Epilogue

Andrea and Daric never did leave the city.

It seems that Andrea used all her money to get there. At the time she was banking on Aric still being in love with her and offering to continue on their life together.

Aric and Brianna offered to pay for them to return, but Andrea said they had nothing to return to, so they would make a life here.

Daric found a job working with the local Blacksmith. While he was in a guild up north, he was able to show he was proficient enough the guilds down south accepted him.

Even though a lot of the local girls appeared interested in him, some of it almost bordering on stalking, he refused to date or have any form of casual sex with any of them.

Learning the circumstances of his own birth put his libido on hold. Aric got the idea from a few conversations with him, that before the revelation he was quite the ladies man where he was from. But that all changed once he learned how his father really was.

Aaron and Aric had talked to him extensively about his father when he asked. They told him all he wanted to know. And later they found out that's why he was trying to change, because he said he wanted to be liked as a better man than his father was, and that wasn't going to happen with him bed hopping with every woman he found.

He also said that once he found the right woman, he would do right by her and any children they had. Aric and Aaron also didn't fail to notice that one of the qualities that helped draw the ladies to him was that he couldn't pass a child of any age without talking or taking time to play with them.

But his careful planning may be all for naught, because Candice's little sister Brenda has her eye on Daric, and something says that once she seriously pursues him he won't stand a ghost of a chance.

Like her sister did, she works for Gemma as a serving girl. She's is a very cute and petite girl, with short honey blonde hair, small but perky breast, and very long legs. And the owner of the biggest brown doe eyes anyone has every seen.

She has turned them on Daric a couple times when he came in for a dinner and they always seem to cause him to stumble his way through a conversation with her. After he leaves she always giggles and smiles, as she stares after him, well after he's long gone through the door.

When she decides it's time to get serious it will be a shortest engagement ever seen. One could see that the boy was already hooked and doesn't realize it yet.

Andrea worked for Gemma for awhile. Gemma wasn't working the longer hours once she had two teenagers running around, and now that Aaron and she were their sixties, they are kept very busy. She employed more people to help her out and was happy to give anyone a job. Bryan is currently managing the tavern for her.

But while Andrea was there, Andrea and Gemma really talked in depth from time to time about Andrea and Aric's past. Andrea eventually started to really see how hurtful what she and Daven did was to Aric, and why he never got past it.

One night while Aric was there Andrea pulled him to the side and tearfully apologized. She said that she finally could see what she had really done to him and its true impact.

Aric graciously accepted her apology, but was never alone in her company without Brianna around. He knew that it still made Brianna nervous.

One night Aric introduced Andrea to Melt when he came into the bar for a drink. Instead of Melt getting a drink, they talked and really seemed to hit it off, and after few months of dating they started talking about marriage. Both of them seemed to be looking for someone to be with at this point in their lives, and not just a casual bed mate.

As it started to get serious, Andrea sat Melton down and told him up front, that while she was falling for him, that Aric would always be her first and greatest love. She had loved him almost her entire life and that was part of her he would never be able to get from her.

Melt said he understood because his first wife Marie would be the same for him, but he also thought he had enough love left to go around for her too.

They got married that fall and seemed to be doing well. They were a good match and Andrea now works in his bakery along side him. Anytime anyone sees the two of them, they are always laughing and talking arm in arm.

Aric only sees Melt on the street now and never in the tavern any more.

Brianna, Aric, and the twins looked back at their home they had locked up tight. They were all going on an extended family trip and explore the world a bit.

When the boys were younger, Brianna said that all her children would be far better than her, and would be the best weapons masters the world had ever seen. Now they would be going out in to the world to have a look around and experience it, while their parents watched that is.

The boys seemed to get better and better during the seasons, and it also didn't hurt at the time that little Darla kept turning up with a friend to watch the boys.

The times she started turning up the most was when she turned twelve. And at twelve seasons old Darla was just as pretty as Gemma must have been at her age, with the same midnight dark raven hair and large dark blue eyes. She was painfully shy and quiet, but still seemed to be the center of attention of the boys her age because of her looks.

She never seemed to want any boy, other than Caelan, to get to close to her. She kept all other boys at arms length. But with him, while she seemed even more shy and quiet, she was never anymore than 5 feet at best from wherever he was, even if he was in town for any reason.

And later on she had somehow even managed to get him to walk around with her and hold her hand while he was in town. It was like she always knew when and where he was coming to town, and there she was.