Silence: Part Two of Echoes & Silence (56 page)

The sudden shock of being lifted from the warmth among the roots startled her, and we all smiled as the first cries of our baby ripped through the quiet morning, echoing off the treetops like the assertive demands of a princess.

“I will never get tired of hearing that,” I laughed, my eyes lensed with tears.

Lilith laughed, too. “That will change—in about seven months.”

I looked up at her and smiled.

“Ara,” David whispered, cradling the baby gently against his arm. “She’s so beautiful.”

He brought her up to his lips and kissed her head softly, stroking his cheek along hers. And all the worry, all the concern he had a few hours ago—that he wouldn’t love her—folded away inside of him. I could see it, feel it.

He looked at me, fighting back tears, his mouth trembling around words that just wouldn’t shape.

“I know,” I said simply, leaning my head against his shoulder. “I know.”

The spirit of Life filled the clearing then, and I could sense the living creatures here as they gathered around to look on. The trees seemed to lean in slightly to get a better view, and tiny crawling insects flurried about in the soil beneath me. A flock of birds shadowed the sky as they descended into the forest and gathered on the branches above us, sensing the energy, the life, the future of this little baby and her soul’s new path. Great things would be expected of her; I could feel it. And as much as I wanted to wrap her up and protect her from it all, I knew in that moment that it would be my sole responsibility to prepare her in a way no one else could.

“I have a little gift for the new babe,” Lilith said, moving her open hand toward me. “Give me her Spirit Crux.”

I picked it up off the velvet cloak and handed it to Lilith, frowning up curiously at her. “What are you doing?”

“She will need to wear this, always,” she said, burying two fingertips into her hair. She pulled out a singular strand and wrapped it around the stem of the tiny golden apple, then blew against it softly. David and I watched in amazement as the ethereal hair of the goddess became a thread of silver chain.

“The length will grow with her,” she said, handing me the apple.

I studied it carefully, running my fingertips down the long chain, but as I wrapped it around the baby’s ankle, it shrunk in a very unnatural way, twisting itself loosely around her tiny leg but holding tight. I got the sense then that nothing would ever be able to break it.

“Thank you,” I said, smiling up at Lilith. “I was kind of wondering how we might keep that on her.”

Lilith bowed her head. “You are welcome, my Queen.”

Chapter Eleven

It was made from what looked like burlap, stitched crudely together with a jagged seam all the way up its middle, kind of like Frankenstein. Yet, when Eve had held this doll in her hands in the Other Realm, it resembled its newer form—clean and almost cute, with two black eyes sewn into the face, and a knot of human hair atop its head. It had even been wearing a cotton dress. But time and mould and neglect had left the little ragdoll smelly and brown—not fit for a little princess.

I handed it back to Falcon. “You’re right. She can’t have it.”

“What will you do with it then?” He considered the doll, peeling back the seams and upending it to inspect its legs.

“Maybe clean it up—keep it in a glass case for her.” I sat down on my bed and grabbed the cane laundry basket in the middle, sliding it closer to me. “Is Em coming up?”

“She’s just finishing up with Blade.” His tone held a slight hint of amusement.

“How’d he take the news—that he’s being bumped down to a grunt?”

“Poorly.” He lowered the doll, pressing it and his hands behind his back in that soldierly way. “But we’ll keep an eye on him. The love in this curse seems to birth a certain amount of revenge within the victim’s heart. He may become a threat—like Ryder.”

I nodded, but I didn’t agree. I still trusted Blade. Still adored him. I would never believe he was capable of hating me. “Six months,” I said.

“Your Majesty?”

“Six months,” I repeated. “Keep him in the lower ranks for about that, then bring him back up. Hopefully he will have learned his lesson about lying to his Queen and
using
her friend.”

Falcon bowed his head respectfully in agreement.

The door flew open then, and Emily charged across the room to where David sat by the balcony, the dainty, snow-white child in his arms. She leaned right over to take a better look, and I could almost see her heart melt.

“Someone said she has green eyes,” she said in a questioning tone. “Is that true?”

I smiled at David. “Rumour spreads fast.”

“Aw, give her to me,” she hummed in a slightly demanding tone, and practically stole the floppy little ragdoll from her father.

David stood up to secure the baby in Em’s arms before letting go. “Support her head,” he instructed.

“I got her,” Em said, shaking her head then as she looked down at the little bare foot sticking out from the blanket. “She’s just so soft and light.”

“About the size of a baby at twenty-eight weeks’ gestation,” Falcon reported. “But, as I told Ara, she’s as developed as a thirty-eight week, and she’s a hundred percent fine. Scored high all three times on her Apgar.”

