Author's Note: So, I'm going on hiatus after this chapter. I'm not sure how long; I'm thinking of forcing myself to take at least a month long break. Writing everything up to this point has been really emotionally draining. I'm predicting the story is going to be a good deal more lighthearted from here on out, but still. - gotta recharge my batteries.

So! Full disclosure at last! Did you guess at Helena's secret? I tried to hint toward it, but I also hoped to keep you confused right til this moment. I hope it was worth all the heartache, and that you can forgive Helena for being crazy and emotional and weird. Now without further ado, the author proudly presents: Zoro's Odyssey, Chapter Sixteen - Kuina.

Ch. 16 – Kuina

The secret passages led all throughout the castle, Zoro knew. He'd used them once before. He hadn't realized there was a hidden entrance leading from Helena's gym, but it didn't come as much of a surprise when they ended up in Helena's private quarters.

"That's strange," Helena whispered as they stepped through the door hidden behind her bookshelf. "Papa was supposed to be here. I had him relieve Andromache for guard duty. He wanted to see this…"

"Guard duty?" Zoro asked, whispering because she was. "Why would your father be on guard duty?"

"I've been training him in swordsmanship. Didn't you notice?" Helena asked. She still spoke quietly, but he could hear the note of pride in her voice. "He's doing rather well, I think."

"That explains a lot. He wasn't half bad in the fight back there," Zoro replied pensively, "But that's not what I meant. –Why would your room need a…guard…?"

He trailed off as his gaze alighted on the tiny figure curled up asleep against Helena's pillows.

"Helena?" he asked, his good eye growing round in shock. "Helena, who is that?"

"It's precisely who it looks like," Helena replied, and he could hear the sly smile in her voice. She still had him by the hand she'd used to guide him through the passage, and though he'd involuntarily gravitated toward the bed on his own, he hadn't gone more than a few steps ahead of his wife before he froze.

Helena released his hand and gave him a little nudge. "Go on," she said.

He didn't budge.

Helena nudged him again. "Go on. She doesn't bite." She chuckled quietly, " – wait, that's a lie, she does. It's a phase. We're working on it. Unfortunately she seems to have inherited her Daddy's strong jaw, so her bites can leave quite a mark."

The little person on the bed had inherited more than his jaw. A chin-length mess of hair hid her face from view, but there was no question who the child belonged to. – The hair was mint green.

"You said we only had a son!" Zoro accused in as hushed tone as he could manage, still rooted to the spot.

"I never said that," Helena retorted. "Though I have worked hard to make sure people believe it. I let all kinds of rumors run wild. –even the rumor that I had a lover."

"…the ghost child!" Zoro murmured. "It wasn't a ghost at all! Your servants heard an actual baby crying! It was her!"

"That's right," Helena said. "There are no royal ghosts in our family. Hades always takes us, body and all when we die, remember?"

"Twins…?" Zoro went on faintly. He still hadn't moved, so Helena started pushing him with two hands to his back.

"Twins," Helena confirmed, grunting at the effort of pushing a man too petrified to move. "We didn't know she was there because their hearts beat in tandem when we listened. – She came second. Hades returned to take her too, but the doctor arrived just in time to save her."

She managed to push him the remaining few feet, his heels carving two small trails into the fine carpet as he dug them in.

"If there could be any silver lining to losing Telemachus," Helena said, panting with the strain, "It was the ability to keep her existence a secret. Because he died, no one realized the possibility of another child. Only a select group of people know she exists: Hector, Paris, the palace doctor, Andromache, my father…"

"Your father never said anything," Zoro continued in disbelief.

"He couldn't," Helena said apologetically. "I issued a strict gag order. No one could say anything about her to anyone outside this room so to speak. Not even to you."

