"You're doing well," the mystic says during a brief lull. "The girl is positioned correctly. She'll come first."
"And the boy?"
"We'll see." The mystic's expression gives nothing away. "One at a time."
I feel useless. Worse than useless—every instinct I have is screaming to fix this, to take the pain away, to do something other than stand here holding her hand while she suffers. Butthere's nothing to fight. Nothing to kill. Just my mate, bringing our children into the world the only way they can be brought.
"Talk to me." Kess gasps it between contractions. "Distract me. Tell me something."
"What do you want to hear?"
"Anything. Everything." Another contraction hits and she crushes my hand, a sound tearing from her throat that makes my dragon want to emerge and destroy whatever's hurting her. "Tell me about—fuck—tell me about our children. What you want for them."
So I talk.
I tell her about the nursery Corvith has been preparing, the walls painted with dragons and mountains and the night sky. About the names I've been considering—traditional ones from my bloodline, wild ones I think she'd like, combinations of both that honor where we each came from.
I tell her about teaching them to fly, once they're old enough. About showing them the mountain passes where I used to escape when the castle felt like a prison. About the hidden valleys and secret lakes and all the beautiful places I've discovered in three centuries of lonely wandering that I want to share with someone.
I tell her about watching them grow. About being there for first words and first steps and first shifts, if they inherit enough dragon blood to shift at all. About raising them without the curse, without the violence, without the weight of divine punishment that shaped every generation before them.
"I want them to be happy," I say as another contraction builds. "That's all. I want them to grow up knowing they're loved. Knowing they're safe. Knowing their parents chose each other—chose them—over everything else."
Kess screams.
Not a contraction scream—something different. Something urgent.
"She's coming," the mystic says sharply. "Now. Push."
Our daughter enters the world furious.
She comes out screaming, tiny fists clenched, face red with outrage at being evicted from the warm dark of her mother's body. The mystic catches her, clears her airway, and the scream that follows is the most beautiful sound I've ever heard.
"Healthy," the mystic announces, already wrapping the baby in clean linen. "Strong lungs. Ten fingers, ten toes. No visible curse markers."
No curse markers.
The words hit me like a physical blow. I've been bracing for it—some sign that the transfer didn't work completely, some remnant of divine punishment still clinging to her tiny body. But there's nothing. Just a baby. Just our daughter.
"Let me see her." Kess's voice is wrecked, barely audible, but her arms are already reaching.
The mystic places the baby on Kess's chest, and something inside me cracks open.
She's so small. So fragile. Dark hair plastered to her skull, eyes squeezed shut against the candlelight, one tiny hand escaping the swaddling to grip her mother's finger with surprising strength. Kess is crying—tears streaming down her scaled cheeks, mixing with sweat and exhaustion.
"She's perfect," Kess whispers. "Rhystan, look at her. She's perfect."
I can't speak. Can barely breathe. Three hundred years of believing I'd never have this—a mate who survived, children who lived, a future that held anything other than death and guilt andendless lonely centuries. And now here she is. Our daughter. Alive and screaming and absolutely fucking perfect.
"What's her name?" the mystic asks.
Kess looks at me. I look at her. We haven't decided—couldn't agree, kept arguing about traditions and meanings and whose family to honor.
"Sera," Kess says softly. "After my grandmother. The one who told me stories about wild omegas but died before she could explain what I was."
Sera. It fits. It's perfect.
"Sera," I repeat, and the baby's eyes flutter open at the sound. Gold, like mine. Like her mother's now. "Welcome to the world, little one."
