It was late the next morning by the time Eli and Aria exited her room and came down the stairs. The smirks on both Freya’s and Lilly’s faces made it obvious they’d heard every word of their kinky play, but thankfully none of them made any comments. Freya handed the two of them cups of coffee, offering a broad smile to Aria and a deep kiss to Eli.

“Good morning to you too.” He said after taking a long sip of the black coffee.

“Good morning lovebirds!” Lilly said cheerfully.

Eli chuckled while putting down his coffee and moving around the kitchen island so he could kiss Lilly as well. Despite the fact that he was thoroughly satisfied with the previous night’s activities, his hands started to roam up her lithe form and underneath the white apron she was wearing. She broke the kiss with a grin and turned around, facing the pan that contained the scrambled eggs she’d started for them when she heard them waking up a few minutes earlier.

“You’re insatiable.” She chastised him teasingly, but ground her hips against him.

“I can’t help it.” He shrugged, holding his dryad girlfriend tightly.

“Go sit with your coffee. I’ll bring you your breakfast in a minute.”

With one final kiss Eli relented, sitting at one of the bar stools next to Aria. She placed one of her hands on his while she unlocked her phone with the other and read through her morning messages. Eli did his best not to disturb her while she did this – he knew her work as both a member of the Hightower royal family and an executive at their front company on Earth was important. He silently drank his coffee and looked through his phone, reading an email from Gradumir and relaxing until Lilly served the two of them their scrambled eggs accompanied by toast.

“Zee came through.” Aria said, gesturing to her phone. “She sent a report on Vessara.”

“What does it say?” Eli asked before digging into the food with a groan. “Lilly, this is great!”

Aria took a bite and grinned. “Thank you Lilly.” She said through a mouthful of food.

Suddenly, Minerva emerged from the guest room with a triumphant cry. “I found something!” She shouted as she leapt from the 2^nd floor balcony, her modest grey dress with slits in the back to accommodate her wings flapping as she sailed through the air. She landed softly in the kitchen with Dr. Scalemore’s book and a blue notebook of her own tucked under her arm.

“What did you find?” Eli asked.

She slid onto one of the bar stools and placed the heavy book down with a thump. She opened her own notebook first then the heavy tome, speaking as she did. “Vessara was in Targe Maraz.”

“What?!” Eli exclaimed, dropping his fork.

“A big part of Dr. Scalemore’s work was to investigate potential dragon remains. He used to go to every site himself, but he was getting too old to trek through mountains and swamps. A few months ago Vessara reached out to him, claiming to be a fan of his work and offering to go on field expeditions for him, and she’s been going since. When he heard about the rumor of there being dragon bones on Targe Maraz he sent her.”

“He seemed surprised that we found dragon bones though.” Freya countered.

Minerva nodded. “By the looks of it, this is the first site that she visited which didn’t end up being a dead end. It’s not surprising he didn’t have a ton of faith in us.”

“You said Vessara had been chasing rumors for months. This is really the first one that was legitimate?”

“That’s right.” Minerva confirmed. “Reading through his notes it looks like 99% of the leads he was given ended up being fake. The 1% of the time it ends up being real he ends up with a pit full of burned dragon bones – which obviously he couldn’t use for his testing.”

“I don’t get why he didn’t just track down a live dragon and ask them for a DNA test.” Eli wondered aloud.

“Putting aside the fact that I don’t think dragon’s would subject themselves to testing for a moment, his research says he needed a pure blooded dragon.” Minerva explained. “Some dragon bloodlines have other bloodlines intermingled over time. Demons and elves and the like. If a dragon had a great uncle or something who was an elf, it would throw off the results of the test. He thought that finding remains of a long-dead dragon might give less of an opportunity for mixed-race DNA.”

“So he would have had to track down a specific dragon.” Eli shook his head as he chuckled. “I empathize.”

“What a depressing job.” Lilly said. “That kind of failure rate has to be grating on you. No wonder he started sending someone else instead.”

“I feel badly for Dr. Scalemore.” Freya agreed. “Vessara…less so.”

