Parenting Lessons

"Oh, Filia, you're out of tea."

Filia turned to see Xellos rummaging through her cupboards. She huffed. "Well that's your fault- I set my shopping schedule to buy tea for Val, myself, and guests." She continued counting her assets. "If you want tea, you'll have to go buy more yourself."

As Xellos went to leave, Filia piped up again. "Actually, while you're out, could you pick up something for dinner, too?"

Xellos smirked in frustration. "So I'm to do errands for you?"

Filia gave him a half-lidded glare. "You wish to keep in my good graces, don't you?" she said, one hand on the basket containing the powerful golden egg. "Then if you're going to consume my food, you'll do errands."

A few weeks had passed and Xellos had managed to get roped into more and more chores. Due to his association with 'the town dragons', his presence became noticed by the local townsfolk.

Filia came home after a day of manning her shop, and Xellos showed up with Val shortly after.

Filia raised her nose so she could look down as best she could at Xellos. "Good. I suppose I can trust you with him after all."

Xellos forced a smile. "Oh, yes. It was very hard to resist kidnapping this scaly toddler or neglecting the child of someone that has possession of something I have a great interest in. You're welcome."

Filia scowled and led Val to the table. "So, dear, how was your day?"

Val hopped onto the chair and frowned in thought. "Mama?"

"Yes?"

"Why didn't you tell me Xellos was my daddy?"

Both Xellos and Filia stared at the toddler with looks of shock. Filia tried her best to put on a calm expression. "Where in the world did you get that idea, darling?"

Val frowned. "That's what all the other kids said. They said that they heard he was the new baby's daddy and so he got to be my daddy too."

Filia inhaled slowly and she and Xellos exchanged glances. "Xellos… is not a father." Filia managed to sputter.

Xellos wagged his finger in thought. "Though… we do have shared custody of it. And if it's sentient..." He cringed.

Filia clenched her teeth. "Xellos, I think you and I need to have a chat in private."

She dragged him into the next room. Xellos shook his head before she had a chance to speak. "I have no intention to be a 'father' to anything, figure or otherwise."

Filia put a finger in his face. "Whether you intend it or not, your presence affects my children. And there is no way I can trust you to be a decent example."

Xellos frowned, opening an eye at Filia. "Are you trying to take the orb from me?"

Filia stared him down, a determined look on her face. She then looked away in frustrated thought. "I suppose if you could be a good influence, there would be no problem..."

Xellos smiled. "Well, then, we have our solution!"

"But I don't trust you to be a good influence."

Xellos sighed. "Well that puts us at an impasse, doesn't it?"

Filia nodded. "Unless."

"Unless?"

"You were taught to be a good influence."

Xellos laughed. "I hardly think that you'd be qualified for that."

Filia swallowed her frustration and smiled. "But we know someone who certainly is."

Xellos's smile dissolved. "Please, not her."

. . .

"Lesson number one: Being a good role model! You need to make sure that everything you do reflects the same ideals you want your child to have: so standing up for justice in the everyday is a must!"

Xellos slid further into his chair from the onslaught of positive energy emanating from his raven-haired teacher. "Miss Amelia, don't you have important duties to attend to back home?"

Amelia flinched, but quickly recovered, pointing at Xellos. "That's a bad example of modeling! Unless you want your children to question their teachers?"

Xellos clenched his teeth. Hearing the phrase 'your children' was nearly as bad as every motivational speech Amelia had ever given. Mazoku didn't have children, they created underlings. And Xellos never had any intention of sacrificing the power necessary to make any of his own. He folded his arms. Maybe in that sense 'having children' was a good thing. If he considered them as a form of underling, that would mean he had two, without having to expend any power.

"Okay, scenario one: you're in the market with your child and someone accidentally knocks your groceries onto the ground. What do you do?"

"Vaporize them." Amelia gaped at Xellos, who placed a hand on his forehead. "It was a joke- you can't honestly think I would vaporize someone for something as trivial as that."

Filia looked in on Amelia's role model lessons to see Amelia frantically gesturing and Xellos looking completely uninterested. She sighed and poured more tea for her other guest. "Circumstances aside, it's nice to see you again, Mister Zelgadis."

Zelgadis shrugged. "It's nice to see you too, Filia." He took a sip of tea and squinted at her. "But I don't think I exactly understand the situation- how do you have shared custody of a child with him?"

Filia gripped her teapot and sighed. "A weird ritual in a strange temple." Zelgadis squinted in a way that made her rethink her answer. "I-it was sealed inside, I think. It appeared inside a strange glass ball."

Zelgadis nodded and resumed sipping his tea. "Still, I'm surprised you let him claim any right to the child."

Filia poured herself a cup and stared into it. "Well, it's easy to forget with his demeanor, but we both know very well I really don't have a choice..."

