The Fire and the Storm - Metric Pro Edition: Fiction, Dragons, Elves, Unicorns, Magic (83 page)

There was another long pause.

“Damn, that’s positively mind-boggling.” Mark cursed as he considered the outrageous plan.

“It sure sounds a lot better than spending a few centuries in small stasis fields, raising children.” Alilia mused.  “And we wouldn’t have to share you with all those girls.  I mean, we’d have to…  Well you know what I mean.”  She chuckled at her own fluster.  “We’re going to need some new vocabulary to describe some of the situations this is going to get us into, but I’m for Six’s plan.

“You’re sure of the spell?” she asked the children.

“Very.” Fire assured her.

“If one of Mark is going to stay out here with you, why do we need to…  Oh I see.” Talia said, thinking out loud.

“Exactly.” Six nodded.  “You and Alilia could just remain one self out here with us, and let the copies of Father raise his children on Hiliani without you, but then the Father on Hiliani would have to spend up to sixteen years without you, since he can’t re-integrate through the time-bubble.  I wish we could just join you in the time-bubble.  But we three agree that we want to avoid that if we can.  We left because it was too constricting, and that won’t change if we go back.  So the copies of our parents on Hiliani will have to spend sixteen years without us, but at least they’ll have forty-four new children to love while they’re in there.”

There was another long pause, but no one had anything else to add.

Finally Mark stood, and was strengthened by the love and confidence on the faces of his family.  “All right.  By now the girls of The Volunteers have probably heard that they’re pregnant by me without their own consent, since it was announced at the Assembly.  And they might have heard what I did here when I was mad.  The poor things have to be going out of their minds with worry.  Let’s go talk to them and let them know what’s going to happen.”

“While you do that,” Povon decided, “Kragorram and I will go back to the assembly and make sure that Hilia and Serminak are well represented in the planning of the joint training exercises.  We’ll meet you in Laylas Valley for the wedding.

“Karzog, you’re with us.”

“Thanks.” Mark nodded as the dragons of his family vanished.

He sent out a psionic call to all The Hilian Volunteers even as he Translocated all six left at Focus Mountain to Backyard Valley on Hiliani.  Over the next three seconds all The Volunteers appeared on the grass around them.  Many of them looked scared or worried.

“Thank you for coming so quickly.” Mark told them as he surveyed them.  “Please, sit down and relax.

“As you may have heard, Yzell has solved the fertility problem.  She did so by removing the Contraception from the spell set that she cast on you girls before you made love with me, and observing your conceptions.  So all of you girls are pregnant with my child, and Kalem is bearing my twins, without any of us knowing about it until a few minutes ago.  She blocked your instinctual awareness that you were pregnant.  I know you girls had nothing to do with your becoming pregnant by me, and I want to assure you that we’ve found a solution to the problem I’m presented with.  I’m going to do right by each and every one of you.”

He paused to give them a moment to absorb that.  Every girl among them placed hands on tummies.  All were shocked, some were immediately giddy with happiness, some seemed afraid to believe it was true.

Mark continued when most of them were looking to him for more explanation.

“The Governors here have a Multiple Simultaneous Manifestations spell, and I’m going to use it to make forty-three copies of myself.  We’re going to live in the Hiliani time-bubble for the remainder of its duration, and raise our kids.  I’ll live with each of you girls and give you each the love you deserve as the mother of my child, and I’ll give each of my children the time, attention, and love they deserve.  Every night when I sleep, all my memories of my selves will exchange their memories of the previous day, so that I remain one person with one mind.

“But I want you to understand that this is temporary.  At the end of the time-bubble I’m going to go back to being one person, and I won’t have as much time for you, or for our children.  So over the next nine or ten months in the time-bubble during your pregnancies, before I become multiple people, I want each of you girls to try to find another man that you could love for a long time.  You can choose from the males here or anyone else on Hiliani, or if you have someone else in mind you can ask them to join us before they seal the time-bubble.  Each of you girls should have two men in your lives acting as your husbands and the fathers of your children while those children are raised; me temporarily and whoever else you choose.  I want each of these children to grow up with two loving and devoted fathers each, so that when the time-bubble ends and I don’t have near as much time for them, they each have another father who’s still there for them full-time.

