After a rushed trip to the market, and several lingering stares from near passerby, Abe and Nuala finally sit down at the kitchen table, and the queen smiles politely as an elf walks in, only to see the couple and bow in respect before quickly turning on his heel to walk out the way he came, a small smile gracing his features. Abe blinks at the swinging door, and turns to his wife in question.
"Why do they all do that?"
Distracted by the breakfast on her plate, Nuala looks up from her chewing, a mouthful of bacon blocking her smile, and shrugs halfheartedly. The gesture screams Liz, and he finds himself smiling at the thought-the small movement such a big representation of how much Nuala's changed.
I suppose they want to give us privacy, she murmurs in his head, and he absently replies with his thoughts, so accustomed to speaking through his mind rather than his mouth.
They act like they're scared to interrupt us.
She swallows down her food hungrily and nods in observatory agreement, her golden eyes shining in the glow of the hanging lights overhead.
"Perhaps they…want to give us space," she offers quietly, her lips pressed together in thought as she pushes her scrambled eggs around with the tines of her fork, the metal scratching across the white porcelain plate.
"For what?" Long into her suspended silence, as if she's simply opted to ignore his question, Nuala slowly folds her hands into her lap and gives him a pointed gaze, a slight reddish tint blooming beneath the scars grazing her cheekbones, and he understands her better than he's ever understood himself, the shock of such a strong link still new to them both, and he swallows nervously, looking down at his food.
Of course, he thinks awkwardly, and the sudden and unbidden idea of the people of Bethmora giving them space for procreation still hovers fresh in his head, and Nuala clears her throat with a tiny smile, sending him quick glances from across the small table in between bites of bacon and eggs. The court would want an heir, naturally, but the image still makes him feel all sorts of uncomfortable, and then he realizes that Nuala must want it, too.
For a queen to be without an heir, or a woman to be without a child, would, in her eyes, be such an awful thing, and he catches a glimpse of a hazy memory, one gleamed from the elf's moments with Liz and her pregnancy, the way she'd look down lovingly at her stomach-as if she had x-ray vision. The sensation of longing that accompanies it is no doubt a projection of Nuala's own perceptions of the moment he's reliving with her, and he swallows down the last of his breakfast before reaching out to take her hand, squeezing her slender fingers gently.
Abe knows with more clarity than ever before that he wants a child, knows it because the shine in his wife's eyes is all too bright to ever be dampened with the absence of one, and allows himself the small moment to imagine what a child-her, his, their child-would look like, with her golden eyes and her hair and her gentle smile. The idea that the child would inherit anything of his immediately darkens his thoughts, and he struggles to shield it from Nuala's detection, but he's too slow.
Her presence, always lingering in the back of his head like a group of eternal shadows, flares up with surprise, and he meets her wide eyes with reluctance, an apology already forming on his lips.
An apology for what, exactly?
The fact that he doesn't want his child to look like him? The fact that he doesn't want to ruin a child's life?
Her touch upon his hand stills, and the heartrending look that falls upon her face brings him to standing, as he quickly hurries over to her to wrap his arms around her small shoulders, the burning warmth of her skin felt even beneath the thick cloth of her blue dress.
"I'm sorry," he whispers soothingly, and she turns in his arms to stare up at him with a frown, shaking her head in confusion.
"Why would you ever think that?" Nuala questions in disbelief, and the accent in her voice, coupled with her trembling tone, makes the words nearly die out on her tongue, and there are tears pooling at the bottoms of her eyes. He sighs, and a surging feeling of hopelessness rises up within him, as if he's plummeting into darkness, her tears putting him in the worst of places as he strains to find a response.
"It's just-any child that would bear my features, they'd have a hard life. I've been fortunate, really," He gestures to himself wildly, his one goal being to dry the wetness dripping down her face, "I've been cooped up in a secret agency all my life, and I haven't had to deal with as many people as I could have. But any other, I mean, they'd have to venture out, wouldn't they? And if they looked like me-"
Lightning fast, Nuala reaches out to wrap her fingers around his wrist, stopping his arm in midair as he points to himself, and she stands, pushing her chair away to meet his eyes.
