Chapter 289 – A Warrior Finds Her Place

*** Alzi ***

Isda comes waddling in, her belly dominating her frame. Shyla is pushing her Mother in a wheelchair behind her. Aurora's body is also dominated by my kids in her womb, but her eyes are fluttering around as her body shakes.

What happened to her?

"Sorry for being late. I'm not as mobile as I used to be," Isda says. "I know there's a lot going on here, but if we may have a moment? Shyla, if you would like, it is something that can and should be handled quickly. No need to put it off."

"Thank you, Lady Isda," Shyla says, pushing her Mother to me. "My Lady, will you please accept my Mother as your maid again? I- This is worse than I've ever seen her. Please."

A small flash of recognition comes to Aurora's eyes before she falls to the floor at my side. Is she trying to beg? Her belly is keeping her face from hitting the floor. Will she even be able to birth my children like this?

"Please, Lady Alzi," Aurora groans. "Let me serve you."

"Um, sure," I say. "I need someone to teach my Mother how to read. And me, too." I should be honest. I can trust Sarania to read them for me, but it would be best if I did it myself. It would be stupid to be a ruler who can't read.

"I would be honored," Aurora says. "My Lady." Her body is still shaking, but her voice steadies out, and she gets her arms under her.

"Is the pain really that bad?" I ask. What kind of fucked up shit is this? How many breeders are there for this thing to even exist?

"Yes," Aurora says. "It wasn't happy that I stopped serving you, my Lady. Give me a few minutes, and I will be fine. I'm sorry to embarrass you before the Queen. I will accept any punishment."

"Shyla, go take her to rest," I say. "I'm sure one of the Priestesses can show her to a room and maybe check on her kids. She is heavily pregnant."

"Yes, my Lady," Shyla says. "I will come back once she is safe." She helps her Mother off the floor and rolls her back out in the wheelchair, leaving Isda to start with her issue.

Isda twitches her fingers for a few seconds, refusing to meet my eyes. I guess she figured out what her Goddess did to me.

"I'm sorry," Isda finally says. "I never wished to hurt you or help others hurt you. I- I had hoped I could manage the house correctly, but I failed. I didn't help you as I should've, and then my prayers brought pain upon you. I didn't know she would do that. I didn't know, or I would've never done it. I promise. I understand if you hate me; I certainly would. And I kind of do. I know you are tired of hearing this. I'm sorry, but that is all I can offer for now. She is my Goddess. What can I do? I can only ignore her so much. When I found my Goddess, I was put in a position where I couldn't do anything without getting a Goddess mad at me, and I let that hurt you. I'll understand if you need me to be left out of the deals here, but I hope we can work together with the Goddess of Fertility to find a path forward for me to work for you. I wish to help your house, Lady Alzi. I wish to serve you as if you are my Goddess. You are more worthy of my loyalty than any Goddess is."

Sorry, sorry, sorry. Words my ex-wives loved. I want more. "How?" I ask. "What is going to keep you to that promise? You have all told me 'sorry' over and over again, and yet things never changed."

"We are going to be in your house instead of being in mine. Your goals will be the main thing we strive for," Elora says. "And we can talk with Fertility about helping Isda with her issue. You have a connection with the Goddess of Space and Geta with the Goddess of Death. We can ask them if there is something we can do to free Isda of her chains to Sex. There is the Goddess of Royalty we can ask as well."

The Queen starts to tap her fingers, eyeing the annoying angel closely. Like I can trust her to do the right thing for me.

"My Aunt. Where is she?"

"Justice took her," the Queen says. "Her Priestesses took her and provided their form of justice. I'm guessing she is free and likely the one who is stirring up the pot of dragons right now. After the war, you'll have her to extract true justice from. If she doesn't die."

So Nesh really did look into my case and didn't just fake it. Or they lost her and are blaming the Dragons for it. Whatever, I have things to worry about in the present rather than getting dragged into the past with her.

"As for the Mistress, we can work something out," the Queen says, sitting back. "Things are a bit complex with her. As you were her slave, she had every right to do as she pleased with you, just like you will have every right to do as you please with Esiyae. But we'll make things up to you, along with the rest of them. We'll have to enact new rules for temporary slaves, and I've been told one of your daughters is the new controller of the temporary slaves. Royalty isn't able to change the terms of the sales of slaves anymore. If you are able to communicate with her, we would love to hear what new rules she is placing on the slaves so I can make sure we all follow the will of the Goddess. For now, I have ordered them to be treated as workers instead of property. True slaves will continue to be treated as property. Marrying Elora would make it easy for us to make the owners disappear. Nobles would look the other way. The brothel owners aren't nobles, after all. But we can't just make the wealthy disappear for nothing."

