by Trina Bates
“You have grown! This seems a little strange,” Lyra tells me, rubbing the bump I now have. I can feel Alyria squirm like she’s trying to get as far away as she can from the Fae.
“Growing indeed,” Lyra exclaims.
We all stay quiet, letting her finish her examination while we shake our heads and roll our eyes at her. There’s something behind my guys’ eyes that I can’t place, but I let it go for now. Worrying more about what’s happening with my daughter.
“So, what’s the prognosis?” I ask her while she takes my blood pressure and then brings a large machine over my belly, taking pictures and I watch with rapt attention as a little hologram of Alyria is created right before our eyes. When it finishes, I’m left speechless at what it says.
Gestation: Six months, five days. Weight: Three pounds two ounces. Length: Seventeen inches.
“How can that be?!” I breathe out, fear settling within me. I wasn’t with them six months ago, and when we were here last, I was only two months along!
“Where have you been?” Lyra questions.
“My home Realm, and Hell,” I tell her honestly but a little confused as to why she needs to know that.
“When you are in your own worlds, or Realms, the gestation of Others when in their own elements, it progresses at the rate of what is expected of the people there. Since you are of two worlds, you are progressing at double the normal rate. Fae, we are only pregnant for three months in our own Realms. Shifters, twelve; Warlocks six; and Valkyries and Demons are usually around two to four months depending,” she explains, her eyes full of wonder and excitement.
“How the hell long do we have then?!” I shout to her, my heart starting to race and my nerves have me wanting to kick her smug face.
“If you stay here, most likely you will have about a month. If you go back to either Realms where you hail from, you would have about a week I would assume.” She shrugs, not seeming to care how big of a deal this really is.
“I don’t understand, why did you not think to fucking tell us about this when we first came to you?!” Merrick shouts earning him a glare from the ugly goblin.
“I did not know you would spend so much time in either world. You are here for me to watch over the child, nothing more. Our agreement wasn’t for advice, even though I have given you much. It was only for caring for Mira and Alyria. Do not presume to berate me like some Hollow welp for the information you should have obtained on your own,” she growls back, her little hands in fists, and her shallow yellow eyes filled with malice as she looks at Merrick through mere slits of her eyes. I quickly get off the bed, right my clothes and jump in between her and Merrick before he does something all of us will regret. I look over to Ebbin and Rhydian for help and see nothing but proud looks on their faces as Merrick takes on the Fae.
“Stop this, NOW!” I yell, finally gaining everyone's attention. My annoyance showing clearly, and even Lyra backs down. “Make me a fucking second copy of the hologram. You three!” I grind out looking to each of my men with a finger pointed in their faces. “Go sit the fuck down. Once she is done with the hologram, we are taking one to Rhett and going home. Shut up and fucking don’t make me go into an even earlier labor!”
They all sit and look down sheepishly at their hands while I turn back around to Lyra, hold out my hand and wait for the two chips. When she places them in my hands, I look down at her and ask, “When is the next time I need to come see you?”
“You would do best to see me every three days at this point. Your next time spent with me will be to see how your cervix is and if you are dilating at all,” she answers, and turns away, walking out of the room without so much as and glance back to me, or one for the guys.
I walk up to the guys and hold my hands out for them to take.
I search my heart and memories for Rhett’s sweet face and push with everything I have and teleport us all to where he is.
He’s standing in a room filled with dusty pictures, clothes over furniture and staring straight ahead at one picture in particular. It’s very large, and has a woman, with a small white-haired boy on her lap, and two men on each side of her. She’s absolutely gorgeous. Long white hair just like the boys, her eyes a deep honey and filled with such joy and love. Her smile is infectious just looking at it. I walk away from the guys and place my hand in Rhett's while we both stand there, looking at the picture. I know it’s his mother, and the fathers that left him behind, but I can’t say anything. I know very little about what had happened to him. He doesn’t want to yet open that part of himself up to me, and that’s fine. So we stand in silence for a few moments before he squeezes my hand once and lets go.
