Chương 717: Day Seven Hundred And Fifteen

Dear Diary," Your choices and yours alone, Your choices are important, Choices make you who you are." - Tabitha Diaz, Doctrine of Tabitha, Book of Agency In the second Verse of the Book of Agency, Tabitha reiterates that each of us are responsible for, and thus empowered to make, our own choices. She states that our choices have meaning and value.

She goes on to explain that the reason each of us should be aware of our choices, making them consciously, is not because of any external consequences, although she does address that in later Verses, but because it is our choices, not the various accidents of our birth, that make us who we are. Tabitha is not concerned with whether a person was born of a particular Human-Adjacent type, or to a particular family, or in a particular position of wealth, power, or both.

She is also not concerned with the lack of any of those things. In the end, her judgement will be based on the choices an individual makes during their lifetime. - Priestess Most High Above All Others, Archmage Imperator Saffron Aetos-Diaz, Commentary on the Doctrine of Tabitha I mean, I think that's accurate as to what I was thinking when I wrote that. I'm really not sure.

I know at some point early on I wound up getting Blessed with amnesia, after which I kept writing, but if I remember it right, it felt like one of those things that I'd decided to do, and felt compelled to do, but didn't really understand the deep reasons why I needed to do it. Shit, I'm only just now realizing that I had some kind of hyperfocus thing going on, and that's the only fuckin' reason I finished.

I mean, yeah, later on it was pure sunk cost fallacy, sure, but getting to that point, to where I had to keep going, that had to be hyperfocus. Not like I can point at some God on High and say 'oh, they inspired me'. I answered questions for you when I could, Daughter, but you are correct, I did not inspire nor direct you in the creation of your Holy Book. Good to know. Thanks, Dad. You're the best. I know.

So yeah, in an amusing turn of events, and by 'amusing' I mean I'd call it deeply ironic if I or any other normal sane human being knew what ironic actually meant, the first real use of Agency I can point at myself doing, where I chose to do something without feeling forced by circumstance, is my Holy Book, where I talk about our choices, our Agency, making us what we are. Thing is, I realize at this point that there's a bit of chicken and egg going on there.

Yeah, the choices we make form us as people, but they also speak to who we already are. So they're both formative and illustrative. Yes, I'm aware eggs have been a thing since the Cambrian Explosion, and chickens are just dinosaurs that nobody clued in to the fact that the Age of Dinosaurs is over. Which, given that the Mother of Water Panthers was from the age of Dinosaurs, I'm now regretting not asking her if dinosaurs tasted like chicken.

I am also trying very, very hard not to freak out right now that I know that they must, since she herself tasted faintly of chicken. Dark meat, sure, but definitely chicken, and Dragon and dinosaur are as similar as human and pork. Which I know from reading about it back in the day, not from eating both humans and pigs, despite some part of me thinking that I knew it because some part of that big Draconic bitch hasn't fully digested yet.

Or that her memories were part of her 'power', and I've inherited them along with that power. Of all the fucked up shit I've experienced over the past year, I did not have 'maybe remembering shit that happened to a Dragon in the Jurassic Period' on my bingo card. So yesterday after sleeping late and eating an oddly sweet meal in the water closet, I carried Siobhan down to dinner.

Saffron made little noises like she wanted to be the one carrying her baby mama down the Bore, so I deliberately misunderstood her, Co-Located, and scooped her up too.

"Sorry, Kitten," I murmured into her hair.

"Why?" I shrugged and snuggled her.

"You looked like you wanted to be the one carrying Darling down?"

"Hmm... True. On the other hand, I do so enjoy this." I snuggled them both as I carefully walked, did not run, down the Bore, because our kids would rightfully give me all the shit in the world if I ran on the steps. I kinda smiled at the heavy, tough fabric someone had covered the otherwise open railings with.

"Oh, no. I have been bribed from my intended indulgent behavior with a different indulgent behavior. Whatever shall I do?"

"Sneak off with me after everyone's asleep?" She chuckled and threaded her fingers through my hair.

"I think that's a fantastic idea. Consider me bribed into compliance with your wicked plan." If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

"Wicked? Me?"

"I certainly hope so." Unfortunately, dinner was... Interesting. Tallulah is not the greatest cook in the world. Okay, that's an understatement. After the past few weeks of me learning from Marie and Jack, our meals improving on the daily, having a grown assed adult fuck up steaks wasn't something I expected. To be clear, she didn't make steaks for everybody. The kids got eggs.

Okay, more accurately, there were enough eggs for the kids, and enough steaks for the adults, and if some mixing and matching happened, nobody involved had a problem with it, except maybe poor confused Tallulah. Still, Ria got her eggs, and she did a pretty good job at hiding the face she made when they were not up to my standards, let alone Marie's. On the other hand, the woman has a blessed gift with bread.

