Moonsong Glacier And we won't let it in

"Marina," the chief supplied, speaking her name with a sad smile. "Nasamik has not returned." Dutch suspected she was dead; what else could keep a woman from her son?

"And it is Chakliux and his wives who should receive congratulation," he added, though he'd been pleased to receive it all the same. "It is not — secret — but they are his wives, and they will be his children. My place in this will be secondary to his and his wives'."

This did not hurt him. Not the way his place in the lives of Auk's children had. He could still be someone to them, this way. Still be family, even if he was not their father. He could still offer them the same degree of love he'd wished to offer his first children.

The question Simbelmyne asked next troubled him.

"I do not know," he admitted. "I have no wife, and I don't think I could stand to have children who would not be born into a whole family. I hope that there will be children, though, even if they are not mine."