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“Come again?”
“Lat-jo,” the munchkin on my lap says slowly, like he can’t believe I’m missing it. “Lat for Lat-sil. And Jo for Jo-ann-na.”
“Yeah,” Silann says. “And Sil-ann for Lat-sil and Jo-ann-na. Get it?”
“Well, I was quite clever, wasn’t I?”
Huh. I knew all along who my parents were. I can’t believe I was almost tricked by that imbecile who called me his mate. If I hadn’t a head injury, I might’ve de-brained him weeks earlier. Preferably before the mating tats. I fight the urge to rub at the marks again.
“Okay, we got chocolate to warm ye up before the dancing starts,” Mag hollers and Latjo scrambles out of my lap to run back to the other brats in the fort.
Silann crawls out of Hisa’s lap, but deposits a kiss on my cheek before running for the fur fort. Not to be outdone, Latjo doubles back and kisses my other cheek, then puckers over my shoulder for Bakog’s kiss, then whoops and hollers as he heads back to the fort.
“Still think DeBrainer’s a lovely name!” he calls.
“No.” Across the way, my mother shudders in my father’s lap. “Please. Just no.”
“Listen to yer mother, myiake,” my father says, using the orc word for lilacs, as he knits his brows together in a mock frown. And this... this is what I remember. Latsil, the great orc king-slayer, scarred for life, losing his heart to my beautiful, gentle mother.
Her best friend—on Brun’s lap—leans in to giggle.
“Hannah,” I say suddenly, another remembrance hitting me like a ton of bricks. “Hannah and Joanna. Their names rhyme. Best friends with rhyming names.”
Vinshesa, the mate of Kreele, scowls. I remember her face from the moon ritual, though not her name. That just came to me. “I am pipsqueak’s best friend also. You just don’t recall it because our names don’t rhyme.”
“Of course,” my mother says, reaching over and squeezing Vin’s hand.
From where I sit, I can actually feel the love between them.
“Her name never dawned on you because we called them Mom and Mum,” Hisa says, leaning up against Tok’s chest.
I nod, grateful that she’s giving me grace in my memory full of holes.
But then that also means... I gasp.
“Oh, my Goddess. Then you... and Bakog”—I twist in his lap to look over my shoulder— “You’re also mixed breeds.”
He laughs. “Of course, my love.”
So, the shame I felt was all imagined.
“Ye were born out of love, brat,” Brachard says and his mate, Aga, inserts her hand in his at his tender words.
But then he ruins it.
“Greatest accomplishment I ever decreed, mating your mother and father. Worked so well, I did it again and again, with that one, and that one, and that one”—his huge finger points at various couples— “truth is, I even had a hand in Mag and Ulga’s pairing.”
“Aye. If our King hadn’t been so noisy, I might’ve settled for a male meself,” Mag agrees. “Instead, the loudmouthed fool turned my head toward females.”
A bark of laughter escapes me.
Just then a little girl, no more than five, heads out of the fort and makes her way to Ulga, sitting herself in her lap. This little girl is light-skinned too, and looks like Azorr, who sits with the third human woman who is usually with my mom and mum. Abigail.
“She’s yours?” I ask the woman.
“Aye. Myesha. Our last. It’s time for the next generation to have babies,” she says, raising her eyebrows at me and Hisa.
“Oh, not yet,” Hisa protests. “We’re enjoying our honeymoon phase. Besides, Shally and I changed enough diapers.”
