Page 196 of Stars in Umbra
Ki’Remi, calm and precise, guided the delivery with a surgical authority, his rumbling bass steady and instructions clear.
Issa moved in tandem with him, in her capacity as assisting physician, checking instruments and watching both mother and child with a careful eye.
Sheba worked as a nurse, assisting the two doctors and holding Rina’s shoulders firm whenever her pain ratcheted.
After much pushing and breath work from Rina, the farmhouse rang with a cry.
The infant’s first utterance cut through the air, strong, fierce, alive.
He came into the world radiant, dark curls clinging to his forehead, his small body glowing with shifting glyphs in silver and gold.
With each inhale, they lit up brighter, pulsing with life.
Rina cradled him first, her eyes shining, before passing him into her man’s arms.
Mo froze. For a man who survived war zones and shadows, nothing prepared him for the awe-inspiring, white hot swell of devotion he felt for this little being.
He held his son as if he were sacred glass, his hands trembling, his jaw tight.
Emotion bloomed as the glow on the boy’s skin echoed his own Sacran markings, including the same pulsing sigil of the Third Eye, a gem-shaped etching that caught the light and fractured it like a prism.
He bent and spoke into his baby’s ear, words only the infant would hear. ‘You and I are no longer from a bloodline that is extinguished. For with your coming, this house shall rise again to glory.’
On the bed, flushed and exhausted, Rina smiled as she observed Mo falling in love with his child.
Hanna wept behind them, her hand pressed to her mouth, Reth holding her close, eyes fixed on their daughter and grandson.
Issa leaned in, running a careful scan, murmuring observations to Ki’Remi. ‘He’s strong. The Sacran resonance is balanced; I find no destabilization in his glyphs. His divine potency is off the charts.’
‘Sante,’ Mo intoned in both relief and awe.
Mo bent and placed his lips to the boy’s forehead.
Without warning, words spilled from deep within him, ancient and loaded with meaning.
He never learned them, but his marrow remembered.
Later, Issa would confirm it as a Sacran naming chant.
As he spoke, the glyphs on his arms burned bright, flaring in rhythm with his son’s light.
‘I name you Zev’Mihal Sulahn,’ he whispered.
Zev’Mihal, born of flame, daybreak, and sky.
Sulahn, the soul restored.
His voice cracked.
He gazed at Rina, her hair loose against the pillow, eyes brimming with tears.
‘He’s our dawn,mi kaya. Proof that we are meant to survive. To rise again.’
She reached for them both, her grasp trembling but sure, drawing father and child to her chest.
Under Dunia’s twin suns, in that small farmhouse room, a family was forged.
One rooted in love, bound in light, and marked by divinity, and blessed by a favor older than the stars.