“I still don’t understand how all the pieces fit together though.” Minerva continued. “How does Vessara fit in with the group you ran into on Targe Maraz? And why was she working with Dr. Scalemore?”

“I think I understand.” Aria interjected, nodding back to her phone. “Zee was able to dig into her text messages, her email, everything. It looks like Vessara was part of a fringe group of conspiracy theorists who’d taken to calling themselves the ‘Church of the Immortal Primordial Dragon’.”

“Well, that sounds ominous.” Eli chuckled, shaking his head. “How do they fit into all this?”

“To them, finding a dragon isn’t just about enabling lizardkin and naga to have offspring. They want to undo millions of years of evolution and recreate the common ancestor between the 3 races. They think doing so will unlock all sorts of primal magical powers that will allow them to rule all the magical realms.”

Eli rubbed his temples for a moment. “They’re talking about creating chimeras?” He said slowly.

“Yes.” Aria confirmed.

“Is that even…possible?” Minerva asked.

“Maybe?” Lilly offered. “If they’ve got a common ancestor, access to human gene sequencing technology, and life magic…it might theoretically be possible. But it’s a stretch.”

“I’m still lost. How does that relate to the group on Targe Maraz?” Freya said.

“I think I know.” Eli said. “Imagine you’re Vessara for a second – a fanatical member of the cult of the whatever-”

“Church of the Immortal Primordial Dragon.” Lilly corrected him. “And how do you know she’s a fanatical member?”

“The fact that she was willing to kill, the fact that she killed herself before getting caught... Besides, nobody casually joins an organization with a name like that. It practically screams ‘cult’. They’re all fanatics.” Eli said with a grin before continuing his theory. “You’re Vessara. You’re a lizardkin and your goal in life is to combine lizardkin, naga, and dragon DNA into some sort of chimera.”

“I’m going to go ahead and assume you need pure-blooded dragon DNA for their little experiment too.” Minerva added. “If they needed it just to figure out whether they’re descended from dragons, they’d definitely need it if they’re trying to make a chimera.”

“Right. That makes sense.” Eli nodded. “There’s just a few problems standing in your way. Your first problem is that you can’t even leave your realm without special permission, much less search for a dragon. Your second problem is that you have no idea where you’d even begin to look for a pure-blooded dragon. Your third problem is that I’m absolutely sure that no pure-blooded dragon would let you poke around in their…what did you call it Freya? Their ‘hoo-haw’?”

The girls burst into giggles. Aria was the first to recover from the laughing fit, picking up Eli’s story where he left off. “I see where you’re going with this. If I’m Vessara, to get around all these problems I go get a job working for Dr. Scalemore, posing as a well-meaning research assistant who is passionate about solving the problem of naga-lizardkin reproduction.”

“How do you know Dr. Scalemore wasn’t in on it though?” Lilly asked.

“Other than the fact that he’s now dead?” Minerva responded. “She approached him for the job. Besides, there’s no indication in his notes that he was looking to do genetic experimentation. He was a scientist, just looking to confirm his theory.”

“Alright, fair.” Lilly acquiesced. “I think I see the next part of this story. Vessara uses her job to access Dr. Scalemore’s notes. She uses the notes to secretly try to track down a live, pure-blooded dragon. Eventually she’s handed the lead for Targe Maraz. She checks it out and realizes that it’s the real deal – she’s found real dragon remains.”

“Oh! I know what comes next!” Minerva interrupted excitedly as she flips through the notebook. “From her work with Dr. Scalemore she knows that the responsibility for incinerating the dead falls to the next of kin. When she looks up the entry for the dragon on Targe Maraz, she realizes he has a sibling. Not only that, his sibling is a pure blooded female dragon – exactly what her church is looking for in order to create their chimera.”

Freya was the next to join in on the theory building. “So she calls for reinforcements! She gets her friends from her little cult to lie in wait for Isla, knowing that sooner or later she’ll show up. When she does, they pounce! Think about it: during the battle, those lizardkin were jumping all over her but none of them were going for the kill. They were working to trap, not to kill.”

