Epilogue: Mother-in-Law

"So," Queen Hippolyta said, leaning forward on her throne to stare at Lois Lane. She was like an older version of Diana: a few grey hairs, a bit more curves here and there, hints of scars peeking out from beneath her robe of royal purple, edged in gold thread; a few more lines in her face—heavy was the head that bore the crown. "You are the one who has stolen my daughter's heart."

Defensively, the reporter grinned. Amazonian ideas about marriage were fairly simple, but the legalities and messy realities of Lois and Diana getting together had taken nearly six weeks—long enough for Lois to begin her application for dual citizenship and for her pregnancy to be confirmed. There had been a little civil ceremony in Metropolis, with Clark Kent and her sister and dad, but there was no putting it off any longer.

It was time for Lois to meet her mother-in-law.

"I'd like to say," Wonder Woman said. "That she won it fair and square. She put up quite the fight."

The queen raised an eyebrow. "I should hope so. I wouldn't want my grandchildren to be born from the weak womb of a woman that would surrender easily."

There was a bit of acid in her voice, and Lois felt her hackles rise.

"Certainly, my daughter deserves better than some slut that would open her legs at the drop of—"

"Okay, rude!" Lois Lane balled her fists together. "Lady, you might not like me, but we're fixing to be family!"

"Beloved," Wonder Woman laid a hand on her shoulder. "Don't, please. Mother, why—"

"Mortal cunt!" Hippolyta's lip curled back. "I can smell your dripping quim from here!"

"Bitch, you are not too old for me to kick your ass!" Lois felt her blood boiling, and Diana had to lay an arm across the reporter's chest to stop her.

"Is that a challenge?" The queen said, smiling.

"Lois, no!" Diana said, then turning back. "Mother, stop this!"

"You're damn right!" Lois shouted.

"Very well," the queen stood. "I accept."

What happened next was so well-choreographed, the reporter had no doubt the Amazons had planned it. The Queen doffed her robes, standing in a plain white shift, like what Lois wore, that barely came to mid-thigh. The reporter could clearly see the hard muscles on the woman's body, who stood as tall as Wonder Woman herself did. One of the Amazons pressed a plain wooden stave, some six feet long, into the reporter's hands and guided her to a circle marked out on the floor.

"Mother, she is eight weeks pregnant!" Wonder Woman said.

"An Amazon mother should be able to protect her children, born and unborn," the Queen said. "In any event, I will not cause too much damage. I merely wish to see if there is any mettle in my new... daughter-in-law."

Around them, the Amazons began to clap. Lois held her staff, feeling instantly outmatched. She'd done a little bit of training with pugil sticks at her father's insistence, but that was a far way from fighting with real staves, without any padding or protection.

From the start, the reporter was on the defensive. Hippolyta was no armchair general, letting her ass expand to fill her throne. She moved forward with blinding speed and easy balance, thrusting hard, pushing the end of her staff toward the reporter's eyes, giving Lois just enough time to duck, or dodge, or parry...and just enough strength to send a shock through the reporter's arm whenever their weapons made contact. Rapidly, Lois began to tire, sweating and uncertain, even as Hippolyta was just getting warmed up...and Lois knew the Queen was holding back, pushing Lois toward the edges of the circle...

Oh, fuck this, Lois decided. She tossed her staff into the crowd and leaped forward, grabbing Hippolyta's and pushing downwards with all of her weight. With a contemptuous snort, the queen boldly pushed back, lifting the reporter up...and opening herself up for the kick that landed squarely between the Amazon queen's legs.

The cunt-punt caught the Amazons by surprise, the clapping momentarily interrupted...and Lois took advantage of the brief pause. Her left hook slammed into the Amazon queen's face, hard enough that Lois felt the pain run all the way up her arm to the elbow. Hippolyta rolled with the punch, but her footing was off, and Lois slipped her leg in behind the knee—and no matter how strong or fast you are, knees are only supposed to bend one way. Once on the ground the reporter's jiujitsu came into play, and in half a heartbeat she had the Queen of the Amazons in an armbar...

"Enough," the Queen said. She smiled at Lois, and there was something strange in that grin. "I like you, my dear. Perhaps my daughter did not choose poorly after all. I will allow you to call me 'mother.'"

Then with an effortless shrug, Hippolyta ripped her arm free.

Lois Lane sat up, panting, as the Amazons began to disperse. Diana Prince-Lane was at her side in an instant, offered her a hand up.

"She could have kicked my ass at any time," the reporter said, accepting the hand.

"Yes," Diana said, her dark pupils wide, a slight flush to her cheeks. "But I think you made a good impression. Now come, I want to show you my...I mean, our bedchambers..."

There was the handfasting ceremony, in the Temple of Hera. Then a feast. Lois refused the wine, but there were plenty of other things to eat. Women sat with women talking, eating, joking, plucking at lyres, singing songs, some sweat and some ribald. Endless rounds of toasts. At some point, Lois excused herself to go be sick in some bushes outside the hall. Stopped puking long enough to catch her breath and stared out over the wine-dark waters of the Mediterranean, a full moon overhead.

"The pregnancy sickness, yes?" Hippolyta stepped forward from the shadows, once more in her purple robe. For a moment, Lois had almost thought it was Diana...but there was no mistaking that voice.

"I suppose you've had some experience with that," Lois said, with a smile. "Mother."

"Yes. Quite. Although there are a few here who claim I fashioned Diana from clay and the gods granted her life."

Lois blinked. She couldn't imagine any of the Amazons falling for that kind of stork nonsense. "What, really?"

"No, but, you know how it is. An island full of women, stories start to circulate." The queen shrugged, and stepped closer. "Has Diana told you of some of our other Amazonian traditions?"

Lois blinked again. "Um...not much. We met under...odd circumstances, and then we were getting to know each other, and trying to get everything set up, and..."

"Hmm," the queen reached forward and brushed a lock of the reporter's dark hair out of her face. She had a look on her face that Lois had only seen once before...on Diana...down in the dungeon. "That...blow that you struck. Amazons call it the Venus Strike. It is often used during lover's duels to show...interest. The idea being that the one who dealt the blow should...how does one put it? Kiss it and make it better."

The reporter swallowed heavily. She wasn't sure she liked where this was going.

The queen shrugged...and her purple robes fell off of her, so that she stood there naked in the moonlight. Now Lois could clearly see the differences between Diana and her mother—the darker, rounder breasts, the straight scars of sword and arrow, healed to fine white lines; the darker scars like little trees on her stomach which showed the Amazon Queen's pregnancy.

"The purple ray can remove such scars," Hippolyta grasped the reporter's shoulders and **** Lois to her knees. "But I wear them with pride."

Lois Lane's mother-in-law was shaved like her daughter; a single thin strip, very spartan and utilitarian. The labia were darker than Diana's thought, more pronounced...or at least, so it seemed to the reporter in the moonlight. Hippolyta grasped her daughter-in-law's head and pulled it toward her cunt.

"You will find," Hippolyta said as Lois got the hint, her tongue reaching out to taste the Amazon's slit. "That there are fewer taboos on the Amazon Isle, than in Man's World. This is how many a mother has welcomed a new daughter into her family."

Head crushed between the Amazon's thighs, tongue licking over the furry snatch, Lois Lane wondered what other strange surprises were in store for her on Themyscira.