"She's never left this room?" Zoro asked accusingly. Now that he had the mind to look for it, he realized that Helena's room had a few changes just like her gym. Child proofed doorknobs, toys in a toy chest in the corner, a child's scribbled drawings on the wall, a rocking chair…

"Oh, she has, don't worry. The secret passages help with that. Anyway, what do you think that playhouse is doing in my gym?" Helena asked. "I get to spend precious little time with her, so she 'works out' with me in the morning. I also come see her for lunch. And though we talked about giving her her own nursery, I decided to have her sleep here in my bed for her safety. I am her guard at night…"

Zoro stared down at the sleeping toddler, still too stiff with nerves to do more than run his fingers through his hair.

"What's the matter?" Helena asked after a failed attempt to get him to kneel down by the bed for a closer look. "What are you so nervous about?"

"I don't know!" Zoro confessed, stuck in the confusing no-man's-land between laughter and tears. "Helena, I'ma…I'ma…"

"Papa?" a sleepy voice asked.

Zoro gave a start as he noticed that the little girl had been awake and watching him. She sat up, rubbing the sleep away with little fists, and blinking at him in confusion. She had her mom's russet brown eyes. Oh, those were going to spell trouble for him, he could already tell.

"She knows me?" Zoro gasped, emotion welling up inside his chest cavity and threatening to spill out of him in a most unmanly fashion.

"Look up," Helena said, and he could hear the confusion of laughter and tears in her voice as well. "I made sure she would know you…"

Zoro glanced up to see his wanted poster pasted to the canopy of Helena's bed, right above where the child slept.

"No matter how hard it got, or how angry I felt toward you sometimes, I never let her see it," Helena assured him. "I told her all about you; every story you told me of your adventures, anything I had read in the papers. I wanted her to know what an amazing man her father was…Is…"

"PAPA!" the girl cried again, wide awake this time. She bolted up onto her feet in the bed, jumped, and Zoro suddenly found himself with her arms and legs wrapped around his middle. Though small for her age, she had a good, strong grip, and long limbs like her mother. She still wasn't big enough to wrap them all the way around him, so she clung to his clothes with her fists and her toes as if to hug him harder. "PAPA COME HOME!" she cried giddily. "PAPA COME HOME!"

Helena stood beside him now, and smoothed back the little girl's hurly-burly hair. It looked like it couldn't decide if it wanted to be curly or not, and so just hung in wild waves about her face. Zoro had no idea where that could have come from; he and Helena both had arrow-straight hair.

"That's right, Kuina Bee," Helena said as she smoothed the girl's hair, and Zoro chanced a sidelong glance at his wife to see her smile. "Papa's come home."

"What did you call her?" Zoro rasped.

"Oh…yes, I forgot to say," Helena mumbled, and then got a bit sheepish. "Her name is Kuina."

"Kuina?" There was no holding back the tears now. He turned his face upward to hide it from his child – after all, he didn't want her first memory of her father to be of him crying, even if it was out of joy.

"I, uh…" Helena said, slightly alarmed. "Well, yes. I wanted to name her after a strong swordswoman. She meant a lot to you so I thought I'd carry on her legacy. Is that…are you…ok?"

Zoro laughed heartily. Everything was more than ok.

"Just as long as you don't mind her being Queen Kuina someday," he pointed out, still chuckling, "That sounds kinda weird."

Helena laughed too. "You know, I never actually thought about that."

"Even though you nicknamed her 'Kuina Bee'?"

Picking up on her parent's mirth, Kuina started to giggle. She had the most adorable laugh Zoro had ever heard, beating Chopper's by a long shot, which was saying something.

"Oh, watch out. –you remember what I said about her biting?" Helena warned, "She does it out of emotion."

"OW!"

Helena winced on his behalf. "I guess she's happy to see you."

Several leagues away from Ilium, a young marine captain paced the deck of his vessel. He'd been antsy since he and his crew had left port, but none of them had been able to draw the why of it out of him. His Vice Captain approached him for the umpteenth time that evening.

"Captain Coby-San, you're really starting to worry the crew. What's the matter?"

"I didn't get to warn them. – Either of them," Coby muttered under his breath.

"Warn who about what?" Helmeppo demanded.

"That little girl is in danger," he murmured. "And it's all my fault."