Zelgadis frowned, and grunted in agreement.

Filia, wanting to change the subject, smiled at her guest. "So, what brings you here with Amelia?"

Zelgadis shrugged. "As a princess she can't exactly travel alone, so she's hired me as her bodyguard again."

Filia smiled. "Well, how sweet."

Zelgadis scoffed. "For accepting a job?"

Filia chuckled quietly. "Of course." She wasn't referring to him, but she wasn't going to embarrass Amelia by pointing it out.

. . .

Xellos was absentmindedly watching Filia folding laundry when they heard a knock at the door. Filia opened it to see the local baker holding a basket. Filia blinked. "Oh! Good afternoon; can I help you?"

The baker smiled. "Oh, I just had some left over bread from this morning and would hate for it to go to waste. I thought you, your son, and your…" He glanced at Xellos and trailed off.

Filia scowled at Xellos, and then smiled pleasantly at the baker. "Unwanted guest."

Xellos noticed the baker subtly sigh with relief. "Well, I thought the three of you might like it. To have the bread I mean."

Filia smiled and accepted the basket. "Why, thank you! That's so sweet…"

"Ford! I'm Ford. And you're ...Filia, right?" Filia nodded. The baker laughed softly. "Good! I couldn't just keep calling you 'that beautiful dragon woman' to your face, now could I?"

Filia blushed slightly and laughed with him. "You're too sweet!"

The baker stepped away from the doorway. "I suppose I'll see you around, then?"

Filia smiled. "I suppose you will."

The baker left and Filia closed the door. She set the breadbasket in the kitchen and gazed at it dreamily.

Xellos hummed in thought. "So bread and flattery is how you win a dragon's affections?"

Filia scowled at Xellos. "Basic decency with added kindness, yes. It also helps that he hasn't murdered thousands of my kind if you wish to compare."

Xellos scoffed. "Hardly. Unlike him, I have no fetish for extraspecies relations."

Filia shrieked at the comment and swung at Xellos, only to miss as expected. Though, despite her frustration at Xellos, she couldn't help but still feel a little giddy about the possibilities for her and the baker, Ford.

. . .

"Lesson 3: try to have fun and spend time with your child!"

Xellos shrugged. "That sounds easy enough."

Amelia smiled. "I knew you'd get into it!" She placed her hands on her hips. "So, your assignment this week is to spend an hour with Val."

Xellos squinted. "I have homework now?"

Amelia nodded. "You said it would be easy, so prove to yourself it is!"

Xellos sniffed. "Right."

"Xellos?"

Xellos appeared before Filia, which to his disappointment, did not startle her. "Yes?"

Filia sat down the vase she was holding on its proper shelf. "I'm going to need you to watch Val and the egg tonight once I close up- do you think you can manage that?"

Xellos sneered at her word usage. "'Manage'?"

Filia's eyelids lowered. "Yes. Can you?"

Xellos scoffed. "Of course I can!"

Xellos walked Val home from the neighbor's house, watching as the little dragon skipped ahead, kicking pebbles as they walked along. Xellos them remembered Amelia's silly assignment. "So, Val. What do you do for fun?"

Val stopped kicking to think. "Well, pretend, mostly. But I like to draw, too."

Xellos laughed. "Well, I'm certainly good at 'playing pretend'."

Val smiled. "Really?"

Xellos nodded. "I'm pretending to be human right now, even!" He smiled. "You are too."

Val seemed to be confused and then looked at his own hands. "Oh yeah I guess so."

The two of them reached Filia's home, and the two of them sat at the dining room table. Xellos set the basket with the egg down on the table and smiled at Val. "So, Val, do you want to play a game?"

Val smiled. "Yeah!"

"What do you want to play?"

Val stood up on his chair. "Let's play house!"

Xellos blinked. "'House?'"

Val nodded. "Yeah! I'll be the dad, and you and the egg will be the kids."

Xellos leaned on the table. "Oh… I suppose I'll take your lead, then."

Val ran out of the room and grabbed his cloak, only to walk into the room and set it down on a chair. "Work was hard today!" He declared, sitting down at the table. "Did you have fun playing?"

Xellos smirked. "Oh, a bunch of fun, sure."

Val nodded. "That's good!" He then blew kisses to Xellos and the egg. "I love you very much!"

Xellos cleared his throat. "Right." He glanced at the kitchen. "What's for dinner, 'dad'?"

Val thought for a moment, then smiled. "Bread, cheese, and tea!"

Xellos nodded as Val went into the kitchen to grab the ingredients. He was glad Val didn't want anything more complex for dinner, as the only recipes Xellos knew were not exactly for food. "Can I help with the tea?"

Val nodded and stretched to pat Xellos on the back. "What a good boy!"

Xellos laughed. From an objective standpoint, he was taking orders from a toddler- but there wasn't anyone watching, and Val at least seemed to be having a good time. "What a good father!"

