Chapter Eleven
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GRACE HAD SPOTTED ANOTHER gold comet at midnight when she’d ducked outside to check last night.
It had become her ritual now. She didn’t have a knight to wake her up frequently for nookie, so she didn’t need to spend as much time in bed as the other females.
Her excitement that maybe this time her mate had arrived died a swift death when she saw Zoe’s expression in the morning.
It had taken a single shake of her bestie’s head to inform her that the latest knight belonged to someone else.
Zoe had waited for everyone to be gathered at the dining table for breakfast before she’d broken the news. There had been the usual speculation about which brother had just turned up and what his cambion would be like. Their matriarch hadn’t seen much. She just knew that the pair had already met.
They’d all spent the day working on the ensuites that still needed to be installed.
Cam and his brothers had poured concrete in every room, making the entire base level.
Zo had decided she wanted redwood floors, so the knights had teleported to a distant forest. They’d returned with a gigantic fallen log and Oaklie had worked her magic on it.
She’d formed a bunch of floorboards and Sin had duplicated them.
They’d all helped install the flooring, using rubber from a carpet store to cushion the wood first. Sin had created enough of it to cover the entire floor of the base.
Zoe was admiring the glossy sheen as they prepared dinner. “I can’t get over how amazing the floors look,” she said.
Grace was lost in her own thoughts as she bounced little Arakiel on her lap. “Huh?” she asked, looking up from her seat at the huge kitchen table.
“Is everything okay, kiddo?” Vic asked. Most of the females were in the kitchen, either helping or chatting. Qi and Koach would be heading out to search for people who needed to be healed after dinner.
“Sure,” Grace said with a grin, hoping they would buy it. She was morose about having to wait for her knight once again.
“I dropped a knife on the floor earlier and it just bounced off it rather than the tip sticking into the wood,” Zoe said.
She’d regained her slim figure and the only sign she’d had a baby was her bigger breasts.
She expressed milk for Arak, so Amaros could feed him during the night when their son woke up.
“I’m amazing,” Oaklie joked. She’d made the floors impervious to damage after their mates had glossed them to a high shine.
“We’re all amazing, girl,” Tori said and shot a tiny bolt of lightning towards her. It fizzled out before it could make contact.
A noise came from the computer in the great room and Xan’s head whipped around.
She dashed off only to return a few moments later.
“False alarm,” she reported. “It was just a bird setting off one of the sensors.” She’d set security cameras up in strategic places around their base.
Animals kept setting off the alarms whenever they came too close to the cameras.
“When is the mysterious visitor going to turn up, Zo?” Reegan asked. The newest arrival, she and Braqel had settled in quickly. They both felt like they’d been living here for months rather than just three weeks.
“The Mad Prophet didn’t say and I haven’t been given any hints,” the seer said.
“Damn it, I need to pee again!” Wynter complained. She was sitting next to Grace and heaved herself to her feet. Angel appeared from out of nowhere, almost tripping her up.
Sinai darted over to pick her kitten up, giving Wyn an apologetic look. Angel yowled at her with her mouth wide open as she demanded to be fed. They figured she was about three and a half or so months old by now. The gray feline with darker gray stripes was adorably annoying at times.
Arakiel let out a burp and Grace cooed at him. “I can’t wait to have a bunch of babies,” she said as he waved his fists around. “I hope they turn out to be as cute as little Arak.”
“He’s as handsome as his dad,” Vic said as she checked on the roasts that were cooking in their two ovens. “I wonder if Wyn and Tol are having a boy or a girl.”
Grace caught the tiny smile Qiana didn’t quite hide in time and narrowed her eyes. “You know, don’t you, doc?” she whispered too quietly for her voice to carry from the room.
“Who, me?” Dr. Forgan, surgical prodigy, said in exaggerated surprise.
“She knows,” Zoe declared and the females converged on her. They herded her over to the table so the teen could be a part of the conversation. “Did you know Amaros and I were having a boy?” their matriarch demanded quietly.
“Maybe,” Qi said, looking anywhere but at her sisters.
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Tor asked accusingly.
“What if I was wrong and they had a little girl instead?” the doc said defensively. “I’m a trauma surgeon, not an obstetrician.”
Wynter could tell something had happened when she returned to the kitchen. She’d used the communal bathroom, since it was closer than her ensuite. “What did I miss?” she asked, noting the tenseness in the room.
“Qi knows the sex of your baby and she isn’t going to tell you what it is,” Zoe said. Her brown eyes were glaring at the beautiful surgeon in stern disapproval.
