When I walk into our condo at the Garden Palace, I’m surprised to find a disaster centered around my bride to be. “Honey, what happened?”

  “I started looking at choices and had a breakdown.” She whimpers softly from the floor in our living room.

  I smile sadly, knowing that these kinds of things are hard to get past. I crawl up next to her and cuddle her side. “I’ll be here to pull you back together if you need it.” I whisper into her shoulder.

  She rolls over to kiss me, tasting of tears and thanks. I hold her close, accepting her affection while trying to be her anchor. She wraps herself around me until there is no more contact she can find, then ends the kiss and presses her cheek against mine and shivers.

  “Thank Andromeda for you, mate. Can we just be complete already. I want to feel your mana merge with mine and have a piece of you with me always.”

  “Mm, at least that secret came out before the wedding. I do hate surprises.” I say into her cheek. “We have a few weeks before you need to spill all of the secrets, so take your time.”

  She bites the lobe of my ear and I lose my sense of self for a moment. Next thing I know, I’m leaving bite marks on my fiancee’s chest with a fully open shirt that was not meant to open that way. Zia is breathing heavy and her breasts are heaving in front of my face.

  “Shit, I’m sorry baby, I didn’t mean to . . . you bit my ear! You know . . .” she kisses me hard, interrupting my voice and my train of thought.

  “You can make it up to me by not stopping. Kimber, rip the rest of my clothes off and fuck me like you’re claiming me.” She leans up to my ear and says “Wife.” And then bites my ear again. My consciousness flicks in and out, and all I know is that if I were a shapeshifter, I would have devoured her whole.

  ***

  “Kimber! You have to stop or we’ll be late” She arches her hip into me as I bite her hip bone.

  “Don’t start shit you can’t finish, Wife.” I destroyed her pajama pants last night so there is no barrier between my lips and hers. A long lick stops her protests, and I confirm that we’re going to be late for lunch with her parents.

  With a solid satisfied grin, I saunter down the garden arc on the outer ring of the Castle to the café that we have reservations. Zia is clutching my hand and being very lovey as we walk, and I couldn’t adore her more. She doesn’t seem as worried about the nightmare we’re about to wade through and that was my goal for the morning. Mission Achieved.

  I hear a familiar Pixie with a raised voice at the end of the patio for the restaurant that we’re walking to. I feel that this noise is only going to get worse, so I whisper to Zi and she nods while she heads to her parents and I divert to the server station.

  “Hey, ma’am, I don’t mean to be intrusive, but those to women are making a lot of noise and I would like a table set out for us on the lawn. Say, ten yards off the restaurant patio? I have ten credits incentive and the fact that we’ll be less loud.”

  “Oh thank fuck. Sorry. It’s just those ladies have been loud and catty and I’m ready to send them away.” I look down to see the name tag on her chest, troublesome placement that ‘Heather’ is. She flicks me an eyebrow and a smirk.

  “Heather, while I appreciate the sentiment, the small perky one owns the building.” The waitress blanches and puts a hand on my arm.

  “Please don’t tell her. I need this job.”

  I smile and chuckle at her desperate squeak. “No worries, convince the waitstaff to migrate a table to the green, I’ll deal with any fallout. To that end.” I reach into my storage and pull out a hand full of credits. “This should help with any management pushback.” Her eyes go wide and she nods vigorously.

  Bitch disappears she hops-to so fast. I have to turn to see my girl to make sure I didn’t imagine the whole interaction. I shake out the confusion and walk over to the minefield that is my future family.

  “Ladies, good afternoon. I am arranging a table on the lawn, if you would please follow me, we will be seated in more . . . distant accommodations.” Penny smirks, Zia seems relieved, and Katie seems permanently annoyed.

  “Kimber!” Penny exclaims, “looking dapper as ever.” The shit kisses me surprisingly chastely before continuing to speak. “How did you convince them? They are always resistant to my pressures.”

  “You both were making a scene, and I expressed that you were the owner of said lawn so that we could picnic on it.”

  “If anyone was making a scene, it was you flirting with the wait staff.” Katie accuses me.

  “How is your harem taking your meeting with the ex-wife, Katie? Well I hope. Sixty jealous women seems an impossible task.” Zia immediately slaps my shoulder while Penny smiles at me. Katie sneers and I can tell her ‘harem’ is not a fan of her meetings with Penny.

  “Penny! How is Mik? Have they come around yet?”

  She sighs in response. “They’ve finally come around after I nearly had to pinch their tits to get their attention. Turns out, expensive gifts can get the point across.”

  “Why are you even fucking here?” Katie accuses.

  “Uh, I’m the future wife and current mate. We’ve met before, Papa in law.”

  “I’m not fucking stupid, Kimber. This is a family meal to discuss family topics. Why . . .”

  “Are you kidding me, Dad?” Zia yells. “She’s my fucking mate. We’re already connected permanently. This is just an Elvin marriage to consolidate my whole being with her.”

  Miss O’Connell sneers at me as her daughter essentially sews our life together.

