Page 39 of Family Found

“Of course.” Gesango added something in Lugarra.

Kinnek nodded before turning to me. “Are you going to be okay while I steal Gesango for a moment? Why did Vergis leave you alone in the first place? You two didn’t get into a fight, did you?”

I shook my head and wiped my eyes and nose on my sleeve. “He said he was going to pick up ligua and didn’t want me to say how fluffy they all were. They really are fluffy. And so innocent.”

Kinnek sighed. “That was a good call on Vergis’s part, then.”

I nodded, still wiping at my face. “Yeah, I know. I’ll wait here, if that’s okay. I’ll do some more packing.”

Gesango turned one of the baskets he still had to fill upside down for me to sit on and refilled my tea, then handed me the cup. That was a bit much maybe, but it didn’t stop me from sitting down and wishing that today were over already, that the monster world were already separate from Earth again. I wanted Earth to be just a little safer for everyone than it had been in the last two years. That couldn’t be too much to ask, surely.

Chapter 13

The ko circle we used to get everyone back to Earth was massive, but then, our little group, as well as at least fifty Raikengana and all their stuff had to fit in there.

The Raikengana were not all going to come with us and help close the veils. Some were reinforcements for the base camp Hove would head, and while they could have traveled through a Lagasar near Esaka, going by ko circle cut the travel time and made sure there were no accidents on the way. I didn’t blame them for choosing the comfortable way of getting to Earth.

Lissir had found Sonyo during the final prep and kept the excitable little bagu company. Kinnek had double-checked Vergis’s ko circle design and pronounced it in order. The two of them were talking while Inkiri helped get everything into the ko circle.

Gesango stuck close to Aragis. Vergis, on the other hand seemed to want to keep his distance from Aragis. I hadn’t even seen them speak yet. I just stood around in the center of the design, waiting for someone to tell me to dispense and feeling slightly uncomfortable about being superfluous until then.

When Vergis, Kinnek, and I finally did join hands to pool all our magic, it was a relief.

We hopped the veils easily enough, and the land greeted me with its casual regard once we were back. What wasn’t all that casual was Nokim, who wove his way through the Raikengana to get to me.

“Rory!” He hugged me close, his clicks echoing in my ear. “Vergis and Charles told us everything! We’re so happy.”

And happy was right, going by how Hove and Fellisse greeted each other. In an almost rough move, Hove took Fellisse by the horn and pulled his head aside in order to get access to his throat and lick over his skin there. I hoped Lissir was covering Sonyo’s eyes.

But Lissir approached on my left. “Nokim, take your hands off Inkiri’s mate and coddle this little one instead.” He had a hand on Sonyo’s shoulder.

“Oh?” Nokim released me from the long hug and looked at Sonyo.

Inkiri came up behind me and wrapped me in his arms instead. “Sonyo made his case for becoming hanmen to our sentenmen, and Rory left it to me to decide, given he’s still new to Raiken culture.”

Lissir raised his chin. “Sensible. More sensible is teaching Rory about how things work in the Raiken.”

Nokim tilted his head at little Sonyo, who I now noticed was wearing, like, a copper wrap-around jacket over his normal clothing. Had someone told the kid to dress warmly for the journey? One of us was probably going to have to do that now. I’d have to check who was responsible for that sort of thing.

Nokim said something to Sonyo, who was still wide-eyed as he took in everything around him—a lot like I was feeling myself. I’d not expected to arrive where we had.

“This is the base camp?” I reached for Inkiri’s hand where it rested on my belly.

“Yes, sadir. Is anything wrong with it?”

“No, it’s just—this is Trinity College. Or it was. You brought us to Dublin.”

“Nice central spot to liaise with the humans,” I heard the other human in our group say, and I looked over my shoulder to find Charles making his way through the Raikengana. All of them were busy unpacking everything we had brought along. “You guys made it safer for the reinforcements to get here. There isn’t a fuse point that’s easy to reach this close on the Earth side.”

I looked around at all the busyness. “Makes sense they’d bring that much stuff, then.”

“You always supply your troops when you can,” Charles said.

I watched him approach Kinnek. It was entirely possible that I was reading the situation as overly romantic, but to me, everything else in the world stopped mattering for Charles. He had only eyes for Kinnek as he hugged him close, gently cradling the back of his head as he kissed him.

That was love, a kind of love I now recognized. That surprised me, given that it was still all new, but it also made me feel warm and fuzzy on the inside, and I wiped at my eyes before I accidentally started crying for them and alarmed all the bagua present at the same time.

Luckily, Inkiri didn’t notice, just led me away from the ko circle. Lissir, Vergis, Nokim, and Sonyo followed.