Chapter 5
PART 2
Ny minutester, after they had swum in thegoon and repaired their appearances, they were still
grinning like fools with joy at what they had done.
“Well, we need to contact everyone we’re inviting and exin what we’re doing, and see if they want to
going to live for the next twenty-four years. Once we’ve got those done, we should start getting it ready
for us right away. Everyone else is going to want to prepare their homes there too, and be done with it
by the time the time-bubble goes up.”
Talia was drawing a dress on over her head, and at that moment she stopped and held absolutely still
for a second, then hurriedly finished pulling it on andid her hands on her belly. Her face lit up with
vibrant joy as she blurted; “I’m pregnant!”
“I know, my love, we’ve been celebrating it for over an hour!” Markughed as he swept her up and
hugged her.
“No, you great silly oaf, I mean I’m pregnant again! On the other side this time! We’re going to have
twins!” she informed him, her hands still pressed to her tummy.
Mark stopped and stared at her in surprise for a moment, then couldn’t help but hold her away from him
and stare at her tummy, like he could see the life growing there.
“Great gods! That’s amazing!” he finally eximed.
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“It is!” she giggled. “The very first time we’ve made love without the contraceptive spell, and we’ll have
two babies! It’s so very unusual in every way! As Yzell said, we should barely be fertile with each other
at all, let alone be able to produce twins on our first attempt! And it’s rare for a pregnancy to begin so
long after our lovemaking! It was over thirty-six minutes after youst fertilized me when it happened!
One twin will be almost an hour older than the other!”
“Can you tell if they’re boys or girls?” he asked, his grin so wide it was hurting his face a bit.
“No, not for weeks yet. Though Yzell might well be able to.”
“Okay, we’ll invite her and Theramin first then!” heughed. “We’ll have them all meet us at the cottage
so we can do the nning.”
And with that, he Translocated them to their patio. They quickly reviewed their tentative list of invitees,
added a few more to it, them Mark cast Battalion Command to call them all at once.
“Hi, it’s Mark and Talia! We’ve called you all to invite you to spend some time with us…”
He quickly exined what they were going to do and why, and invited them all to join him and Talia at
Hilia to talk about it that evening. He asked those who needed help with the Translocation to give the
time they wished toe, so they could be transported when they were ready. They asked Yazadril,
Nemia, Theramin, Yzell, and Quewanak to arrive at their earliest possible convenience, to help with the
nning and research.
Almost everyone they’d invited to join them agreed toe, and many of their families and friends also
asked toe, not wanting to miss so many years of their loved-ones’ lives.
When thest guest arrived for the meeting at Hilia that night, the attendees included 261 humans, 225
elves, 12 unicorns, and 4 dragons including Quewanak, who also represented the gods.
“This is going to be interesting.” Mark chuckled as he surveyed the gathering. “We have almost all of
my family from Finitra out to second cousins and some of their friends, and their friends’ families, one
hundred and sixty-six Finitrans all together. It’ll be challenging learning to tell all the Longstrider men
and boys apart from each other. We have newlyweds Nek and Reen and six more of our friends from
Norka’s in Sming, and their families and friends, for a total of fifty-five Smingans. And we have sixteen
human-elven mixed couples, and their families and friends. Among the other elves we have all of the
original Hilian Volunteers and twenty-one of The Atoned and some of their families and friends, a bunch
of your family from The Nine Valleys, and a few of Alilia and Bezedil’s family and friends from The
People of Life. Sran and Equemev have ten of their family and friends. Kragorram and Povon just
have little Karzog.
“I notice that those we invited from long-lived races have far fewer other friends and family with them
than the humans we invited, but that makes sense I guess. I suppose a dragon isn’t missing much of
another dragon’s life in twenty-four years.”
“All in all, they should provide all our children with a good variety of neighbors!” Taliaughed.
When everyone was settled Mark stood at the edge of the patio overlooking thewns, augmented his
voice to be heard by all, and spoke;
“Wee, everyone, and thank you for joining us! We hope that our time apart from the world with you
will be a beautiful respite from our troubled times.
“The first question to be decided was; where would we spend it?
“After an hour of research in the Hilian Library, and after consulting with Falgaroth, we’ve chosen an
isted archipgo called The Evergreen Inds some five thousand two hundred kilometers west of
southern Membitra.”
He then cast a dwarven Revealing showing what he was describing.
“It’s a dense cluster of inds on the t top of a huge and isted ancient volcanic seamount, in an
area of the ocean known as The West Debivinian Abyss. The area around the seamount and in the
shallow and narrow channels between the inds is a bountiful oasis of sea life in the midst of a
gigantic expanse of ocean that’s almost lifeless, due to its extreme depth and theck of any major
currents through the area. Most of the life on the inds is simr to the flora and fauna of southern
Membitra, having been seeded from there by a dominant east wind and the general flow of the sea to
the west, which is due to the world’s rotation and the pull of the moons. Much of the inds are
covered with big hills or small mountains, and as their name suggests, many of those are covered in
pine forest. They’re quite simr to the forests around Shinosa Valley and The Nine Valleys, but
simpler. Most of the trees are a variety of fir that reaches about fifty-five meters in its natural state, so
they’re already big enough for Nine Valleys-style tree homes.
“The cluster of twenty seven inds form an oval two hundred and four kilometers long and a hundred
and thirty-eight kilometers wide. Only narrow channels averaging a third of a kilometer in width and
about twelve meters deep separate the inds, so as this map of the archipgo shows, it’s an
almost-solid oval ofnd. It’s ringed by a barrier reef, which protects the beaches from the worst of the
great swells that roll across the deep ocean.
“It has very mild weather most of the time. The heat of summer should never be unbearable, and it’s
only likely to have snow on the ground for a few hours on two or three asions each winter. In the
spring it tends to warm rains every night. Only the early autumn brings the chance of extreme weather
in the form of the asional hurricane sweeping up from the south-east, which range from
inconvenient to catastrophic in intensity, particrly on the south side of the archipgo.
“The inds were legally part of The Kingdom of Membitra, though they’repletely uninhabited,
undeveloped, and pristine. A spell that Yazadril cast revealed that they hadn’t been visited for over one
hundred and seventy-two years, when they’d been surveyed by a floti of elves of The Sea People of
Debivin. The elves had subsequently sold their im to a king of Membitra who wanted to build a
vacation residence there, but had never gotten around to doing so. Though the record remained in the
Membitran archives, no living Membitran was even aware of the archipgo’s existence.
“So, when we dropped in on him, King Raznoran of Membitra was delighted to learn that he owned
those inds, and doubly delighted to learn in the same minute that The Principality of Hilia was
offering him ten thousand one-ounce gold Hilian Crowns for all ownership, sovereignty, and rights to
them!”
He paused while a chuckle went around among those listening.