Dear Diary,

"Vengeance is the last resort, It should never be the first, But when you're on death ground, fight." - Tabitha Diaz, Doctrine of Tabitha, Book of Vengeance

Here Tabitha once again entreats us to avoid leaping to Vengeance as our first response when we are harmed. She clearly states that we ought never have it as our first resort. However, she is still a Goddess of Vengeance, and when all else fails, she will support us when we seek it. But as a Goddess of Vengeance, she well knows how seductive its call can be. If we seek it too easily, it can quickly become our response to any slights. - Priestess Most High Above All Others, Archmage Imperator Saffron Aetos-Diaz, Commentary on the Doctrine of Tabitha

Yeah, this one really got me twisted up more than any other Domain I'm Goddess of. Vengeance, I mean. Which is weird, you'd think it would be Bloodlust. Seriously, 'killing to lubricate the love tunnel' has so much potential for shitty abuse. Fuck, even I kind of did that with those Spartans, and definitely with that one Athenian. But Vengeance...

I think she nailed it, though. Bloodlust is all in my face about rip and tear, and gentle, quiet lovemaking is not exactly my go to in any case. It probably says something not very good about me that my hesitation when it came to Sparagmos with Marie wasn't actually 'cutting my lover into convenient serving sizes', it was the thought that I wouldn't get her back in the morning. Violent sex and sexy violence are just kinda hard wired into me. Shit, I remember all the times I self-serviced after a particularly good game of Call of Duty, so I can't even blame that shit on the Mimic part of me. So while Bloodlust is clearly a part of me, something I can relate to and slip into like a comfy pair of pajamas, it's also something that, when I'm not drunk on power loaned from the God of Madness, I can generally step away from when necessary.

I keep telling myself that, anyhow.

But Vengeance, like Saffron says, is sneaky. Seductive. It tastes like Justice. Sometimes there's not even a way to tell the difference until you've done enough Vengeance that the aftertaste builds up, and by that time you're totally addicted.

But I'm not saying 'don't do a Vengeance'. I'm not quite that much of a hypocritical bitch. But I am gonna say 'keep that shit under lock and key, and take it out when you've already tried Justice, or anything else you can think of to make things right'.

So yesterday, after a day of doing not much other than feeding our kittens and getting fed by Saffron, I Co-Located myself down to dinner just to have some nominally adult conversation. Unfortunately, even with Marie back in action, everybody seemed a little tired out after a day at work. But we sat there and talked about nothing much at all while we took turns feeding each other dumplings. Not, like, Asian dumplings, but not what I thought of as traditional Western dumplings either. Not sure what they were, other than tasty and just the right kind of chewy. Also, just about the perfect size for bite sized food. They had filling, and I'm pretty sure the filling had meat, but the dough part had more in common with those pillow dumplings in canned chicken and dumpling soup.

There was not soup with the dumplings. Instead Marie served them in a kind of savory gravy. Not her normal sweet gravy that came with waffles and tendies, but something rich and thick with hints of onion and garlic alongside the normal savor and salt. She also brought lots of loaves of dark bread, although they were on the smaller side, just about perfect for sopping up the extra gravy.

When we all trooped up to the Bath, Isnomi very pointedly led her sisters over to where my ladies and I floated. "When the babies coming to the Bath?"

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I shook my head. "They've been here once already."

Ria nodded, but backed Isnomi up by saying, "yes, but we all bathe daily. Shouldn't they?"

I smiled at her to make sure she knew I wasn't upset, then said, "Marie's been taking care of that for the moment."

They all looked at Marie at that point. She scooped Maze up and ran her tongue over my little pony girl's head, starting with her hairline and going over the top and down her back, using her tongue like a big fine toothed comb. Maze giggled when the tiger tongue bath wound up with her going into the tub. Of course at that point she all but disappeared, but that started a whole game of 'catch the kids to tiger-bathe them' between an ever increasing number of Marie and the girls.

They all dropped off to sleep the moment their heads hit the bed. For the first couple nights, they'd actually rotated through sleeping in their bedrooms, because the constant kitten rooching did not make for easy sleeping sometimes, but tonight they all slept through the night. Honestly, the kittens mostly did too.

Dreamt of another night of choreography. It seemed off, but not in a bad way. More like the ladies were still having fun with the dancing and chibis and beans, but were bored with following the script exactly, so some horseplay and dunking wound up happening. Can't say I minded all that much, especially once Madeline got into the spirit of the thing, grabbed Karen, and dove into my Maw. Karen's usually a little hesitant about that, but that cinnamon alcohol fire hit hard, mostly because I think I needed to really let go in a way I hadn't, even when I had my ladies in the Bedroom.

Like, I'd definitely gotten my groove on with them, and it got all the best kinds of messy and rough, but I think I needed to let go in that 'fall asleep and let go of the tension' way. Karen's boozy self definitely did that, especially when Marie, apparently inspired by Madeline, kept doing the same thing every time Karen showed back up.

Woke to something I'd dreaded. The sounds of unhappy kitten, combined with the sounds of unhappy girl. In this case, specifically it was Isadora yowling and Isnomi growling at her.

"Girls!" I scrambled for a moment before Co-Locating, since that was just simpler than disengaging from sleepy suckling Felicia and Erato. One hand on each of their heads, holding them apart without grabbing either of them too hard, I said, "Isnomi, aren't you the big sister here?"

She pouted up at me. "Yeth, bud..."

"Okay, that means you're not supposed to fight with your little sisters."

"Thee bid me!" Before I could really respond to that, she added, "then thee thckwathed me when I bid her back!"

I frowned at her and picked one of them up in each arm, scooting around until I held them on my lap. "How could she bite you. She doesn't even have teeth yet. Or claws, for that matter."

Isnomi held up one arm, showing me a little bleeding circle, with a couple long raggedy scratch marks a little further down. "Thee!"

At that point Marie grumbled out, "Teething."

I froze, then sighed and dropped a Heal Injury into Isnomi, wiping away the evidence of the bite along with the damage. "Now, where did you bite Isadora?"

"Onna awm." I checked, but Isadora showed no evidence of having been mauled by the Hell of Teeth. When I looked the question at Isnomi, she looked a little sheepish and said, "I did nod bide hawd."

At that point Isadora was kinda scrambling and squirming to get on a tit, so I rolled my eyes, did the Mimic and Shapeshift thing, and let her get her nom on. Meanwhile I head bunted Isnomi. "I'm sorry you got bit, kiddo. But I don't think she really wanted to hurt you."

She sighed. "I know."

I looked around; the other girls had mostly rolled over and gone back to sleep. My ladies had seen me taking care of things and done the same. Even Marie had put her head back down and gone into her Marie power save mode. A quick check showed the sun still way below the horizon. I nudged Isnomi. "So, we'll get them some wet rags or something to teeth on, but if your sisters start tryna nom you again, what do you do first?"

She looked a little sheepish, then said, "get you, owah Ma, owah Mawa."

I nodded, then added, "or Siobhan, or Tallulah. The babies are growing fast, and it's gonna be hard for you guys to keep them in check without hurting them. And how would you feel if you hurt one of the babies?"

"Bad." She sounded genuinely contrite. I snuggled her up, lay down with her and Isadora both in my arms, and smiled as she stroked her sister's hair and sang to her until she fell back to sleep. Not sure which of us fell back to sleep first, and I'm not sure I cared, either.

I mean, I Co-Located to the water closet and brought back a dozen damp wash cloths before I fell asleep, because I'm not that much of an idiot.

Really I'm not. Why is everybody laughing?

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