“On her what?” Em screwed her nose up at him. “Never mind. It sounds technical and all I care about is that she’s perfect.”

“Well, perfect she is,” he announced with a proud smile. “Although, I’m still wondering how.”

“She has immortal blood in her veins, that’s how.” Em cuddled the baby to her face, swaying side to side in a soft, natural rhythm. “Have you named her yet?”

Both Falcon and Emily looked at me then, as if it were
my
job to choose a name. I looked at David.

“Ooh, how ’bout Eve,” Em suggested. “Name her after her soul-sake.”

I scrunched my mouth up, shaking my head.

“What about Rose—after her grandmother?” Drake suggested, waltzing into the room like a movie star, a broad, beaming smile bringing sunlight in under the clouds.

“Nah—too old.” I stood up and wandered over to land in his opening arms.

He kissed my head and squeezed me really tight, breaking away before I got too uncomfortable. “Are you okay, my dear?” he whispered between us.

I nodded, but I still wasn’t all that sure. All I could do was play it fine for now, and maybe, eventually, I would be.

“I like Elizabeth,” David carried the conversation on as if I hadn’t left. “After my mother.”

I walked back over to the bed, nodding in consideration, but Elizabeth just didn’t seem to fit. The baby looked somewhat like a delicate flower, her almost translucent skin bright with a kind of glow. Elizabeth was a powerful name—for someone I imagined to be quite headstrong and yet beautiful. It would be a good name for our daughter, yet when I looked at her flowery eyelids, closed over with pretty long lashes, I couldn’t call her by that name.

I went through nearly every name of everyone I knew: Eleanor, Vicki, Arietta—but none of them fit this pretty little blonde petal. “It seems unfair to name something so perfect, don’t you think?”

“What do you mean?” David asked.

I looked up quickly, realising I’d said that aloud. “Oh, um… just that… she seems so pure and so perfect. It almost feels as though to name her is… to taint her.”

David moved to stand beside me, leaning over to look at the child in Em’s arms. “I know exactly what you mean.”

“Then do not name her,” Drake said resolutely. “There is plenty of time.”

“Yeah, we can just go on calling her
The Baby
for now,” Em added.

We all looked up then as a broad, demanding gong sounded throughout the manor. It had been a long time since I’d heard that outdated call to dinner. A long time since I’d eaten among my people, my friends, but I got a slight sinking feeling as I realised how empty the table would be now. Blade was gone—demoted. Mike was in Australia, unaware that he had a goddaughter. Lord Eden was on the run. The Upper House, aside from Walter, were all dead, as was Morgana—hopefully only temporarily—and Jason was missing. I was looking forward to dinner, but also not.

“You don’t have to eat in the dining room tonight,” David offered, taking me by the elbow. “You need rest. You can—”

“No,” I said softly, smiling. “I think I’d like to.”

He smiled back, then angled his head to look at everyone else. “We’ll see you all downstairs then.”

Being the amazing friends they were, they all took that as their obvious cue to leave, Em placing the baby down in her blanket-lined laundry basket before politely bowing out behind the others. And as the door closed, David and I looked at each other.

“Finally. Alone,” he said.

“I thought they’d never leave.”

“I’ve been thinking the same thing about Falcon all afternoon.” He laughed. “And I was also thinking… you had better call Vicki and tell her the good news.”

“I’m still a little emotional about it all, David,” I explained, fussing over the baby that didn’t need any fussing. “She’ll ask questions, you know—ones I don’t want to answer.”

“About the birth?”

I nodded, not looking at him.

He sighed and grabbed my shoulder, forcing me to turn as he looped his arms around me. He didn’t say anything, as time expired between us, and he didn’t need to. We just stood there by the bed, looking out the balcony door at a sunset on the snow, losing our minds to private thoughts for a while.

It was nice in here in the winter, with a white backdrop outside and a roaring fire across the room, but even nicer now with everyone gone, and a perfect little green-eyed baby staring at the world with wonder from the cane basket in the middle of the bed. I could almost still feel her presence within me, like a void now, where there once was a little bump. Something about healing this fast and losing that pot so quickly just felt unnatural. I wanted it back, and it saddened me to think I would never have another child—my curse predetermining them all to be soulless.

In truth, though, none of it mattered. In time, the memory of my belly would fade away and I’d forget. In time, she would grow and begin to smile, and subsequent children would seem unnecessary with the light she would bring to our darkness. In time, my heart and my mind would heal, but for now, I just had to act okay to eventually
be
okay.

