Ever Cynical

Chapter 57- Tribrid Babies, More Mates?

Kieran POV

I sighed as the weight of what this ancient dragon (now apparently my uncle by marriage?) had said hit all of us. At least we had some possible leads to get where we needed to be, but it was not going to be fast, nor easy. I could now feel and smell the added presence in Anais' body, and I was having a hard time staying focused. I knew it was important, but I was still in damn rut. My eyes drifted over Anais and Erik hungrily. s**t. I needed to focus. I looked to Uncle Tengjing and saw his raised eyebrows and slight grin.

"I have absolute faith in you and your mates, though. Do you need warriors from our clan to help with defense?" He asked, instantly sure we would agree to his generous offer. Royal guards from the Chinese dragon thrall? Who would dare to say no?

"Vidar is already sending me warriors, Uncle." Anais replied. Oh boy, even I knew he would be unhappy with other dragons guarding his niece. Tengjing huffed.

"That European upstart. I doubt his warriors are all that experienced, being as young as they are." He grumbled. Ana's eyes flashed in annoyance at her uncle. Now that they knew they were family, it seemed they were comfortable being much less formal with each other.

"Uncle, do not disrespect my friends." Anais snipped. "Vidar and his queen are very dear to me."

"Fine, but you should have family here guarding you." Tengjing complained. "I have grandchildren that could help. It always bothered me that Taiyan never took guards with him to Celtic Moon. Maybe things would not have gone so very sideways." He pushed. Anais crossed her arms.

"Taiyan is my father, then? You may send two, alright? One male and one female to be fair." She insisted, and he clapped his hands in delight. His fingers flew as he rapid-fired off a text.

"They'll be here in a day or so." Tengjing said as he grinned. "Now, once you've located Céibhionn and Rónán, let Tianlong know and I will locate Taiyan. Yes, Taiyan is both my brother and your father, Háizǐ. I don't think he's actually aware he has a daughter. I'll be here for dinner, but as excited as I am to meet the Luna Queen, I must return to my mate before she misses me too much."

"Why did you not bring her along, elder?" Erik asked him incredulously. "I don't think I could leave either of my mates behind if it was not necessary." I squeezed his hand, still in mine along with our Luna's. I was with him on that one. I was already struggling if I wasn't touching one of them constantly.

"Ah, well, she rarely leaves her garden. She's got millenias-old plants there and is nearly as attached to them as she is to me." Tengjing chortled. "Besides, this news I must share with Tianlong, and I just can't do it over technology. He's the one that thought to send me here, after all. I've also got to send out emissaries with very specific instructions to locate Taiyan. My gut tells me once he hears about you, he will want to come here, but will need to do so in secrecy. If Dark Witches catch wind of him here, you will all be in grave danger. Hopefully, we can find Céibhionn and Rónán quickly. I hope I'm right, that they are the council administrators." He said thoughtfully, stroking his beard.

Probably trying to find strategies to make our next steps more efficient, I'd bet.

"I've just applied to become a council member, actually. We should hear back in a day or so." I said and his eyes twinkled. You know when people are proud of doing something like they were the ones that told you do it? Yeah, that was totally Uncle Tengjng's vibe right now. I made a solemn vow right then and there to never, ever do that to my children.

"Very smart young man. I'd bet Ekezeic lit a fire under you, hmm? Good thing you took his advice." He said and I felt irritated. I know he's literally thousands of years older than me, but the condescension rankled. Even without Ekezeic I'd felt the only way to get support publicly, the best way to prevent people from trying underhanded bullshit, was to do so. "Don't be offended, pretty boy. I speak to my own King that way." He said. His eyes swiveled to Anais, truly examining her head to toe, his eyes widening. "Ohhhh myyy. Oh my dear. You are going to need warriors. Probably a few from each ally." He stood and began to pace. We all looked at each other, wondering at his sudden change in demeanor.

He was completely silent as he paced, every once in a while stopping, looking between all of us, rolling his eyes, and muttering under his breath. Somehow, in less than five minutes, he'd managed to completely undo his tidily styled bun that once sat atop his head and frantically stroked his beard at least another ten times. His long, sleek black hair flew out like a cape behind him as he walked. Ana finally had enough of his baffling behavior.

"Umm, is something wrong Uncle?" Anais asked. Her tone was getting more stressed by the moment. I felt a little envious of Erik, who was able to shove his face into her neck as our anxiety ratcheted up. Tengjing tossed his hands up, then turned and at pointed at each of us for a few seconds before tossing his hands in the air yet again. He took a deep breath, as if trying to calm himself.

