Note: As always, thanks to everyone who reviewed. I hope you enjoy the last installment. -smile- It is set quite a few years into the future.

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Epilogue

Zaimid thinks that they have gone soft.

Kaddar doesn't share the same opinion. "It's not as if we're declaring our undying love to one another, or anything," he says grumpily.

(He keeps it to himself that he's starting to think that Kalasin is beautiful, and not just in the figurehead-empress kind of way. She is still beautiful when she sulks, or when he has to hold back her hair during her bouts of morning sickness. He is learning how to comfort her when she is moody, instead of saying something hurtful and making her feel even worse. He puts up with the fact that her nail paint smells absolutely awful, and that she talks in her sleep and is clingy, to boot. And he loves their children more than he will ever admit.)

Kaddar is learning how to appreciate Kalasin, despite—or even because of?—her quirks, and that unnerves him a little, although he finds that he prefers quiet evenings reading to verbal battles and door-slamming and playing twisted little mental games that leave a bad taste in his mouth.

Kalasin doesn't flirt with other members of the court or his mages just to make him jealous, now. She thinks being a parent is strange, but at least Kaddar helps. She appreciates it that he makes it a point not to favor the two youngest; the twin boys, over Kalahari, and she thinks that someday, she might be able to make him promise never to marry their daughter abroad. Secretly, she likes it that when she looks at their children, she sees a little bit of Kaddar, and a little bit of herself, in them.

Kalasin never tells him that she likes being in Carthak, with him and their family, and that she wouldn't trade their life together for anything. She thinks that he knows already, by the way that she sometimes strokes his hair when he's very worried and he squeezes her hand absentmindedly.

Kaddar never tells her that he thinks he might love her, because he isn't brave enough, and secretly, he is a little bit afraid of rejection. He does, however, think it in her general direction every night, and she smiles, kisses him goodnight, and blows out the candles, and that is good enough for both of them.

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fin.

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Well, it's over. Thank you so much to everyone who left a review - you guys rock. I love getting feedback, so I can know what I'm doing well, and what I can improve on.

Kally and Kaddar thank you for listening to their tale!