Chapter 2

Leaning back on the loveseat once again, Cobweb smiled and chuckled softly to himself. He could easily understand how young Sage could have been so taken with his "Uncle Cal." Now as always, Cal tended to stir up strong reactions, often favorable, despite himself. His most recent visit, nearly three months ago, had certainly produced an effect: Cobweb and Lisia had conceived Lilia.

The visit had been unexpected, falling just two weeks after Festival, when the household thought they were finally through with holiday guests. Opal and Sage were playing at being cats, prowling about the living room, when Cobweb and Seel both felt the shift in from the lanes. "Cal's here!" they both thought, and from in the office down the hall, Swift's reaction followed: "We've got a visitor!"

Cal seemed to be alone at first, his sleek Farladienne appearing in the meadow beyond the house. Dressed in fur-edged leather against the cold winter, his raised his hand in greeting. A moment later, three Gelaming guards appeared behind him. No matter what dangers Cal had courted in the past, his position as Tigron demanded certain sacrifices be made; it behooved him to accept that his safety and security would be forever guarded.

"So much for my spontaneous visit," Cal grumbled as he came through the back door. One guard followed, while the other two went off to stable the horses. "I just wanted to get away and a little piece of Immanion had to follow me." With his hand he brushed out the ice that had formed in his short spiky hair. "No offense, Regan."

"None taken, Tiahaar. I do my duty."

"Come in, you two," Seel urged, stepping forward to embrace his old friend. Amazingly, although occasionally Seel would let the occasional snide or jealous comment slip, since the day of the Ascension, most, if not all, of Seel's enmity towards Cal seemed to have evaporated.

Half a minute later the sound of children's voices and adult feet let Cobweb and Seel know their mates and children had arrived. Lisia had been working in his office upstairs.

"Good afternoon, Lord Tigron," Lisia said, curtsying politely. Sage, standing at his side, copied him earnestly.

Cal smirked and gave Cobweb a nudge. "You sure know how to pick 'em, Cobweb." To Lisia, he added directly, "Afternoon, Lisia. No need to be so formal. This is a personal visit."

"The best kind!" Swift exclaimed happily. His affection for Cal had never wavered.

A short time later the five hara were settling comfortably in the living room, a servant offering each of them warm drinks. Regan had just left, taking the two harlings with him, seemingly eager take them off their parents' hands.

"Do your guards normally go off with the harlings?" Seel asked. "Seems a bit irregular."

"Hmmm, I suppose," Cal shrugged. "I think he's thinking about starting a family and wants to get familiar, that's all. He mentioned something about it to me. Don't know much more than that -- I avoided getting into it, as it's part of the reason I'm hear."

Cobweb's intuition immediately picked up on his meaning. "Oh? Talk of more harlings at Phaonica?"

Cal took a long drink of his heated sheh. "More than that, Cobweb. They're damned obsessed with it."

"Do tell!" Cobweb insisted. "I've heard some of that talk here, you know -- news of the Triad is always in circulation."

"What have you heard?" Cal asked stiffly.

"Just that everyone is wondering when there will be a second royal harling," Cobweb explained, non-chalant. "I'm not surprised you're not looking forward to that."

Cal laughed, mirthless. "You've got my number, Cobweb, but actually it's more than just that -- let me tell all of you, because it's so ridiculous. It's not only this obsession with 'a second royal harling.' No, now there's something else. Now the idea, being pushed by members of the Hegemony, is for five more harlings."

"Five?" Swift repeated, surprised.

"Each of us is to host for each of the others," he sighed. "Pell and Rue already started, now we're supposed to complete it." He fumbled in his shirt pocket, then pants. "Seel, do you have--"

"No, not here," Seel said, "later, we can go outside." As always, Cal had a voracious appetite for cigarettes, as did Seel. "God, Cal, I must say, that plan does sound a bit intimidating. Five!"

"Exactly!" Cal agreed. "Which is why I left. It's quiet over there, not much doing, and I was sick of people talking about it, making insinuating comments. Then last night Pell and Rue slipped off somewhere or other and somebody said it was to make harlings -- that was it for me. This morning I packed a little bag, wrote out a note, and took off."

"That seems a strange reaction," Lisia remarked, speaking up at last. Unlike the other hara, he was a relatively recent acquaintance of the Tigron. It was also unlikely this idea of five harlings impressed him, as he himself had delivered twenty-five. "From what I understand, you three don't have need to be that jealous of one another. And as for the notion of the Triad having five more harlings -- perhaps its my usual naiveté, but that seems quite a natural notion."

"Not to Cal, it doesn't! Cobweb teased. "Cal's probably afraid that once Pell has Rue's pearl, next it'd be him hosting -- and you can't have that, now can you, Cal?"

Cal set down his glass. "I could do it, I even have wanted to do it -- and stop rolling your eyes, it's true. Anyway, it's just this notion of having to do it! I don't want to do anything because someone else wishes it, especially if it's an outside party like the Hegemony."

"The yoke of responsibility has never rested comfortably on your shoulders, has it, Cal?" Cobweb couldn't resist teasing.

As Cal glared back, Swift stepped in to defuse the situation. "Oh, stop it, Cobweb. Poor Cal had a terrible time delivering Tyson -- even you know that and you didn't even go see him. Naturally he's a little wary of repeating that."

Cobweb tossed back his hair and held out his glass for a refill. "Oh, that trump card again -- Cal and his awful delivery. I think he needs to get over it. Think what a bad state he was in back in those days, Swift! That, coupled with the fact that we didn't exactly know how to handle deliveries, made his a lot worse than it might have been."

"Hmmmph." Cal's eyes drifted across the room. "Well, anyway, I came down here to escape talk of it all. I'm not totally opposed to harlings, I just..."

"It's a lot of committment," Cobweb commented.

Cal grabbed a pillow and tossed it at Cobweb's head; it missed and only barely escaped landing on a mug of tea.

"Shut up!" Cal burst out in an infuriated voice, though his face smirking. "I've pretty well settled in with the idea of committment by now. Right now, I'm feeling committed to maybe just sitting here talking about other things."

"I suppose it's possible," Cobweb agreed.

"Assuming Regan's all right with the harlings, that is," Lisia remarked.

Cal cocked an eyebrow just as harling feet could be heard stomping at high speed across the floor immediately above them.

"Opal!" they heard Regan calling in the distance. Everybody laughed, even Cal.