He laughed when her face pinched.
“Aw, my stubborn little girl. Please, just for a moment. Then we can cuddle and take a long nap together. You love cuddling with daddy, don’t you?” He rubbed his nose against hers.
She sniffled, and with her face still pinched, Skya slowly reached out towards Severo.
“Aw, there’s my good girl.”
Severo took her into his arms with a smile. He winced when even in his arms her eyes remained locked on Seri, as if she was afraid he'd disappear. He hated that this whole thing had scared her. They should have taken the time to show her that it had been them under those disguises…
“Will this hair just wash off?” he asked, pointing to his face.
Severe head tilted. “It should?”
Seri grimaced and went to the sink in the corner. He winced at his appearance…Goddess the facial hair looked horrible. Nymphs really didn’t grow facial hair, so he’d never had to worry about it before, but… ugh, this was awful.
Turning the sink on, he splashed some water on his face, and began to wipe at the ugly fuzz. He sighed in relief when it all began to come off. Cleaning the rest away, Seri dried his face on the giant sweater he was wearing before turning to the suitcase he assumed was his.
He pressed the button for it to turn on its side and flipped the latch.
Looking through the stuff inside, Seri couldn’t help but frown. There were fuzzy white snow boots, along with white snow pants, a thick white winter coat, white jeans, a fuzzy white sweater, and a matching white scarf, gloves, and hat set. There was also a fuzzy polar bear onesie that he guessed was for Skya. He grimaced. “Has whoever packed this ever been around a baby before?”
“Not sure who packed either of them, to be honest,” Severo said, eyes on the pile of white things. “But not a color I’d choose, for sure.”
Well, it would be warm at least…
Not wanting to think about the fact he was about to flash Severo way too much skin, he turned away and stripped out of the oversized outfit, along with the tighter underclothes they’d given him, and quickly put on the no doubt soon to be stained white clothing.
Boots on, he straightened up and turned around. Severo was staring at him with a frown. “What?” he asked as he pulled the white cap on his head. Laying the scarf over his shoulder, Seri shoved the gloves into his coat pocket.
“Your eyes,” the man drawled. “I think we should keep them covered. Your eyes are pretty striking. They stand out.”
“Ah…” Seri grimaced, holding his hands out for Skya.
The man handed her over, and she sighed happily, only to start pouting when he pulled out a throw away blanket from the dispenser on the wall and laid her down on the changing booth by the wall. Seri just barely held back his smile at her glaring at him while he pulled the thick polar bear onesie over her clothes.
Severo moved closer and hummed. “I think hair wise we should keep yours black. I can change your eyes with a shadow. I’ll keep mine blond as well when it’s showing. For Skya, we could probably just put different hats on her. I will say, if we have to stay out in public for any length of time with our faces exposed, I will be altering at least our features.”
Seri went to touch his hair, but stopped as he knew he had it covered with a hat. It was still black, but the dye they used wasn’t permanent. “Do I have to dye it permanently?” he asked while scooping Skya into his arms.
“No, I can change it with a shadow too,” Severo informed him at the same time he closed both suitcases and sat the diaper bag back on top of one.
“Okay…but next time we do that…we need to make sure Skya realizes it’s us. It scared her, and I don’t want to put her through that again.”
“Agreed. It didn’t even cross my mind how she would react.”
“Right…so now what?” Seri asked with a yawn.
“I change your eyes.”
Seri gasped, blinking rapidly when a layer of coldness fell over his eyes.
“That done,” Severo drawled. “We can now head out and see if our car has arrived. Ender said someone should be monitoring our flights and be there to drive us to the apartment his group got for us. And then maybe…sleep? It’s been a long few days, weeks even. We can figure out what to do after that.”
Seri yawned again and just nodded in response. He felt like he should be asking more questions, as he was about to move in with someone he really didn’t know, but…he was just tired—too tired to even think. So, vaguely nodding was all he could manage right now.
Once they got everything into place—hats, scarves, etc.—they left the bathroom. As he followed Severo out of the airport, Skya complained the whole time, because Seri had switched her stroller back into car seat mode and had strapped her in. She wanted to be held, and was letting him know fully that she was mad.
“Aba, AH BAH,” Skya complained loudly as he sat down on a bench, Severo sitting next to him.
