Page 23 of King of the Dawn

“It’s not her blood,” I had the forethought to say, before he nodded, and picked her up in his arms, marching her to the sofa in my arboretum as he brought the phone to his ear.

I knelt before her, holding her hand the entire while, whispering her name. I placed my palm over her growing belly until she fluttered her eyes open.

Her husband had called the doctor and was now trying to reach Jericho.

“Hey kids,” Rose had smiled and whispered in her delirious state. “It’s your Lola Evie.”

My heart fluttered in my chest. A grandmother. I was going to be a grandmother. How strange that feeling was, when I had done everything I could not to have children. In many ways, I felt like I was skipping that painful step of childbirth and reaping the benefits of grandbabies.

I rubbed Rose’s belly and her forehead, as her husband paced like a lion in a cage, wanting to fight something, but having no one to break.

“I just felt lightheaded,” Rose said, after a moment, as she tried to sit up.

“Hush, now,” I whispered, pushing her gently down to stay reclined. I didn’t want her to stand up too fast. That seemed like something she might do, after all, stubborn girl that she was.

It was only maybe thirty minutes before the doctor came in his tailored suit, but it had felt like a lifetime. Alastair hovered over his shoulder like a madman, looking at numbers he couldn’t possibly know how to read.

“Alastair, calm down,” Rose said with agitation as the color returned to her cheeks. “You’re making me tense. Leave the man alone!”

“You collapsed, Rose!” Alastair was on an adoringly tight leash. “Don’t tell me to calm down. You collapsed!”

The doctor lifted Rose’s shirt, and I was gratified to see that her tight belly had rounded, the six-pack faded and she was gaining weight, just as she should be. The babes were growing.

“Well, I 'm not collapsed now, am I?” Rose rolled her eyes, waving away the seriousness of her own health.

“Everything looks perfect,” the doctor declared, taking his hands off of Rose’s belly.

I sat beside the sofa in the arboretum, holding her hand, as a pale Rose pursed her lips.

“I’ll just want to examine and monitor you for an hour or so,” the Doctor said, pulling the stethoscope around his neck. “Please stay where you are, until I get a bit more information.”

“Ugh!” Rose wailed, falling back with her head on the armrest.

Alastair didn’t stop pacing.

He was a good husband, even if he was a Green.

When Jericho and Yuliya arrived, Alastair barely mumbled, “She’s under observation,” before he continued to wear a hole in the carpet.

“What happened?” Jericho gritted out.

“Never you mind,” I said, still kneeling in front of Rose, trying to soothe the tension in the air. The anger was not good for the little ones. “Everything will be fine.”

“See?” Rose said. “Everything will be fine.”

She tried to smile, but it was weak, and forced. I didn’t think that it was because she felt ill. It was because she was afraid of her father’s disapproval.

“While I respect your instincts, witch,” Jericho said trying to soften his voice, even as the anger flared in it. “I want the doctor to tell me she’s fine.”

“Pain in the ass,” Rose said under her breath, smiling at me. I laughed, despite myself.

“That’s enough from you, young lady,” Jericho stood, arm’s crossed, staring down at us from behind his prominent nose.

Alastair stood beside him, striking a similar pose. The two men, in so many ways, were exactly the same.

The doctor returned, and touched her belly again, checking her blood pressure, and running a wand over her stomach, identifying three separate heartbeats - Rose, the boy, and the girl. All were normal.

“Seems like they’re all doing well,” the doctor said, taking Rose’s wrist in his hand to check her pulse. Then her temperature.

---