I opened one eye. My vision was blurry, but the voice was as familiar as my own. “Are we dead?”
“Not quite. Although we are in Anwyn.”
I opened the other eye and concentrated on focusing my vision until the vision of multiple Gregories merged into one. “You are the best Traveller ever,” I told him.
He smiled, kissed me gently, then touched a tender spot on my forehead. “You hit your head on your own sword.”
“It was worth it to see an enraged Traveller do what he does best.” I let him help me up to my feet. It looked like a bomb had been dropped around us; the ground was scorched black, while the several hundred warriors and attendants had been felled just as though they were trees in the middle of a nuclear explosion. I was relieved to see that they weren’t dead, since they were slowly moving and sitting up. Ethan was on his knees, shaking his head. Aaron staggered as I watched, said something about his beloved Piranha, and stumbled off toward the giant machine. Holly lay still in a sort of a crater. De Ath was sitting with his hands dangling between his knees, his face black and his hair smoking.
“Crikey,” he said in a rusty-sounding voice, then promptly fell over.
“We won,” I told Gregory, and flung myself on him. He flinched, and I suddenly remembered his arm. “Goddess! She cut you!”
“It’s nothing that won’t heal, although I believe she managed to dislocate my shoulder,” he said, a patient look on his face when I ripped off his sleeve to examine the damage. His arm was sliced in several spots, but the flow of blood was already beginning to thicken.
“My moms can probably fix the dislocation,” I said.
A look of embarrassment crossed his face. “Would you hold it against me if I said I would prefer to have a proper healer look at it? It’s not that I don’t like and respect your mothers, but they do have a tendency to . . . to . . .”
“Mess things up?” I bound up the worst of the slashes, then cuddled into his good side, kissing the edges of his lips. “I wouldn’t mind in the least. Gregory—”
“No thanks to the thief’s light show, the Piranha is unharmed,” Aaron announced, coming back to where we stood. He surveyed the people who were in various stages of recovering and getting back to their feet. “Although I regret that Constance left before she could be blasted. I would have paid good money to see that.”
“I take back any objection I had to the thief,” Doug said from behind us. Aaron went to help him onto his feet.
“I’m just glad my moms aren’t here—oh, hell, there they are. They must have heard the lightning explosion. They’re going to want to fix you, Gregory. I’ll go tell them to go back to Ethan’s camp until Aaron’s healer can see to you.”
Gregory grabbed the back of my mail shirt as I started off, pulling me back. “You don’t want to do that, Gwen.”
“Why don’t I?”
“Because they have something we badly need.”
“They really aren’t that great at healing, although they do try their best—”
“No,” he interrupted. “Not that. See?”
I looked at where he nodded. My mothers were picking their way through the half-sensible people, the slight form of Mrs. Vanilla in their grasp. “See what? All I see are my moms and Mrs. Vanilla.”
“Yes.” He looked expectantly at me.
I shook my head. “What is it that you see that I don’t?”
“It’s not see so much as hear. What’s the name of the bird that Aaron is looking for?”
“Vanellus.”
“Right. And what does that sound like?”
“Vanessa?”
He looked at me.
I pointed to my forehead. “I have a head injury. Stop giving me the look that says I’m missing something . . . Oh. Vanilla.” Enlightenment dawned with a prickle of electricity along my arms and legs. I turned to look back at my mothers. Gregory very gently placed a finger beneath my chin and pushed it upward until my mouth stopped hanging open in surprise. “You are kidding me!”
“I think, unless we are very mistaken, that we are about to make Aaron extremely happy.”
“Goodness!” Mom said as she and Mom Two lifted Mrs. Vanilla over the moaning, recumbent form of De Ath. “What did we miss?”
“Nothing other than Gregory being awesome and stopping Death and Holly in one lightning-bedazzling blow.” Gregory smiled at the pride that I couldn’t keep out of my voice.
“Death?” My moms stopped and looked worried.
“He’s a new guy, evidently.” I waved toward De Ath, who once again was sitting up. “Not the same one you had the run-in with.”
“G’day,” he said, lifting a shaky hand to my moms.
“Oh, thank the goddess for that. Gwenny, dear, I believe Mrs. Vanilla is needed here.”
“I do believe she is.” I watched as my moms stopped in front of me, gently setting Mrs. Vanilla onto the ground. She was just as crumpled as ever, a wrinkled old woman with hair that stood up in the back, and weathered skin that hinted at more years than most mortals saw.
But she wasn’t mortal. At least, I didn’t think she was.
“Do you want to do the honors?” Gregory asked me.
“No. You figured it out. You can be the one to tell him.”
“I love you, Gwenhwyfar Byron Owens.”
“Almost as much as I love you, Gregory . . . er . . . what’s your middle name?”
“I was born Rehor Ilie Nicolae Faa, which is Anglicized to Gregory Elijah Nicolas Faa.”
“Rehor? Really?”
“Really.”
I licked the corner of his mouth. “Almost as much as I love you, Gregory Elijah Nicolas Faa.”
“Do that again, and I won’t wait for a healer before I take you to bed,” he growled.
I smiled, enjoying the way my heart sang when he turned and called for Aaron.
“What is it? I’m busy right n—” Aaron, who was assisting the warriors nearest him, froze in mid-word, his expression blank as he stared past us.
“I have goose bumps,” I whispered as Mrs. Vanilla, who had been making her usual unintelligible squeaks, stopped. She took one tottering step forward out of my mothers’ grips.
Gregory said nothing, just held me with his good arm, his breath ruffling my hair in a way that was both sensual and comforting. We were meant to be together, meant to be at that place at that time, watching as a frail old lady moved past us, every step she took transforming her. Her back straightened, her skin smoothed, her hair darkened and lengthened until it flowed down her back in ebony waves. Her bathrobe lengthened as well, becoming a long dark green velvet gown that hugged blossoming curves.
“Vanellus,” Aaron breathed, his voice filled with awe at the vision of young womanhood that stopped before him.
“Aaron,” she responded, her voice as light and high as . . . well, as a bird’s.
I sniffled happily as they stared at each other for another minute, and then she was in his arms and the air was full of birdsong.
“OK, that’s seriously romantic,” I said, blinking back a few happy tears.
“It truly is,” Mom said, handing me a tissue before using another to dab at her own eyes. “And aren’t you glad that your mother and I liberated her when we did? Just look at how happy they are.”
I turned to look up at Gregory and basked in the love evident in his beautiful eyes. “They can’t possibly be happier than we are.”
“Not in a hundred lifetimes,” Gregory agreed, and took my breath away with a kiss that sent lightning shimmering about us both.