“I don’t know for sure,” Qiana refuted. “Not even an x-ray is one hundred percent accurate.”
Wyn took her seat again, grunting when the weight left her feet. “It’s a girl, isn’t it?” she guessed. Qi turned to her in stunned surprise. “I knew it!” the water wielder said triumphantly. “I told Tol we were having a girl months ago!”
“Aw, maybe little Arak and your daughter will fall in love and become mated,” Grace said, making faces at the baby. He was too young to smile or laugh, but she knew he liked her.
Tolas appeared just as she finished speaking. “Arakiel will need to prove his worth before I’ll allow him to court my offspring,” he said, putting his hand on his mate’s swollen belly.
The rest of the knights entered the kitchen, drawn by the conversation that was no longer private. Dinner was almost ready anyway, so they began setting the table in the dining room.
Amaros took his son from Grace and cradled him in one arm. “It will be interesting to see what our younglings will be like as they grow older,” he said. “For all we know, Fate could have already decided which of our progeny will become bonded to each other.”
Zoe smiled at that notion. “I can only hope our children will experience the same kind of love we all have with our mates.”
Grace turned away so no one could see her scowling.
She checked the vegetables that were steaming on the stovetop even though Ree had just looked at them.
At the rate she was going, Arak and the as yet unborn female would grow up, become bonded and have children of their own before she would even meet her knight.
“We made good progress installing the ensuites in the unoccupied bedrooms this week,” Cam said.
All of the couples had christened their showers together by now.
Grace always found somewhere else to be whenever her friends started talking about sex.
While she was glad they were all happy, she didn’t want to hear the nitty gritty details of their private time together.
“Life is pretty sweet here for us now,” Jac said in profound satisfaction.
“I hope our brother and his cambion don’t suffer through too many trials before they can finally join us here,” Semiaza said. “But we all know they’ll go through the same kind of hell we all did.”
That was enough to slightly dampen the mood.
The sight of the feast being carried in perked them up again.
Thanks to Sin, they had all the food and beverages they could ever want or need.
Her special talent as a duplicator could feed a small army indefinitely.
Once all of the knights and their females arrived, they would have over forty people living in their base.
One baby had already been born and another one was due to arrive soon.
It was only a matter of time before the other females decided they wanted to start having kids as well.
Zoe had heated up a bottle for her son. Amaros held him with one arm and fed himself with his free hand.
His mate held the bottle for Arak, while using the fork with her other hand.
They worked seamlessly as a team. Wyn and Tol were learning a lot from their leaders.
While Arakiel took after his mother when it came to his personality, they were able to contain his anger when it flared up.
Wynter’s talent at manipulating water could be deadly.
They would both need to know how to deal with their youngling if her talents showed as early as Arakiel’s were.
Another ding came from the great room and Xanthia launched herself out of her chair. “Moose,” she said with a grin when she returned. “It was the big male heading to the lake for a drink.”
“Can’t you calibrate the magic so it only notifies you if humanoid creatures or vehicles trigger the sensors?” Arkas asked.
“Probably,” Xan said as she took her seat next to Semi. “I’ll need volunteers to trigger all of the cameras for me so I can finetune them. We’ve had other things to do that were more important than this.”
“We’ll take some time out from working on the ensuites after breakfast tomorrow,” Amaros told her.
Their computer genius gave him a grateful nod.
None of them had done much training during the past few weeks.
Getting their base the way Zoe wanted it had taken up most of their time.
Vic still spent a few hours working out every day to maintain her amazing body.
Grace made sure she didn’t skip her weight training either.
Her baggy clothes hid how toned she’d become, except for her legs since she was wearing cut-off jean shorts.
They were short, but she was happy at how much muscle she’d developed.
Victoria had promised she would turn their littlest sister into a warrior.
They spent at least an hour together every day having a private training session.
While she didn’t have a spectacular talent like the other females, Grace was determined not to be a liability.
Her weapons and hand-to-hand combat skills had improved a lot during the past eight months.
She’d beaten their trainer in battle a few times due to her sheer speed.
Their sparring was only minimal contact, so no one got hurt.
They’d installed proper boxing rings in their training rooms now.
They were no longer in danger of being slammed into the hard stone walls.
Zoe glanced around the table, noting the happy glow from everyone except Grace.
Her best friend was slowly changing from the carefree kid she’d been.
Soon, she would turn nineteen. She would still be a teenager, but Grace was growing up.
Zo could only guess how much her bestie would evolve by the time she reached her full potential.