Our Goddess Incarnate

Chapter 2: Islac Ve Consta. Vedi Ve Custi.

A/N Updated this with a rewrite to make some parts clearer.

Thursday, July 19th ( 18, Mizami, Dies Reis, L.S.L 10041 )

Mizarmonie woke to the quiet morning. The sun had not even begun to crest so that she could see the lavish walls of her room as she took in the black stillness. She lay entangled with her Den. Dawn was approaching, and she didn't want to get up.

Miza loved their unconventional family. While nesting was traditionally something only reserved for the Goddess Incarnate and her consorts within their mateship, Miza's Nest included the extended family her consorts already had before their bond snapped into place. They had brought the ancient practice of Dens. The action of nesting provided safety and warm comfort as they slept.

Nesting also had proved to strengthen the bonds amongst their "little" family as they navigated building the relationships in the Den their way rather than according to how the Imperial House Council demanded they live. As Miza and her youthful wisdom had explained to Donte three years ago, when it was just the four of them, they were each other's people. They were supposed to love each other, but love looks different and comes in different ways.

Despite relishing the warmth and the electric buzz of being surrounded by those she loved, Miza's discipline won out. She slowly detangled herself from two of her Nestmates, crawling around several other sleeping bodies, and crept into her changing room to put on her morning workout clothes. Compression capris, sports bra, and running shoes. She grabbed her workout pack and quietly slipped out of their residence without waking anyone in the large two-story apartment. As she made the long trek from their third-floor residence, Miza was deep in thought.

They had heard so many assumptions in Lestania about the perversion of their family since the mate bond was triggered four months ago, based solely on the conjecture surrounding the last Goddess Incarnate 400 years prior. Being the host of the Goddess herself, she was slowly remembering her past lives, and she knew for a fact that the Clergy put out that propaganda against Leana to support the whims of the imperial family all of those years ago. The purpose of the Goddess's Den was lost to the people over the last four centuries, so as Mizarmonie's mates were revealed, many opinions concerning their ages, genders, marital statuses, and classes were made known based on how the Clergy had presented the Godess's Nest in scripture and lore.

"Thank you, Alivar, for making my life harder even in death."

Aside from her deep love of Liero, nothing in the lore was accurate. Based on the little that Mizarmonie had reviewed since the awakening, she could see subtle changes that erased key details. Simply put, the Goddess Leana's Nest, the Primi Consortiu, had ten people in it. Leana and her mates. All but Liero were erased from the history of Leana's children.

Some of her mates had partners and children before pledging themselves as her chevaliers and consorts, thus creating the first Den that was protected and cherished by the Goddess herself even after Leana's children were born. The only thing that saved face is that Mizarmonie had become a beloved princess in Lestanaia, and her Den lived in the Academy hidden in the human realm, so many would argue that the rumors were just that. There was nothing the Nest could do about the beliefs that others had about something divined and built into the structure of the Guardian Realm itself, even if Lestanians had chosen to ignore their heritage. It wasn't time to deal with it yet.

The Provincial Palace, colloquially called the Academy, was smaller, of course, than the Verdant Palace, where the Imperial family resided on the isle of Lestania, but it was just as grand. Leana had used the location itself for thousands of years as a go-between for her realm and the humans, but the Academy itself had been standing for just over 400 years. It was a massive mid-16th-century structure with heavy French influence in the architecture that easily housed 500 people.