“It’s not a perfect solution, but it’s the best I can think of to deal with this situation.”

Everyone there took a moment to absorb and consider all that, then Balen stood and hesitantly spoke.  “Um, can we have a minute to talk about this?”

“What, with me or in private?” Mark asked.

“I think we need a minute to talk about this among ourselves.  The Volunteers that is, the males included.”

“All right, we’ll be at the house.” Mark nodded as he hooked a thumb back over his shoulder in the direction of the pass.  “Call us when you’re ready.”  With that he Translocated with his wives and children to their Hiliani home.  It was still prepared for vacancy and most of their possessions from it had already been moved to Hilia, but the living room furniture was still all there, so they sat as Alilia Summoned them a light meal and beverages from her home in Heartwood.

They ate in silence, then Mark waved them over to the huge sofa he was sitting on.  All five piled onto his lap or cuddled up around him and simply hugged each other.  Balen called almost an hour after they’d left.

They returned to Backyard Valley, and found the young elves there separated slightly into eleven small groups.

“Prince Mark, we girls are somewhat hesitant to propose this,” Balen began, “Because we’d be giving up our chance to have you all to ourselves, but we have to do what’s best for you.

“You can give your children enough time and attention with three children in your household, you’ve proved that.  So we of The Volunteers have closely examined our love and affection for each other, and as you can see, we’ve formed ourselves into eleven households.  All eleven will have three children each.  Eight households will have three males and one of you, and three will have two males and you because we’re short three males to make it divide evenly.  All except Kalem’s house will have three females, hers will only have two, her and I, since she’s having twins.  Ours is also one of the ones with only two males plus you.

“We’re sure living as a bunch of separate people will be very difficult for you, in it’s own way.  And having to integrate forty-four sets of memories every night would have to be hard on you mentally.  This way every one of our children will have two or three fathers plus you, and two or three mothers.  Most will have three of each.  This should lessen greatly the effect it will have on them when you go back to being one person.  And this way you only have to be eleven extra people, instead of forty-three extra.  And we keep the whole thing among us; The Hilian Volunteers.”

Mark considered it, and smiled.  “Thank you.  That’s all brilliant thinking, and I’ll sure take you up on it.”

“Thank
you
.” she told him with a huge smile.  “And we want you to know, though none of us chose it, that this is the most beautiful thing that could possibly have happened to us, boys and girls both.  The chance to love you, to live with you, to bear and raise your children, it’s like a gift from the gods.  While we were talking Yzell removed the block from us, and now all of us girls can feel that we’re pregnant.  And it feels indescribably wonderful.”

“A gift from the gods!  Crap!” Six suddenly exclaimed.

“What?” Balen asked.

“I’m just thinking that we should examine Yzell psionicly, and closely, and find out if the gods or anyone else influenced her decision to do this thing.” Six declared.  “Considering how we three turned out, there’s no doubt that The Just Alliance will benefit from having forty-four more young warlocks, which gives someone a motivation to have done this.”

“I don’t know.” Mark said with a frown as he gave his head a slight shake.  “Yzell and all of us were still in the time-bubble when she did this.  So if she was influenced, it was either done by someone here on Hiliani with us, or the gods have a way to see what’s happening in a time-bubble, and influence it.  Either possibility seems pretty unlikely.  But you’re right, we’ll certainly examine Yzell anyway.  Not only for the reason you mentioned, but also because this whole thing seems very out of character for Yzell.”

He mentally searched for the elven midwife, and found her crying in her home here on Hiliani under the disappointed glare of her husband Theramin.  He Summoned them both, and said; “Wait.” as they were about to speak.

Mark, Talia, Alilia, and their children Linked deeply and Read Yzell with all of their concentration.  They found what they were looking for almost immediately, and examined it for a moment.

“I’ll be damned.” Mark stated.  “You were right, Son.