Turning, and peering down at me he says, “What are you doing here. It’s not safe.”
“I just wanted to give you this.” I hold up the hologram chip for him and when he kisses my cheek, he takes it slowly out of my hand and tells me, “I love you, and I will figure this out. I promise.” After he says that and I'm filled with tears, I nod once and walk away, taking me and the others back home. Leaving Rhett to deal with his demons and find out what's going on that’s turning him into someone none of us know.
Back home, I portaled us into my room. I wanted a few moments to simply watch the hologram of my daughter with my guys before I go and try some strange magic ordeal that I’m having my doubts about. I’m worried I won’t be able to fix… Blue’s mates. I can only hope she doesn’t hold it against me if it doesn’t work.
We all sit on my bed and I pull out the chip, placing it in my tablet and we watch as our little girl comes on screen. I turn the volume up and listen with happy tears falling down my cheeks and a huge smile as her heartbeat takes up the quiet in the room.
Her tiny little body moving around, kicking and grabbing at nothing, her little face already so clear. Chubby cheeks, a cute little pert nose, and her little lips moving around the hand she looks like she’s trying to chew on.
“Is that a tail?!” Ebbin asks, earning him a punch in the arm from Merrick and a scowl from Rhydian. I know he’s making a joke about Rhydian and Kigiree, and I do laugh. After, I look to make sure she doesn’t have one.
“You’re such an ass, babe,” I say, shaking my head with a smile and rolling my eyes.
We all stay quiet, taking in our gorgeous Alyria for a bit longer. I lean back into a hard body and hold on to two hands while we all stay still for a moment just reveling in the sweet feeling of watching her.
“She’s gorgeous, just like her momma,” Rhydian remarks, awe in his voice.
“Strong like her too, look at how hard she’s kicking! Can you feel any of that yet?” Merrick asks, and I feel like a jerk for not even thinking they might want to feel all that she’s doing, even now.
“She’s fierce, and yes I can. Do you all want to?” I ask them, sitting up and pulling up my shirt, smiling like a fool when they all eagerly rush to place their hands on me. Alyria goes crazy! Kicking here, punching there. We’re all laughing and enjoying the fun until our little one tires herself out and stops moving.
“I think that’s our cue to get going, Bugs,” Ebbin says with a frown.
Hefting myself up, I put on some jeans, that barely fit. A long sleeve shirt and my big coat with my boots and walk downstairs, looking for Blue.
Finding her and her men all sprawled out on the couch, I smile seeing how happy she is, quietly walk down the hall to the study, giving her a few more minutes while I go back over the book, making sure there’s no secrets or anything that could make this all blow up in our faces. Finding none, I come out and see my three big guys, Torunn and Gor with both of our Agathions in tow. It’s strange to see a giant eight-legged horse roaming around inside the cabin, with a small little lynx on his tail, but this is our life now and I shrug it off, walking through all the bodies, and yelling to Blue.
“Come on, hooker! We’re doing this outside. Get your mates and mine will get their weapons,” I shout, opening the door.
I go to the side of the
house where you can just make out the barn, place myself in the middle of the snowy circle I made, and wait for everyone to get into place.
“Wait!” I yell out, when Blue’s mates are ready, their weapons before them. “Someone rush in and grab some blankets! They’re going to be cold and naked and I’m really not into seeing a sausage fest like that unless they’re my guys.” I laugh out and laugh harder when I see my guys give proud smiles and Blue giggles like a schoolgirl. Torunn shrugs her shoulder as does Gor. Both seeing their fair share since one is a man and the other has seen more battle than I care to think about.
Blue and Torunn rush inside together and come out a few minutes later with arm fulls of plush blankets they found from somewhere.
“Your guys are very well stocked up, tatts. Kinda proud you got the ones with some sense in them,” Blue says, hiding a secret smile from her own mates as we all laugh when they growl and one whines.
“Okay! Let’s get this party started,” I huff out.
