I blinked twice, thinking about what Mab had just dropped on me. Having the Queen of Summer gunning for me was terrifying, it was the sort of thing that made wise men looking for a nearby hole to crawl in and die. I was smart enough to know before I said something that a year prior would have sounded impossible to me.

"No. I'm not going anywhere."

Mab arched a single brow.

"Unless you've forgotten, I was there last time. Heck, I'm the one who told you what to expect. And I sure as hell remember the timeline of the next couple days where the world of fairy is concerned. There is no way you told The Queen of Summer what is coming until after the Summer Knight died so that you could be sure to have as much control over the situation as possible. Even if they're sending their heavy hitters my way, Summer can't afford to send that much at me at once and the Summer Queen can't afford to waste too much power on vengeance while she's missing her knight. If the Summer Court shows that much weakness and foolishness you'd be on them in an instant. So - Summer's heavies are going to have to go the long way round and Nekheb isn't exactly easy to get to." I shook my head, the idea of it seeming more and more absurd by the moment. "I've listened to endless rants from Lea about how much trouble it is to maintain two fortified positions in the Nevernever. And I'm not stupid, even if you negotiated passage through the Nevernever for the forces of Summer you left enough room for Lea to fulfil her obligations. Heck, even if they get through the worst parts of the Nevernever to get here, they're walking into a fortress city made with the expressed purpose of repelling the supernatural. I don't have all the wards working yet, but I've got enough that I feel confident in my ability to make sure that some supernatural nasty can't sneak into the Palace without me knowing. And I've got a whole army worth of Jaffa just itching to put the hurt on any Furling who looks at me funny."

I reached out and picked the page Mab had discarded upon the table. "So as far as I can tell, I am in a highly defensible position behind ancient wards, defended by a massive army, and guided by a Genius Loci that will happily aid me in crushing anyone who invades my city. Summer is stretched thin and able to only toss a token effort to kill me. I don't get how it even remotely benefits me to strand myself on another planet and just make myself an easier target."

"There are many reasons Warden. The first is that you over-estimate your ability to repel the Summer Fae. There are warriors of Summer who did not participate in the war as you described it to me, great and terrible things." The Winter Queen's eyes twinkled with malice. "Precisely the sort of things my opposite might throw at the one who engineered the death of her child. A week of fighting those creatures would force you to withdraw soldiers from your front lines and allow Chronos and Moloch to decimate your forces."

"Force you are pledged to aid." I retorted.

"How, and when I aid is very much a matter of my discretion, Lord Warden." The Winter Queen disagreed. "And as my pledge of safe passage is only through my own territory to reach where you are, thousands of your vassals need not die needlessly in the crossfire between your armies and the forces of Summer, provided that you are not actually on Nekheb. In a week, the only viable way for them to travel here will once again be as guests of your war against Chronos. The Summer Queen cannot afford my price a second time."

"Oh, I see, you're redirecting me from a hardened fortress for humanitarian reasons." I snorted. "Now it all makes sense."

"Many of your vassals will die if you stay Warden. I do not lament their passing any more than I would for any other mortal, but they are your people and your responsibility. How you choose to fail them is, of course, your prerogative." Mab's smile widened. "But if those lives alone are insufficient, there is a more personal reason to comply. Because if you do not, it seems entirely likely that a son of Margaret Lefay will meet a most unfortunate fate."

"Hah," I snorted. "You don't say."

"No Warden, I am referring to the other child." Mab might as well have stabbed me.

The other son of Margaret LeFay, our mother. Thomas, she was talking my half-brother. A vampire of the White Court, Thomas Raith wasn't someone whose relation to me I publicly advertised. Neither one of us wanted it to get out and end up being used as blackmail against either of us.

I'd gone out of my way not to tell her that Thomas was my brother when she'd asked me about the future.

Somehow, she'd found out anyway.

Bitch.