“Yzell, you are without blame.  Someone else was forcing your mind from the time when you made the decision to remove the Contraceptions and cause these girls’ pregnancies to the moment you finished solving the fertility problem.  And they didn’t even bother trying to cover up that they’d done it, it’s right there as blatant as can be to anyone with the skill to look for it.  They were obviously looking out for you, since any trace of the identity of the perpetrator has been completely erased with great and subtle skill, so they could have hidden the evidence of the tampering if they’d chosen to do so.  They must have left the trace there on purpose to exonerate you.

“And to be honest, I’m more than a little glad to learn this.  I sure didn’t like the thought that you’d done this to us.”

Yzell rushed to him as she burst into tears, hugging him tightly around his left thigh as she cried uncontrollably with relief and ill-deserved regret.  He picked her up and comforted her like a tiny child.

“Thank you.” Theramin said with great sincerity.  Talia gave him a hug for emotional support as the tension drained out of him.

“Well, we should check in on what’s happening at the global summit we’re still supposed to be attending.” Alilia suggested.  “And then we need to get ready for a state wedding.

“I suppose we should invite all you girls to be bridesmaids.” she teased with a chuckle.

“Then we’d have to invite all these fine gentlemen to be groomsmen!” Mark added with a laugh of his own.  “And I’m all for it.”

“No.” Balen told them with a warm smile.  “I mean, thank you ever so much, we cherish your invitations and I know it’ll be great fun, but no. This is your wedding, and you don’t need all of us there to complicate the emotions of it.  And besides, we just formed eleven new group marriages here, and in a hurry at that.  So we have a lot of new planning and bonding and relationship-building stuff to do.  We might end up trading a few of the men back and forth over the next week or so, until we’re sure we have the best matches.”

She paused for a giggle, which some of the other girls joined her in.

“After you become eleven more people for us, it’d be nice if we each had a little ceremony to celebrate our commitment.  We know you’ll only be committing for sixteen years, while we’ll be committing for at least as long as most elven children stay in their parents’ home, which is about thirty-six years.  After that we might choose to stay together longer, since we’ll always be united in your service anyway, but we’ll have to see when that time comes.  So the ceremonies won’t quite be weddings, but still, it would be nice to stand together before the community and proudly declare our love and our dedication to each other and to the wonderful responsibility of raising your children.”

“I think that would be nice.” Mark chuckled.  “As Talia said earlier, all of you are going to be very easy to love.”

“Father, Mothers, we need to speak privately before we go back to the Hall.” Six firmly stated.

“Mark, why don’t you take the children and do that.” Talia asked him as she floated up to give him a quick kiss.  “Alilia and I need to stay here a minute or three and explain to these girls about the curse.”

“Great Source, I hadn’t even thought about that!” Mark cursed.

“Yes, well when the curse strikes me it strikes you, and vice versa.  If all the copies of you will be exact manifestations of you, I don’t see why it wouldn’t strike all of them.  All of you.  Anyway, these girls will need to be prepared for it, and protected.”

“But my love, when the curse strikes me I want
you!
” Mark protested.  “What if every copy of me wants you at the same time?!”

“It’s true that you need me when the curse strikes, but it’s obvious since Alilia joined us that you like having her then just as much, as long as I’m there and part of it.  If necessary, you can Link with all your other selves while you take me, so they can all enjoy me just as fully while they enjoy these girls without all twelve of you needing to have me physically.”

“How are you going to prepare these girls for experiences like that?” Mark asked in consternation.

“We’ll figure something out.” Alilia assured him.  “If necessary, I’ll cast a mild blessing on them to ensure they’ll enjoy it.”

“Ah.  Okay.  We’ll see you in a few minutes at the hall.” Mark stammered, then Translocated back to the house with his children.

“So, ah, what did you need to talk about?” he asked.

“Well, we’ve been considering who might’ve forced Yzell’s mind.” Six explained.  “Only the gods could see through the time-bubble from the outside, and they led us to believe that they couldn’t act through it without taking it down.  They’ve also said that it takes more than one of them to maintain a time-bubble that big, and I’m sure the gods who’re maintaining it could tell if another god was trying to see through it or act through it.  So, for it to be done from outside, there has to be a conspiracy of the gods, they’d have to be doing what they told us they couldn’t do, and all of them are sworn on The Truthstone.  Plus, unless they were watching us through the time-bubble, I can’t see what motivation they’d have had to do it.