"You put a kid in danger?"

"I can't say," Coby told him, brows knitted in concern. "If I do, I'll put you all at risk!"

"At risk of what?" Helmeppo demanded. "Coby, this is starting to get ridiculous! You know your men support you. In fact, I'd hazard to guess you've got one of the most loyal crews on the grand line. If there's something you need us to do, we'll do it. Do you want us to turn back?"

Coby looked at him with haunted eyes, but then seemed to get a hold of himself. "It doesn't matter," he said with hard-nosed resolve, "The danger to our men has passed. Our heading is the same."

Helmeppo saluted, though he glanced back over his shoulder as he turned to walk away. Whatever was eating at Coby's conscience, it was sure to turn into action sooner or later.

Coby turned his gaze out to sea. He said something, but he spoke too softly for Helmeppo to hear.

"I'm so sorry, Zoro," her murmured to the waves. "Regent knows you have a daughter."

In front of a certain Drum-maker's stall, a squat man paced back and forth, bristling so much that his normally glossy white mustache seemed to poof out like a pin cushion beneath his nubby nose.

"Regent is a fool, like it's his job!" Bags spat, pacing. "He won't listen to me!"

The sounds of battle raged from the streets around them, but the small side-street in which Calypso's stall stood remained abandoned but for the two men.

"He's still trying to go through with the plan, mon?" Calypso asked, calmly packing up his drums as though he hadn't a worry aside from his wares.

"In a half-baked sort of way, yes!"

"Even though we're losing?" Calypso glanced at the end of the street, where he saw a couple of marines completely overwhelmed by a few of Helena's people. While the marines had better guns, the Iliads – both soldier and civilian alike – had the advantage of knowing the city, and most were well-trained in close combat. The marines didn't have a prayer.

Calypso didn't do anything to save his allies; just turned back to Bags with his brow furrowed pensively.

"The attack at the palace was a disaster," Bags went on. "Cygnus and Helena both survived. Roronoa Zoro returned at just the wrong moment and took everyone out, like it's his job. I knew he was still alive! And I KNEW he was here! That Coby brat lied to us! – On top of all that, General Hector's men were prepared to counter the marines positioned throughout the city. We've been thoroughly trounced, but Regent still hasn't called a retreat!"

The screams of the beleaguered marines at the end of the street punctuated his point, but neither Bags nor Calypso turned from their conversation.

"I thought Regent sent for reinforcements, mon," Calypso put in.

"Yes. Reinforcements that are going to arrive on wooden boats," Bags exasperated, waving his hands in the air for emphasis. "Do you think they'll get anywhere with General Hector watching the harbor?"

Calypso just shrugged.

"Ugh! So now we've got a PR nightmare on our hands. Soon I'll have to go in and smooth things over with Ilium AGAIN. Like it's my job. – As if it wasn't hard enough the last time!" Bags ranted. "That idiot says he's got some plan underway to capture Cygnus; all he's interested in is revenge! You'd think he'd be more worried about the possibility of splitting that disgusting head of his further; I've told him time and again, he has to capture ALL of the royals at once, or we're just going to repeat the disaster of twenty years ago."

"What are your orders, mon?" Calypso asked calmly. With his wares now safely packed away, he turned to Bags and casually rested a hand on the hilt of one of his machete. "You want me to bail our men out?"

"No," Bags said firmly. "If there is one good thing that has come from all of this, it's that that lying brat Coby unwittingly gave us leverage to use on the Queen in the future. Regent is going to lose this battle, and when he does I am guessing it won't be long before we mobilize CP4. – your orders are the same. Befriend the Queen; retain her trust, even if that means killing our own."

Calypso's brow furrowed in disappointment.

"What?" Bags asked.

"That means I can't kill Roronoa, doesn't it?"

"I didn't say that, necessarily," Bags said, grinning as he smoothed and twirled his frazzled mustache back into place. "From what I hear, he and the Queen aren't exactly on the best of terms right now. Use your better judgement though; don't be an idiot just because you're jealous of the man."

