Page 16 of Triplets for the Dark Elf

It kills me because it makes me miss him so badly. Even now as I braid my hair and lace up my boots, I still want to walk out of here and turn right instead of left and head back across the districts to him. To tell him about them. About Maeve and Indie and Hazel.

But whenever I’m on the verge of giving in, the night of the attack flashes in my mind and I rememberwhyI’m staying away. I have to protect him and I have to protect my babies.

The dark elves that attacked would absolutely come after us all. And I can’t let him get hurt. I love him.

Admitting it doesn’t hurt as much as it did at the beginning. I love Miothro and I would do anything for him, including keeping his children away from him to ensure everyone’s safety. But gods!

Maeve has his skin tone. She’s beautiful with her pewter skin, strawberry blonde hair and blue eyes, like me. And Indie has fair skin like me but he’s got Miothro’s indigo eyes, so deep they’re like looking into the cosmos themselves. And Hazel has his hair, his inky black hair color even though everything else about her is like a miniature version of myself. But I see him in her smile.

She’s so damned smart too. She’s smart and clever and extremely observant. When she was born, she was constantly looking around and trying to observe the world around her. She’s never stopped.

Indie is the curious one, though. He’s always trying to test boundaries and limits, trying to figure out the world around him and what to make of it. Too nosy for his own good.

And Maeve is my funny one. She’s got this way of always knowing how to make me laugh, especially when I really need a good laugh.

I love them all, especially because they’re a piece of him that I get to keep with me. It sounds selfish and it probably is but the three of them bring so much joy to my life.

And trouble. Definitely trouble, I think as I bustle into the front room where they’re all trying to climb Lucy as she enters the door.

“Hey!” I call in my “Mother Tone” as Daphne named it. The three toddlers stop and freeze, giving me various guilty expressions.

“Sowwee Mama,” Maeve says sweetly. I raise an eyebrow and shake my head.

“Don’t say sorry to me, say sorry to Aunt Lucy,” I tell them.

“Sowwee Auntie Wucy,” Indie says, grinning as he snuggles into her neck. Damned kid is too much like his father, too much of a charmer.

Lucy instantly rubs his back. “It’s okay, I love you Nindee,” she says.

“Hay Hay, do you have something to say?” I ask, turning to the last of the three. Hazel smiles and pats Lucy’s arm.

“Sowwee,” she says. She doesn’t talk much but she’s always deliberate about whatever she does say.

“Thank you,” I tell the three of them. They settle down and Lucy takes them into our tiny kitchen to make breakfast so I can get going. I rarely work the morning shift but I needed the extra hours – even if I did get three measly hours of sleep after working the evening before.

As I gaze back at them, my heart feels heavy in my chest. I feel a tear slip down my cheek and hurriedly brush it away. They don’t know Miothro even though they’re so much like him. It hurts that they don’t even know him.

But they can’t know him. Not if I want to keep all of them safe. It’s better this way. Still, I wonder deep down if I’m doing the right thing or not. Am I ruining their lives because of this? Will they grow to resent me when they start asking questions about him that I can’t answer?

I don’t want to let them down but I love them too much to put them in danger, or to put Miothro in danger from knowing about their existence.

So instead, I stuff it all down and pull on my shawl, determined to put that all to the back of my mind like I have every time he comes up in my head.

“I’ll be back in a few hours!” I call. “Be good for Lucy!” The triplets scramble down from the table to hug my legs goodbye and give me syrup-sticky kisses on the cheeks. I finally make it out the door and I hear Maeve whining behind me. She hates when I have to go to work but it’s what I have to do.

As I walk to the mill, I try to clear my head of thoughts of Miothro. I might be able to get a promotion to shift supervisor of the humans if I work hard enough, according to the bosses. I could really use the money too, as the triplets are constantly growing out of their clothing.

So I’m going to keep my head down and focus on work and providing for my family. It’s what’s best for everyone. Even if I miss Miothro, I need to get over him and stop yearning for what could have been.

10

MIOTHRO

“Zhisk is such a marvel of an invention, don’t you think?” I tilt the bottle of amber liquid in front of my face, feeling the buzzing effects already numbing my body. It’s my second bottle today, after all. “Even magic can’t make you feel like this.”

“Yes, sir,” the zagfer – is it bad I can’t remember her name? – behind the counter answers.

My gaze falls to her, and I grunt before pushing up to my feet. She’s been here for the better part of a year, though I have to say that having zagfer man my shop has been more of a pain than its worth. They’re so worried about castes.