I could get Yuki to make them disappear, but I doubt the Kitsune can promise that right here and now. Promising to take another Queendom's citizens as slaves would have to be close to declaring war.

"Marriage is a bit much," Sarania says. "I think we can go with a softer version of what the Goddess of the Dragons proposed. My Mother even sent a short message about that. I think it was a step in the right direction, but it didn't go far enough."

"I need to know about Yuki, and I need to see proof of your statements," I say. "I've had too many promises fall apart. The Mistress wasn't supposed to sell me, yet I ended up in the Princess's hand. Safety, rape, pregnancies. All things I was promised about and didn't have any follow through. Why should I trust any of you to act correctly? I need that before we can decide what our agreements will look like. I would like to avoid a marriage if possible."

"Fertility is caring for the Goddess that can enforce it," the Kitsune Queen says. "Why ask us when you can ask your daughter?"

"She isn't even a week old, and you wish for her to use her power on so many promises?" I say. "I don't know if she can even use her power as she wishes."

"Ask her Mother to help enact her power, then," the Kitsunes says. "I'm sure Fertility can help direct it if Contract can't do it herself, but as Yumanea stated, she has started to use her power already. She isn't some frail thing like us mortals. She's a Goddess. She can probably already understand what we say and can already make out what the contract should be. She may even spin it in your favor."

"My little baby..."

"She is your little baby, Lady Alzi," the Queen says. "Her being able to control her affinity won't change that you are her Father, but she is a Goddess. She isn't going to grow like a mortal. But it is possible she can't control her affinity perfectly yet, or perhaps she can't do it to the degree we need her to right now. You have her mark tattooed on you, correct?"

"Yes."

"Then, you should be able to use some aspect of her domain as well. I would imagine building contracts between you and another party would be the basic power from Contract's tattoo. Ask for help from Fertility and Sarania. Fertility should have an idea of the power, and Sarania can help to build the contract correctly. I doubt Sarania will let me control the wording of the contracts, but if you wish, Kiyomi and I would be more than willing to help build the contracts."

The door slams open behind me. White tails hide who opened it, but they quickly clear away to show me Yuki dragging a man and woman by the hair. Nakuma has claimed one of Yuki's tails for herself, hugging it in her arms as her tails wave about behind her. A warrior whose body I know well follows behind them, and another Priestess comes in after them with Shyla.

Quite the crowd joining us.

"Hello, Alzi, my Love," Yuki says, tossing the elves at my sides. She drops to her knees and kisses my hand. "I have brought the assassins that tried to hurt you and are behind your kidnapping. They're already full slaves, ready to serve you completely. I just need a Goddess to transfer the ownership. If you want them."

"I want my damn marriage," the warrior says. I may have memorized her body, minus her new tit size being two cups larger, and her arms have grown an inch along with two inches in the thighs, but her name eludes me. "Never send me back to that damn cold fucking wasteland. That shit freezes you to the bone."

"We are in an important meeting. Please try to soften your tongue a bit," the Queen says. "Elora is looking to marry Lady Alzi. If you are ok with marrying Lady Alzi in the future, then the marriage can go through. Otherwise, I will find another Princess for you to marry."

"I know this dragon. Her massages are relaxing. I was expecting to marry her as well. I'm fine with her being the damn head of the house."

"Very well. We'll have to figure out the details of the marriage of your house, Alzi, and Elora's. Yuki is promised to Elora, after all. We'll ignore the others, as they weren't there to sign off on the deal. Victoria would be a great addition to your guard detail, Alzi."

"Victoria," I say. "Victoria. Yes, that is fine." Shit, she's probably going to be useless as a guard. With a mouth like that, I am not going to have any choice in the matter. I'll have to correct her ways around the kids, and I only really have one way of doing that. Would she be willing to model for my carvings? If I make a full line of them as she goes through pregnancy, I could compare how her body changes based on the number of kids.

"Those are some nasty fucking eyes," Victoria says. "Don't put me on guard duty too fucking often. I want to have a damn easy life now. But that settles everything for me. Come get me when the damn wedding starts." She turns and walks back out, her strong ass taunting me as she goes.

I hope she counts constant pregnancy as an easy life.

Yuki. It's time to handle Yuki now. "Why didn't you free me?" I ask.