"Jealous?" Calypso's lip twitched. "It's not about jealousy, mon. There's nothing he can do that I can't do better…" Then he added under his breath, "…whatever that stupid tramp says."

"Is that so?" Bags asked.

"You'll see," Calypso told him with full confidence. "I'll take his wife, then his life. And I won't blow our cover in the process."

"I thought you said you didn't go after women who don't deserve to be played."

Calypso's expression darkened. "Oh, she deserves it mon," he growled. "No one insults Calypso Blue and gets away with it."

Bags laughed loudly. "A woman is going to be your downfall one day, Blue," he proclaimed.

Calypso chuckled in good humor. "I can't think of a better way to fall," he said with a saucy grin. He turned to walk casually toward the battle.

"Hey, Blue," Bags called after him, and Calypso paused. "Feel free to show them what you're really capable of. Convince them you're on their side, but make sure they know to be afraid of you when the time comes."

Calypso shot a grin over his shoulder. "You sure about that?"

Bags nodded. "Like it's my job."

Calypso's grin widened, a flash of something wicked flickering through his strikingly blue eyes. "I always did like working for you, mon."

Helena had to carefully extract Kuina from where she'd sunk her teeth into Zoro's arm, hanging off of him like an incredibly determined leach. When she'd finally gotten her free, she set her on the ground, shaking a finger at Kuina's nose.

"No biting," Helena said firmly. "Kuina hurt Papa!"

Kuina's eyes grew large. "Papa no get hurt," she insisted. "Papa big, strong pirate!"

Zoro smirked.

"You're right," he warned, rubbing his arm. That was probably going to leave a bruise. "Next time this big, strong pirate may have to bite you back."

"That mean, papa," Kuina informed him, shaking a finger at him like Helena had done to her. "No biting."

Helena giggled, hiding her face to try and stifle the sound. Meanwhile the little devil lifted her arms toward Zoro, stating in the universal child language that she wanted to be picked up. Zoro wasn't exactly familiar with universal child language, so he needed a prompting from Helena before he did anything.

"Gampa Pinch, Honk honk!" Kuina informed her father very seriously when he lifted her.

"Yes, where is your Grandpa Pinch?" Helena asked.

"Honk honk!" Kuina insisted. "Gampa, goose!"

"She's never called him 'Grandpa Goose' before," Helena mused aloud, "Though I suppose it fits."

Zoro's brow furrowed, and he turned a serious gaze to his daughter. "Grandpa, goose?" he asked.

Kuina nodded vigorously, then lifted her arms out wide, flapping them like wings.

"Gampa fly! Yodel-odel-odel-odel!"

"That's not good," Zoro said in alarm.

"What's not good?" Helena asked.

"Here, take her for a sec," he said, attempting to hand Kuina to her mother. The child apparently didn't want to let go of her father now that she had him, though. She clung stubbornly to his neck, despite whatever efforts he made to pull, twist, or turn her. Eventually he gave up; somehow she ended up hanging down his back like a cape.

He took her with him to inspect the large French doors leading to the balcony of Helena's room. They were ajar.

"All he'd have to do was open the door," Zoro muttered to himself. "If Circe honked and started yodeling he'd have no chance. She probably didn't even know where he was. If she did, she would have taken the kid too."

He noticed a broken window pane in one of the French doors; something he'd done ages ago. Helena had had the remaining shards of glass removed, probably to keep Kuina from cutting herself, but she hadn't replaced the pane.

Zoro smirked at the memory, but then his brow furrowed. Cygnus wouldn't have had to open the door to hear Circe then. Her voice could have reached him in this room, then controlled him in animal form to open the doors and fly to her.

"Honk! Yodel-odel-odel!" Kuina repeated. "Honk-le odle odle skreeee!"

Zoro winced at the imitation of bad yodeling. Yup, that clinched it. This was definitely Circe's work.

"Zoro, what's going on?" Helena demanded. "Did something happen to my father?"

