It was closer to midnight than sunset by the time Lucas and his bridge finally escaped the crowds. Half of the guests had gone home to sleep by then, but as long as booze held out, it seemed likely that the party would go on. No one tried to stop them, but the only one who went with them was Mort. His carriage driver, turned valet, went ahead of them with a lantern to make sure that the newlyweds found their way through the home that was still only halfway built.

The basement lab was roughed in, but it was still weeks away from being brought online. Normally, that would have excited Lucas, but tonight he had other priorities.

He and Danaria managed to keep their hands off each other until they threaded their way through the construction site to the only finished room in the entire building. It was lit by three dim oil lamps, which provided just enough light to show off the bed that stood there in the stark, white washed room. It wasn't fancy, but in time when it had other furniture, it would be more than cozy. For now, all the two of them needed was the bed.

When they reached it, Mort tried to reassure them both that they were perfectly safe. "We have guards posted around the back and—"

"Yeah, I'm sure you got it covered," Lucas agreed, practically shutting the door on the young man. "Maybe not too close, though, right?"

Then, suddenly, at last, they were alone. He turned to smile at Danaria and ask her how she was doing, but he couldn't. As soon as he opened his mouth, she was kissing him with a hunger that he completely understood.

For several minutes, there was no talking. There was only touching and tasting as he pinned her to the wall of their new home and let his hands wander across her body. While they'd made out before, it was never with this intensity, and the only reason they got undressed as slowly as they did was because Lucas held himself back. The last thing he wanted to do was rip her dress.

A piece at a time, their clothes came off, and by the time Lucas had his wife down to her underwear, she was so shy that she'd practically frozen like a deer in the headlights. "You've got nothing to hide," he whispered as he bore he down to the bed.

"No one's ever seen me with so little on…" she said. It wasn't quite a plea to stop, but it was enough to make him pause.

"And no one besides me ever will," he agreed, tracing a line from where she covered her lacy white bra with one arm to where she covered her thin panties with the other. "And I got to tell you, it's a real privilege. It's like someone opened an art gallery, or built a cathedral all for me…"

As lines went, it was lame, but a lot of the clever things he might have said that occurred to him in the moment used too much Earth slang and would have derailed the conversation entirely. Still, she didn't seem to mind. She wanted to be appreciated, and after a few seconds, she moved her hands, letting him see everything, well, almost everything. He was only a couple of thin pieces of fabric away from seeing the rest, but as much as he hungered to, he waited to see Danaria's reaction.

"You're going to… we're going to make love," she whispered.

"We are," he agreed. "It's going to be amazing."

"I'm sure," she sighed, "But what if…" Her words trailed off.

"There's nothing to be afraid of," he said, kissing her again as he felt her tremble beneath him. "You'll like what comes next."

"I… " she paused, almost unable to say what she was thinking, "what if your seed takes root? What if we have a child?"

He paused as he tried to really understand her concern. In the world that he was used to, sex was more for recreation than procreation, and thinking about the two as inherently linked felt strange to him. There was magic that handled that sort of thing, of course, but Lucas didn't bring it up.

He didn't bring up the Lwynthenll he'd made for the occasion either. While he'd made it in case they wanted to make the night really special, he'd decided against using it well before this moment. He knew better than anyone that drugs made poor foundations for a lasting relationship, and he doubted that the nonaddictive sort would do much better than the sort he'd been hooked on back on Earth.

He thought about reassuring her that they didn't have to bang now if she didn't want to. Instead, he opted not to worry about it. "If we get pregnant, well, then we'll have something else to celebrate, won't we?" he said, answering her question with a question of his own.

That was apparently the right answer, and as he spoke, her nervous smile brightened noticeably as she released his hand. That was how people had lived their lives for thousands of years; either they'd have a baby or they wouldn't.

I'm too young to be a dad, he thought, not daring to speak the words as he lifted her negligee and reached for his wife's panties. They weren't really true anyway.

The truth was he wanted this woman for far more than sex. If that had ever been the main reason to get close to her, then it was a long time ago. While he wanted to explore every inch of her body, that was only a small part of their connection now, and he watched her face for the subtle signals of pleasure and pain as he took her for the first time.

. . .

Whatever doubts Danaria might have had evaporated with her first orgasm. While they started out slow and took a nap somewhere after midnight before the second and third rounds, by the end of the night, he'd woken up something insatiable in his lover, and he was okay with that.

While he wasn't sure if she was pregnant yet, he was pretty sure she would be before the first month was out. He hadn't fucked like this since high school, and suddenly he'd found another use for the superhuman endurance he'd used to beat the ice troll and Skylara.

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Maybe that's what I should make, he told himself as he listened to Danaira snore softly beside him.

He considered it for a moment before he decided against it. Nah, I already have two little blue potions. The world doesn't need any more of those.

What did the world need more of, though? That was the question. Despite fucking for hours, he was energized now. The realization that he was married, and soon he'd be a father, mixed with the knowledge that he was pointlessly, hideously wealthy, and his mind was racing. What was he supposed to do next? Build an alchemical plant? Run for president? Just try not to get himself in any more trouble?

Lucas lay there restlessly, but eventually got up and put on his pants to go outside so as not to disturb Danaria's slumber. If I do, she's going to want to go another round, and that might actually kill me.