“Only we interrupted their plan.” Eli said. “Then, we show up at Dr. Scalemore’s office and we start talking about dragon remains on Targe Maraz. Vessara knows that within a few minutes, the professor would put 2 and 2 together just like we did, and be able to pin this back on her. So she panics and kills the professor, stealing his notebook to try and cover her tracks.”

“Lizardkin are exceptionally good at hiding.” Aria finished. “I bet if you weren’t there with those magic eyes of yours she would have escaped and gone to ground. By the time we figured out what had happened, she could be anywhere.”

“Not to be alarmist, but when was the last time anyone heard from Isla?” Minerva asked. “Assuming all of this is true – and it seems to fit the facts so I have no reason to think it’s not – I don’t think they’re just going to give up and let it go. Now that they can identify Isla specifically, they’re probably going to take another run at her.”

The look on Eli’s face darkened. “It’s…been a few days. I didn’t think anything of it, but now…”

“I haven’t heard anything in a few days either.” Aria said. “Do you have any other way of getting in touch with her?”

“No.” Eli replied. “Shit.”

“Shit indeed.” Lilly agreed.

“So how are we going to help the lovely dragoness if she won’t answer your texts or calls?” Freya questioned.

“I think the plan remains the same.” Eli answered. “The dragon’s ball. We’re going to be digging into the House of the Snake while we’re there. Why don’t we see what we can find about this…Church of the Immortal Primordial Dragon while we’re at it? We can figure out how they’re planning on going after Isla next, and stop them.”

“If that’s the case, we’re going to need to plan this out carefully.” Aria said. “It’s one thing to try and do a bit of research on a dark elven house. It’s another to go poking around a lizardkin cult on their home territory. This could be dangerous.”

“Agreed.” Eli replied. “Let’s ask Zee to cross reference the list that Zalara gave us versus anyone she can find in this Church. Maybe we’ll get lucky and figure out who’s making the disguises for them.”

“Good thinking.” Lilly said. “Talk to Naz too – she’ll have some ideas on security while we’re at the party. Come to think of it, we should bring in Sira, Ziran, Aratessa, and Vespera too. I’m sure they’ll all be able to help.”

“Going all out for this one?” Minerva asked. “All hands on deck?”

“No reason not to.” Lilly said. “This is supposed to be a party for the richest and most powerful people in across all the magical realms. Everyone will be bringing their entourages, their harems, their retainers, their guards…”

“I’ll ask my parents to spare us some of their guards.” Aria said before turning to Eli with a loving smile. “I’m sure they won’t mind, given that it’ll be to help protect their daughter and future son-in-law.”

“You two are too cute.” Freya said with a smile. “You should get your tribe of orcs to come too! I’m sure they’d be willing to work security for their chieftain.”

“That’s going to be a big group.” Minerva warned them. “How are you going to coordinate everyone? Make sure they’re where they need to be, and showing off a united front? And if you’re taking everyone, who is going to be responsible for making sure your household still runs smoothly here?”

Slowly, a thought started to occur to Eli. “You know, she’s right. Not just for this one outing though. Our little family is starting to grow and turn into more of an…organization. A house. A force to be reckoned with.”

“Agreed.” Aria said. “Where are you going with this though?”

“We could use someone to help organize the chaos. Maybe someone who isn’t on the front line, but someone we trust to run the household and keep everything on the rails. Someone…like a majordomo.” Eli replied, his face breaking into a grin and looking at Minerva.

“Wait. Me?” She asked.

“You’re perfect for the role.” Eli replied. “You’ve got the experience. You’ve done it before. You’ve proven you’re trustworthy, helpful, and smart. We talked earlier about you finding purpose in whatever your next job is.”

“I don’t… well, I mean…” She stuttered.

Eli was unperturbed. He looked over at Aria and raised one eyebrow. “Assuming my fiancée is okay with it, of course?”

“Of course. I think she’d be an excellent candidate to help run our household.” Aria replied.

