Chapter 9

Morning after the wedding

Nexus Ranch

Harborton, Washington

It was so hard to leave their marriage bed.

Maria awoke to the delicious feeling of being entwined with the man she loved, The essence of their passion permeated the sheets around them. She could smell him and herself and them together and it was intoxicating, but she couldn’t stay- she knew her sisters were waiting on her.

She carefully slipped from under the covers and gave Ben a butterfly soft kiss on his slightly bent nose. Then with a sigh, she donned one of his old t-shirts, slipped her fuzzy slippers on, and made her way down the stairs for her first meeting as one of Ben’s wives.

Even just moving down the stairs she could feel the changes starting to take place in her body. For one, she was ravenously hungry. She had always been a delicate eater but this morning she was looking forward to one of her mom’s huge breakfasts. Now she understood why her sisters always ate like little piggies but never gained a pound!

She was also quivering with excess energy and all of her senses were on fire. She could even sense Tom on the window sill and Joe in the paddock next to the house. And the bond with her sisters was complete. If she closed her eyes she could pick out each of them and could tell exactly where they sat around the table waiting for her.

And that was nothing next to the bond she now felt with Ben. She could sense him completely- his breathing, his heartbeat, she could even get a glimpse of his mental state as he lay sound asleep. Strangely, she just knew that should she whisper to him in need he would be immediately awake and by her side an instant later.

She had felt some of this before, intimate exposure to Ben’s saliva or taking his fluids orally triggered a level of change but this was an order of magnitude different. LIzzy’s research had shown that having sex with Ben re-wrote significant portions of both of their DNA.

Beyond the sciencey talk of chemicals and body processes though, Maria knew that she was bound now- body, soul, and spirit to the love of her life, and he to her.

She would never want or need another.

Kelly could feel Maria’s glow as she floated down the staircase. She glanced around the table at Mei, Lizzie, and Sarah- they each shared Maria’s happiness as they remembered the occasion when they first achieved theirs. Everyone else in the normally busy household had respectfully made themselves scarce so that the woman could share their first meeting as wives privately.

“So ... how you doing sis?” asked Kelly playfully as Maria took her place at the table.

“Oh you know ... just freakin’ fantastic!” beamed Maria. “I wish I had done this months ago!”

“We could tell! I left a wet spot in the bed that could drown an otter,” laughed Lizzie.

Kelly thought back to the first time the girls shared an orgasm when Ben and Mei had made love. She never understood how, but they were all intimately tied together and whatever one experienced making love with Ben they all experienced. But until last night they had been unable to share Maria’s experience.

“You sure were a naughty ‘lil minx weren’t you?” laughed Sarah. “I didn’t know you had it in you until you had it in you!”

Maria blushed slightly and then gathered herself, squared her shoulders. “The time for being ‘shy Maria’ was over the moment I said ‘I do’. Now ‘I will’ every chance I get!” she said proudly.

The table erupted in peals of feminine laughter.

“Okay, ladies we can talk about the fun stuff in a bit, but there are some things we need to discuss before Ben gets down here,” said Kelly. “Maria, I’m sure you’ve felt that there are some things that we were keeping on the down low from Ben. We can’t, of course, lie to him but there were things he just wasn’t ready to hear. Now we’ve concluded that we can’t wait to tell him any longer and we were just waiting for you to join us. You got your ‘gift’ last night, didn’t you?”

“I did! I got two gifts,” said Maria as she proudly displayed the two new tattoos on her inner wrists.

“Wow those are amazing!” said Lizzie.

“Soooo beautiful!” said Mei.

“Bitchin!” said Sarah. “When are we getting matching Harley’s?”

“This is great Maria! Who gave them to you and what do they do?” asked Kelly.

“This one allows me to talk to the recently dead,” Maria said pointing to the bone key on her right wrist. “And this one somehow allows me to protect children,” she added, indicating the rose on her left wrist. “I don’t really understand how to use them yet, but my sponsor was the Lady of the Land of the Dead and she said I will know how when it is time,” said Maria.

