Cicero was humming as they skipped along the path. Telki wasn't quite sure with the fog if they were in Mania or Dementia, but either way, things had not stopped leaping out of the bushes at them, much to the Duke's delight. "This one would make a wonderful cushion for Mother!" the jester enthused, holding up the bloody, brightly patterned fur he'd just more or less ripped off…whatever that used to be.
"Oh! That reminds me! I made pillows, there's one I think would go well with your blanket. Do you want your name in red, green, or alternating?"
"Oh, red, please!" Cicero cried happily, doing a strange skipping dance as they moved. "Bloody red thread for good, sweet Cicero!" Beside them, the stream continued to flow in circles and burn. Another grummite rose to threaten them, and Cicero kicked it in the face, cackling as it fell back into the stream and started to burn, body inflating with a strange hissing sound not unlike a teakettle.
"So, what can you tell me about what has been going on here? He told me to give him five days, and here we are now, and he's still….I've never seen the Isles this badly off."
"Oh, Cicero has!" he exclaimed. "One time in particular there was a giant chasm in the middle of it, but this is pretty standard for when the King feels very down. Things get a little confused, and the Fleshmage has to put people back together. She complains the whole time, but the King is father to her child, so she obeys him."
Telki winced, rubbing the back of her head guiltily. "Yeah, the chasm, sorry about that. So, care to give me a little idea of exactly what state he's in?" She was going to ignore the queasy little flip the whole 'daddy to the frankenbabies' thing caused. She and Rommy had talked about that, she understood the situation, and refused to give it any power over her.
"Best you see for yourself," he said, halting at the edge of the trees. The shadows ended abruptly, giving way to open air tinged in grey, the sky above clear of clouds and stars, and the field before them filled with dead grass and empty flower stems that rustled dryly in the still air, as if missing the feeling of wind.
Rommy could faintly be seen sitting at the top of the slight hill of the clearing, facing away from them with his white hair on show, also blowing in a wind they could not feel.
"Cicero, this will probably get hairy in ways I can't even imagine. Your job is to make sure nobody else interferes. This is solely between me and him. Can you do that for me?" She was so gonna have to make him a sweater or something.
"Of course! Of course! Loyal Cicero is happy to keep lookout! Do hurry, though. I had dreams last night." He looked faintly worried.
"I'll do my best. Thank you for getting me here." Telki kissed his forehead goodbye, and marched resolutely to her man in the center of that desolation.
Telki dropped to her knees in front of him, taking him in, and then laid her head on his shoulder. "I'm here. You said you'd come back in five days. I missed you, Murril misses you. Isn't it time to come back to us?"
He didn't react very much, pulling the second to last petal off a flower in every shade of purple, only for another to grow. "Real. Not real. Real. Not real."
Telki raised an eyebrow. She climbed in his lap, took his head in both hands, and kissed him for all she was worth. Not that she considered herself an expert kisser, but in her experience, no imagination could compare with a real, solid, heartfelt kiss. She hoped.
He pushed her back, looking up at her quizzically. "You're real? No. I'm becoming very good at hallucinations." There was a long pause, then a hint of suspicion, "You're not Vaermina, are you?"
"Compare me to that hogswallowing swamptramp again, and I'll hit you over the head with your own Wabbajack, you overdressed turkey."
"Not Vaermina," he said, mostly to himself. Lifting her by the waist, he put her on the ground in front of him and said sternly, "Now, sit there. This is serious." Picking up the flower, he pulled the next to last petal. "Not real. Real. Not real."
"Rommy! No flower is going to tell you what's real." Telki huffed, and climbed back in his lap, plucking the flower from him. "And I missed you. Murril's near inconsolable. If I don't get your crazy hide back down there to her, I'll have to bring her here. I didn't think you wanted that."
"I don't know where it came from," he said, looking at the flower in confusion. "They're everywhere."
"Sweetie, what's my favorite color?"
