I take the stairs in the secret passageway to Rina’s studio two at a time. The bookcase swings open to show me my mate with her hands at her lower back, breathing slowly. I analyze everything from her scrunched brow that has a smear of green paint bisecting it to her stiff posture, but a single detail has my heart rate picking up.
There’s a puddle under my mate’s feet.
“Did your water break? And you didn’t tell me?” A hefty dose of disbelief mixes with my alarm. I take out my phone and dial Maggie, not needing my mate’s answer. Griffin gives a croaky meow from his cat tower that seems to agree with my exasperation.
Katarina winces guiltily as she smiles at me. “I needed to finish the painting first.”
I snap my mouth shut to keep from releasing flustered words. The woman is going into labor. Now isn’t the time for lectures. Later we’ll see how she appreciates spanking. That’s an activity we haven’t tried yet.
Maggie picks up, and I detail that Katarina’s water has broken and how many minutes apart her contractions are. Katarina’s brows raise as if surprised I’ve kept track. This witch will be the end of me.
Maggie calmly gives me instructions before hanging up.
“Maggie will meet us in our room,” I say. Katarina decided that was where she wanted to give birth after the dome was finished. Something about it feeling like her space.
It should feel like her space. The craftsman used one of her dragon fire paintings as inspiration for the dome design.
“Sounds like a plan, but first, look,” Katarina says while pulling off a glove and gesturing to the canvas. I don’t want to give her the satisfaction of looking at her work with how annoyed I am. She rolls her eyes at me. “Kalos, chill out. She’s not going to rush out of me. We have hours yet.”
Yes, spanking is looking better by the minute.
Aggravated, I turn toward the canvas and freeze.
The brushstrokes are bold in Alla Prima, but the edges are smoothed artfully in places to give enough definition that the portrait is clear. The toddler has a shock of curling dark hair that contrasts with her cherubic cheeks and bright green eyes. Black scales cover her tiny hands as she reaches out as if demanding to be held.
Our daughter looks like me with Katarina’s emerald eyes.
My throat swells with meaning.
“She’s going to be fine,” my mate says. “I thought this would help the fears.”
Help me because this is something she’s seen in her dreams. A message from fate of what is to come. A message that won’t just be for me.
Our daughter is hope. It’s a heavy burden for one so small, but that doesn’t change how people interpret her existence. Dragons haven’t yielded eggs in centuries. The world thought the age of monsters was over.
And now our immortal hearts have hope again.
I swallow. Pain breaks me from the moment, and Katarina hisses, hunching over. I use my body to support her. I’ll carry her as soon as the contraction passes.
“You’ve given me such a gift.” I kiss her damp forehead. “I may not even spank you later for ignoring your contractions.”
She breathes a pained laugh. “Don’t take away my incentive.”
In all the wars and bloodshed I’ve seen in my life, nothing is as primal and vicious as birth.
Nothing makes me feel nearly as helpless as holding my mate through her bellowing cries.
Dragons have the right idea with eggs.
With there being no other dragon from witch births, we couldn’t know if any of the mitigation strategies for pain would be dangerous. Maggie can’t help herself from adding a small amount of magic here and there to soothe Katarina.
Maggie croons instructions, and Katarina tries to control her breathing. I help her reposition, knowing through our connection which direction her pain is urging her. The cat makes appearances during the lulls between contractions, but there hasn’t been a long lull in a while now.
“I can’t do this,” Katarina gasps.
I almost laugh. The words would have terrified me before seeing that painting. Katarina gave me the gift of knowing both she and our daughter come out of this ordeal on the other end. “You are doing this. I tremble at your power, my queen.”
“I’m so tired,” she whines.
“I know.” I feel her waning as I wipe away her tears. “She’s almost here.”
“She has a lot of explaining to do when she gets here,” she grits out.
I press my forehead to hers and feed more energy to her through the bond. Katarina shifts, perking up in time for another contraction.
All my deep-seated worries that I will fail my mate, my young, pales in the visceral nature of this moment. I will not let them down. If the hatchling bond doesn’t snap into place when she is born, I will work every day to rectify it.
Failure is not an option.
Time blurs together as if I’m lost in a killing rage, but my only focus is Katarina.
It could be hours or minutes, but finally our daughter is born. Maggie holds up a squirming pink creature that bears no similarity to the toddler in the portrait.
The bond is a whisper before becoming a taut, ringing string at her first cry. The relief almost brings me to my knees.
“A baby girl,” Maggie says, placing the squirming witch-appearing infant on Katarina’s bare skin.
“Kalos—” Katarina’s eyes are bright with tears, and she looks at me. “Look at her.”
“I see her.” I swallow emotion, overcoming my stoic nature. “I feel her.”
My voice cracks, and Katarina’s laugh is full of pained joy as she understands.
The bonds we’ve forged together vibrate with joy and sweetness.
I am whole.
EPILOGUE
KATARINA
I GASP AWAKE, something tugging me from the deepest sleep.
My hands fly over the covers of the bed, searching for what’s missing. The bassinet next to me is empty.
“Rina.” Kalos’s voice is soft and halts my panic. “I have her.”
He stands near the window, holding our daughter Evangeline in his arms. I sigh and fall back against the pillows in relief.
“I thought we were having a wonderful time and letting you sleep, but someone seems to have become impatient.” Kalos arches a brow at our adorable baby girl who shrieks and stretches her hands toward me, flinging the raw piece of meat she was gnawing onto the bedspread.
Kalos rolls his eyes and wipes her cheeks and scaly hands clean before handing over our daughter. Her dragon features automatically recede when she’s back in my arms. It’s always a marvel to watch her instinctively shift to protect my skin.
“I’m sure she loves hanging out with you in the morning,” I say. I know I enjoy being able to get more sleep. Evangeline blinks her green eyes up at me when she starts nursing. With her dragon nature, it’s been all guesswork to figure out what she needs. Sometimes she loves to chew on raw meat and other times she wants milk.
And as soon as we figure something out, it changes.
She appears closer to a five-month-old than her real age of seven weeks. Parenting blogs say that it’s unbelievable how quickly babies change, but a dragonling puts that all to shame. I’m not prepared for how much quicker she’s developing than a human child, and it feels like whenever I blink, she becomes someone new.