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Azem is left for dead on a deserted island right before the Trojan War
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"Oh! Right. Sorry. Well. I don't know if I want to marry you, either, I just. I like you enough that it's..." She fidgets with her hair some more; a small, neat little braid is coming along nicely. "... I wouldn't immediately flee into the sea at the prospect."

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"I certainly aim to at least meet that bar."

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Giggle. "Well, it was honestly what I was planning to do if anyone tried to take me as their wife. Play along, bide my time, flee into the sea at the first opportunity. Steal any resulting children and try to give them a better childhood than what I got."

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"Well I will only take you as my wife if you want me to, of course."

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"Yes. And if I agree, I don't expect I'll want to steal your heirs away to raise them where you will never find them."

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He laughs. "I am sure you could get children without having to be wedded to someone for it if that were what you were looking for. I would hope you would prefer to stay with me and them if we get married."

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"I hope I would, too. It wouldn't be for me, parenting by myself sounds exhausting. It'd be for them."

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"How do you mean?"

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"If... you weren't a capable father, some flavor of cruel, abusive, inept, or likely to get them hurt, cursed, or killed, it wouldn't matter what I felt about you, or how I felt about the prospect of raising children alone on an island somewhere. If it'd be better for them, I'd do it." The absolute certainty in her voice is perhaps a little jarring, especially after all of her self-conscious anxiety. "But I have no desire to bear a child alone just for the sake of it, I just, er, didn't expect I'd get much say in that side of things. Only the after."

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"Chryseis is a pretty name for a baby girl, I think."

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“After... oh. Yes, I think I agree. A nod to my poor sister without actually stealing her name.”

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Well he really wants to kiss her now, what do.

Whatever he was doing before, he guesses.

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She tilts her head and looks at him fondly.

“That’s it? No concern or desire to talk me out of potentially stealing your children?”

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"Not for the stated reasons."

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"The stated reasons being such that you immediately move on to talking about baby names."

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"No comment."

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"No comment? Really? But Zotikos, it goes against your stated goals to sire children with a woman who admits that she might very well steal them and run off to raise them on an island if it's the best thing available for them, what changed?"

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"Does it?" he wonders. "Maybe I misspoke. Or perhaps I had a divine revelation."

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"Well if you had any revelations, divine or otherwise, please share them, because if you misspoke I'll be terribly disappointed."

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"Perhaps the revelation is that my actual goals with respect to children is upstream of what I previously stated, and your solution fits them just as well."

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"Hmmmmmmm," she hums, dramatically. "That doesn't seem like much of a revelation, it seems like you'd already know that..."

The birds are all about ready, by now. ... A little crispier than they perhaps should be, actually, since they were a bit forgotten about in favor of banter.

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—oh right yes, he notices the smell and gets them out of the fire.

"We can go with that, too."

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"But you would not immediately flee inland at the prospect of marrying me, or having children with me."

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"Indeed not."

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"I aim to at least meet that bar."

She eyes the (burned) birds. ".... Are those supposed to smell quite so unappetizing?"

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