning to forget how you used to be, so you cling to it so you don't have to accept your new reality as truly what your life now is. You keep one foot here, and one on Earth, and you forget that no one is asking you to choose, except you."

Cassie hung her head. She was so afraid of so many things. She chuckled bitterly. She, the most powerful magical being anyone could mention and she was afraid, quaking in her boots because reality was a mean bitch.

"This Solstice Holiday is a good time for you to ponder on the things you are thankful for, and for thinking of the future and what you truly want for you, Baxter and your children."

"What if something happens to Bax?" Cassie asked quietly. "It would destroy me."

"What if something happens to you?" Siletha countered. "And yet, he still craves that bond with you. Because, if anything did happen to you, he would have that solace that he'd had it, not the regret that he was too afraid to connect with you on that level." And then Siletha was gone, but her words drilled deep.

Cassie sat on the bench, tears silently falling from her eyes. Her fear and shame kept her rooted to the spot, lost in her internal arguments.

Bax found her not long afterward, silently contemplating the rose bushes that were dormant this time of year.

"Baby, you're going to freeze out here with no coat on," He said as he pulled her into his arms and nuzzled her warm cheek. Clever witch! She'd put a bubble of warm air around herself. "What are you doing out here alone."

Cassie still wept. "I'm sorry, Bax. I'm so damned sorry I've let my fear drive for so long." She tucked her face into his shoulder and Bax couldn't do anything but hold her and feel pain because she was hurting and he couldn't help her. Only Cassie could help Cassie at this point. She, who had helped so many thousands of beings on so many worlds, could not help herself, and it had to eat a planet size hole inside her. So, he held onto her, comforting her when he could.

"Bax, we have to complete our bonds," she hiccupped. "I know what I said before," she said when Bax shook his head. "But, I would not be able to live with the regret of not having given us both the best thing we have to offer each other."

Bax grabbed her face and kissed her deeply. "That's all I want for both of us, Cass," he said when he came up for air.

She popped them into their bedroom, and Bax began to divest her of her clothing and she helped with his. Once they were gloriously naked he pulled her to him.

"I love you Cassandra Clancy," he whispered in between kisses.

"And I love you, Baxter Clancy." Then she morphed into her Demoness form and Bax gasped. Her entire body was outlined in the fire that was her true element. He touched her and wasn't burned.

As Cassie pushed him back to the edge of the bed she smiled.

"Bax, baby, hold on to your socks."

He nodded at her and prayed that he wouldn't embarrass himself before it came down to show time. Looking at her teeth in that smile, he felt himself growing harder thinking of them sinking into his skin, and feeling her tongue licking it, tending it. It was a mark that she would tend as long as they lived, a visible mark of their bond to each other. He carefully sent his mating bond out to her and for the first time, glory hallelujah, she accepted it.

He felt himself fall back on the bed and Cassie climb astride him, rubbing herself on his cock, her wet heat making him groan.

"Lie back and think of England," she whispered in his ear as she pushed her body down onto his.

Think of England? Bax's last sane thought soared out his mental window. Who could think?

*****

There were ten Coniferous trees in the center of every town on the planet, decorated with icicles and colorful balls of magelight. Trestle tables were brought out and filled with food by everyone and many had brought gifts for family and friends. Cassie stood in the middle of the small village at her brother's house, smiling as she watched her children and Seth's play in the square with other children who had come with their parents. The priestess who served their temple, heavy with child, laughed with her mate, who looked down on her and her belly with pride and love that positively glowed.

Cassie looked over at her husband and saw him rubbing the left side of his chest, through his jacket.

"Do you need me to tend that again?" She smirked and saw him smile.

"Do we have time?" His keen expression cause Cassie's eyelids to lower in desire.

"None of that!" Brigid blew past them with trays of cakes and cookies. "Cassie can you go to the kitchen and send the food to that table over there?"

Translocation was Cassie's newest trick and she loved exercising her magical muscles. She nodded at Brigid, happy that her sister by marriage wasn't holding a grudge. She wasn't so happy with the woman for cock blocking her, quite literally.

She popped over to the kitchen and sent the food to the table and came back to find Bax pulling chocolate out of Ari's mouth.

"No, Daddy! I want!" And their beautiful daughter was winding up for a tantrumfest.

"Ariadne, you will not be a brat on this day, in this place," Cassie said sternly. "No more candy or you will get sick and Mommy will not make it better."

Bax put his daughter down and gave her a stern nod to reinforce Cassie's scold.

"Run along, Ari," he said. "Go find Letha and see if she wants to play."

Ari ran off, without a backward glance and Bax sighed.

"She's going to be a handful," he stated watching as she pushed her brother down to get to her cousin. He shook his head and started to go over and collect his son.

