Page 37 of The Griffin, the Tiger, and Their House Cat Omega

“No,” I said. “She says she’s not coming out till you wash your hands.” And now I was doing it too.

“She did not say that.”

Flora wrinkled her nose but still went into the bathroom, cleaning up from school. When she came out, I gave her the bad news—it was best to change her clothes too, since those would be dirty from the day.

“Babies are hard,” she grumbled.

She had no idea.

I went in and joined my mates, who were now both at the nest, watching intently.

“There’s a crack.” I could barely make it out, even with shifter vision and squinting, but it was for sure there. “A crack is good, right?”

“Yep. Well, we need more cracks so they can pop out.” Matthew was much more chill about this than I was.

Part of it was that I didn’t fully understand the hatching process. Allen had told us how it normally went with griffins, but this was a griffin born of a cat. So who knew? And then there was my mix of tiger in there too. Only time would tell.

Flora came in and joined us, asking lots of questions as we watched the egg do pretty much nothing for an hour.

And then it happened.

The crack became two, and a couple of chips fell off. Then more. Then more.

I longed to reach over and just help our baby out, but the midwife had insisted that you never,everhelp an egg birth—unless they were snakes. And I didn’t ask what made them different. My mates were not of the reptilian variety.

But now that we were watching our daughter, we couldn’t help but wonder. Because all it would take was flicking things away just the tiniest bit, and they would be here already.

There was a wobble.

Then another.

And then a large chunk of shell fell to the ground, and inside, I could see fur. It looked almost like a tiger, but that didn’t make sense.

One more push through the shell, and out popped a little baby griffin.

And I’d been wrong earlier.

Our daughter’s beast didn’t look like a tiger. She looked like Matthew—but griffinized.

“She’s beautiful.” I was in awe.

We all stood there watching her, knowing that the second we picked her up, she would shift into her newborn form, and this would be the last of her beast we’d see until puberty.

“Who gets to hold her first?” Flora asked.

I looked at each of my mates. They nodded.

“You do, of course.” Matthew looked up at her, his smile reaching his eyes.

“Really?” Her eyes were wide.

“Really.”

She scooped up our little cat-griffin, and then in her arms was our baby girl. Allen stood behind her, making sure everything was safe.

“She’s beautiful.”

“She is. You both are.” Matthew took her, bringing her to his chest for her first meal. Flora watched intently.

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