"Joxer the Mighty
Roams through the countryside
He never needs a place to hide
With Gabby as his sidekick
Fighting with her little stick
Righting wrongs and singing songs
Being mighty all day long
He's Joxer—he's Joxer the Mighty!" Gabrielle sang to baby Joxer.
"Is that really a suitable lullaby for my son?" Xena tried to say seriously, but she couldn't quite keep from smiling.
"You can say a lot of things about Joxer's fighting skills, but you have to admit his songs were catchy," Gabrielle answered, smiling. She laid him down next to the sleeping Cyrene. "And it put him to sleep."
Xena shook her head and said with motherly amusement, "The way that kid fights sleep."
Gabrielle watched the sleeping babies with a new sudden interest. "Joxer looks a lot like Ares, doesn't he? Except for the nose. He definitely has your nose."
"I've never really noticed. I wonder what's taking Hercules and Iolaus so long to get the supplies?"
The abrupt change of subject proved to Gabrielle that she had. "Cyrene, however, reminds me more of Solan except for the hair and eyes, of course. I think her hair will darken into Eve and your mother's hair color."
"Joxer is Joxer and Cyrene is Cyrene. They will look like themselves. As long as they're asleep, I'm going to go get some fishing in."
"Fine, I get it. Speculating which family members they look like is not your cup of tea."
"I just think it's purposeless, but now you can have all the time you want to speculate. Although if you want to make yourself useful, Cyrene and Joxer still need some stitching done to their hats."
Gabrielle sighed as Xena departed the camp, but she went over to the saddlebags to fetch the unfinished hats. The hats were attractive. Xena's stitching was impeccable whether it was stitching up a wound or a garment.
"What are we going to do with your mother?" Gabrielle asked the twins as she threaded the needle.
The sleeping Joxer stirred in response to Gabrielle's voice and the blanket that he held in his tiny hands ripped ever so slightly.
Gabrielle tried to swallow back her nervousness. "Let's just hope the blanket was wearing thin," she said softly and she hurried to sew the blanket up with the needle and thread.
sss
Ares hadn't visited the fates in awhile, but now he wanted answers about these new kids of Xena's. He wanted to know if they were going to be the threat that Eve had been. Children belonging to Hercules and Xena couldn't bode well to what was left of the Olympian gods, but what he really wanted to know the most was where he fit into all this. He wanted to know if he was still going to be a part of Xena's life and affections or if Hercules had crowded him out if it like he had done with their father.
"Long time, no see. Is that a new loom?" he queried, trying a bit of small talk before plunging into the real matter. "I have a question about these new kids of Xena's. Do their life threads spell any doom and gloom for me?"
"You will no longer be the god of war because of these children.
Olympus will never be your home again.
You will see death."
Ares hated the way they spoke in turns like three people sharing one brain. It made him angry but then a lot of things made him angry and this new prophecy was one of them. "Are you saying I'm going to have to kill Xena's brats?"
"We do not advise.
We only tell what will be.
Or show what could be."
"What about Hercules? Is he going to become Xena's new shadow or what?"
"He will see Xena.
More frequently than he has in the past.
Hercules will feel a duty towards Xena's children as long as the children live."
"I guess I know what I have to do then," Ares said darkly but without his usual passion.