With things decided and Halsan no longer bleeding from rage, Eve and I carried on the way we had planned, there was still no sign of Astrael on the second day, nor the third and Quatal had began to miss her enough that we slept as a family out of the pocket dimension.
When the fourth day rolled around, Eve and I were beginning to worry ourselves and Eve eventually told me that when I was at my limit I should just go after. "I'll give her a month, she said her sisters and her had been the stewards of their domain, so I want to believe she just had a work backlog."
"If you're sure, my love."
"I am." Though we both knew I wasn't, we just didn't want Quatal to panic and no one was under any delusion I would come back from the trip either.
"FINISHED!" A voice echoed from the basement, making all of us stand up and rush down. We had been waiting at home and closed the clinic for just that announcement.
"Done? Great, good to go. or does it need to set?"
"Well it's good but, I mean we only had a very rushed discussion about how to use it."
I stepped on the platform as I told him it was fine, from there the teleportation array allowed me to feel all the platforms ready to receive me but it was hard to perceive. "This is more awkward than it needs to be." I ranted under my breath as I withdrew a dagger and began etching some of my magic glyph into the stone.
The poor engineer didn't understand I was upgrading it and asked Kriel what he had done to displease me. "Upgrade? But he needed me to make it, how could he possibly upgrade it."
"Correction I had you make it because we weren't particularly rushing for it and I was too lazy, plus I wanted to see how well you did. You should be proud, workmanship is masterful, usually I am pretty strict on teleportation magic, but if you go grab a coffee I left a manual on how to saturate the stones more efficiently. Workmanship: Masterful, Timescale: Abysmal, Theatrics: Non-existent."
"Theatrics?"
I stood up as I finished my carving and activated the array, now a small global projection appeared where a target could simply be picked, and I chose the spot directly behind him.
"Indeed! Theatrics are the best part of teleportation and I will brook no arguments on the matter. I also just analysed the entire system and luckily pretty standard, so I will put a few in place for our friends to make use of it."
"Analysed the system?" The man, demon, the engineer passed out after that and we carried him upstairs and left him in everybody's care whilst Eve, Quatal, Fala and I made a house call to Abelegia.
The experience was jarring, especially for the girls who had balance issues at the best of times, so I had them sit cross-legged on the floor in case they passed out or got dizzy, we also gave them large bowls as a precaution for messier reactions.
I then spoke Eve through how we had to create a mana barrier inside the girls to protect them, which with Ever's help was cake.
Before we knew it we arrived in Eve's old bedroom, whereupon she gathered up a few things she had wished she had brought. "Adam, I have something for you." She announced as I was rubbing the backs of two comically disorientated girls.
"What do you mean you got something for me? As in had it here waiting? We weren't together back then."
"True, but my father told me, my mother wanted me to give this to the man I loved." She said with a look in her eyes I didn't trust, the envelope she handed over was sealed. Of course that wasn't exactly a guarantee with Eve so I asked if she knew what it said.
She shook her head and turned away to let me read it privately while she continued in her mission, which seemed to be a solid fifty percent stuffed animal reclamation.
With a grin, I sat on the bed and opened the envelope, interested to know what kind of woman had a hand in some of my future wife's genetics.
Dear Adam,
Yes, that's right, I know all about you and my daughter, she isn't the only oracle you know.
You should be ashamed... Making a mother of my precious Evelith before her wedding, she looked about quite young in the vision to and the child already looked ten, you s
Ah, apologies I just had another vision that shed some light on some of the finer details. I would have started again, but if Vedna finds me before this is sealed he will definitely read it and that could be terrible.
Thank you for making my daughter so happy, I know you two have done more than I would have expected of a girl raised by the theocracy, but maybe life was so oppressing for her here she went a bit wild, I understand and you need to relax a little.
Please Adam, trust my daughter to help you, I have seen many possibilities in my life but none make me happier than those where you to succeed. That said, I'm sorry I have to be so vague about this, but I suggest you hold hands in the woods. When you find yourself at your lowest, take her to the clearing and hold her hand.
Again, sorry, I can't say much.... Quickly burn the letter, Eve can't read this ever, not even from your memory orb thingys.
Love Mum-In-Law.
"Adam? Are you ok?" She asked the question as tears fell onto the paper, Quickly moving to my side.
As she approached, I burned the letter before she could read any of it, startling all three of them. "Sorry, I'm fine, Your mum was quite a woman, she knew I made a mother of you before a wife." I chuckled unconvincingly.
"Sure and that made you cry." Eve snapped.
"No she signed it "Love Mum-In-Law". Knowing she approved of us even though she wasn't happy about the order of things was moving in a subtle way I was crying without knowing why."
Luckily that was the truth, I knew Eve would know I was keeping a secret but she was sure I was happy about it so she simply dived into me, knocking me back onto the bed. "Keep your secrets, as long as it's nothing bad, I'm sure you have a good reason and I can guess it probably has something to do with the best outcome and not disrupting events."
"I mean yeah, pretty much, now you should probably get up before someone comes in and this gets awkward." As I finished someone walked in. "My god this world is so clichéd."
After the shock of finding the excommunicated high priestess in bed with a man with two children present smashed the new arrivals in the face we were dragged to a red-faced Vedna in the grand confession hall.
"Do I even want to know?"
"Eve gave me your late wife's letter, turns out it was addressed to me, made me cry and she tackled me onto the bed to cheer me up." I rambled nearly incoherently, whilst Eve acted like a teenager who just got caught sneaking in from a party and Fala and Quatal giggled at the silly adults and their adulting.
"Fine, she was reclaiming her possessions, you are at least betrothed and with the oracle setting these events in motion I suspect there is likely more at stake here than a surprise visit from my daughter. How did you even get here?"
We explained the teleportation and the limitations and how we went there to examine his friend that he had wanted to bring to us.
"I see, and who is this second treasure, another apprentice?" Vedna asked, as Eve and I pulled her across to stand between us."
"Actually, I'd like to introduce our daughter, Quatal." Eve said, clearly wanting to make this is painful as possible for some reason.
"Daughter? but, you aren't even married!"
"Marriage isn't what mattered at the time, she was a motherless child who needed somewhere to belong."
"...Motherless, but not parent-less, I notice." Vedna said eyeing me vengefully.
"Indeed by husband to be suddenly discovered he already had someone calling him Papa and then he asked me to be her Mama and she was so cute, well I just couldn't say no."
Vedna's fury was intense and aimed directly at me. "You! Lech! Womaniser! You dare..."
"Hey I didn't do anything... Eve I don't know what the point of this is, but you need to explain this better because I'm the only one getting punished.!" Our raised voices were apparently enough to make Quatal protective...who transformed...
"Oh and she is a human-beast rank divine summon known as a feathered serpent." Quatal lunged, making Vedna flinch and his guards very scared.
"Quatal! Don't hurt grandpa!" Quatal changed back into human form, as she fell Vedna and her looked at each other then to me.
"Grandpa?" They asked in unison, as I nodded, breezing past the near execution of the pope of one of the largest nations on the continent.
Quatal changed back, then carefully lapped around Vedna. Changing yet again as she shouted her decision. "Yay! Grandpa, you smell like Mama, so I'm sure you're nice too." With that Vedna's heart immediately melted and he fully embraced his new grand-daughter.