"Hallucinations don't have favorite colors. I'm sane enough for that," he scoffed, rescuing the flower from her grip only to continue to pluck it.
Telki sighed heavily. " I'ma have to fus you before you believe I'm me, aren't I?"
"You have her eyes and hair, but you're nothing like her. You're sweet, like Nydia, and you're kinda Aedra-y like she was," he said, pulling the petal off in frustration.
"Uh, precisely who do you think I'm a hallucination of?" Telki tilted her head at him. Could he have forgotten her completely? She felt her heart give a little sideways squeeze. "Do you know who Tyrlief is?"
"My grandson," he said, frowning at the flower still.
"Do you remember his son?"
"Well, Hallucination, that's where things get fuzzy again. Yes and no. It's hard to tell. I keep seeing a small little happy face with human features, or a small little happy face with Dunmer features. I don't want to think about either. Real. Not real. Real. Not real. How is this thing still growing petals?"
"Telki. What does that name make you think of?"
"Mixed things. Warmth. Blankets, the fuzzy kind. Music. Dragons. Is that what I called you, Hallucination? I'm sort of impressed with my imagination," he said, wrinkling one side of his nose. "I haven't been friends with many Khajiit since I got…anyway."
"The petals keep growing, because you planted them for me. You're not sure if things are real or not, so the flower can't decide either. The only way you're going to get out of this is to get through the fuzzy part. You have to remember." Telki felt the tears welling up, but tried to push them back. They wouldn't help right now. He just kept finding new ways to leave her behind, didn't he?
"Hallucination, you're getting it wrong," he said, frustratedly throwing up his hands.
"Am I? Explain it to me, then. Why does the petal keep growing back?" She snuggled down in his lap, leaning back on his shoulder, wondering if muscle memory would help her.
He sighed, flopping backwards into the dried stems behind them, gravity bringing her after him. "I had to have made you up."
"If you made me up, I'd be more like Felicia, you said yourself you never considered Khajiit. What if I'm real?"
"Real people aren't that perfect."
Telki rolled off him laughing. "Perfect? Me? Where? I'm the Divine Idiot to everyone else. Divine Idiots are far from perfect."
He shook his head, looking up at the sky. "You're bright, you're sweet and kind, you're beautiful and loving enough to want to encompass the Isles themselves. You're powerful and dangerous and completely unaware of what you can do and what you really are. You're playful, and clever, and when I'm with you, it's like I'm not cursed."
"You do remember; you're just scared it's real. Why?" Telki clambered over his chest, so she could look down in his face. "Why would you want to cheat yourself out of the little bit of happy this whole curse thing has given you? Why make Murril cry? Why deny Tyrlief and Blossom and Orien the little bit of their family that, against all odds, still lives? Why deny yourself?" Telki's lip trembled, and she found it escaping despite herself. "Why leave me behind again?"
"I failed them. I failed everyone," he said, looking anguished. "Martin saved Tamriel. I just watched him. Couldn't save Felicia, couldn't save Orien…Could something as good as you really have happened to someone like me?" He shook his head, but whether refusing to believe or in confusion was difficult to tell. "I've seen it both ways, lived it both ways. My mind is sundered. Which did I hallucinate? Which path actually happened?"
Telki pulled him upright enough she could straddle his lap and take his face in her hands, forcing his eyes to meet hers. "Now you listen to me, Romulus Amulius, and you listen good. You helped Martin save the Empire. He couldn't have done it without you. Orien lived a good long life, and had Tyrlief, that we—you and I—just saved from the codswilling Thalmor. We saved him, we saved Fey, and we saved their kids, Blossom and Orien, named after your son, you know. You also saved me. You saved me from sundering the Isles and getting swallowed by the curse. You did that, so yes, most emphatically YES, you deserve some happiness."
A brief burst of alarm entered his eyes as the ground shook with her thu'um. "What if I let everyone die again?" he asked.
"What if Alduin comes back and eats us all?" Telki snorted. "What if I accidentally thu'um my own head off one day? Nobody can live like that. Nobody should try. You have today. Live for that, Love, and let tomorrow take care of itself."