Closing my eyes, I take the knife from my jacket pocket that I grabbed on the way out the door and slice my hand from thumb pad to the base of my pinky. I hiss from the pain but open my eyes and rush around, thrusting my hand onto each man-beast and place my hand hopefully where their hearts are in their chests and go back to the center of the circle and take off my pendants.
I pull from my Valkyrie side, my endless pool of the good within me, bursting forward and meeting the darkness that I start to draw from. The hate inside at war with the love. I imagine that all the men in the circle around me are turning to their former selves and will my magic out of myself as I turn in a circle, my eyes tightly closed in concentration as I give my magics the power over me to do what they know I want and need them to.
Gasps and sobs are sounding all around and when I look up, and pull my magic back, replacing my necklace, I drop to my knees. Where there was once a half lion, half dragon, there are now giant men, all that are running towards Blue as she stands there crying with her arms open, unable to move.
We leave them all alone, letting them have their own personal few minutes. I walk back inside, my heart lighter and my mind clearer.
“I’m so happy something finally went right. Now that we’re done with this part, Torunn, you wanted to bring a friend of yours here, is that right?” I question, taking each new step one at a time.
“I do, her name is Lyanna, she is the daughter of a very good friend of mine. A very powerful Succubus. I haven’t fought with her, but I know how formidable her mother is, and there’s no doubt in my mind that Lyanna is just as amazing. With the help of her and her own mates, I think it will give us the magic we need to help bring down Alastor once and for all,” she says proudly, she stands taller and crosses her arms giving me a smug look. I hold back the laugh and to away from her.
I look to Merrick and ask, “I thought you said Torunn fought with her?”
“I must have misunderstood, love. I’m sorry,” he says to both Torunn and I.
“It’s fine. I think I’m going to need to talk to all of you, Blue and her guys too for this one. I don’t want to keep making such rash decisions without having all options explored beforehand,” I say to them, thinking back to how our rescue mission went in Hell and how things could have been avoided.
“I agree,” Ebbin says, and when I look over to where he Merrick and Rhydian are all standing, I smile knowing they have my back when they nod their heads.
“Alright, I’m gonna make some more food and wait for Blue and her mates to come in. When they do, we can discuss it then.” With my mind made up, I call out to Cynide and laugh when she jumps on the counter as I take the meat for sandwiches out. I give her a few pieces and start to make up two entire loaves of giant sandwiches, knowing everyone is hungry, and Blue’s men look like they can eat... a lot.
I give Torunn and Gor two plates piled high with food and wait for the guys to make up their own since they all don’t like the same sides and finish my food in peace. Done and happily full, Blue and her guys come in fully clothed which makes my head hurt trying to figure out where she got the clothes. She sees my looks and smiles telling me, “I can cast spells, Mira, putting clothes on my men is nothing, though taking them off is a lot more fun,” she says with a bright smile and a wink. I roll my eyes and gesture to the food before me.
“I am Calder,” the big man says, his silver eyes, braided beard and bald head all look strange to me, but I shake his offered hand with a smile.
“Nice to actually shake your hand and not a giant paw.” He smiles and walks to the side, taking a plate I offer him.
“Brandt. I’m an asshole, or so my mate tells me. Though she just doesn’t understand, even after all of these years, I’m just better than the rest,” he says, his brown eyes filled with mischief, though on closer inspection, one of them is very dull, when he sees me looking he laughs a deep grinding sound and runs his hand through his short blonde hair saying, “Aye, my own father took my eye when I broke his favorite drinking horn. Even with shifter healing, only the eye returned, not the sight,” he growls out. I hand him a plate, saying,
“I’m sorry, but it gives you… character. Just don’t be an asshole to me or mine, and we’re good.” He laughs at my words and takes the plate with a nod in thanks moving away to take a seat at the table with Calder.
“Hakon, I’m nice, that’s all there is to it,” he says with a sheepish smile, his green eyes telling me the truth as his long beard hangs to his chest catching a few crumbs when he takes a bite of a chip.
“Nice?! You’re a fucking priss you, damsel. Tell the truth now.” I hear Brandt call out.