“We did it, you know.”

“Did what?” David asked, leaning back a little to look down at me.

“We got married—had a family. We’re together, and we always will be. It’s everything I ever wanted.”

A breathy laugh moved through his nose, his evergreen eyes small with a smile. “Funny, I was just thinking the same thing.”

I rose up on my toes to kiss him, feeling the tickly brush of his breath and the bristly dark stubble before our mouths even touched, but as our warm lips finally met, a burst of high notes rang out and his back pocket started vibrating.

“Sorry.” He grinned sheepishly, pecking me quickly on the lips, then stepped back to look at his screen, laughing to himself as he brought the phone up to his ear. “You have a sixth sense, don’t you?”

I heard a very high-pitched and excited voice on the other end.

“Okay, okay, I’ll put her on.” David handed me the phone, and as I rolled it toward me, I caught a glimpse of the caller ID.

“Vicki.”

“Tell me all about it!” she demanded excitedly. “How big was she? What time was she born…?” The questions went on and on in one long sentence. I had been worried that they’d bring me pain—to relive the entire mess—but I just felt excited about sharing it with Vicki. I didn’t cry as I told her that I’d gone into labour spontaneously and that no one had been around. I even told her that the baby was so small and her breaths so tiny that at first I thought she was dead. Vicki deliberately skimmed over that part of the conversation, demanding instead that either we come to stay with her—permanently—or that she come stay with us for a while because, clearly, I needed my mother right now.

David wrapped his arm around me again as tears sprung to my eyes, and I promised Vicki I’d talk to David about it and then let her know.

She asked for David again after she finished with me, and I went off to change my clothes for dinner, then returned and quickly checked the baby’s nappy, and when he hung up the phone, he just stood there for a moment, exhaling.

“You okay?”

“Yeah.” He offered me a reassuring smile, putting his phone away in his pocket.

“You don’t look okay,” I noted, lifting the cane basket of baby and resting it on my hip like a load of laundry. “What did Vicki say?”

“A lot.” He tried to change his smile, but she’d clearly given him something to think about. “Anyway, let’s go down to eat.”

“Not until you tell me what she said.”

“She’s just worried about you, that’s all—she could hear it in your voice that you’ve been through something pretty rough.”

“I’m okay.” I cast my eyes downward, away from his.

I expected him to deny me the safety of deflection, but he stayed put, and didn’t say a thing.

“By the way,” I added, regaining my composure, “we can’t tell her that Lord Eden betrayed us…”

“Actually, I think we can, Ara, and I think we
should
.”

“Why?”

“She needs to know—in case he ever comes back. And Sam needs to know what lengths his father will go to to protect the human race—above all else.”

I nodded and shrugged in consideration then agreement.

“And I think you should turn her,” he added, saying it quickly.

“Turn her?”

“Yes—make her Lilithian.” He moved over to the bedroom door and opened it, turning back to take the basket from me. “I think you’re going to need her, Ara. Always.”

For some reason, that simple truth filled my heart out with a kind of warm relief. I smiled. “I’d like that.”

“Then it’s settled.” He led the way, and I closed the door behind us. “We’ll take a few days to relax and spend time with our baby, then we’ll start making plans to bring Vicki and Sam out here.”

***

After a surprisingly pleasant and rather quiet dinner, I laid down diagonally in my dark room on my comfy bed, with no intentions of sleeping yet, and opened my eyes again to a room full of morning sun.

I shuffled over onto my back, warm and tucked in on my side of the bed, confused, my hair screaming out on my head, and put my hand out to feel for David. His bony hip was right there where I expected it to be, but as a wave of relief eased my twisting gut, panic burst open in my chest.

A baby. I had a baby!

I jumped out of bed and ran across to the sitting room, trying to make sense of where I was and how I got here. Where was the baby? How did I get in bed? How did I—

“Ara.” David’s hands cupped both my arms and he spun me to face him. “Are you awake?”

“I don’t know,” I said, rubbing both hands over my head. “What happened? I—”

“You fell asleep last night.” He pressed his palm into the small of my back and walked me toward the bed. “I moved you and tucked you in.”

“But the baby—”

“She’s fine. Look.” He pointed to the basket on the floor next to his side of the bed.

I exhaled, reaching up to brush my tangled hair off my face. “Sorry. I just freaked out. I thought maybe it was a dream—all of it, and then I couldn’t feel my belly, and—”

“It’s okay.” He laughed, holding both my shoulders at arm’s length. “You were exhausted, Ara—after giving birth and then crossing to the Other Realm, then going straight down to dinner. You needed to defragment.”