I'd already been planning on doing what she told me to, I just wanted to see what information I could bleed out of her to explain what her goal actually was out of this, but this changed the stakes, and she knew it. It was stupid and selfish for me to be more worried about my brother than the citizens and soldiers of Nekheb, but he was family. Being irrational about family was kind of par the course.

A rush of emotions ran through me, shock at the threat she'd just made, horror at the realization that Mab knew of the connection between me and my brother, and then abject confusion at what the threat implied. "But – he is alive, I mean he keeps being alive for years more. He was still alive when – " I paused, avoiding saying more in front of my household staff. Mab, of course, already knew, she'd spent days grilling me on the specifics of the next couple of years – milking me for every possible detail no matter how insignificant. I considered my next words carefully. "His future was already set."

"I have altered his course." The Queen of Air and darkness replied with a tone of arctic cold. "It took remarkably little effort really."

"But – that's insane." I sputtered, my metallic voice boiling with rage as my eyes glowed like angry coals. "If he dies then you're going to cause a paradox! You could destroy everything!"

"Paradox is an overrated threat, Warden. Important events in history that have happened have a tendency to continue happening. Certainly, the events that brought you here will unfold. If they still happen in a pattern that pleases you, however, is up to you." The Queen of Air and Darkness strode around me, cooling the air by ten degrees simply by virtue of her proximity. "The Vampire is important to you, but you'll find that few men transpire to be important to history. If he lives or dies, history will stay much the same. The life of any one man is rarely enough to turn the tide. He has saved you many times, but you are not without friends and allies. Had he not been there one of your other compatriots would have been."

"That's a hell of a gamble to make." I replied, wanting very much to set the evil Queen of fairy on fire.

"Not especially." The Fairy Queen replied. "Surely you've noticed that certain memories are fading and others are clear in a way that seems disconnected from the norm."

"I don't…"

"Don't waste time lying warden." Mab sighed in exasperation. "We've already spent more time discussing this matter than I'd care to and every instant you waste on denying truth is a moment that the child of Margaret comes closer to lasting harm."

"Yes, I've noticed." I had taken it for homesickness at first, the brief little bursts of insight and clear daydreams. Not often at first, but with increasing regularity I had begun to remember days that I was certain had never happened or had happened in a slightly different way from how I was equally certain was the truth of how that day had unfolded. "I'm – I'm remembering how things happened before and after I changed the timeline, aren't I?"

"Warden, were you some mere Wizard you wouldn't even have that much insight. You would just accept the reality you caused to be the only one to have ever happened." Her matter of fact tone was clinical, as though she were talking about a fond hobby rather than re-writing the fabric of reality. "Even your memory of events that once that might have been will be only fleeting. If he dies, you might never even discover his existence."

"But if I go then he'll live." I replied, not bothering to keep the venom from my tone.

"If you go, you'll have a chance to keep him alive." Mab touched the page in my hands, motes of blue light dancing down from her finger to the gate symbols on the page. "What you do with that chance is no business of mine. I lose nothing of great consequence if the vampire dies and no matter how angry you become once he is slain, you will soon forget and return to being a valuable ally."

I shook with fury, the page crumpling in my fist as I tightened it. My knuckles popped loudly as I snarled. "You had no right to bring him in to this."

"I had every right." She replied. "I am Mab. Now you may gamble the child of Margaret's wellbeing on the goodwill of his father or you can take my chance to save him. I leave the choice to you."

Check and mate. By the time I'd been sent back in time the White Court had been taken over by Thomas' half-sister Lara, leading to a "kinder, gentler" White Court. But back before I'd known who he was, house Raith's leadership hadn't been quite so cuddly. Mab knew that there was no way that I would leave Thomas to the "mercy" of the King of the White Court. The man was a monster, plain and simple. A monster my mother had cursed to be unable to feed and replenish some of his nastier mojo, but still a monster. That whole thing about a "kiss of death" that the Mafia ripped off? That was based off of him.

"Fine." I snarled, my lip curling. "I'll go."

"The Tau'ri will meet you at the address I have provided." Mab replied.