Kuina finally released him, jumping to the ground and crouching near Zoro's feet. When she turned back to her mother she held out a feather, the same pure white as Cygnus' hair.

"Mama," she informed her with a stern expression on her little face. When she furrowed her brow like that, she looked a lot like her mother. "Gampa goose now. Fly away. Mama and Papa bring Gampa back?"

"What…?" Helena started.

"That's right, k—…kid," Zoro said. He couldn't bring himself to call her by her name yet; it just felt too weird. He liked that Helena had named her after Kuina, but it would take some getting used to. "We're going to bring him back. Preferably before he becomes someone's dinner."

"Someone's dinner?!" Helena exclaimed in real alarm now. "Zoro, what's going on?!"

"I'll explain on the way," Zoro said. "I just hope we're not too late…"

Unfortunately for Cygnus, Captain Circe wasn't about to dawdle this time. Stuck as a goose again, the king struggled fruitlessly to get out of her grip as she tramped up the gangplank of an enormous navy warship now brazenly harbored in their port.

Cygnus' legs had been tied together after he'd hit her with a few good, webbed-toe pinches. She had also tied his wings to his side with twine, and she dragged him by the beak to keep him from trying to bite her. Not that pinching, biting or attempting to fly away would do him much good now; all the woman had to do was yodel and he'd be back at her side again.

She kicked open the door to one of the cabins, then stomped inside without waiting for an invitation. An old, blinking lightbulb cast a murky orange glow on one half of the room, barely illuminating an old, dented, wooden dining table standing at its center. Cygnus could sense someone on the other side of the table, but the light hardly reached whoever it was.

Knowing the funding that the Navy generally had, Cygnus had the feeling the dim lighting was a purposeful choice. It certainly created a frightening ambiance. Cygnus gulped when he noticed a plethora of animal bones scattered about the room.

Circe tossed the trussed up goose onto the dining table without ceremony.

"There's yer royal pain, Vice-Admiral, sir," Circe informed him. Though she spoke brazenly, something about her overstated bravado made Cygnus think she was compensating for her own terror.

"At last-ast!" A voice echoed from the dark side of the table. "You're lucky, Captain-ain. This may just make up for your little slip-up from earlier-er."

"So roast 'im already," Circe said dryly, turning to leave.

"Not yet-et," the voice said menacingly. A blue, scaly hand reached from the darkness to lift Cygnus from the table by his long goose neck. "You're not dismissed until I say you're dismissed, Captain-an; I still have use for you-ou. Now turn the king back-ack."

"Turn 'im back?" Circe asked, slightly alarmed. "Yeh ain't gonna eat 'im as a human, are yeh?" By the terrified look on her face, Cygnus didn't doubt that he would do it. An echoing growl issued from the shadowed portion of the room, and Circe honked without further complaint.

Cygnus felt the familiar pins and needles through-out his body. A flash of golden light momentarily illuminated the cabin, and Cygnus caught a glimpse of his captor before the light faded and the king fully regained his human form, bursting his bonds.

The Vice-Admiral's blue hand held him up in the air by the throat. Despite his predicament, the king managed to choke out a snarky comment. He really couldn't help it; the Vice-Admiral's current state was more than well-deserved:

"Hello, Regent. You're looking handsome as ever," he rasped, grinning vindictively at the grotesque monster of a man.

With an angry snarl, Regent raked a clawed hand across Cygnus' face, dropping him onto the table. The king cried out in pain and clutched at the wounds as blood filled his vision.

"Do you know how long-ong I have waited to do that-at?" Regent's face caught some of the light now, but mostly shadow, showing his mangled, split head to grisly effect as he loomed over his captive. "I'd warn you watch-atch that sharp tongue of yours, Majesty-y, but I guess it's too late-ate."

"Aren't you going to kill me?" Cygnus managed to rasp, lifting a shaking, blood-stained hand away from his face. Thankfully he still had his vision, but the wound ran deep. It was definitely going to leave a mark, provided he lived through this.