  “And you think you’re worth my daughter’s attention?”

  “Honestly? No. But that’s her call, not ours, chica. She wants me to share a millennia with her? My job is to live that long to be worthy of her affection.”

  “Baby, you know how I feel about self-deprecation.” Zia says, perhaps about to continue when the wait staff show up with a table and some carts.

  The table and the cloth with table settings are placed quickly, three of us sit as we are bade and Katie stays standing as though she were offended by the make of the flatware. I ignore her tantrum-like behavior.

  “Penny, you know we don’t want anything large, so how much are you ignoring our wishes?”

  She smirks and gestures when a 3-D representation of her plan comes into view. “Oh, I like the arch out of the Garden, but . . . is that artificial? Penny, where is this!?!?”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  “Super not telling. It wouldn’t be a surprise otherwise. Plus, I want to be involved. After I finished a project I’ve been working on for over a decade, Alphea told me she wanted to have adventures on Earth and live with you two. I’ll be honest, it hit me pretty hard.”

  “At this point, Penny, how are you surprised that people want to leave you.” Kaitlynne smirks.

  “Dad, why are you here? I foolishly hoped that you too wanted to be involved, but if your involvement is merely smearing feces on everything, perhaps you should go back to that Zoo you call a menagerie.” Zia sneers.

  “Oh? Did our meek little Elf get infected with the brash foolhardiness of her human?”

  “Kaitlynne O’Connell, you will be civil to our daughter.”

  “A daughter you forced upon me.” Oh, no she didn’t.

  “Listen Kate, if you don’t want Zia in your life, just go bury yourself in somebody’s crotch and hide away from your responsibilities. I hear you’re good at that.” I say standing and leaning over the table.

  I get a hand on both arms, one from Zia and one from Penny, telling me to back off a bit. Kaitlynne’s aura explodes from her, her eyes surge with a blood color and her fangs drop into her snarl. “My interference in your affairs will feel like a bee sting in comparison to what I will visit upon you now!” I had flared my Illuminating Gaze the moment her aura hit.

  [How dare that feral miscreant talk to me that way. Perhaps if the gangs find tier 3 weaponry, it will be the end of my attempts to disrupt Penny and Zia’s relationship.]

  Petulant Pixies, that bitch has no desire to have Zia as a daughter.

  \Be that as it may, Kimber, Katie is tier 5 and not someone to casually anger.\

  /Well, she now has plans to propagate tier 3 weaponry to Earth, so it’s not like she’s pulling her punches./

  \I’ll Look into it.\

  “Daring to message each other within my presence. How do you know my plans, Human?”

  “Supposition, mostly. I know that the tier restrictions on humanity are only nominal. Crafters of higher tiers are limited to the tier of their crafting instead of the normal Citizen limit.”

  “It’s actually related technology. A tier 3 cook cannot access tier 3 weapons, but can access that level of alchemics and medicines.” Penny adds for distraction.

  “I also know that anything above tier three is not suited for personal combat in most cases. That and any weapon sanctioned by the Empire or the Andromeda Forum is logged and tracked in minute detail.”

  “Experience with that have you? Not even tier two and the pet thinks she has things figured out.” Katie smirks and dulls her aura.

  My inner bitch smiles at the relaxation. Her hubris is astounding and is allowing her to think my thought skimming is a mere fluke of logic. Penny tells me she’s likely the smartest person in the Empire, and devoid of aether, so magic would make less sense to her, I suppose, considering she would have absolutely made the same leap I suggested I did.

  “Katie, I have no doubt that a war between the two of you would find you surviving, the real estate and people around you would not. I would hate to have to kill you both.” She does not continue her speech as the food I didn’t know we ordered arrives.

  It’s mostly sushi, so I know exactly what happened. Only Zia has something different, much to the distaste of Katie Mc’Bitchell. I grin as I smear the green paste all over my rolls of veggies and raw fish.

  “I think we need a river boat business confab this week, Penny.”

  “You’re staying for the week?!” The Imperial Pixie looks at her daughter with hope.

  “Yes mother,” Zia scoffs. “Kimber is convinced that you can convince me to wait two more months to bond with the other half of my soul.” She bends over to kiss my cheek and I can’t help but blush with a dopey grin on my face.

  What is this woman doing to me!?!

  “That said, I am going quite insane with the waiting.”

  Penny flutters with dust, and I flinch without thought. “When should I expect grandbabies?”

  “MOTHER! We both have new jobs. There will be no talk of babies from you for at least five years, since I know that my God Parents are moving after this Founder’s Day.”

  I can tell that the statement hurt Penny, but since Jenna and Dr. Summers have raised almost all of Penny’s kids, I can’t fault her logic.

  “Plus, Zia tells me that with likely changes with me between now and tier 3, we don’t want to limit their potential.”

  “Like you’ll live that long.” Katie smiles.

  This time, Penny flares her aura and some of the restaurant staff pass out. Katie staggers. “I take threats on me and mine personally, O’Connell. I think it’s time for you to leave.”

