[i]Althalus[/i] 

He hadn’t expected Mar to give up her original policy of ‘we may share the same room, but we won’t share anything resembling the same bed’ ever. Except for that one drunken escapade, and the few times Lyn would bring out emotions resembling warmth from her, he expected to be like the ocean smashing against cliffs. Chipping away miniscule amounts of her emotional armor every time he crashed up against it, but doing no noticeable damage even if he had a hundred years to work on her. Which he didn’t. He’d be lucky for ten more. Regardless, he hadn’t factored Lyn into the equation. She seemed to do what would have taken him more lifetimes than a human could live in. Just another reason for him to love his daughter all the more.

When he felt something creeping along his body, with sharp points dragging gently across his skin, he was only a second behind Mar in waking up and sitting up to see what the problem was, his hand reaching for a dagger nearby. You don’t live in the Port Slaughter slums without having a weapon practically in your hand while you sleep, and being a very light sleeper. As soon as it appeared that no one was going to try to kill them in their sleep, Althalus took a very different reaction than Mar to the dozens of tiny little spikes digging into his skin. “Son of a-“ At this point, Althalus began to incorporate all his creative ability and all the curses he had learned in Port Slaughter. And the denizens of his home had turned cursing into an art. There were weekly cursing competitions when he was a boy, and they were bad enough to make a mercenary blush. He never repeated himself once, and at one time used a cow, a chicken, and a horse, all in the same curse. This continued for a minute, “-damn!” He finished. Then he looked at Mar holding three month old Lyn and shrugged a bit sheepishly. “Okay. I may have overreacted. But it’s not every day that you wake up to find rose thorns stabbing you in all the wrong places.” 

He smiled at Lyn’s tired form. “Well. I guess that we’ve found out your blood, haven’t we? It should be noted that I don’t actually have anyone who was a plant manipulator in my, so I have no clue as to why she can make a rose bush grow and stab us while we sleep.” Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Lyn’s stuffed animal pick itself up and waddle closer towards her. He repressed a shiver, shooting a nasty look at the thing. It unnerved him, what Uicle had done to that toy. He was sure the thing had been about to stab him when he had walked up behind Lyn before it had gotten a good look at him. And when he had asked the Necromancy teacher about it, he had only gotten cryptic answers at best from the man…suit of armor…whatever. He trusted the thing only as far as protecting Lyn was concerned. It not stabbing him was an entirely different matter. 

“So. Shall I go get Alaira, or should we make her wait a bit? You know she’s going to be out there. Lyn is like a magnet.”