Cassie put a hand on his arm. "Let me, she's getting a little too excited."

Bax nodded and watched his wife walk to their children and pick up Jacob before pulling Ari away from Letha by taking her hand and walking them to the fountain and setting them down on the edge and squatting down so she could get at eye level with them. She usually had him deal with sibling conflicts because, as she said, she had no experience with it, and according to Bax's mother, he and Rory were unholy terrors before Nestra had come along and made them overprotective big brothers. But she handled this one, because she had to get the experience, for the future.

He watched as she spoke to the children and saw Ari's head shake and her mouth took on the same stubborn set her mother got. He smiled. Cassie wiped away Jacob's tears and then she looked sternly at Ari with an expression that Bax recognized from his mother's own face. Uh oh, Ari was in for a warm bottom if she kept that up, and might miss the festivities altogether. He held his breath.

He let it out with great relief when he saw his daughter tell his son she was sorry, and then give him a hug and Cassie leaned forward to hug them both. He was so proud, so happy. He rubbed his chest again. Those Demon bites were something and he looked at Brigid with new respect, considering she had gone weeks without her bite being tended while Seth had been an ass. He already needed Cassie to tend to it. Sucking in his breath he called to her through the dual bonds they shared. She looked over at him with a smile.

*****

When everyone had gathered in the square, Demon, Demi, Human and Half-Elf, they all found seats and piled food on their plates. Everyone was talking and laughing. Finally, Seth stood up and tapped his knife on his water glass as he had seen in movies on Earth. It took a minute, but everyone became quiet.

"This is our first Solstice Celebration," he began. He'd argued that Cassie needed to make the speech, but she had been firm in her refusal, telling him it was his town, his people. "I look around us and I see everything we have to be thankful for since we've returned. We are thankful for deliverance, for family, for health, for new lives. Especially, for those of us who have been fortunate enough to find our mates... our other halves. We thank the gods for our mates and our families for they are our future." He smiled at everyone and nodded. "We now have futures to look forward to, not to rail against." Everyone nodded and murmured at that.

Seth stopped a moment as emotion was threatening to choke him up.

"This is a day where we are to think of the things we are thankful for and to peer into the future to work on the things we want to be remembering next year." He pulled Brigid to his side. "We will be looking forward to a new child, and I know several others are as well," his gaze stopped on Ganza, the pregnant priestess of his Silethan Temple. "We are experiencing such growth and prosperity because we had faith when others had none. We lived with the hope that we would be delivered from the hell our lives were, to now give thanks for the blessing we all have received."

He stopped again and chuckled at some old Demon telling him to get on with it so he could eat.

"Give me a moment, Delig, you may fill your mouth while I speak," he looked around. "All of you, please eat."

Everyone laughed, but quickly tucked in.

"This is a time of year where we don't have much to do but ruminate and I'm guilty of that as I consider our future. I am thankful for the past, because, of my past, I have a bright future with my mate and with every one of you here." He looked around again. "We have so many strengths between us, and I truly believe it is why we have come so far this quickly, after centuries of stagnation. We are reclaiming our homes, our lands and our lives. We are building something to leave our children, our young. I honestly feel that it is because, as they say on Earth, we know that those we have faith in 'have our back'. Meaning our gods stand with us, making us stronger, because we are all of us, part of this rebuilding project we started a few years ago."

He picked up his glass of wine and lifted it, and he was gratified when the Humans and Elves did the same, urging the Demons to do so as well.

"To our bright future," Seth toasted and then drank deeply of his wine and watched as Brigid drank her fruit juice. "Now, everyone, eat up before our young are driven to pure madness in search of sweets."

Everyone laughed and again began to eat.

Seth took his seat after making sure Brigid had enough and was comfortable. He eyed his daughter, his female, eating with her cousins at what Cassie had called the Kids Table. A Human witch sat close by, keeping a close eye on them, a happy smile on her face.

He looked at the trees that Cassie had put up everywhere and decorated with non-Christmas decorations, which turned out to reflect what they celebrated that day. Remembrance and Hope. He had so much ope for all of his people.

*****

Five gods looked at the celebrations going on over the world. They had been watching for hours as the planet had time zones and they wanted to watch every being on the world they oversaw celebrating this new holiday, and know their hopes for the future.

Mlegnan squinted his eyes as he clasped the hand of his mate, Gnaga. "This really should be my holiday," he growled. "What are dreams but hope for the future?"

Four beings laughed, even his beloved Gnaga. Love and Dreams they were.

"This needs to be their holiday," Siletha spoke quietly, smiling as she watched her chosen celebrate. "They need something separate from us to ponder on themselves."

Himsu nodded.