My anger evaporated back into confusion. "The Tau'ri… you mean humans from Earth? Soldiers?"

"They bore the uniforms of Earth's warriors, yes." Mab replied. "Lest you forget, I too have a war to wage with Summer. I cannot convey you to the First World myself else I risk bringing Summer's vengeance upon me and mine for the harm you will bring its Lady. And the Asgard are reluctant to allow anyone to arrive through the void."

"So, you arranged for me to go there through means that are outside of your control." I nodded, "In a way that doesn't cause direct conflict with the Summer Court or the Norse pantheon."

"I have," Mab replied icily, sounding as though she were irritated by my lack of gratitude. A tone that managed to simultaneously be infuriating and patronizing. "They know to expect you. If you go to this address you will be transported to the First World by them with appropriate discretion."

I raised an eyebrow in surprise. "They know what is going on?"

"Of course not. They have a scrap of the image that they've woven into an entire tapestry of ignorance." Mab snorted. "But we make do with what we have, not what we might wish."

I nodded. "That's why you wanted me to take such a small retinue. If I showed up with an army the military would think I was invading."

"Precisely." Mab smiled. "Four individuals are a much more manageable threat. We wouldn't want to scare them away or have them decide to shoot to kill, would we?"

"No," I agreed. "I prefer not to be shot with lethal intent."

"Good." Mab snapped her fingers, opening portal into the dark landscape of the Nevernever. As always she opened a way in front of the massive army she kept on the other side, a retinue of tens of thousands of Fairy warriors. "Happy hunting, Warden."

I waited for Traitor's bane to let me know that my fairy visitors were really, truly gone before I let loose the series of epithets I'd been holding back. I punched the stone table's surface, boring a hole in the diorite with my closed fist. My brother was in danger, likely lethal danger, and it was all my fault.

Of freaking course. I'd known that Mab was going to twist the knowledge that I'd given her – pervert it to her own use and benefit, but I'd made the error of assuming that she was as averse to paradox as I was. Hell, I'd made the arrogant assumption that she would actually treat paradox as a threat. But she was Mab and she would always be Mab – the trials and tribulations of individual mortal concerns were beneath her interest if not her notice. She would kill everyone I knew and loved in an instant if she believed it were in her best interest to do so.

And I could already see about a dozen benefits to forcing me from my stronghold. Even if I didn't manage to get back to Earth, where Titania's retainers would most definitely be able to reach me with ease, I could easily drag them across the galaxy. Some of Summers strongest hit men, and I could drag them halfway across creation for a week. Assuming, of course, that I survived that long. Some of the baddest of asses hung their hats in the court of Summer. Just because they were generally accepted to be the nicer of the two courts didn't mean that they were any less deadly.

Leading Thomas to almost certainly lethal danger? That was barely an afterthought as far as Mab's plans went, just a final enticement to ensure that I danced to her tune. And while I was certain that neither distracting Summer nor saving my brother were Mab's actual goals, I was equally certain that if I stayed I would forever blame myself for the loss of innocent lives in my Kingdom.

I had only recently reconciled myself to thinking of the Theocratic Monarchy of Nekheb as my own, though I'd been living there for the better part of a year. Call me crazy, gumshoe to "divine lord of the galaxy" wasn't a seamless transition. I was already having nightmares about the men I sent into combat, men who I knew were going to die by the hundreds. Hells Bells, I wasn't qualified to actually run a war. But my Generals still came to me when they were at an impasse, turning to their "god" for guidance when all other logic had escaped them. What was I going to be able to tell them that their decades of experience waging war couldn't provide? Who was I to choose who lived and died? Ul'tak and the other Jaffa were better at the strategy of war than I could ever hope to be.

But standing around and just being a rubber stamp for my First Prime's orders? Nah, that wasn't going to happen.

So, I'd done the only thing that I could do to still be able to sleep at night. I made sure to fight alongside them. I found out wherever the fighting was going to be bloodiest, where the battle was sure to be near hopeless, and I made sure to go there and fight with my Jaffa warriors. It didn't mean that we won every time, or even half the time but I knew that some of the men fighting in my name would make it back alive. Even in the most hopeless fights, some of them would make it back to their families.

