by Amy Sumida
I dressed up as Yennefer from The Witcher series and Odin had humored me and dressed as Geralt—the prettier version from the Netflix series as opposed to the scar-faced video game version. With Odin's buff build and strong features, he made a great witcher, especially since he also agreed to glamour his hair into a long, white witcher hairstyle and his eyes to gold. He was getting some serious lovemaking later. I just hoped I called out the right name.
“I'm fine, Mom!” Lesya shouted/grumbled at me before she went back to waving her hand at Cid as if she had telepathic power.
Cid screeched and fell backward, the deadly, toothed petals of his weird, plant-face shivering in theatrical agony. “Oh, I'm dying!”
“The Demogorgon doesn't speak!” Zariel said in her sassy Erica voice.
“Oh,” Cid muttered. “Uh... arg!”
The kids cheered.
“I need a monster to slay as well,” Odin declared in a low, growly, Witcher voice.
I sighed deeply and smiled at him in adoration.
“Death comes!” Another deep voice shouted as Reaper from Overwatch jumped down the palace steps and aimed his enormous guns at the crowd.
The Demons cheered and when he strode up beside me, I realized why. A pale blue eye winked at me from within the bone-skull mask—a mask which I, for some strange reason, found incredibly sexy. I looked over the black leather—from hood to pants, the ammo cartridges strapped to a broad chest and a low-slung belt, and the big, silver boots. Suddenly, I had a deep appreciation for video games.
“Az?” I asked.
“I am Death!” Azrael declared in a deep voice that echoed out of his mask.
I laughed my ass off. Death going as Death. Of course.
“Nice costume, Son!” Lucifer declared as he sauntered over in a leather hood that matched Azrael's. Except beneath the Devil's coat, he wore Victorian clothing and had normal-sized pistols strapped to his waist.
“Sir Jacob Frye, I presume,” Death intoned.
“It is I.” Lucifer made a sweeping bow.
“Jacob Frye?” I asked Sabrina—the Netflix version—AKA Holly.
Holly's Sabrina bob, well, bobbed as she leaned in to whisper, “Assassin's Creed. It's another video game. They like to play it together.”
“Boys.” I rolled my eyes.
Then the Sanderson Sisters from Hocus Pocus went cackling by, the blonde screaming, “Amok! Amok! Amok!” A bunch of lions dressed as pirates chased after them, roaring, “Argh!”
“I love my life,” I declared as I set myself between Azrael and Odin, taking their arms to lead them forward.
Reaper, Geralt of Rivia, and I headed into the fray, searching for the women who had stolen my infant sons.
“I'll take all of you!” Pennywise declared as he jumped in front of us, scaring the hell out of me.
“Sweet baby Satan!” I screeched as I drew back. “It's... it's... IT!”
“It's me, La-la,” Re whispered conspiratorially.
“Re?” I asked in shock as I peered closer.
As for my men, the only costume I knew about was Odin's and that's only because I'd requested it. The other men wanted to surprise me and so far, they were doing a bang-up job.
“What do you think?” He giggled like Pennywise and drooled a little.
“Ugh.” I made a face. “You're disgusting.”
“Thank you!” Re said brightly. “I figured that I'm normally so gorgeous, I should see how the other half lives, as it were.”
“The other half is not hideous, Re,” I huffed.
“No?” Re asked as if that were news to him.
“Go blow up a balloon, clown-face,” Quill from The Guardians of the Galaxy declared as he hung the headphones of his walkman around his neck and posed before me. “Hey, pretty lady. Wanna explore the stars with me?”
“Viper, did you decide to embrace the Star-Lord joke?” I asked and giggled.
“I am what I am.” Viper spread out his arms to show off his leather duster. “But I look around and you know what I see?” He peered around us at the partying gods and faeries. “Losers. Lots of losers.”
I snorted.
“Zhat's a problem,” Captain Jack Sparrow declared as he sauntered up. Kirill's long hair was hidden beneath a pirate hat and a glamour of dreadlocks. His kohl-rimmed, cerulean stare shot my way and winked. “But ze problem is not ze problem.” He refocused on Viper. “Ze problem is your attitude about ze problem.”
“Ze problem is your accent with that costume,” Viper shot back.
“Zhat is not ze problem.” Kirill grinned.
“Oh, I see how it's going to be.” I grimaced. “It's a night of everyone trying to use quotes and be like me. Well, good luck to you all. No one can out-quote the Godhunter. Or... er... Yennefer of Vengerberg!”
“You've yet to make a Yennefer quote,” Geralt noted dryly.
“A true man would state his desires,” I shot back. Then I sniffed haughtily and walked away. “He's already lost me.”
“Hold on one minute now,” Odin/Geralt growled.
“This is the way!” The Mandalorian declared as the Child tottered ahead of him with big, floppy, green Yoda ears.
The Child also giggled like an Imp.