A slight crease formed between his eyebrows. "I wouldn't think that," he said. Lifting his hand, he looked at the much-abused flower. It still had two petals.
Telki huffed and plucked a petal. "Not real, oh look, real!" Telki picked the last petal and waved it at Rommy.
He stared at it for a moment, then moved his gaze to her, lifting one hand to lightly brush along her cheek, almost as if he expected her to crumble to dust at his touch. "You're real?"
"Still here, still love you. Say my name." She murmured against his hand.
"Your name is longer than the stars, Telki," he said, his voice still wondering, examining her features as if he'd never seen her before and was eager to commit each one to memory.
"Just making sure I wasn't about to take unfair advantage." She claimed his lips for her own, once again putting all her fear, all her love, and all her hope into it. Hesitantly at first, his arms came up to encircle her, pressing her to him as the kiss deepened. Threading his fingers through her hair, one brushed the tie keeping her tumultus curls neat and tidy, and he erased it, sending them tumbling down her back and pooling on the ground behind her.
She giggled. "You're helping me tame that mess when we're done, mister." She pulled him down on top of her. "But that can wait, you owe me five days worth of snuggling and stuff."
Gently, as if he were still not quite sure this was happening, he leaned down and pressed a kiss to her forehead, then cheek, her lips, and along her jaw. His hand ghosted down along her side and back up, resting momentarily over her heartbeat before curling around under her back, pulling her tight against him as he returned to kiss her fiercely. The grass around them softened and bloomed. "I love you," he murmured softly.
.
.
"Oh. me." Telki sucked in a deep breath, holding it a moment before releasing it in a long sigh, trying to recover, rubbing her face against his chest. "I hope it's always this way between us."
"The day I stop responding to you is the day I go ask Jyggy to teach me algebra," he said breathlessly, giving her a squeeze.
"He teaches math? Hmm, I keep hearing it's related to music. Wonder if he knows how?" Telki nestled her head comfortably on his chest, idly smoothing her fingers over the silky strands of his meticulously trimmed beard.
Shaking with laughter, Rommy shook his head at the thought, "I wouldn't ask him to play, but he was the Sheogorath that brought music to Nirn. I wonder if that's where the system of writing it actually comes from."
"Mmm, which reminds me, I called for him, he sent a note. 'The Dragonborns must crash the super secret Elder council meeting.' I may be late for it, since I had to reclaim my Rommy, unless a certain Mad God wants to be very helpful come morning?"
"Come morning," he said agreeably, holding her to him a little tighter and staring up at the sky as the stars winked back to life. "I need to focus on restoring the Isles for a few minutes, then…just, stay with me a while?"
"How many times I gotta tell you? You're stuck with me for good." Telki yawned and kissed him right over his heart. She squeezed him tight in a whole body hug, just in case he didn't take her meaning. "You don't need me to move anytime soon, do you?"
He chuckled, "No. We can stay right here." Reaching over, he tugged on some grass until it became a green blanket, draping it over them. "Just give me a little to…apparently put out fires."
.
.
Icy tar grit and tile edges pressed into the flexible soles of her shoes as Ama scrambled quickly across the rooftop, launching herself at the next without her usual finesse. She landed and rolled into a full run, tearing madly for the next rooftop. She had to get back, and there was no time to waste. Her contact said the meeting was happening today.
The night had been long and frustrating. Explaining the situation to the Guild without actually revealing Young Ones had been a chore of careful wording, but she had little doubt there would be at least one in the Guild itself, and from what she'd seen in the last few days she realized that they wouldn't hesitate to wipe out the entire Guild. So she'd shared what she could about the twins and the "mercenaries" that had taken them, hoping more searching eyes would prove beneficial and not simply deadly. Then, she'd taken to the streets herself, hunting fruitlessly until long after breakfast, when she'd finally paused to rest and eat, and news had come to her.