  Kaitie walks over to Zia and curls a hand around the back of her neck with a manic grin. “what if I don’t?”

  A screeching noise erupts from a glowing ring around the Vampyre’s forearm before the screeching stops and the arm falls away at the elbow.

  “I will be forced to be unpleasant.” Penny states with the certainty of a decaying orbit into a star.

  “How?” She stutters in disbelief at the neatly severed and un-bleeding stub. “I have the highest defenses a tier 5 magitechnician can make.”

  “You focus much on how much you know and how much power that that intelligence lets you curate. Only one of your staff focuses on how much I allow you to find out.” Penny says with the emotion of a billion-years-round stone.

  Her ex-wife’s arm erupts with blood suddenly as the Vampyre begins to look worried. She summons and ampule and stabs it into her stub. The bleeding stops but the limb does not show signs of regrowing just yet.

  Not needing to be reminded again, Kaitlynne grabs her fallen arm and walks down the garden ramp to whatever transport she’d arranged for the day.

  “Would this be a poor time to ask what tier you are?” I stutter in disbelief.

  “It’s always a poor time for that question. But know that as powerful as I am, the Andromeda Forum has race leaders that have surpassed a Mark in tiers. I am a long haul from protecting my people from them and I aim to reach it before I relinquish control of this Empire.”

  A Mark of tiers, where a tier is a Mark of levels? Level 256, what a benchmark. We get minor gifts at a half-mark of levels per tier, what would the boon be at a half-mark of tiers? Or a deferment to a full Mark of tiers?!?

  “What I should be asking you, is when you intend to ascend to tier 2?”

  “I, uh, was waiting for the second tattoo session.” I reply.

  “My lovely mate wants a chance to integrate your work into her . . . physicality.”

  Momma Pixie nods. “We’ve talked about this. Seems I should do that this week then? You’re ignoring your messages to make this happen, it seems. You are radiating aether.”

  “Baby, are you ready to ascend? Why haven’t you already?”

  “Zizi, same reason, I want the tier up to have transformative properties more than boons.” She looks at me oddly, then turns back to her salad.

  \Does she know about the Ordinal business?\

  /I may have insinuated that I was like you, but other than that, I haven’t confirmed anything./

  \Good. Huge penalties and all that. You might want to use your token for this transition. It feels big.\

  /My AI used it to keep me from killing myself with a mutation, so I’m afraid I only got a capacity bump./

  \Only?! Fuck, that’s the best result you could ask for. If your power were any higher, with your insane refinement, I would be looking to set you up with a distant Queendom for you to start and not cause me troubles.\

  “Penny! I would never . . . purposely cause you troubles.”

  “Relax, menace. I tease you because you also force me into situations I don’t want to think about: like religion.”

  “Oh! Zizi, did you know that your mom is my patron deity? It’s the craziest thing!”

  “Kimber-uh, we’ve talked about this!”

  “I’m sorry, love, but knowing my deity and being literally related to and friends with her, gives me some stupid leeway with my class.”

  “Mom,” Zia sneers, “You better not abuse this.”

  My Zizi is the hottest thing I’ve ever seen. Right now I can’t imagine a reality that anything loves me enough to warn her literal mother that she might have made the mistake instead of me.

  “You know how I found out?! You two were sexing in my house when I could literally hear Kimber in my brain, tainting it forever. That’s why I asked you to get a condo, and why I dressed your mate down and told her to never do that again!”

  My Pinkie-saur’s gaze waffled between us before erupting into a fit of giggles. “Probably a good time anyway. I had to listen to your encounters, and now that you and Mik are dating, I don’t want to . . . wait. You have been pining after this woman for two decades and she’s not chained to the castle. What gives?”

  “Zia. I have a type. As we all do. She loves her job, and I mostly have to invent quests to get here for a week of together time and canoodling.”

  “Mom . . .”

  “Calm, daughter. Mik is still responsive, just dutiful. When she’s here, she only sees me. I have some jealousy issues with her . . . previous galivanting ways, but I’ll be a Forum Troll if I don’t love the idiot.”

  “You invented a new ship drive for her, Mother.” Zia says, with a syrupy know-it-all tone.

  “I knooooow. I’m not into blondes, I’m not into relationships I have rank into, but Universe around, I love her.”

  “Get this, Kimber,” My lovely mate leans toward me and I kiss her despite her intent. “Aw, love you too, but anyway, Mik was trying to avoid her feelings for mom while mom was trying to find a way to show them to her without letting Mik avoid them. She invented a ship for her. Like, half the ship was UNIQUE!”

  I look at the leader of Humanity, “Bitch, you are dead-ass owned by that affection.”

  “Kettle? Kimber?” She snickers, though blushing like a lantern.

  “Mom, somehow you knew we’d be inseparable. As though Izzy-bear told you something.” My currently Elfin bae scrutinizes.

  A poof of air emits from Katie’s former seat, a small, pixie princess sits in her place grabbing the sushi and popping it into her mouth.

  “I would never, Sappy. You know better.”