“Lady of the Dead?” Weren’t you terrified?” asked Lizzie.

“Uh, well a little at first. I was also startled by her appearance. She looked just like my older twin sister!” replied Maria.

“Hmmm I have a feeling there’s a clue there about these deities and maybe about us as well,” said Lizzie.

Maria continued. “In my culture, the Lady is usually not feared since she is a protector and guide to the dead, and going farther back to the Aztecs she was also a protector of children.”

“I can see where that fits in with us!” said Mei. “We are all about protecting, especially children.”

“Yes and that brings us to the point we need to discuss with Ben,” said Kelly.

“Yep, we need him to slut it up,” said Sarah with a grin.

“Sarah! That’s not how I’d put it exactly.” chided Kelly gently.

“What? The Lady said you all would be able to explain things to me, I sure hope this is one of those things,” said a shocked Maria. She wasn’t sure she liked where this was going.

“I know you haven’t had many opportunities to talk with your sponsor yet, but each of us has been shown parts of our potential future, and without certain paths being taken our future and that of our children is gravely at risk,” said Mei gently as she touched Maria on the shoulder.

“Maria, Ben is our greatest weapon against the Dark in more than just his ability as a warrior and leader,” said Kelly.

“His weapon is also a weapon it turns out,” said Lizzie.

“In short we need his magic wand to make as many babies in as many different women as possible,” added Sarah.

“Uh well yes. In short, that’s it,” said Kelly. “You see when Pan fiddled with Ben’s DNA he didn’t intend any far-reaching consequences but it turns out that those changes have allowed the forces of Light to bring into being certain abilities that would have been difficult or impossible for them otherwise.”

“Every unique recombination of Ben’s DNA gives them a chance to tweak probabilities, much like how Sarah was created,” added Lizzie.

“Thank you, thank you very much,” said Sarah with a cheesy Elvis impersonation.

“Haha, yes you are special Sarah,” said Mei with a kiss on Sarah’s cheek.

“Athena told me that to create Sarah and bring her into being in this world took as much energy as a star like ours puts out in a year,” said Lizzie.

“With Ben’s DNA, they will now be able to create hundreds of deity-capable children relatively easily. Maybe even enough to finally turn the tide against the Dark.

“But we can make Ben plenty of children can’t we?” asked Maria.

“Our children are to be very special cases Maria, and they must be conceived in a fated time frame,” said Mei as she stroked her small baby bump.

“Um Maria, not to pry, but did you use any birth control with Ben?” asked Kelly.

“No ... I wanted my first time to be without it so that in my heart we were trying to make a baby together. I knew though that my cycle was wrong for that,” said Maria.

“Yes, that’s exactly it. You see none of us have used any type of birth control since our first time with Ben. Only Mei and Kelly have caught it though. We should all be pregnant as potent as Ben is and as often as we do the deed,” said Kelly.

“Ah, I didn’t know. How then...?” asked Maria.

“We each consciously decided to let the gods who help us choose when conception happens. That in turn means that no matter how much each of us wants a dozen or more children...” Kelly paused as they all laughed. “The gods in charge have determined that we should probably not be out of commission nine months of every single year for the next decade. We will likely be restricted to a more typical number of children so that at any time, some of us at least, are operational.”

“You know Ben won’t let us pick up a paper clip since we’ve been pregnant, much less do any strenuous training or god forbid go on any kind of op,” said Mei.

“One other thing that we don’t want to think about, but need to be aware of. We can’t remain on the Nexus Ranch forever. All of us and our children will need to leave the protections here sometimes. We need those who have special abilities to be able to protect themselves and others as we are targeted by those of the dark. Our sponsors assure us that demons and hellhounds are only a few of the dangers the dark can throw at us,” said Kelly.

“Couldn’t we just use a turkey baster and do artificial whatchamacallit?” asked Maria.

“Haha I doubt very much Ben would put up with that, but no, that’s not an option,” said Lizzie.