Fensa expected them to be pursued back to the States, and took every precaution to ensure they didn’t get caught. She and Ola had already offlined their GoGens. But just in case, they flew into Bulgaria, prioritizing getting the hell out of Greece over the risk of Xenon and Eos being seen in dragon form.

There, Ola, using her strange Ola charm, zero fucks, and get ‘er done, found a pilot who not only spoke English, but was willing to accept off-system credits from a temporary account she set up upon landing in Bulgaria.

After that, it was a matter of flying home before chartering another private plane that would take Fensa and her newly reunited family plus two to their final destination. Just a couple more steps, but Fensa braced herself as they walked through the front doors of the North Dakota kingdom house.

Communicating with their uncles over the bioware had been too risky, so as they pulled up to the house in Ola’s Escalade, she had no idea what she’d find. Which was why she instructed Eos to stay in the car with his father, who’d fallen asleep on the long ride from the private North Dakota airfield, and wait for her signal.

For once she received no argument from her usually over-protective son. And she could see in his short nod of agreement how worried he was for the father who’d done little more than sleep on the long journey. Well, relatively long. At least this time they didn’t have to walk across several ice sheets, forests, tropical jungles, and mountain ranges teeming with oversized prehistoric beasts to reach their destination.

“You ready?” Ola asked, pulling her gun out of the Escalade’s glove box.

No, not really. But Fensa got out anyway and braced herself for anything from her super worried uncles to a swat team lying in wait as they walked through the doors of the North Dakota kingdom house.

But what they found in the grand house’s ornate foyer was way more shocking than either of those possibilities.

Their fathers. Both with a wolf puppy raised above their heads. “Ein! Tveir! Thrír!” they chanted together in Old Norse, before whipping the puppies so high into the air, Fensa screamed, “Dads!”

However, the two puppies shifted into baby dragons at the top of the throw, cawing down to everyone beneath them, before shifting back into puppies and dropping into their grandpas’ arms.

“Daughter, you should have given warning,” Fenrir said, his tone admonishing as he stroked the furry head of the twin he’d just caught. “Your papa and I might have missed catching our granddaughters, if not for our Viking focus.”

“So that happened while we were away,” Ola said beside her as Fensa stared at their two fathers in amazement. “Also, gender mystery solved!”

What followed was a Lifetime Channel-worthy tale of regret, apology, and a Color Purple-esque proclamation from their wife that FJ and Olafr would not be allowed back in her good graces—or her bed—until they “made things right with Fensa.” Like Other Fensa had said, after their very rough start, her parents really were happy together. It had taken them less than twenty-four hours of their wife’s affection deep freeze for the Viking brothers to follow their daughters to North Dakota.

However, upon arrival, they were informed by their equally vexed brother-in-law that Fensa, Ola, and Eos had left for reasons unknown shortly after leaving the babies with them. They had known the reason must be important if Fensa had left her barely weaned babies behind, and had decided to stay on at the house to wait for her return. (Also, they sensed it would be better to wait here in North Dakota rather than Michigan where they’d be subjected to their wife’s baleful stare.)

To that end, they went to the room her uncles had designated as the twins’ nursery to make amends with the babies who they would need to claim as their grandchildren before they returned to the Detroit kingdom house. So imagine their surprise when they found two girl wolf puppies where the creatures they were expecting should have been.

To FJ and Olafr who had missed the first five years of their own twin daughters’ lives, this felt like a gift from Odin himself. And for the last forty-eight hours, they’d been making up for the lost time they hadn’t had with their daughters.

“Wow. And I thought you had a heart wrenching seventy-two hours,” Ola said, wiping a bit of mist from her eyes after their fathers finished their story, still holding the wolf pup granddaughters in their arms. “Thug down.”

What was it about the sight of huge men and babies? As angry as Fensa had been when she stormed out of the Michigan kingdom house, she came down with a big old case of the “All Is Forgivens” by the time they finished.

“But where is our grandson, the future King of Michigan?” FJ asked. “We must request his forgiveness as well!”

Aaaaannnnd cue the return of the Awkward Mood.

Fensa and Ola looked at each other in a way that must have clearly relayed their “Oh shit” response. Olafr asked, “Why do you look to each other so?”

Which is how Fensa came to find herself bracing for a fight all over again only fifteen minutes after entering the North Dakota kingdom house.

“Dads, you swear you’re going to be cool about this?” she asked one more time as they approached Ola’s Escalade.

But before they could answer, the door opened and slammed shut.

“You will not hurt Blue Papa!” Eos declared before once again hulking out of his third set of clothes in as many days by going ten-foot dragon.

And then…whoa…she was reminded of the time she pulled the spear out of his father’s eye as Eos let out a roar so thunderous, she could hear the windows rattling behind her.

“Good luck explaining that to the rest of the kingdom town,” Ola muttered as Fensa ran forward waving both arms at the golden dragon.

“Eos, it’s okay!” she called up to her seriously pissed off son.

“They just want to say sorry!” Ola yelled behind her.

“And meet their son-in-law. Please change back!” Fensa begged, even though she wasn’t sure he could hear her over all that roaring.

But then the roaring stopped, and Eos once more stood before her in a shredded version of the WELCOME TO BULGARIA! shirt and basketball shorts they’d bought him yesterday.

To her surprise, her mate stood behind him. Gaunt, but thanks to his shell, much stronger than he’d been when she’d found him in that room.

“Hi,” she pushed into his head.

A very long beat passed. Then, “Reverence, you do honor me with your hi.”

And she found herself smiling as she came to stand in front him and their hulked out son. “I’m glad you’re awake, because totally weird story: my dads are here and they want to meet you.”

“We have already met.”

“No, I don’t think you understand,” she said, scrunching her forehead. “They’re standing behind me. But they want to formally meet you. Like, get an introduction.”

“Reverence, they do not stand behind you.”

“What?” she asked, glancing toward her fathers because she couldn’t understand what Xenon was talking about—

Wait, what was going on?

Her fathers weren’t only not standing, they were in full-on kneeling bows on the ground, babbling, “Please forgive us, All Father. We did not know! We did not know!”

What. The. Hell? Before Fensa could ask, Xenon did something she’d never conceived he ever would.

Spoke out loud. In a human tongue.

It was Old Norse, which she could vaguely translate as, “Rise, worthy ones. Of course, you could not have known.”

And that was how she discovered her mate, the King of Wolves, had gone on to become the god her fathers called Odin. The same god who had spoken to their Aunt Myrna, and come down from Valhalla the eve before the great North Wolves battle against their serpent enemy, and guided them in their fight.

Or as Ola put it after all was explained, “Let me get this straight. You went back in time, mated friggin Odin, made three half-dragon babies. And now you’re, like, somehow our family’s whole freaking origin story, too?! Dude, you were only gone for two weeks!”