"Well, it certainly has nothing to do with me," Flega giggled. Her domain was death and gathering the souls of the dead to their deserved afterlife.

A sudden glow entered their hall and all five turned to see an old friend re-appear.

"Klenit!" Siletha gasped and smiled.

"It's about time," Mlegnan winked and smiled.

Klenit looked about, nothing had changed.

"It took a few harvests and all of those today giving thanks for my bounty for me to manifest," Klenit said shyly. He'd always been so quiet, Siletha thought. Silent, yet so strong. "But, I usually rest this time of year on this hemisphere anyway... It's good to be back."

They all nodded at him and he joined them around the orbs where they stood watching over their people, their world.

They all gasped as the power that fed them, allowed them to exist, grew stronger.

"What was that?" Himsu scowled, distrustful of changes in the norm.

Siletha allowed it to rush over her and she smiled.

"That is their love," she explained. "They are thinking of us and how much they are thankful that we have allowed them this existence."

"This is better than prayer," Flega said in awe. Gnaga nodded at her.

"This is for all of us, not just one, by everyone on the world," Himsu spoke. "That is why we are all experiencing it."

Mlegnan pulled Gnaga tightly to him, showing her how he felt about it and then they disappeared.

"Figures," Himsu quipped as he looked at Flega. The goddess called to him on a very deep level, for what was death but the ultimate justice? She smiled at him and they both disappeared.

Klenit shook his head and chuckled. "It has been too long," he muttered and stared at Siletha and dared to hope on this day of all days.

For millennia he had carried his love for her in a secret place, allowing no one to know of it since she was mated to Grythom and was the epitome of marital devotion, even in the face of her husband's infidelity. He was her friend, but kept a certain distance. Unfortunately, his followers had been eradicated almost completely by the time Grythom finally was killed, and without their belief and prayers he could not manifest and allow himself to comfort Siletha, who had then disappeared for so long, before returning in a fury. It was only the love he felt for her that had kept him from disappearing altogether.

Biding his time, and becoming stronger by the day, he still hesitated to manifest, even while blessing his Demons with fruitful farms and orchards and keeping the game from over-populating a sparsely populated planet. On this day, he felt strong. So many had spent the entire day thanking him for his blessings of bounty and thinking of what they could do in the next planting season and he finally felt strong enough, brave enough, to manifest and see if Siletha felt the same for him as he had spent so long feeling for her.

Siletha stared at Klenit and blushed, ashamed at the thoughts and memories of thoughts that rushed through her head as she looked on him. He was a god of earth, fertility, and it was evidenced in his muscular, strong body. She was ashamed, because even before she'd finally taken Grythom out, she had begun to feel differently towards her friend of so long and began to look at him with longing and desire. She had strangled those feelings as she had dealt with her anger and grief, and then barely surviving as her few Demons were trapped on Era, until Cassie...

They both stared at each other for so long. It could have been mere minutes or days, neither bothered to count. Every bit of want and desire was there in both their eyes.

"I am glad you are returned," she finally spoke.

"I am glad you are returned as well," Klenit said and continued to watch her. There was nothing, not one thing, standing in their way if she wanted it and every signal from her told him she did. She finally ran up to him, throwing herself into his arms, which caught her, grateful for the opportunity to touch her, now, finally.

"I am so sorry..." she began and he stopped her by kissing her long and deep.

"I am not." Then he got them to his old chamber and quickly into his bed.

"You will accept my mark," he told her masterfully and was so relieved to see her smile and nod. "I will accept yours," and without preamble, without foreplay, he sank himself into her willing body.

As everyone on their world watched the day and night skies lit up with shooting stars as the gods of their world celebrated the thanks and hope for the future.

THE END

Other Books by Severine Wolfe

Demonworld

Dark Matters

Tangled Strings

Uncertain Principles

Complex Familiarity

Quantum Flux

Unified Fields

New Reality Paradox

A Demonworld Solstice

Dragons of Wushin

The Air Witch's Dragon (Fall of 2017)

Shifting Alliances

Reborn Hope

Determined Hope

Cautious Hope

Renegade Hope (Winter 2018)

Urban Paladins

No Owner's Manual

The Shield (Early 2018)
About The Author

Thanks so much for joining me in my Demonworld. I enjoy this world and we are expanding out to the other worlds in this universe in the books I plan to write in the next year. The Demons, and their resolve to hold on to their honor, as the Dragons had, inspire many stories. I am intrigued by that.

If you would like to get in touch with me, you can visit me at www.sevwolfe.com or email me at sevwolfe@gmail.com. You can like me at my Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/SeverineWolfe/. I look forward to hearing from my readers and try to get back with you as quickly as I possibly can.

