A Tale of One Deviant (Book One)

Chapter 123: Earl's POV...and Third Person

"Dad!" Adri came running up the steps of the de Libellule mansion. His bright school uniform was unusual to my eyes, but welcome. It's only been a few months, but it was a sign he was growing up. "We're home!"

"Hello, Adri," I smiled lightly and swooped up my seven year old son, holding him in the air. He laughed and smiled, his face reddening with how hard he had to breathe from running out of the carriage parked by the front gate. "Welcome back."

"Daddy!" Hera exclaimed, slamming into my legs. I would've fallen backwards with the force of Chord joining in with them.

"Hello, Dad," Chord looked up at me from my waist, smiling happily.

"Why am I getting all of the love?" I asked, setting Adri down. He was getting heavier, and I couldn't pick him up as easily as compared to when he was three. It wasn't a problem of myself lacking strength, but rather of him growing up.

"They grow up so fast..."

     That's what she would say, if she was here, with a grin on her face. Maybe watery eyes, while forgetting her own age and forgetting to look in the mirror.

"Because Mommy would break our ribs if we hugged her," Adri explained while dusting himself off of nonexistent dirt, grinning triumphantly as he looked at the house behind us. "And Thérèse would dodge us."

"So I'm the fallback, huh?" I ruffled their hair, making them reach up and fix it while complaining. The grumbles were fake, I could tell, because the grins never left their faces.

"No...!" Hera objected, reaching up and latching onto my hand. "You're just the most appro-approach-"

"Approachable," Chord finished for her. She blinked with a new intelligence in her eyes, beginning to smile more demurely as if to show off some sort of newfound maturity. It was quaint because we could all see right through what she was doing. "It's a new vocabulary word from last week."

"I see," I nodded, turning towards the house and walking back with them through the garden entrance. Ana hadn't said a word the whole time, just had a light smile fixed on her face to welcome them. Her eyes, however, were turbulent with other matters she couldn't pry her mind away from. It was enough that she wasn't speaking to alarm anyone, but no one had mentioned anything of it. The children kept walking and clinging on, looking all around as if they hadn't seen home in forever, and she kept her head in the clouds and her mind in the past. "You didn't bring Prince Lars home with you this time?"

"No, his daddy wanted to see him," Adri answered me while falling back to take Ana's hand. Chord was on my left and Hera was adamantly latched on to my right, so there was nowhere else to go. Thérèse simply walked behind us, expressionless. These days, she didn't express her emotions as much. Nor did Magaris. Nor did anyone I saw around the estate, since the bright little star that was the youngest de Libellule had departed. It'd been almost five months since she was last seen, and we offered no explanation as to why she left so silently, despite just coming back from another fight with another enemy of hers. Here and gone, here and gone. She was always moving, but now it felt like she was really gone for good, and it was worrying. "But River came with us! I don't know why, but she wanted to greet you!"

I stopped walking, warm smile frozen on my face in a man unexpected break in my mood. Ana's eyes sharpened drastically, turning to those inhuman slits after trading her human pupils away, and slightly turned her head. Her eyebrows lifted, and she stared.

The Demon. The Demon was here.

Gracefully, the prided caretaker of the king's children stepped out of the ordinary carriage, being helped down by Terrence. Hair a bright blue, eyes a steady yellow, lips like a crescent moon, she stepped on the grassy area the carriage had stopped in and looked up. The sun hit her dress, displaying the simple thing that was nothing in comparison to the normal garb of the king's servants and putting her supposed humility up for show.