Silkie could not stay still for the life of her. It had been so long since she’d seen her daddy and her excitement that she was able to now was damn near impossible to contain. 

“Sil, could you please stop bouncing around for five seconds?” Ash begged for the third time as he tried to finish tying up her hair. As annoyed as he was, he couldn’t blame her. The last two weeks had felt like a year and he was just as anxious to see Coby as his daughter was.

Silkie let Ash pull her back closer, the hair tie caught in his teeth as he brushed half her hair up into a ponytail. She turned from side to side, the hem of her new purple and white dress swirling around her legs. 

“Do you think Daddy will like my new dress?” she asked.

“Of course he will, now quit moving or this won’t sit right on your head.” Ash held the hair in one hand and set the brush on the floor, taking the hair tie from his teeth, he wound it carefully around the baby fine locks, nervous as always that he was going to somehow mess it up. He used to do this for Lynn and Sophie, but even the simplest of ponytails came out cockeyed at times.

He sat back on his heels with a sigh and surveyed his work. “Looks straight enough,” he muttered, touching the messy bun at the back of his head. Silkie turned on a bounce, smiling down at Ash. 

“How do I look?” she asked, holding up her dress like a princess. The bottom half of her hair lay over her shoulders in curls, courtesy of Avril, her big amber eyes were bright and shining with excitement, lighting up her delicate features. Her dress, picked out by his mother since he still couldn’t shop for Silkie to save his life, hung down to her knees, and her feet were bare. 

That part couldn’t be helped. The girl hated shoes, and any chance she could find not to wear them, she took it. 

He smiled, shaking her gently back and forth. “Pretty as ever,” he declared before getting to his feet. 

“I’ll say.”

They turned to see Coby approaching, a big smile on his face.

Silkie’s face lit up like a Christmas tree. “Daddy!” she ran at him, and he caught her, lifting her up and hugging her tightly. “I missed you so much!”

He laughed, kissing her cheek, his soft flames harmlessly licking her skin. “I did, too,” he said. 

“We both did,” Ash said, coming up to him. He gave Coby a kiss, his hand on his back.

Coby smiled adoringly up at his husband, his bright blue eyes shining. “Sorry I’m late,” he said. “It was hard finding a good spot to stay safe for a little while.”

“Where are you?” Silkie asked.

“Off the coast of South America,” Coby said, setting her down. He turned to one of the walls and touched a finger to it, an image of the country appearing in a bright outline. He motioned to a spot that was located in what was once central Peru. “There are a lot of mountains here so the currents are a little difficult to navigate. They’re pretty strong, too.” He frowned, glancing up at Ash. “That’s why it’s taking us so long to get to the southern continent. We’re fighting currents left and right.”

“Stronger than Rowan anticipated?”

“Much stronger. He said it could take us another two weeks before we get there.”

“That’s a long time,” Silkie said, her brow furrowed. She touched the wall, tracing a line down the outline of the country to just beyond the tip. “What’s after this?”

“A whole lot of nothing for around eight hundred miles or so,” Coby said. “Rowan said this area wasn’t too terribly affected by the Reconstruction. There are islands that are gone, sure, but aside from that, the Drake Passage is largely the same.”

“What’s that?” Silkie asked, looking up at him.

“It’s a stretch of water between South America and Antarctica.” He frowned, glancing at the wall. “It’s also an extremely dangerous area to go through, but it’s our best option to get where we’re going.”

Ash didn’t like hearing that, but it wasn’t like he could offer any alternative. “From the sounds of it, you guys might not have time to go north once this sibling is found,” he said.

Coby shook his head with a sigh. “No, probably not,” he said. “Rowan wants all five of us to arrive at once in order to make a bigger impact on our people, but between getting behind thanks to these currents, and dealing with Yates and Tulle, our only option now is for the four of us to head to Umi Island and meet up with our final sibling there.”

“Do you know who they are?” Silkie asked, looking up at Coby.

“No,” Coby admitted. “All we get is information based on old stories and the research your Gram sends us.” He turned his gaze back to Ash. “She left the college?”

Ash nodded. “Two days ago. She’ll be in Spain for the next month or so. She said there may be some info there she can’t find back at the college and whatever she gets, she’ll send me.”

Silkie gave a little childish gasp as a thought suddenly occurred to her. “Wait, what about Miss Tina?” she asked excitedly. “She’s from the south. Maybe she knows them!”