"Trust me, your highness-ness; you will pay the ultimate price-ice for this little makeover-er," the Vice-Admiral growled, showing the needle-sharp teeth lining his split mouths. "Unfortunately-y I need to post-pone my revenge-enge until Ilium-um has been secured-ured."

Cygnus mustered the courage to push himself into some semblance of an upright position, and glare at him through the blood. "You still think you can take us, baby-snatcher? Sounds like the two halves of your brain aren't communicating with one another like they used to."

Vice Admiral Regent lifted one tree-trunk of a leg and slammed it down onto Cygnus so hard that the table split, then shattered beneath him.

"Don't worry about us-us," Regent replied, stepping through the rubble to press a booted foot to Cygnus' already cracked ribs. "Reinforcements-ents are on their way-ay. Anyway, now that we've got you-ou, we're at more of an advantage-age than you think-ink."

The King didn't try to resist much. Not that he enjoyed being manhandled, but he realized by now that struggling wouldn't do him much good. He knew he wasn't anywhere near strong enough to push the enormous man off of him.

"Your heretic daughter-er doesn't have the gods-ods on her side anymore-ore, does she-ee?" Regent went on, leaning forward to press down on Cygnus' lungs further, "–her pirate may have returned-urned, but from what I've heard-eard he won't be willing to fight-ight at her side-ide. That means-eans that the only real threat-eat from the god powers-ers is you-ou."

Though Cygnus struggled for air, his brain kept working a million miles a minute. Regent was operating under some strange assumptions. – Yes, Helena had offended the gods, but that didn't mean they wouldn't serve her. They had to if she consulted the Sybil. –and where did he get the idea that Zoro wouldn't help her? Sure, the two had quarreled. Cygnus had no idea if the prideful idiots had managed to make amends, but the pirate had already shown he would fight to defend Helena, despite some pretty powerful misgivings.

He wasn't about to let Regent know as much, though.

"I suppose there is one other person-on with access to the god powers-ers," Regent went on, lifting his boot off of Cygnus' chest at last. He placed two enormous, clawed hands on Cygnus' shoulders, lifting him easily and placing the tall, lanky man on his feet as he towered over him. "But she is a little young-oung, don't you think-ink?"

Cygnus' eyes widened, too shocked to hide his surprise. "No…" he gasped in consternation.

"That's right, Cygnus-us," Regent simpered, dusting Cygnus off with would-be conviviality and a crocodile smile. "Did you honestly think-ink you could hide her from us forever-er?"

"You may as well kill me now, halfwit," Cygnus told him point blank. "There is nothing you could possibly do to make me help you."

"I'm afraid you have that wrong-ong," Regent informed him, then nodded to Circe. The Captain let out a honk in understanding, and Cygnus found himself again enveloped in the now-familiar golden light as he transformed back into a bird.

"Now, Your Majesty-y," Regent said, grinning impishly at the goose in victory as Circe took in a breath to do her mind-control yodel. "Let's meet this lovely granddaughter of yours-ours."

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Author's Note: So, didja guess? Didja guess? Didja? - I didn't hear many theories after the last chapter about what Helena's final secret could possibly be, so I'm genuinely curious what you thought. By the way, I can now say it: Telemachus is well and truly dead. Gone. (Probably chillin' with Leda in the underworld somewhere, if that makes you feel better.) You didn't think I could do it, did you? Also, Hera's a...well, you know, a witch. Feel free to hate her. I do.

Here's where I come to you for help. I could really use some ideas for Zoro-Kuina II interactions. What are some things you'd like to see happen between Zoro and his daughter? I've got some personality traits vaguely decided for her, but I'm open to suggestions. You can already see she's got a problem with biting, a la Sunny Beaudelaire. (Actually, my inspiration from that came from life. My ten month old likes to bite me, and it seems like it's always in the same place on my arm. I've got a bruise like Zoro's! ha ha!) Remember, she's not quite two, which limits what she can do/say.

I look forward to your thoughts. Thanks for reading! Review please!