Below her there was a shrill piercing cry of a patrol, "Halt!" but she was out of earshot before it got much further. It wasn't like she was breaking any laws or they stood a chance in Oblivion of catching her. She had places to be, things to do, warnings to deliver, and she had no time for a jumped-up self-important blowhard in a guard uniform.
In what was probably less than a candlemark, but too long for Ama's impatience, Mitten's poor abused house came into view. Ama pitched herself towards the inviting tree, caught a branch, and then slung herself through the opening in the roof, and slid down a convenient beam. By the time she sauntered into the makeshift war room, she'd caught her breath, and no signs of her mad dash back to base showed on her person. "Talon's not back yet?" Her voice was all that was cool, calm, and collected.
"No, any news for us?" Wemie crossed yet another dead end shield off the map.
"Amaryllis is home safe, none the wiser or suspicious of where she's been." Ama grimaced to remember that awful family. She could understand why the girl wanted to be far and away from them. If Mercutio's was just as bad…Ama pulled her mind back to the job at hand. She had more important news to deliver. "The Guild had important news. The Elder Council is meeting today at one. You have places to be, chief. Better get ready for your Big Debut."
Tyr's blank look of surprise vanished after a moment, his eyebrows lowering. "So they kidnap my kids and have a Council ready the next day? How closely were the bastards planning this?"
Ama could only give him a confused shrug. "I'd say too much so, but I'm no politician, am I?"
Wemie shook her head. "I don't like it. Either they were overconfident or that well planned. Let's hope Telki makes it to the meeting. At this point, I'm afraid we need her kind of luck to turn this situation around."
"I'm not waiting for it," Tyr announced, striding toward the door and grabbing his overcoat.
"Tyr!" Fey said, watching him with surprise. "You can't be thinking—"
"Of walking right in and telling them off? I most certainly am. I'll tell them in dovah if I have to," he interrupted, anger glittering in his eyes.
"They'll kill you," she protested, walking around the table and staring at him as if he'd gone mad.
"They'll try," he countered. "Are you coming?"
Wemie raised an eyebrow. "I thought you'd never ask."
"Miss this show? Are you kidding? I'll bring the snacks!" Ama hopped down, bouncing on her toes. "More of us show, less likely they can make us disappear, yes?"
"I'd be happier if some of the guards just found themselves taking a short nap," he said, glancing between her and Fey. "Think you two can handle that?"
Ama grinned. "Come to think of it, I know a few folks that would love to help."
"I'm starting to like the way she thinks," Fey said, glancing approvingly at Ama.
Ama beamed at her. "I grow on people. We'll be having sleepovers before you know it like a pair of giggly school girls." Ama stuck her tongue out at Tyr. "No boys allowed."
"Go get your friends," he said, his usual humor absent. "I'm going back to Windhelm a moment."
"On it, Chief." Ama slapped a salute, and dashed out the door.
Tyr took the steps to the portal two at a time, bounding through and into Hjerim. "Gideon!" he yelled, looking around, "Merc! Either of you around?"
"Aye, I'm here." Gideon came stomping down the steps. "What's amiss?"
"I'm attacking the White-Gold Tower," he said with deceptive calm.
Gideon bellowed back up the stairs. "We're storming the castle, who wants in?"
"Let me know when you figure out who's watching the kids," Tyr said, moving passed him to the courtyard. Looking around and deciding that Telki's house looked sturdy and Ulfric would forgive him later, he pointed his face at the sky. "OD AH VIING!"
Both Mercutio and Erandur came hurriedly down the stairs, sounding more like a stampede than two grown men. "We're attacking Cyrodiil's capital? When do we start?" Mercutio sounded flippant, but tension around his eyes gave him away.
"Considering Cyrodiil is no stranger to magics, we thought perhaps we'd be more useful than another sword arm," Erandur added.
"Know how to shrink a dragon?" Tyr asked as the thunder of wingbeats sounded overhead and a guard's bugel rang out from the city.