Ash stared at her. “I didn’t even think of that.”

Coby’s eyes flashed with hope. “Ask her when you get back if it’s possible.”

“It is,” Ash assured him. “Jin and Osa have her babysitting me.” He grimaced, absently touching his side just under his ribs. Coby frowned but said nothing. Silkie kept her eyes glued to the map on the wall, doing her best to control her features. Her fathers didn’t miss the guilt that still managed to cross her face, and they shared a look. This was a situation they shouldn’t talk about with Silkie…she still felt horrible about what happened and no reassurances from either Ash, Jin, or Coby had managed to assuage it.

She touched the wall, the image shifting to show the island chain Coby had created. She traced the curves the twelve islands made, her expression changing to one of interest. Her head tilted to the side and her brow furrowed. 

“It looks like a sea dragon,” she said thoughtfully. 

The men followed the path of her finger, noting how the chain curved and bent in the same way Silkie moved in the water. There were even offshoots where her arms and legs would be. They weren’t islands, merely underwater features that lay several feet below the waterline, just far enough that during low tide, the tops of the outliers would show. It made for a good path for someone who was tired or needed to moor a tiny boat to get to the main islands.

The largest island at the northeastern point, the first in the chain, was shaped like a dragon’s head, while the last one, further southwest, was beveled like Silkie’s tail. That island was forested, giving it, as Marilla said, a “cute fluffy appearance.”

Ash chuckled softly. “It does, doesn’t it,” he said. Even Coby had to smile. 

“It needs a name,” he said. “We can’t keep referring to it as just an island chain in the middle of the ocean.”

“Well,” Silkie said in a long, drawn out sing-song voice, the fingers of her free hand going to her chin, the way Ash’s did sometimes when he was thinking hard about something. “The magic we used to protect it from bad people is also what makes it safe for good people, right?”

Ash nodded. “It’s a refuge. A safe place for those in trouble.”

“Definitely not a vacation spot,” Coby confirmed. “Nice as it may be.”

“It can be for us,” Ash said with a teasing smile, giving Coby a knowing wink. Coby snorted softly, shaking his head. 

“Felmor Kel.”

The men looked down at her, Ash’s eyebrow cocked. “What?”

“It means ‘Dragon Island’ In the common mertounge,” Coby explained. To Silkie, he said, “But that’s just for one. There’s twelve.”

She nodded. “I know,” she replied, pointing at the head of the chain. “It’s that one.”

Ash’s eyes danced over the map, touching the wall to enlarge it, then tapping it twice to give them a more realistic view. From where they were in the Veil, they could see everything as it was, as though they were looking down on the earth from a plane. He noticed how some of the islands were volcanic, rich with life, while a few of the smaller ones were more desolate, yet still sparsely populated with copses of fruit trees and bushes. There were oases on all of them, filled with fresh water to drink. 

“I remember learning about a former state called the Hawaiian Islands,” Ash said. “Way back in high school. The main island was Hawaii, and the smaller ones had their own names, but everyone just knew the whole chain as Hawaii.”

“That makes sense, I guess,” Coby said. He turned to Silkie. “Why Felmor Kel?”

“Sea dragons are viewed as sacred,” Silkie said. “We’re so rare that when one of us is seen, it’s a good omen. We’re not bad, either. We protect people, and take them somewhere safe if they get lost.” She glanced up at Ash. “But some people are still afraid of us because we look scary.” Her eyes grew sad. “That’s what my Mama told me.”

Ash released a long exhale through his nose and he squatted next to her, wrapping his arm around her waist and drawing her close. Coby didn’t release her hand, only squeezed it once. 

“We would never think you’re bad, Sil,” he said. “No one else would either if they knew you.”

“Plus, you don’t look scary,” Coby said, drawing her attention to his radiant smile. “You’re the most beautiful girl in the sea.”

Silkie’s expression brightened, her amber eyes sparkling as Coby hoisted her up into his arms, kissing her on the cheek. She wrapped her arms around his neck, giggling. Ash stood straight, his arm around Coby as they gazed at the map of their island.

“Felmor Kel,” Ash said. “I like it.”

Apparently, as it was later documented, so did High Divine Hero Grace Helman, and his husband Most High King Hawk Grace Helman. When the Turners turned away from the map on the wall, they never saw the chain briefly glow, the spell the family had placed becoming stronger, before the glow faded altogether.

It was to be the only island chain in the Mortal Realm to ever be blessed by the gods.