"This is ri-god damn-diculous!" Solus was (once again) rendered unable to sleep by the unmistakable (and frankly disgusting) sounds coming from Riyanna's room.

He was out of bed and on his way to (once again) tell her off about her noisy (not to mention disgusting) ways when a crash loud enough to wake the dead came from behind him… back in his room.

Swearing and grumbling under his breath, Solus returned to his room to find his two year old son on the floor, picking large pieces of what used to be Solus's oldest (and favorite) chair out of his legs as the wounds healed with the speed that could only be mustered by a child of immortals. Upon seeing his father, the mischievous child smiled and handed a bruised red rose petal out to his father.

"I did it," the mute signed, very proud of himself.

"Go back to bed and don't get up until morning." Solus said dismissively to his only son.

After seeing the boy to bed, Solus noticed the noise in Riyanna's room had ceased. If he listened harder than he wanted to, he could hear her leaving her room, presumably to take a shower. Solus hurried to intercept her. Just in case she moved faster than he could get to the bathroom (which he highly doubted) he locked the door with his mind.

"Riyanna, just because Arkelus can't talk doesn't mean he can't hear either. What the hell is your problem and what were you thinking bringing your 'guests' here when everyone is home?" Solus wasn't loud, but he was angry.

"I'm not going to deal with you right now." Riyanna replied dismissively.

"And why are you teaching our son God Arts? I thought we had agreed-"

"He needs to know at the very least how to escape a bad situation without getting tracked. It's only petals, which he would have learned eventually anyway. I would rather he knows something than nothing." Her voice was too clam for Solus's liking.

"He's your son. Why are you killing him?" Solus pursued.

"I'm not. No one can. He's the bright and warm-blooded immortal son of Death and Darkness. Even if you do, I will never allow him to die." Her voice shook, but otherwise it was very calm. She was refusing to argue.

"If you keep depriving me of sleep or putting Arkelus in danger, Death will have no son."

"Why on earth did you move in with me? I was doing fine on my own." Riyanna complained, not for the first or last time.

"I was afraid you would kill my kid. Even while you were pregnant you weren't careful. If I wasn't here he would probably be dead by now."

Riyanna blocked him out. It wasn't the first time and it wouldn't be the last that Solus would use her health against her. Everyone, including her brother the God of Life, saw her son as a future problem. When she acquired toxemia, they told her it was an omen. Now her son was a beauty, a mute, and had the potential for massive amounts of power. When Solus had found out she was sick, he had hurried to her side, shaking his head at her carelessness. He never moved back out. Not that she could blame him. It was hard enough trying to be the goddess of Death without the child. Now she had to keep eyes on her son consistently, and she couldn't really spare the time. He was two now and could be put down for naps for two hours at a time, but she did realize that soon she would not be able to have things so easy after about five years. Solus had the same problem, but was not so busy now-a-days.

Solus would soon be out of a job. No one really cared too much for invoking real powers from real darkness. Every once in a while there would be someone who would show some promise. They usually died before anything really got done. Then there were the "Satanic worshippers", a title that was oxymoronic to Solus. They would call him up from whatever dark crevice he could manage to find in the human world (usually over by the vampires) to ask him for or to do some of the dumbest things Solus had ever heard of, then had the nerve to be angry about it later.

There was one incident that had always stuck in his craw. A couple of college students were lucky enough to find what had been Riyanna's Book of Shadows. Using a variation on one of her spells to call solitude to her, they managed to call Solus so loud he was sure he couldn't have been the only one who heard the call. With a massive head ache and an even larger bad mood, he trekked over to the dorm to be sure he was never summoned so loudly again.

Upon entering, Solus realized two things instantaneously. First, whoever had summoned him was a complete idiot and he would be sure to have Riyanna give them particularly horrible and painful deaths. The second (which had lead to the first conclusion) was that they had used fire to summon him.

"Wow. Just wow. Fire to summon a God of Darkness? Truly amazing." Solus told them from a safely dark corner of the room.

"I told you stupid. He doesn't like light. Put it out!" The fire was effectively extinguished.

"What do you want?" Solus asked, then he mumbled, "so I can go home and go to sleep."

"We summoned you and now are your masters. You shall do as we command and make us the most powerful beings of darkness to roam this world!"

Solus hung and shook his head. They were idiots who had no idea what the hell they were getting themselves into and made assumptions probably from old movies.

"Oookay. First of all you command no one. Just because you woke me up in the middle of the day- well here it's night but that's beside the point- doesn't mean you have any kind of control or anything from me. You can ask me a favor, but if you thought that it was all gonna be a poof of smoke and three wishes you've got another thing coming. Now, as for your command I'm gonna say… No. First of all, you two don't deserve to be the strongest things in the house, let alone the world. Secondly, darkness does not suit either of you pussies. And thought the third, I can't make you anything. I signed a treaty with the vamps, so it's them you need to try to contact. Any questions?"

The two idiots looked at him blankly. Neither of them knew what to make of the specter they had summoned. After a moment, Solus decided that was as loud as it was going to get and left. Now that he thought about it, he had gone home to Riyanna, and that was most likely the night their son was conceived. Just an errant thought.

As for Riyanna, her job got harder in some ways, but much easier in others. Crime was declining, but so was worldly satisfaction. While young girls were less and less being murdered