"My darling... I will see them all pulled apart for what they have done to you..." Jiaoying rubbed her great love’s head obsessively, the tears in her eyes a never-ending stream.

Yari couldn’t care less about her missing hair at the moment. She was only worried about her loves.

She could feel, in their touch, that they were exhausted. The blood spattered along their clothes only helped to show why.

For some reason, both looked different than when she last saw them. Jiaoying looked older, stronger, and... even sexier. Solomon had been given much the same edge, but it was as if he’d aged five or ten years in the time they’d been apart.

She couldn’t imagine what her absence had done to him. His normally purposeful orange eyes were black, still, and obsessive.

Every time he looked at her wings or bandages, his heart seemed to break within his chest.

Though their reunion was supposed to be sweet, ignoring the heartache was next to impossible.

Solomon held onto both women tightly, his head buried in Yari’s neck, unresponsive.

She reached for his face to lift it, giving him a heartbroken smile.

"Don’t tell me... Am I no longer beautiful to you?"

The obsession in Solomon’s eyes only grew brighter. He ripped off his chestplate in one swift move and placed it against his heart.

Yari was shocked. His heart was beating again.

"As long as my heart beats... You need never ask such a thing ever again. My love for you, and my attraction to you are the only absolutes that exist in this world."

Solomon cupped both women’s faces in his hands.

"As long as I live, the two of you will always be the most beautiful things I have ever seen. And if I should ever grace the crossroads with my presence, I hope to see nothing but your faces in my resting place."

Both Yari and Jiaoying knew that despite Solomon’s spoken devotion, there were some words in the back of his mind that he dared not say.

The fact that he hated himself for not being able to protect her.

Yari knew exactly where his frustration lay. Which was why she was certain she had to break him out of his tailspin before he became something she didn’t recognize.

Solomon snorted when Yari suddenly stuck her finger up his nose to grab him by the nostril.

"Life is unpredictability. And I am your partner, not your child. It’s not your job to protect me from every scrape I might sustain. Just love me in the moments in between, so that I always want to come back to you."

Yari must’ve known that her ask would be difficult for Solomon. So she didn’t even give him the opportunity to deny her.

She kissed him desperately, her tongue only leaving his mouth to whisper that she missed him, only breaking away to perform the same spell on her weeping woman.

As they did so often, the three of them became enveloped in their own little world. The moment for the three of them was sweeter than sugarcane. More intoxicating than wine.

Griselda slowly turned to her daughter, who was trying to figure out how to peel a dragonfruit without her mother’s help.

"What the fuck am I watching right now?"

Giselle shrugged, already used to watching her sister stick her tongue in the mouth of another woman and a boy not even half her age.

She pointed at each of them without looking up from her task.

"Xu Jiaoying. She was Yari’s student about twenty years ago. She’s been in love with her ever since. Solomon A’kenai. Also, Yari’s student, but much more recently. They both jumped on her as soon as they could get the chance and now they’re in love."

Grisellda turned back and forth between her fruit-eating daughter and her man-eating one.

"...Are you sure that she’s the one who got jumped on and not the other way around?"

"Could be. Every time I ask what their first night together was like, she gets rather squirmy and tries to strike me."

Griselda laughed boisterously. "I’m glad to see my girls haven’t lost their fire! With your father, I could never be sure."

Solomon and Jiaoying only pulled away from one another when they realized there was a question they should have asked all along.

"Honey... Who is this...?" Jiaoying wiped her eyes and her lip.

Somehow, Yari looked as embarrassed to say the answer. "She’s... my mother."

She expected her partners to ask some form of follow-up questions, since she had told them both that her mother had left them when they were young.

But after checking to make sure that the atmosphere between them was not something terrible, both of her partners moved as if they were making a choreographed effort.

They bowed their heads in front of Grisellda deeply, kneeling on the ground with their knuckles pressed against the wood.

""Please allow us to marry your daughter.""

"M-Marry!?" Yari blushed as she pulled the two of them back to their feet. "I love you both too, but it’s too soon for us to be thinking about that kind of thing... W-We just got together, and we’re still getting to know each other, and..."

Jiaoying grabbed the simple satchel that had been resting on her back this entire time.

Pulling back the flap, she fished out a large brown thing that looked like an overfilled coconut.

Yari gasped shakily, her hands immediately going to cover her mouth.

"It’s a surprise, I know... Bear and I already decided on the way here..." Jiaoying began. "We’re going to get married, and we’re going to raise this child together."

Jiaoying held Yari’s face as if it were the most precious thing in the world. She gently pressed her forehead against her love’s.

Already, her tears were returning.

"We know the timing is shitty... But I think... No matter the time or place, I will always want you to be my wife, just like I will always want Bear to be my husband. T-This isn’t a proper proposal, so I don’t want you to think that you have to say yes, so-"

"Yes...."

Everyone in the room could hear the sound of Jiaoying’s heart skipping a beat. She laughed dryly in disbelief.

"You didn’t even let me say..."

"Say all of the rest later." Yari tried, and failed, at not becoming choked up. "Just know that for right now... My answer is yes."

She looked to Solomon, her eyes finally losing the battle against her tears.

"If you will have me as well, then..."

Solomon expressed his answer physically, stealing Yari’s breath away.

As he held her, their tears mixed together to form a unique dew.

A single drop spilled from their faces to water the seed that lay between them.

Though at first nothing out of the ordinary occurred, it wasn’t long before it flashed with light...