"My dear one, you have eight babies in your belly!" He exclaimed in a tight voice, his disbelief apparent. Erik and my shoulders both stiffened at his outrage. Perhpas it wasn't the best timing, but it was what we all wanted.

"Yes, we're aware. My wolf was advised by the moon goddess that we had a limited window for both pups and cubs. It was necessary to restore the pack." I said defensively. I wasn't sure what about the presence of our babies had him so upset. I was getting upset with him for acting like we were naughty children who'd broken an invaluable vase.

"Okay. I understand, I really do. But the thing is... it's not just bears and wolves in her belly. They're going to be tribrids. In other words, Immortal wolf, bear and dragon. Allll wrapped into one. And people are going to come for them, as soon as they know." He sounded so stressed that it was really rather rude. I frowned at his answer.

"No, that's not possible. My wolf said there were five wolf pups and three bear cubs. Our DNA doesn't mix from two fathers like that." I insisted, crossing my arms. I know our mateship was magical and all kinds of blessed, but this was ridiculous.

Ri'dubh? I reached out. Silence. Goddess dammit. Erik could feel my stress and quirked a brow. I could feel my cheeks heat as my wolf pretended he'd gone deaf in my head.

"Well, what did he say when you asked, Alpha King?" Tengjing said in amusement, already guessing my wolf was keeping secrets again.

"Nothing." I grumbled. "Which probably means you are correct." Anais gasped.

"Here's the thing, when you're talking about the true royals, any child, as long as all mates have mated to the Queen, will share all of their fathers' DNA.That's why Anais herself, is a hybrid. If it wasn't possible, she would not have a dragon. Frankly, if Anais had a mate of each race, her child would be all of them." Tengjing announced to our chagrin. It sounded so stressful, to have a menagerie in your head! "So adding more babies to what I can only call a litter was unnecessary. Just mating would have made them genetically both of yours. You'd both have had your heirs without procreating to excess." He huffed.

"Well, I wanted more anyway." Announced Anais primly. Leave it to our queen to stand firmly against the ranting old dragon.

"Fine, fine, but if you end up with any more mates, you might want to wait to see how this all plays out before adding more racial DNA to the mix." I wanted to ignore his comment, but I couldn't.

"More mates?" Now, I know two should be plenty, right, but I was intrigued by this notion that as Luna Queen, she'd be connected to so many mates as a form of balancing. It meant she could not be more partial to one race or another, not that she would, really, because they would all be directly tied to her. No wonder Selene had kept her secret for so long.

"Yeah, she's probably got at least a Fae and Vampire mate out there somewhere." He rambled, not paying any attention to the emotions and expressions we were going through as mates. "Since your Beta was mated to a Kitsune... Have to see what your Gamma ends up mated to. There's always demons, basilisks, and werecats also. Or even Lycans, goddess forbid. Or..." He must have finally noticed our shocked and more than a little upset faces. "Err, I mean, it's not set in stone, of course. It might just be the two of you." He was misunderstanding. It was important to all of us that if indeed we had additional mates out there, we gathered them to us as quickly as possible.

If this prophecy was indeed about us. we could not be complete without all of our mates, nor could we put ourselves at risk by fighting without them. We also could not protect them until they were with us.

"We are not against more mates, Tengjing. We are worried that they are out there alone." I said, amused at the old dragon's utter shock. Anais giggled, and Erik and I both growled lightly. "All of us have no issue with multiple mates, though I'm not sure there's enough hours in the day if we end up with that many." I quipped. Erik smirked.

"I suggest reaching out to allies, asking if anyone has suddenly become desperate in the last two weeks to find their mate. I was hit out of the blue with my bear demanding I go to mate when I had no idea who my mates were." He suggested. "I was the only one in my pack, at least, so we don't need to call Jake."

"Alright, I will do as you suggest, babe. Anais, can you send out a quick email for me, mo chridhe?" I said, and she nodded, turning in Erik's lap to her computer. "We need to let them know it's urgent. Oh right, send one to Silver Moon too, since their Luna is a Lycan, perhaps she'll know something. They recently agreed to our alliance, but I've not had much time to speak with them yet."

"I honestly think we don't need to reach out to demons or basilisk, since my godparents are those." Anais said, tapping her chin. "With Mirgadok and Ekezeic camping out here, I feel like they'd already know, somehow." Tengjing paused his pacing.

"They are both here?!" He exclaimed. "In person?"

"Well, yeah. They're like her mom and dad." I teased, grinning.