It doesn't take many battles watching young men die in your name for you to claim their cause as your own. I was a mediocre god at best, but I would be damned if I was going to make these people suffer more in my name than was absolutely necessary. I would commit men against evils like Moloch or Chronos, but against the forces of Summer? Not so much.

Sure, they were trying to kill me because they thought I was an evil monster who wanted to kill their queen. Generally speaking though, the forces of Summer were decent people and good neighbors. They were the sort of beings that Walt Disney would likely have cast as protagonists in his animated films, powerful and dangerous but ultimately good. It wasn't sure if my Jaffa would end up hurting them more or they would do more harm to my Jaffa, but either way I lost in the long run.

"My Lord, do you truly mean to comply with the Demon Queen's wishes?" Muminah spoke, her voice a somber whisper. "Do you mean to travel into darkness with only three companions?"

"I have to." I replied, choosing a tactical application of truth rather than an outright lie. "I owe Margaret LeFay my life. If her child is in danger, I must save him by any means necessary."

"Yes my Lord Warden." Muminah bowed her head in supplication. "My Lord, if I may be so bold as to make a request?"

"You may." I sighed, wiping the diorite dust from my fist. "I don't promise to comply with it, but you may."

"I wish to come with you." Muminah interjected.

"Muminah…. I, I don't think that's wise." I replied. "I am going to be heading into danger, blind to what is going to happen next."

"Do you think me defenseless?" Muminah crossed her arms, the enchantments in her tattoos shimmering nearly imperceptibly as she did so.

"No, I conceded. I do not." The priestesses of Heka, now "Ha'ri" were a blend of Jackie Chan, the secret service, and a portable anti-monster warding tattoos. Muminah might have been five foot nothing and change, including the chestnut hair she'd finally allowed to grow to shoulder length, but I'd seen her take down full grown Jaffa warriors on the practice mats. I doubted the practicality of combining so many piercings with a clergy who practiced a variant on Greco-roman wrestling mixed with Krav Maga as part of their sacrament, but the result was a bunch of fairly badass women.

"Then I wish to be part of this, my Lord." Muminah insisted. "You have spoken that man is judged through his right and righteous action, but am I as a woman merely to stand on the sidelines without the opportunity to prove myself? You have taken men and Furlings into battle countless times, but mortal women have a way of being put on a pedestal and secreted away to safety as though we were made of glass. I am made of faith and fire, my Lord, and I would not abandon you in your need."

"Geeze tell me what you really think." I sighed.

"I have overstepped." Muminah bowed her head in supplication.

"No… no. You're fine." I acquiesced. "And honestly I probably need someone with your talents to come anyway." All but the strongest fairy enchantments and veils fell apart within a few yards of the priestesses' tattoo wards. I probably couldn't afford to not have her with me under the circumstances.

"And the other two? Ul'tak? The Ancient One?" Muminah queried. "The Bob?"

I shook my head. "No, the Jaffa need to stay and direct the war and Bob… Bob needs to be here rather than on the first world."

This was going to be a dangerous journey. If I died I couldn't risk letting Bob fall into the wrong hands, now with all the knowledge he'd gained since we'd come to Nekheb. Not to mention the danger of letting my brother see Bob. If he recognized Bob later on when he and I started living together, it could mean a whole world of paradoxical potential. No, Bob was best left on my throne, behind a shield and under orders not to drop it for anyone but me. He was better at running the palace's magical defenses than I was anyway. With any luck, he'd delay the forces of Summer from realizing they were on the wrong planet till after I'd left.

"Then who my Lord Warden?" The high priestess tilted her head in curiosity.

I smiled, imagining Colonel O'Neill's reaction when we reached Stargate Command. Just because I wasn't showing up with an army, didn't mean I couldn't put on a show. "I know a guy who knows a guy."