Epilogue

Five Years Later

Aurora was getting ready for the day in her office when the four kits burst in. That usually meant Stryker, her son, was up to no good.

The girls were named Sunshine, Diabolical, Storm, and Nova. The four girls had tormented Stryker ever since he’d been born. But if someone outside the family even looked crosswise at her son, they learned how sharp the kits’ teeth and claws were.

She’d asked their adoptive aunt, SwiftClaw, about their behavior, and she’d just laughed. She said males had to learn to be tough at an early age, and the girls were just making sure Stryker would survive. On the Goth homeworld, it could be a problem since almost everything would try to kill you if given half a chance.

The unexpected part was that Stryker never complained about his sisters’ behavior toward him. Even when he showed up bloodied and bruised, he would shrug it off and act like nothing happened.

The girls had nicknamed him Stryker when he was barely walking because he’d punched all of them at least once. It had all been in self-defense, but the name stuck. His real name was Brodrick Carmichael Just, after his father and grandfather.

Brodie fully acknowledged Stryker as his son, so he was currently heir to the Norse throne until Brodie married and had his first child. Stryker’s grandparents, Bjorn and Freya, had invited him and his sisters to come to Norse for the summer.

“You have mail,” Sunshine said sweetly, handing Aurora a fancy-looking envelope.

The four girls huddled close so they could see what she’d gotten. Aurora used her letter opener to cut open the envelope, which held a card. She pulled it out and opened it, and a hologram started playing. It displayed fireworks, which made the kits ooh and aah, and then Loki’s distinctive voice announced, “Aurora Just, you and your family are invited to the nuptials of our King, Brodie Erikson.”

She’d been amazed that he’d somehow evaded Freya’s efforts to marry him off. What made her smile was that the brat had left everyone hanging about who the lucky lady was. It had been all over the comms that a match had been made.

Early on, she’d been on team Val, Brodie’s childhood best friend. But two years before, Val and Erik, Brodie’s other best friend, had married, and she’d just had a little girl named Zola. The kits claimed her as an adoptive sister.

Stryker came strutting in, holding a sack with something wiggling in it.

“What did you do?” Storm asked suspiciously.

Stryker opened the sack, and a cobalt python shot out, causing the kits to all jump up on the table and hiss, their ears pinned back.

While not poisonous, this particular python was surprisingly strong, and even one that size could be lethal.

SwiftClaw picked that moment to come in, spotted the snake, and announced, “Oh, look. Lunch.”

She took one swipe at the snake, faster than Aurora could follow—hence her name—and its head came off.

“That was going to be my pet,” Stryker complained.

When the girls all glared at him, the rascal got a big grin.

“Your dad’s getting married,” Diabolical announced.

“So?” Stryker fired back.

Diabolical got a cunning look.

“That means as soon as he has a baby, we won’t have to call you ‘Prince Stryker.’”

“Really?” Stryker asked his mom.

“You’ll always be my little prince,” Aurora said.

“What about us?” Storm pouted.

“You’re my evil stepsisters, like in the story,” Stryker said.

Her son would never learn. All four girls pounced on him, and they began to wrestle.

“I don’t think the snake is dead,” SwiftClaw said as she kicked it toward them.

The girls flew off the floor onto Aurora’s desk as SwiftClaw and Stryker laughed.

“Come on, tough guy, we’ll skin your catch and make lunch,” SwiftClaw said.

“We’ll get even,” Storm promised as they took the dead python to the kitchen.

“You can try,” Stryker said as SwiftClaw handed him the snake head.

“Mom, take that away from him, or I’ll wake up with it on my pillow,” Storm worried.