I stopped in my tracks and peered at the Child first. “Scotaidh, is that you?”
“Yes, my Queen!” Scotaidh, the Imp/Child bowed, his ears flopping forward.
“And is that Arach under that mask?” I cocked my head at the Mandalorian.
“No, honey, I'm over here.” Arach sauntered up in a Han Solo outfit and smirked at me in an expression worthy of the character. His crimson hair was hidden under a short, brown glamour, along with his scales and eyes, but the rest of him looked the same. And yet, somehow utterly different. Utterly Han Solo. He rested a hand on his gun, smirked deeper, and cocked his hip.
“You gotta say the line,” Trevor's voice whined from within the Mandalorian helmet.
“Don't get cocky, kid,” Arach shot back in a Han Solo voice.
I squealed and clapped. “I love it!”
“You like me because I'm a scoundrel,” Arach declared as he swaggered up to me and grabbed me by my hips. “There aren't enough scoundrels in your life.”
“Now, that's the line.” The Mandalorian pointed at Solo.
“Shut up, I'm enjoying this,” I chided Trevor.
“I thought you had a thing for the Mandalorian?” Trevor grumbled as he came over and crossed his arms at me.
“I did until he took his mask off. Besides, before I had a thing for him, I had a thing for Han Solo.” I grinned at my fey husband. “And that thing has never hidden behind a mask.”
Arach kissed me like a scoundrel and then said to Trevor, “That's two you owe me, junior.”
Then Morpheus went running by, dressed as Number Five from The Umbrella Academy—which meant that he looked like a little boy in a prep school uniform with a leather eye mask—and holding the hand of a gorgeous Angel. The Angel's costume was very traditional—long, platinum blonde hair and white feathered wings.
“Who's dressed up as an Angel?” I asked.
“Oh, she's a real Archangel,” Az said. “Her name's Saraqael—Sara for short. She's fun, we've been friends for years. I've been trying to get her to come to one of our parties for awhile now, but she's always refused. I think the birth of our sons finally persuaded her.”
“Morpheus and an Angel,” I mused. “Good for him.”
“An Archangel,” Genji from Overwatch corrected me. “Sara's kinda a big deal.”
“You made it!” Azrael fist-bumped Genji. “Where are the others?”
“Right here,” a big gorilla in a spacesuit said.
The gorilla was joined by a man with blond hair and a mask covering him from the eyes down. A glowing red strip laid over the eye portion, sort of like what's his name from the X-Men. What the hell is his name? The laser-eyes guy. Cyclops, that's it! Anyway, I was pretty sure they were all characters from Overwatch.
And I was also pretty sure that the blond hair belonged to the Antichrist.
“I'm sorry, but are those the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse dressed up as video game characters?” Maleficent drawled as she sidled up.
Maleficent, with her magnificent horns, Angelina Jolie lips, and very pregnant belly. Hekate grinned at me as her raven sidekick, who was actually a falcon god, surveyed the joyous group of Apocalypse-gods-turned-game-gods disdainfully.
“I think so, my love,” Horus drawled. “How gauche.”
“You only wish you had enough friends to do a group costume like us,” Sam, AKA War, said through the mouth of the space gorilla.
“As if I'd want more of that.” Horus waved a disapproving hand at the Mad Hatter.
“It's time for tea!” Pan declared as he laughed and tossed a demoness over his shoulder. He ran off into the grasslands with her. “Crumpets and cake! Strumpets and scones!”
“Is tea a euphemism for something?” I asked Odin.
“Not that I'm aware of,” he growled in his Witcher voice.
“Pan can make anything into a euphemism,” Jack Skellington declared as he walked up with Sally, who had just started to sport a belly bump.
“One of my favorite couples of all time,” I declared with a wave at Hades and Persephone.
Sephy grinned and swung her long, red hair over one stitched shoulder. “Thanks, V.”
“I think she meant the characters, Bunny-Nose,” Hades whispered to her.
“Oh,” Persephone murmured.
“But you two are basically them,” I argued.
“We are!” Sephy brightened.
“Have you seen my babies, Sally?” I asked her. “Someone has taken them again. People are always stealing my babies.”
“I think the Corpse Bride and Victor have them,” Persephone nodded toward Artemis and Torrent.
“Thank you so much.” I headed for my offspring, one of whom was being cradled in the arms of a bride who had gone a little overboard with the whole “something blue” tradition.
Some of my men broke off to mingle with our guests, but Azrael and Odin stayed with me. Along the way, I saw Toby. He was with his family, looking dashing as Zorro, and there was a beautiful brunette beside him in a red, Spanish gown. He looked up and our stares met. Toby lifted a hand and smiled. Something eased inside my chest as I waved back. The worst was over; I had looked my ex in the eye and been just fine. Being consumed by wild magic along with the entire world kind of puts things into perspective.