"You again," Odahviing groused, hovering. "Hi los ni thuri. I do not answer to you, New Dragonborn," he reminded Tyr sternly.
"Well, Telki's out of Nirn and I'm probably going to need backup shortly, so I was wondering if you wanted to attack the capital of the Empire to help get my children back. Again."
Odahviing blinked and landed on the house. "I…" he actually scratched at his head with the curve of his wing. "Hmmm."
Gideon grinned. "Actually, my friend, I had an idea. Precisely how could the people of Cyrodiil say no to an emperor who flew a dragon into the middle of the City? What do you say Odahviing? Care to scare some joorre silly?"
Both dragon and Dragonborn stared at him for a moment, before a rather dark smile curved Tyr's face. Odahviing's rumbled laughter echoing around them, he said, "Let's petrify some bureaucrats."
.
.
"Lord Sheogorath! Lord Sheogorath!"
Rommy sat upright, pulling Telki with him and jostling her awake. "Mehris?" he said, very confused.
The Golden Saint making her way up the flowered hill was Mehris, though, wearing a Nordic dress and looking more frantic than was probably healthy for pregnancy. "Lord Sheogorath! Oh, Queen! You're here, too!"
"Mehris?" Telki shook her head, trying to clear cobwebs. "I thought you were on Nirn?"
"Dearest Swaddler Lady!" a voice carolled from the other side of the meadow, "I caught a strangely-dressed Seducer creeping upon you!" Cicero cried, bouncing over dragging Valori by the arm as she pursed her lips at him in displeasure.
"Valori's here too?" Telki called to the Duke. "She's a friend, Cicero, please treat her kindly."
"Valori!" Mehris cried.
"Mehris!" Valori replied, launching herself at the Saint coming toward her and both of them proceeding to ignore everything else as they got reacquainted.
"Girls, Girls! What happened? Why aren't you with Ralof?" Telki could feel dread pooling in her stomach. She worried that panic of Mehris' was well-warranted.
"Surely we could give the pretty ladies another minute or two?" Cicero suggested with an ingratiating grin, fluttering his eyelashes at the pair.
"The Duke has had enough vicarious fun," Valori said, shooting him a stern look. Cicero giggled and blushed, looking anywhere but Telki and Rommy.
"Good Cicero was just keeping watch like the lovely Swaddler Lady asked," Cicero put on a very wounded pout. Telki groaned into Rommy's shoulder. Cicero standing guard rather slipped her mind when faced with a Rommy that had forgotten her.
"We were Banished," Mehris replied, looking at Telki and holding Valori close. "And he sent us to opposite ends of the Isles!"
"Who? When? Why?" Telki felt her embarrassment dissipate as both confusion and worry warred for supremacy. She had a deathgrip on Rommy, probably crushing his lungs.
Standing, summoning clothing for them as he did (his usual outside-the-Isles outfit for him, a green and purple dress that formed out of the field for her), Rommy gave them a somber look.
Mehris and Valori glanced at each other, then back to their rulers. "We were with the children in the courtyard of the Queen's nice city house," Mehris started.
"The Royal Great-Grandchildren were sleeping on us," Valori added with a happy sigh that quickly melted into the rather irate words, "when the pretty mortal boy realized the door was locked."
"So the new mage girl confirmed we were sealed in by magic."
"And we tried to blast our way out—"
"—but the magic was so odd it was like it didn't exist until you tried to interact with the space it was and wasn't occupying," Mehris finished in puzzlement.
"So Sanguine's daughter gathered up all the little ones in the center—"
"—and the funny-headed Redguard boy knocked her down as a ghost-elf appeared."
"After the Second Page started running around screaming," Valori reminded her.
"Yes, after that. So the ghost-elf touched Demeus and he fell down and went to sleep. I think."
"And the younger god-touched Nord—Gideon's, not the blond one—he Shouted, and the ghost-elf appeared—"
"And then he grabbed Lucia, and Banished us," Mehris said nervously. "We can't go back while the Banishment holds—"
"—so we thought we'd better find you," Valori finished.