Val cocked his head. "Really?"

Xellos shrugged. "I wouldn't know."

Val grabbed a loaf of bread. "Me neither."

Filia returned home with a skip in her step. She had just spent the loveliest time out with Ford. He was incredibly kind, genuinely interested in her day and how Val was doing.

Filia opened the door to her home to see Xellos reading in the living room with Val asleep in a chair. Filia scowled, and whispered, "You were supposed to put him to bed!"

Xellos shrugged. "He refused, so I played politics with him." Filia squinted questioningly. "He was the ruler, and I simply listed the territories under him and their exports until he fell asleep. He dozed off precisely before the time you specified."

Filia picked up her sleeping son, scowling. "Put him in his bed next time, will you?"

Filia returned from Val's room, and her eyebrows raised. "So, what did he do while I was gone?"

Xellos lay a finger on his cheek in thought. "Well, we played house, mostly."

Filia blinked. "You played with him the whole time?!"

Xellos nodded, nearly as surprised as she was. "It was a rather enlightening experience." He smirked. "Who knew how much you can learn about a parent by the behavior of their children!"

As Xellos hoped, this made Filia incredibly self-conscious. "Like what?!"

. . .

"Lesson 5, be a good listener!"

Xellos smirked. "Well that's certainly an easy one!"

Amelia pointed at the smug demon. "Being a good listener doesn't just mean listening for information, it means listening for feelings, and communicating that you understand!"

Xellos left Filia's living room having sat through a particularly long lecture on communication and understanding. It was incredibly boring and most likely useless, but it was worth it if it kept all his assets in order. Also, he could probably use it to annoy Filia from a new angle.

Filia noticed Xellos and paused knitting for a moment. "Oh, Xellos! The lesson's over, then?"

Xellos nodded, sighing. "Finally, yes."

"Well then, do you think you'll be able to watch Val again for me?"

Xellos leaned towards Filia to what he deemed an appropriately irritating distance. "Oh, having a night out with the baker again, are you?"

Filia pouted at his condescending tone. "Yes. I enjoy his company, I'll have you know."

Xellos huffed. "How dull. I suppose I can."

Filia smiled. "Thank you. And I'll prepare dinner beforehand this time- Amelia has informed me of your… 'cooking' skills."

Xellos laughed resignedly. "That's probably for the best..."

Filia sat on a blanket by the pond with Ford, talking and laughing with him.

"So," Ford started, hesitating. "That egg you have… where did it..." He paused again. "Does it… have a father?"

Filia nodded in understanding at his hesitance, laughing uncomfortably. "Oh, no- I mean, I don't think so- Xellos and I found it in an old human shrine."

Ford's expression clouded over slightly when she mentioned the shrine, she had delved into a subject that he didn't have any experience in. Filia wrung her hands, scrambling to bring the conversation back to something he might know. "Y-yes it was a shrine made by a cult that called themselves 'The Golden Children'," She flinched, sure she had simply brought the subject further into unrelatablility.

Ford nodded slowly, a pitying smile on his face. "That… sounds relatively familiar?"

Filia sighed. "Ah, it had… quite interesting architecture! Though of course Xellos didn't appreciate any of it; he was too busy looking for a weapon or something, probably..."

"Oh, architecture… I uh, have you been to Seyruun City? I've heard they have some great architecture there!"

Filia held her face in her hands, describing the rest of the night to the only one in her home still awake. "And I just kept rambling on and on, and he looked so bored!"

Xellos laughed. "Well, you are quite boring!"

Filia pouted at Xellos, cheeks red and eyes watery from shame and frustration.

Xellos let out a short sigh. "But, anything an interesting person says is interesting- so if he has already lost interest, I don't think he's worth your effort anyways."

Filia lay her head down in her folded arms and sighed.

Xellos waited a bit longer, but still got no response. "I think you're interesting."

Filia squinted at him. "You said I was boring."

Xellos nodded. "You are. But I think you're interesting."

Filia sat up a bit straighter, her sadness melting into suspicion and intrigue. "Oh?"

"Yes! You're obnoxiously naive like the rest of your species, but your defection was something I didn't expect," Xellos folded his arms. "And I still don't understand why you think you can continue to insult me when I am so much more powerful than you that it isn't even funny. I can't decide whether you're brave, or stubborn, or perhaps just stupid."

Filia stuck up her nose. "I'm just a good judge of character. As long as Miss Lina is useful to you, there's no way you could get away with getting rid of me."

Xellos's eyebrow twitched. "Oh, really? No way?"

Filia nodded condescendingly. "No way."

Xellos set aside his annoyance and smirked. He had successfully pulled Filia out of her mopey state. Who needed empathy? He had acute observational skills and professional manipulation abilities. Everything was going to work out just fine.