"Any child that looked like you would be a blessing, not a curse." The conviction lurking beneath her words shakes him, and he takes her other hand, glancing down at the differences between them, seeing as if for the first time what stands between them.
Her golden nails, so light and shining, and the pale hue of her skin, so completely in contrast with the white webbing between his fingers, the tiny suction pads on the underside of his hand, his cream colored nails and the thick flesh surrounding each digit. He dares not let his eyes wander further, and frowns sadly as he blinks, catching her gaze with meaning. She unlocks their hold and brings her palm up to cup his cheek, her skin brushing against the small section of his gills beneath his cheekbone, and she runs a thumb down his face tenderly, noticing how his dark eyes shine with the gleam of unshed tears.
"I'm not even sure we can have children, Nuala," he whispers hoarsely, and at her name, his voice sounding so weak and vulnerable and desolate, she closes her eyes, droplets of water falling from the corners, and he notices how the trail follows the glossy pink scar etched into her cheek, tears sliding down inside the groove it makes on her skin.
Their one similarity, their scar.
She takes her arms and wraps them around his lean shoulders and pulls him into her, hugging him with all of her strength, crying into the crook of his neck, and he breathes her in, her tears dripping onto his gills as he hugs her close, his face pressed into her hair. The silken feel of her dress sleeves takes over his skin, and he bunches up the cloth of her dress in his fist, shoulders shaking as he tries to stop himself from crying.
He can feel how sad she is, and how her sobs echo and turn into his sobs, and the fact that he's caused this, that he's made her cry, hurts him more than the pinch of her nails as she digs them into his skin, unconsciously trying to bring him closer to her. Through his muddled thoughts, he hears her soft murmurs, and she sounds so horribly confident, so entirely sure, despite her shuddering body, and he tightens his hold on her.
It'll be alright; it has to be.
...
Liz runs her fingertips over the skin of her bare belly and smiles, ignoring the swollen look of it as her fifth month begins. It's hard to completely overlook the way her skin stretches, but she manages, and imagines that she can see her child-a girl, Abe says.
She acts as if she sees her curled within the womb, sleeping peacefully, her heartbeat so very steady and pulsing like the soft, lilting notes of a lullaby, humming and thriving and wholly alive. Red sleeps beside the brunette, tangled in the sheets as he tosses and turns, and when he does, the action rocks the bed, and she laughs at him as his tail lazily curls around her upper thigh, a protective habit he's adopted of late. In the darkness of their room, she smiles warmly, and snuggles deeper beneath the covers as she clicks off her flashlight to set it on the nightstand beside her.
It's become a nightly ritual, to turn on the flashlight and glance down at her stomach, and she turns her head to glance at her husband. By the faint moonlight slipping through the open window, his red skin glows, a small sliver of contrast to the darkness around them, and she reaches out to brush her finger down his cheek, smiling as the obsidian cross glints in the shadows. She casts her gaze down to where her baby is cradled, and her almond eyes shine with the brightest light.
"This is your home," she whispers quietly, and she imagines that the small flutter of movement she feels is her daughter's welcome response.
...
Liz is solemn, for a kid. Red watches her because the Professor thinks she's the type that should be watched, and also thinks that they have a "bond"-whatever that means. All he knows is that he recognizes the lost gleam in her brown eyes as she stares up at him in distrust, and he crosses his arms to make the silence less awkward. He eagerly awaits the moment he can be let off babysitting duty, and longs to go talk to Abe, to see how he's adjusting to his new life at the B.P.R.D.
After two years, it still takes some getting used to, and Abe is still as lost as he was when Red saved him from dissection.
"I don't need a babysitter," Liz hisses unexpectedly, and he glances at her, surprised at the emotion in her voice. He'd always thought the eleven year old girl was dispassionate, her face always so impassive and drained of all life, but her eyes light up with fire as she gazes over at him defiantly, and Red finds himself smiling.
"You've got moxy, I'll give you that, kid," he says laughingly, and she huffs at him, crossing her own arms, her near black hair glinting in the light as the cross choker hanging loosely around her neck-obviously too big for her-jangles against her skin.
"My name's not 'kid', you know."