Outside, false dawn colored the horizon, and though the music had stopped, a few lanterns were still lit in the village square. Lucas stood there for several minutes trying to put all of this into some sort of perspective. Then, the sound of footsteps made him whirl to face the house.

At first, he thought it might be an assassin, or worse, a guard. He quickly saw it was the silhouette of a naked woman, though. No, not a naked woman, he realized. A dryad.

The woman was busty enough that he knew it couldn't be his Danaria, almost from the first moment, but beyond that, he couldn't say. For one terrible moment, he feared that Skylara had come back from the grave to rip all of this away from him. Then he recognized the blossom on the head of the plant woman, and a few moments later, when she stepped out of the shadow of the tree she'd been under, he saw her green skin.

"I understand that congratulations are in order," she purred, making no attempt to conceal her nudity nor her sexuality. On any other day, his gaze might have wavered as he looked her up and down, but not today. Today, he'd seen a beauty that even the most erotic forest spirit couldn't hope to match, and he met her gaze evenly.

"What are you doing here?" Lucas asked. "This isn't the Prince's love nest, and whatever you're selling, I'm not buying it."

"Though I do owe you a debt for killing my master, that is not the reason I've come," she agreed. "We aren't here to talk about my debt. We're here to talk about yours."

"Mine? I don't owe you anything," Lucas answered with a shake of his head.

He wanted to believe that he was dreaming. This felt like a dream, but the air was just chill enough that he knew it wasn't. Still, even as he racked his inebriated, lust-addled brain, he couldn't think of what she was getting at.

"Look, I don't know what kind of game you're playing, but I never touched…" he lowered his tone. The last thing he wanted to do was wake up Danaria to find him arguing with a naked dryad in their back garden. "I never touched any woman in that little prison, so if you think you can shake me down…"

"This is not a tawdry scheme or a mortal debt to be easily discharged," she responded as his words finally coasted to a stop. "I come with tidings from Lwyn herself."

"Fuck…" Lucas blurted out, unable to suppress his misgivings as things finally started to fall together in his mind.

The forest nymph smiled wickedly at that. "Indeed. Though you did not avail yourself of the pleasures I might have offered you before, she has still bid me congratulate you on your union, your slaying of Skylara, as well as your first steps toward godhood. As she said, 'to think those angels called you unimportant. You've been a very busy boy."

As the nymph repeated the goddess's words, she did it in the goddess's voice, which Lucas found more than a little disconcerting. He opened his mouth to respond, but the dryad continued. "However, none of those are the reason she asked me to pay you a visit on this night, of all nights. She asked me to remind you of the favor you owe her, which would come due only after the dragoness was no more."

Lucas nodded. He knew that was coming from the moment Lwyn's name had been invoked. While that unnamed favor was enough for him to hope Skylara had lived another thousand years, after she tried to roast Danaria, that outcome was never in the cards.

"What does she want?" Lucas asked, not bothering to try to get out of it. There obviously wasn't a point.

"Sometime in the next decade, when the Great horde hears the news, the Khrall'koh'thon, the Breaker of Cities, will bring his endless hordes south to feast upon the defenseless region," she explained. "When that happens, you are to slay him and break his army, defeating them so soundly that they never rise again."

"That's all?" Lucas laughed. "Who needs a whole decade to solve that?"

"She will be pleased to hear of your confidence," the dryad teased. "While it might be up to a decade from now, it could be as little as two or three years."

Lucas swallowed hard at that. "Noted," he said finally. "Does she have any advice on the subject?"

The dryad smiled cruelly and pretended to think for a moment before she answered once more in the voice of the Goddess, "I'd recommend you take over control of the city to marshal its resources first, but given that you intentionally tossed away those options so recently… Well, that could complicate things, but I'm not concerned. You're a very clever man, Lucas Parin, and one day, if you survive, you may be a very clever god, too. Don't disappoint me, I'm looking forward to it."

While he stood there processing those words, the dryad turned and left without a word. When she approached the tree, she vanished inside of it, as if it contained an invisible door marked, 'plant spirits only, keep out.'

Then, he was alone with his thoughts. While his peace wasn't exactly shattered, he certainly felt it ripple uneasily around him. Still, some part of him was glad he no longer lived in mystery, and the other shoe had dropped. As he tried to figure out exactly what he should do about any of it, though, he heard the house door open behind him. This time, the silhouette of a woman in a robe didn't frighten him; after tonight, he knew her shape too well.

"Is everything okay, Lucas?" Danaria asked.

"Never better," he answered immediately. It wasn't even a lie. He really had never felt better in his life than he did tonight.

"I thought I heard you talking to someone," Danria said, looking at him sleepily. "Was there a woman back here with you?"

"The only woman here is you," he said with a smile. Part of him wanted to tell her about Lwyn's task. "Now let's go back inside before you catch cold."

While part of him wanted nothing more than to be completely honest with her, the rest of him didn't want to ruin this peaceful moment. So, he decided that complete honesty could wait until at least tomorrow. For that matter, so could his worrying about it.

As he went back in with his beautiful bride, he firmly pushed thoughts of mischievous goddesses, dragon hoards, orc hordes, and anything else he could think of right out of his mind. Tonight belonged to his wife, and no matter who popped out of the woodwork, that wouldn't change, not even for the Goddess Lwyn herself.

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