“Hand over the child,” Death intoned as he swooped in to claim Dominic from Torrent—who was wearing a Victorian suit and a mop of dark hair—then cradled the baby just above his ammo cartridges.
“I suppose you'll be wanting this one back too,” Artemis gently laid Sebastian in my arms.
“I do, thank you.” I took my son eagerly and leaned down to breathe in his vanilla orchid scent.
The babies were both swaddled in thick blankets that doubled their size. Holly had advised us to keep their wings wrapped tightly for the first month so they wouldn't hurt themselves. They looked almost human in their baby blankets, but then Sebastian opened his eyes and stared at me. Those striking green irises flashed once, briefly, but it was enough to remind me that my sons were not human, not even a little. They were little faerie gods, conceived in wild magic and born on the day their father learned to conquer the magic to save them. What lucky little boys, to have a father who loved them enough to lay Heaven, Hell, Earth, and Faerie at their feet. And what a lucky woman I was to have them all.
The Earth might be changed forever by what we did, but I had faith in it and its people. They would recover. They would rebuild and become greater than ever. It was a fey new world and, for both faeries and humans, the possibilities were endless.
A Special Look
Keep reading for a sneak peek into the next book in the Godhunter Series:
God Mode
Chapter One
“Sebastian, you get down here this instant!” I pointed at the naked baby faerie-angel who was currently flying circles around his nursery ceiling. “I'm gonna clip your wings!”
Sebastian giggled and tumbled. I shot forward beneath him, arms out to catch him, but he righted himself and shot upward again. His brother—more angel than faerie—gurgled happily on his back, using his wings as a cushion to prop himself up so he could watch Sebastian zipping about like a frantic sparrow who had accidentally flown in someone's house. Sebastian dived bombed his brother but his coordination wasn't the best yet, he'd only been flying for a week, and he crashed into the changing table, bouncing on the thick mattress before rolling to a stop against the railing that I had put around the table for that precise reason. This wasn't my first flying baby rodeo.
It was, however, the first time my flying babies had flown so quickly. The twins—my second set of boy twins who could fly (what are the chances?)—were only a few months old but they'd been growing rapidly. All of my children so far had grown faster than human children do. The rate of their growth depended on their magic. Those with shifter genes tended to mature at the rate of the animal they could shift into... to a point. They had all slowed down to a normal growth rate once they reached a certain age; the average was six.
Sebastian and Dominic were not shapeshifters exactly. They could shapeshift in as much as calling their wings into and out of existence but they couldn't take the shape of an animal—as far as I knew. Since they were conceived when their father was consumed with wild faerie magic and ended up being half-faerie, anything was possible. That seemed to include rapid flight. My sons shouldn't even be crawling yet but they were crawling and flying. And I was starting to think that Fate had it out for me.
Sebastian started to bawl.
“That's what you get!” I chided him as I checked him and Dominic for injuries.
They were fine, of course. They could have probably fallen several feet and recovered. But no mother wants her children to suffer, no matter how quickly they can heal.
“Oh, stop,” I hushed Sebastian gently as I tickled his brother.
Dominic giggled and the sound made Sebastian go quiet. One of his wings stretched out to touch Dominic. Dominic grabbed the flight feather and pulled. Sebastian started to cry again.
“Dominic!” I chided as I moved Sebastian away from him.
Sebastian was the obvious rascal but Dominic could be sneaky.
“Are you all right in here?” Azrael asked as he stepped into the nursery.
The top floor of Pride Palace was taken up by my bedroom, a kitchenette, a dressing room, a bathroom, and a butterfly garden. However, I had used my territory magic to build towers to either side of my bedroom balcony—making the total number of palace towers six—and above the balcony, I filled the space between the towers with bedrooms for my children. The tower rooms were for my husbands. Like every naughty witch, I liked to keep people in towers. Seriously, though, I wanted my husbands to have private spaces for themselves. Things get complicated when you have multiple husbands.
But not as complicated as multiple children.
Lesya, my eldest child who lived at Pride Palace, had the first nursery, directly above the balcony. When Vero was born, I added another floor for him directly above her. But now, with the twins, I wanted them as close to me as possible so I got Lesya to trade and take the new, highest floor so I could make her bedroom back into a nursery. The prospect of a brand new room convinced her to agree in three seconds flat.
The other good thing about the nurseries, or the children's bedrooms and nursery, was that my husbands were to either side of them—each room opened on both sides onto the tower stairwells. Also, there was a door at the bottom of each stairwell that could be locked. Both of these aspects came in handy often. Currently, the proximity to Azrael's room had summoned him to help me.
“No, we are not all right,” I said over the sound of the squalling baby. “Your son launched himself off the changing table again and has
been flying around the ceiling for the last five minutes without his diaper.”
I growled at Sebastian and kissed his belly before I taped his diaper on. Sebastian stopped crying to giggle again.