“How about it Minerva?” Eli asked. “Come work for us? I’ll pay you out of my own pocket.”

“How are you going to do that?” Aria questioned.

“Oh, I’ve got an app you’re going to love.” Eli answered excitedly. “I’ve been meaning to tell you about it. It’s going to be huge.”

“That’s what she said.” Freya interjected, causing them all to laugh.

“My fiancé’s business ideas aside, how much do you think is a reasonable pay for your services?” Aria asked.

“Well… I… room and board.” She said quickly.

“That’s it?” Lilly questioned. “Come on now. Aria pays Freya and I quite handsomely. You deserve more than that.”

“Well… I’ll take whatever they’re getting paid then.” Minerva said.

“Done.” Aria said.

"I… well…” She hesitated.

Seeing her reluctance, Eli furrowed his brow. “There’s something else isn’t there?”

“No! Not at all. Well, sort of.” She said, blushing furiously.

“Hey. It’s okay.” Eli said reassuringly, locking eyes with her and scooping up her hands in his. “I’m sorry I put you in an awkward position. I thought it was something that you might like. If you don’t want this though, that’s completely okay! You can still stay here and we can figure out your next mo-”

“No!” She protested, cutting him off. “It’s not that I don’t want this, I do want this! I want this so badly! I want to feel useful and helpful again! I want to be doing things I’m good at and enjoy, and you’re dangling them in front of me!”

“So what’s wrong then? Talk to me Minerva.” Eli replied.

“It’s just… well… if I’m working for you, how are we… I mean, how am I supposed to…because you don’t with your staff, and well…” She trailed off.

The lightbulb went off in Eli’s mind. “Minerva, do you want to go on a date with me?”

She blushed an even deeper shade of crimson when he said it. “Yes.” She answered softly.

“And you’re worried that by working for me I won’t date you?”

There was a long pause. Finally, she nodded. “Yes.” She practically whispered.

“Why are you worried about that?”

“You won’t date Sira.” Minerva replied. “I just kind of assumed that meant you wouldn’t date people who are working for you.”

Without hesitation he leaned forward and kissed her softly on the cheek before fixing his eyes back on hers. “Let me remove that concern: I won’t date Sira because she’s not interested. It has nothing to do with her working for me.”

“Oh.” She said, deflating. “I’d…never actually asked her about it. I just kind of assumed…”

“Minerva, I promise that this position will have no bearing whatsoever on our decision to become romantic – or to not become romantic, if we decide. Sound good?”

“Yes.” She said with more confidence, her voice slightly more than a whisper now.

“So will you be our majordomo?” He asked again.

She cleared her throat and nodded. “Yes.” She replied, a smile creeping across her face. “I will be your majordomo.”

“And will you go on a date with me too?” Eli asked.

The question seemed to catch her slightly off guard. She blushed, then nodded. “Yes! I’ll go on a date with you too!”

“Then it’s settled.” Eli said. “I’ll let Sira and Ziran know – they’ll pass the message along to the rest of the staff.”

“And I’ll tell the girls too.” Aria said. “About the new position and the date.”

Minerva beamed with happiness before Freya launched herself across the table in a flying tackle-hug that resulted in giggles. “Finally! Another girl with wings! We need more of us in the harem. Come on, I’ll show you all the best spots to fly from in the castle.”

She proceeded to drag the slightly bewildered Minerva towards the greenhouse and into the courtyard beyond. Eli chuckled as they left, shaking his head before he caught the look on Lilly and Aria’s faces. “What? Is there something wrong?”

“No, it’s just… you’re becoming more confident in yourself.” Lilly responded. “It’s a good look on you. I like it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you just asked a girl on a date while she was sitting in front of your girlfriend, your other girlfriend, and your fiancé.” Aria chuckled.

“Hey, in fairness you did give me the green light.” He countered. “I never would have asked if you didn’t.”

“I know. If it were anyone else, I might have been jealous. But it’s you. I know you have enough love for all of us, and more. And the fact that you did it shows that you’re finally embracing who you really are, which makes me happy.” Aria said.