I came with him. A soft, rolling orgasm that went on and on, my walls clenching around his knot while our offspring grew somewhere deep inside.
When it was over, we lay locked together on the bone surface, looking up at the pale sky of the Ossuary.
"The nursery needs finishing," I said eventually. "Three more platforms, at least. Maybe four."
"Four?" His voice was curious.
"My calculations suggest multiples are likely. The tonic, the repeated breeding, my body's response to your biology." I touched my belly, where his knot pulsed inside me. "We might need more than one platform."
He made a sound that might have been a laugh. "Then we build more."
"We build more," I agreed. "We build everything."
The portal was gone. The ferals were dead. And somewhere inside me, our offspring grew, unaware of the future waiting for them.
A future I'd chosen. A home I'd helped build. A life worth staying for.
I closed my eyes and let myself rest, still locked to my mate, still full of him, still exactly where I wanted to be.
EPILOGUE: BRUK
Five months later.
I woke to the sound of her breathing. Soft. Steady. The rhythm of sleep I'd memorized over countless nights of lying beside her, my hand resting on the swell of her belly.
She was enormous now.
The offspring, three of them according to the movements we could feel, had grown steadily since the portal closed. Her belly was a firm, round curve that dominated her small frame, stretching her skin taut, making her waddle when she walked. Her breasts had swelled further, preparing to feed the offspring that would arrive within weeks.
She was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen.
I slid my hand over her belly, feeling the subtle movements beneath. One of the offspring kicked against my palm. Strong, healthy, alive. Three lives I'd helped create. Three futures we'd build together.
"You're staring," she murmured without opening her eyes.
"I'm admiring."
"You're staring at my belly like it's a miracle."
"It is." I pressed a kiss to her shoulder. "Three offspring. Carried safely for five months. In a body half the size of mine."
She laughed. The sound still caught me off guard sometimes. The easy joy in it, so different from the bitter, guarded woman who'd climbed for high ground on her first day. She'd softened in the months since the portal closed. Not weak. Never weak. But open in ways she hadn't been before.
"The nursery is ready," she said. "Finally. All seven platforms."
"Seven?"
"You kept adding them." She rolled onto her side, slowly, carefully, supporting her belly with one hand. "Every time I said we had enough, you built another one."
"The calculations suggested multiples."
"The calculations suggested three. Maybe four." Her eyes met mine, warm with amusement. "You built for seven."
I had. After twenty cycles of an empty nursery, the idea of having offspring, real offspring growing inside my mate, had triggered a compulsion I couldn't explain. I'd built platforms until I ran out of space. Built warming stones until we had more than we could ever use. Built a future I'd been waiting for since before she was born.
"I wanted to be prepared," I said.
"You wanted to be hopeful." She touched my face. "It's okay. I understand."
