I stood at the highest point of the mountain peak above the crater that contained the home of the Erin-Vulur. The air was cold but not uncomfortably so. It had taken a long time to manage it, but with some help from the God of the Chalice, we had moved the moon into a slightly different orbit, one that exposed it to the direct light of the system's sun for half the day. Of course, when the nightly eclipse fell across the planet, the temperature would drop as harshly as one would expect, but we could live with that. Volistad had been working feverishly for the last decade to ensure that we could. Quite often, I had to go down there to the sleeping hull of the archaic Heaven’s Hawk and literally make him come back up to the surface and interact with his people, not to mention our children.

As it turned out, it had taken only some minor genetic tweaking of my genome to make me able to have children with my husband despite our wildly different backgrounds. Volistad had even found a way to induce the changes more quickly and simply than he had with me. When the colonists arrived, they would need to adapt to all the challenges of their new world if they wanted to avoid getting as sick as I had by the end of my first year. Plus, for the Erin-Vulur to survive, we all had to be ready to interbreed. Genetic diversity made us stronger. Getting spots on my back and knowing my children would come out with little baby fangs was a small price to pay.

Saint Nissikul of the Hammer, as the other Erinye called her, stood beside me on the mountaintop, her arms crossed disapprovingly over her chest. The limb she had lost trying to kill me those many years before had been replaced by a cunning replica, fashioned by Volistad in one of his wild flights of genius down in his subterranean haunt. She scowled at me, glancing significantly at my belly, which was thoroughly swollen by the presence of my third kid. Her scowl was fearsome, especially considering the scars that marred one whole side of her face. “What would my brother say if he knew you were up here in your condition?”

A low, amused masculine voice came from the darkness, preceding Volistad out of the shadows by a split second. “He would probably keep his mouth wisely shut.”

I grinned. “See. I’m fine.”

Nissikul grunted noncommittally at me.

“You didn’t think I would miss this, did you?” I tilted my head back and kissed Volistad on the cheek as he stepped up behind me and surrounded me in his arms.

Nissikul sighed dramatically, though I could see the smile crinkle her eyes. “Of course not. The whole tribe is awake right now. I’ve got my Stormcallers working double shifts keeping the cold at bay long enough for everything to happen so we can get the tribe back to their homes safely.” She shook her head. “Such sentimentality. Barbas will help us if the ship doesn’t come down tonight. We’ll be standing out here to greet the sun, and my Callers will all collapse from exhaustion.”

As if on cue, a bright flare of light broke across the horizon shining like a spear of fire against the eclipsing face of the planet above. We weren’t calling it Palamun, anymore. Volistad had found it tiresome. So now the shadowed, hooded face of Saint Thukkar the Brave watched over his people, the same way he had in life.

I watched at the spear of fire resolved itself into the long, crude outline of an arrowhead. It drew closer, guided by the beacons that Volistad and I had installed at the top of the mountain. A wide open space had been made at the heart of the crater, and as we had improved the village, we had built the new houses into the craggy side of the mountain as it continued up over the crater. We needed the space down in the crater. It wouldn't do for the ship to land on the ice since all that would turn to something of a slushy freshwater sea when the morning came. Flashing lights blinked up from below, and the ship grew ever larger in my sight. I couldn't stop smiling; I was just so excited. This was what we had worked so hard for, what we had fought for.

Soon, the great ship was touching down in the crater, settling onto giant metal feet that gripped the stone beneath it. “Well,” I said to Nissi and Vol, “I guess we had better get down there.” Then, without waiting for either of them to catch on to what I was about to do, I gathered my wind spirits about myself and stepped out into space. As they always did, my spirits carried me smoothly the long way down to the crater floor and set me down gently. They were always so nice to me.

I walked around the side of the ship, looking for where I thought the main hatch would be. Sure enough, the side of the craft split in a whoosh of steam, and a long ramp extended to the ground. I arranged myself neatly and waited. Volistad and Nissikul touched down beside me, the first carried by the latter, both of them wearing identical exasperated looks on their faces. I raised a finger before either of them could scold me. “Shh.”

From the steam, people appeared. They stepped out onto the ramp uncertainly, not sure what to make of everything. They had expected one half-mad Former in a suit of power armor, not an entire village. What could I say? I had gotten lucky. I searched my brain for the right words. It had been a long time since I had spoken anything other than Erinye. Then I put the biggest smile I could on my face, nudged Volistad to remind him to quit scowling and called to Chalice’s newest children, “Welcome home!”