I look around the big man in front of me and raise an eyebrow to the big man and glare. His shoulders drop and he looks down to his food. The rest of the men around us, my own included, chuckling.
“You’re fine Hakon, it’s nice to meet you, and thank you for your help,” I say, garnering a bright smile from him as he walks off with his food.
“Miss Mira, I am Arvid. You are a friend I am glad to have. Someone I am glad my mate has had in her life. Thank you,” he says. His blonde hair and beard so long, I can barely see anything but his straight nose and deep blue eyes behind the veil of hair. Though a large scar is prominent on the left side of his face, making him look rugged. I shake his offered hand with a shy smile of my own from his kind words and nod to him.
“We both seem to have saved each other. No thanks needed,” I tell him and hand him his plate, watching with a smile as he joins the others. The last man to meet is attached to Blue’s hand tightly.
“You must be the white lion, Vali,” I presume and he nods his head vigorously with a large smile.
“Vali doesn’t talk, but he says, in his own words, that he’s glad to meet you and thank you for what you have done, saving them all and bringing them back to me.” Blue grabs his forearm with her other hand squeezing it, smiling happily up into his green eyes. His red hair disheveled and she runs her hand through his beard with a smile as he leans into her touch. I hand them both plates and sigh when the introductions from me are done. I go and take a seat on the couch and close my eyes for just a moment.
I feel the couch on either side of me dip, and I shrink further into the cushions, and only peek my eyes open when I feel my feet being lifted up and strong hands start to massage the pads of my feet. I moan at Rhydian’s gifted hands and lean my head to the left onto someone's shoulders.
“I’m going to fall asleep encased in all the warmth on my sides and the amazing massage if you don’t stop,” I moan out, really needing everyone to be done eating so we can figure out as a group if we should bring more people into this crazy thing that is my life.
“Just relax and let everyone finish eating before we get into this,” Rhydian says. I sigh and shut off the world until I’m needed again.
Rhett:
Dealing with the demons of one's past isn’t as easy as I was hoping for when I first portaled here. I don’t know how lo
ng I stayed in one spot, staring at the pictures of my childhood, the faces of the men that betrayed and left me along with the face that has haunted my dreams for so many years. My beautiful mother, Vaylain. I don’t think I actually saw her in the pictures, but the memories of when they were taken or memories of happier times.
Looking back on it all, I really was a lucky kid, loving fathers, a mother that adored me, all the power she had at her fingertips and she was too humble for words. But all that came crashing down the night she died. I was left alone to grieve, my fathers all grieving her loss and my sisters. I was kept out of the room that night, but I remember the lights flickering and the ominous feel in the air like there was something dark and sinister happening. I wonder if that’s what’s wrong with me. Whatever happened that night, had to have an outlet, and I was the unlucky receiver of it.
After Mira left, I walked up to my old room, nothing in this house has changed, minus the dust and dirt. My bed still unmade, books of magic laying all about and my favorite Hollow baseball player of all time up on the wall. Joe Nathan, a closer for the Texas Rangers. I flop down on the bed, coughing when the dust billows from under me, fluttering in the air and clogging my nose with the old scents.
I lay back and play the little hologram. Alyria, my daughter, strong and healthy. I jolt upright when I see how big she is and what her gestation is. My happy moment looking at my little girl’s gorgeous face, gone.
-Merrick, what the fuck is going on?- I reach out, I know he can still feel me and hear me. We might be miles away, but they’re all still there.
-With what Rhett?- he grinds out. I know he wants nothing to do with me, not right now, but I can’t go to the others. He’s my only life line right now.
-Alyria.- I growl, knowing damn well he knows what I’m talking about.
-Mira’s kind, our kind, Others. We all have different gestation periods. She should have only been pregnant apparently for two to four months in her own worlds, but since the atmosphere is so different here, she would have been pregnant closer to what a Hollow is. But we went to Yggdrasil and then Hell, her home Realms, it sped up her pregnancy. She has maybe a month before she gives birth. That gives you two fucking weeks to get your shit straight and get the fuck back here.-