"The children…" Telki felt like she couldn't breathe. Her children were in danger, and she wasn't there. She'd let her children down. Things started to look a little fuzzy about the edges, and her ears rang strangely.
Strong arms tightened about her as the Isles themselves started to warp, Rommy's eyes gold from lid to lid. "Stay with me, Telki," he said grimly.
"Kay." Her voice sounded thin and reedy. She held on to him for all she was worth, her only anchor against the fuzzing dark on the edge of her vision.
The air around them changed abruptly, the scent of flowers being replaced with snow and woodsmoke, baking bread and warm cider. Rommy knelt, helping her sit on the floor of Hjerim.
Lydia, just coming through the door, shrieked, surprised to see them. Lucky for them, she wasn't armed.
Rommy looked up, eyes still glowing, "What happened?"
"We were attacked. Lucia's missing, the twins, Heron, Murril, and Sura were taken. Demeus, turned. It happened after the ghost touched him, " Lydia heaved. "We know the twins are in Cyrodiil. The men have gone to get them back. The Council meeting is happening."
While Lydia was talking, the kids had filtered in. Telki busied herself cuddling as many of them as she could reach, soft tears streaking down her cheeks.
Rommy's brows nearly met over the bridge of his nose as he listened. "Firstly, who? They took a heron? Someone named Demeus turned into what? And…" he paused as he finally processed something Valori had said, "Sanguine's what?"
Lydia shook her head. "Runaway Young Ones. Telki found Sura, and then Talon and Shell brought in the boys, Heron and Demeus. Heron's been claimed by Shor."
"Alright, rescue them, and…" shadows started gathering in the corners, the beams of the house creaking as he added, "They took Murril and the twins?"
"The Council is happening now?" Telki looked up from her children. "Jyggalag said Tyr and I both need to be there. We can get the twins, then go get the rest of them. Yes?" She'd calmed a bit, able to think again with the reassurance of small hugs and safe bodies. These were safe, but she still had children that needed her. Time to bring them home and ensure this didn't happen again.
"Thank Me I'm already mad," he muttered, wrapping an arm around her waist and dissolving them into butterflies.
.
.
.
As always, if you want a slightly more raunchy version, check out AO3.
So, my dad doesn't need a liver transplant, which is wonderful news. He's out of the round of hospital visits for a bit, which I'm sure he appreciates. I'm working on getting down there sometime around Christmas. Keep your fingers crossed that I can actually go this time.
Tumblr thing has me down. Woke up this morning with the phrase "female presenting nipples" in my head, which, coupled with having to wake up before dawn anyway, made me just SO pleasant to be around. I also had to work on renewing my insurance this morning. So fun. -_-
I finally drew a picture of a guy that I don't hate! I managed to draw Rommy, and it actually turned out how I wanted it to! That happens about once a decade, really, but I'm so happy about it! You can see it on my deviantart or tumblr. Unless it starts filtering lineart mushrooms, anyway, which, who knows?
I'm a bit salty about that.
Thank you everyone who read and reviewed! You guys are amazing!
GalacticHalfling: My stuff tends to be a tad darker. Wynni is the sweetness and light author of the pair of us. The twins are five, and frankly, who knows how they'll be affected given everything else they've survived. If you think they're a bit precocious for five-year-olds, it's because most of the five-year-olds I've been around lately have been extraordinarily gifted and mature, and I only found this out later. ^^;
KStormblade: Yeah, I love her stuff. 3 Jeepers, I want your weather. I'm in Michigan, right in a snow lane. We had turkey, two kinds of stuffing, mashed and sweet potatoes, corn, cranberry sauce, ham, rolls, pie...I think that's it? Yours sounds amazing!
The Celtic Dragon: I sorta forgot what we were talking about because now I'm thinking about pie...
.
Next chapter: Nala gets utterly confused by her kidnappers.