Yes, my love.
My dragon and I took a moment to center ourselves before answering, because this wasn’t a moment to cause panic.
Is your patrol nearly complete?
We have two more hours before we change shifts.
I do not think we have two hours before Opal makes her appearance, I conveyed to him as the first crack appeared.Her shell has a crack in it.
I’m on my way. I know it might be tempting but….
I interrupted, finishing his thought.Do not help her in any way.Emerson warned me that we’d be tempted and to keep my claws to myself. She is doing a fine job all on her own. Dancing and rocking her egg. I think she has been trying to wake her sister. Ruby’s is beginning to wobble now too.
Odem’s face appeared in the window in front of us, so we shifted our wing, so he’d be able to see both moving.
Ionus is on his way. I’ll be in momentarily.
We waved a wing tip at him, his excitement mingling with ours as another shell fragment hit the blankets. My beading tray sat nearby, empty and awaiting the next project. With the greatest of care, I plucked each shell fragment off the blanket with the tips of my claws and deposited them on the tray, intent on saving them and perhaps wire wrapping a few to add to their suncatchers.
A shadow appeared behind him, and my mate’s face was replaced with his brother’s massive snout and eyes that peered proudly in at the scene unfolding inside the room. He might be gruff and stern as hell, but when I looked at my mate’s oldest brother, all I saw was a fiercely loyal dragon who loved his family and wanted, above all else, to keep them safe. I knew he’d need to resume patrol, we could not afford to let our guard down. This moment, as precious as it was, could also be used as a distraction by our enemies.
My dragon reminded me of that part, his instincts much sharper than my own when it came to warfare. I wondered if it was something all dragons possessed an intrinsic knowledge of, or if there remained a great many pieces of our past that he was still protecting me from? In time, I knew all secrets would be revealed, maybe even ones I wouldn’t want to recall, but one of the many things I’d already learned from spending time with Emerson was that knowledge truly was power, especially to ourspecies. I’d learn to handle whatever I learned about myself and my past, and together, we’d grow from it.
I heard the door open and close downstairs and my mate’s feet as he drew closer, pausing to knock on Upalo and Rory’s door, giving them a heads up on the latest happenings in the nursery. They arrived sleepy-eyed to sit beside the nest, while Odem took the quickest shower in history, t-shirt on inside out, hair still wrapped in a towel when he appeared. His timing couldn’t have been more perfect, or maybe Opal had been waiting to make certain her Papa was in the room before she shoved the tip of her wing through the wide opening of her shell and waved at us.
“Good morning to you too,” Odem said, snapping pictures while she giggled, excitedly waving it and dislodging a few more shell fragments along the way.
My dragon made it quite clear that he would not be shifting back out of concern over jostling the nest, nor would he be leaving it in order to shift, not while he was so securely wrapped around our little ones. I couldn’t fault him in the slightest for that decision. We were one. Not only didn’t the form we greeted them in matter in any way, but that was a dragon wing sticking through the shell, and my dragon firmly believed they should see dragon wings when they emerged from it.
Which was totally fair as far as I was concerned.
The party in Ruby’s shell was finally revving up to rave level, while Opal had slowed her dance to a lazy rhythm of slow, rocking motions that occasionally caused another shell fragment to fall.
“Ohhh, someone’s got a crack,” Upalo said when a line split Ruby’s shell, parting those deep red scales from one side to the other.
Ruby made a series of hisses, her shell wobbling with every one as smaller cracks spread out from it. We saw a wing tip pop out, the first piece of Ruby’s shell hitting the blanket, followedby a second and third as she withdrew it, then jabbed it back out, widening the hole she’d already made, more of her tiny wing emerging each time she did it.
“Now we’ve got two wings!” Rory cheered, when Ruby finally extended her wing all the way out.
My dragon nuzzled their tiny wings, letting out a pleased, rumbly sound when our nose touched them and the wings wagged, pressing against each side of our face in a hug. When we drew back to give them space, they clasped wings, holding on to one another as their shells rocked more.
“Awe,” Odem murmured, tears on my mate’s cheeks as he took more pictures for their baby books. “You’ve been waiting to do that, haven’t you girls?”
Their giggles were confirmation that his words were indeed true.
Their rocking became a coordinated effort, helped along by my dragon’s instinct to keep his tail firmly wrapped around them and their blankets. There was no risk of their wobbling sending them in opposite directions. The first time their shells collided, several fragments were dislodged, giving us a first glimpse at their adorable faces.
Hello, beautiful butterflies.
Four eyes peered at me, framed by jagged shell fragments that shattered more when their shells collided again.
Oh, my clever girls. You’re helping each other emerge. I’m so proud of you. Just a little more to go, then Papa and Daddy can hug you.
“I see you,” Odem said. “Are you ready to finally see the lovely pictures in all your books?”
Giggles and hisses accompanied their continued rocking, still gripping each other’s wing tips tight, until the third time their eggs collided, and there sat my girls, with the curved tip of each of their shells still perched on top of their heads like sillyhats. The rest of their shells lay in heaps around them that we carefully cleared away while Odem took pictures of them. The blanket would need to be removed, shaken out, and washed before it was returned to the nest, in case any pieces of shell fragments remained.
My dragon and I were both frozen, uncertain if it was an official hatching if they hadn’t shed the final pieces of their shells yet. We’d been told not to help, not to touch or remove any of the pieces, so we kept our claws to ourselves and didn’t reach to pluck those final pieces off their tiny, beautiful little heads, but it wasn’t easy. I could tell, when I glanced over at my mate, that he was struggling with the same thoughts too.