Three different kinds of bread, although one of them was 'off limits for non-Fae children', which wound up translating to 'the other kids got like one bite each because my kids know how to share, even when they might not understand when not to'. The black Academy bread had to be as good as the Maenads made at the Academy, which is even more impressive now that I know Marie is basically in charge of the Academy's bread mass production.

Finally, there was some rye bread, thick and chewy and good with the spreads she brought out in tubs. Garlic and herb butter, some kind of thick cheese, and pate, which she confessed to me later in the tub had been entirely Marie's doing.

"Hey, how often do you cook?" She just looked at me, confused.

"Okay, how many times have you cooked before today?" She thought about that for a bit.

"I think I made myself a sandwich once, when I was about half Ria's age. I snuck down to the kitchen while my mother dallied with my father."

"Tell me you've at least made bread before?" She stared at me for a moment, then shrugged.

"I've at least made bread before."

"Have you really?"

"No."

"Then why..." I slumped down into the Bath water, fully submerging and letting the heat draw the tension out of me. When I surfaced again, I muttered, "I'd do bad things to you with secret tentacles, but I think that would send all kinds of wrong messages."

"Besides, we've an assignation tonight already. You can play with her later."

"That's missing the point. You see how that's missing the point, right?" Saffron just giggled at me.

"Of course I do, I'm just too relaxed and happy and full of anticipation to care." Once we had everyone else in bed, she carted me off. By the time we finished, I felt the sun rising in the east.

"Looks like I'm gonna be way off schedule again today." She just shrugged at me.

"Should you need to be up during the day, simply let me know, we'll ready you for wakefulness."

"We?" She nodded.

"Tallulah and I. Karen, too, if you need her." I chewed on that for a bit.

"I dunno. Seems, I dunno, kinda..."

"You certainly seemed more than willing before the Liberation of Calverton." I rolled my eyes.

"Yeah. Major battle, stakes were literal life and death, I needed every edge we could get. That was just, I dunno, you helping me in a battle. In a safe-ish way." She snorted.

"You mean you using us to empower yourself before battle." I opened my mouth to reply, but her fingers on my lips silenced me.

"No, love. You were absolutely right to do so, and we Consented joyfully to being used that way."

"Yeah. Don't think you'd Consent quite so joyfully at me using you as a morning pick me up drink." She snickered, then batted her eyes at me.

"Oh, love. Were it something I could do passively, I'd say, 'drink me, eat me, fill yourself to bursting with me'." I snorted.

"I thought that was for Ledger Day?" She shot me all the side eye.

"Who told you?" Then held that for a ten count before she started chuckling.

"Oh, love. I have such things planned for you. Such awful and awesome delights. Terrific and terrifying in equal measure." That got me thinking about our wedding night. The one with Marie. Which reminded me of the current condition of our Wife and Concubine. Which got me pondering something I'd never really understood, even while playing with it.

"Hey, Kitten?" She sleepily murmured, "yes, love?"

"What's up with the boy mode thing?" She smiled and muttered, "you enjoy it, and it is somehow simpler." That got a laugh out of me.

"No, I mean why is that so important for the baby making?" That woke her up just a bit.

"You... you mean you don't know?" I shook my head.

"But you're the one who told me." I just kept staring in clueless Goof, and she sighed, smiled, and sat up, slipping her legs around me.

"Eggs and sperm, love. Female and male. Both are needed to produce offspring." I slipped my legs off the end of the bed, then stood up with her legs still wrapped around me, looking down at where she lounged on the bed, stretching her arms above her head, reaching for the headboard. I shifted just enough to poke her, then thwapped her belly a couple times.

"I'm pretty sure I've goosed you good with this a couple times. You telling me it's shooting blanks?" She giggled, and I realized she got the joke, since she'd been studying guns since I told her about them.

"Not exactly." Which was not an answer.

"Explain? I'm confused."

"Deliciously so. But, to perhaps clarify, are you a man with breasts or a woman with a cock right now?" Easy question, easy answer.

"A woman with a cock. Who is suddenly slightly less ready to sleep, because you keep stretching like that." She just purred at me.

"I hoped it was working. So, do women produce sperm?"

"No, they make... wait... That's just..." I looked down at it, then back at her, then down at myself again, then back at her.

"No."

"Yes," she giggled. I couldn't help it, that got me giggling. Fortunately, as we'd discovered long ago during our first sweaty morning encounter, giggling does not preclude shenanigans. We wound up sweaty enough we probably should have taken another shower before bed, but that probably would have woken us up enough to start things up again, so we just sponged off in the water closet, then slipped into bed with the rest of the fam, who all snuggled in around us.

Of all the fucked up shit I've dealt with here and now, this definitely rates as one of, if not the most hilarious, at least by my personal judgement. Snickered myself to sleep, really hoping the girls weren't awake to hear me giggling and muttering, "ovipositor."