And Red thinks, for just a fraction of a second, that this girl isn't at all what she seems, and his amber eyes shine just as much as his smile does, finally, finally, finding a kindred spirit in the prison that they can never leave.
...
Faolin walks into the library-a place she rarely ever steps foot in-to find Nuala, curled up on one of the many small sofas with a book in her lap, the lights at the ceiling casting her features in an eerie glow. The elf stops, and looks around for Abe, and when she realizes that the queen is alone, she walks over cautiously, positioning herself on the arm of the couch as she looks warily down at her friend, pushing a stray strand of hair behind her pointed ear. Nuala glances up, and there are traces of tears on her face, and she closes her book to set it down carelessly on a nearby table.
"What happened?" Faolin asks worriedly, and the other elf shakes her head wordlessly, starting to cry. Instantly, Faolin pulls her into her arms, shushing her gently and carding her long fingers through her pale hair, and a memory comes to the forefront of her mind.
Cautiously, Nuala pulls off the bandages, and winces as they tug on the still tender skin beneath, and Faolin holds her breath. The young princess is haggard, her skin a sickly pale, and Nuada must look no better.
But no one knows, for the prince is gone and the kingdom is in disarray, rumors of relocation slithering through the city.
Having already brushed off the healers' many protests, Nuala finally manages to take off the first bandage, tightly secured about her waist, and as she unwraps it, she glances up at the mirror to see Faolin's wide, shocked eyes. Nuala ignores the sight, and continues to undo every single bandage, and moves up to slowly unmask the fresh skin of her face.
Faolin feels her heart pounding, and doesn't know whether to embrace her friend or sob for her, and the sound that escapes the princess is not at all familiar, a foreign croak that shakes her to the core, and she collapses, her knees buckling, tears relentlessly pouring from her eyes as she rocks herself back and forth, arms wrapped tightly around her middle as she wails.
Her skin is covered with shiny pink lines of flesh, her body jagged to the touch at some places, and her face looks so overpoweringly sorrowful that Faolin has no choice but to collapse upon the floor with her.
Nuala's sobs shake Faolin's body, and she holds the elf closer, murmuring soothing words into her ear as Nuala attempt to talk in between her gasping breaths.
"What if we can't have children?" Faolin doesn't know what to say, and winces as the invading thoughts spread though her mind-still unaccustomed to the telepathic presence after so many years of having it accidentally slip, uncontrolled, into her mind.
He wants children, I can tell. What if I can't give that to him? What if he blames himself for it? What if-
Faolin blocks her out, a skill learned over thousands of years, and pulls Nuala away just far enough to look her in the eyes, her face serious and sincere.
"You're going to have a family, you hear me?" Nuala swallows her next sob and hiccups, lips trembling.
"The two of you are going to have a big, wonderful family, and you're going to live out your lives together and die a really, really long time from now when you're both old and withered. Understand?"
Nuala stares blankly, and her shoulders droop.
"Abraham doesn't age," she deadpans, and Faolin cracks a warm smile before wiping the tears from her face with the side of her hand. She fixes Nuala's mussed hair, and brings her into a tight hug, her small chin resting on the princess' shoulder.
"Everything's going to be fine, you just wait and see."
...
When Abe, after aimlessly wandering the city for a solid three hours, finally returns to Nuala's chambers, he closes the door with a heavy sigh-and equally heavy heart-and turns around to make his way to the pool, but stops dead, his back to the door.
Nuala sits upon the covers of their bed with a small smile on her face, and his mouth hangs open of its own accord, because Nuala-his dear, polite, reserved Nuala-is completely covered in lingerie, or maybe not so very much covered. His pulse immediately quickens, and his gills flap faster, and she blushes at his reaction as the blue lace snaking around her waist-leaving nothing whatsoever to the imagination as it trails up and down her scantily clad body-catches his eye.
She tilts her head, and pats the bed beside her, the familiar upturn of the corners of her lips turning into a flirtatious grin that sends his blood rushing, his breath caught in his throat.
"I've decided that it doesn't matter, either way. If we're able to have children, then that's wonderful-but if we aren't, my heart won't be broken, so long as I have you," she murmurs softly, and he's never agreed with anything more than in that moment.
She glances down at herself, then back up to him, and her eyes flash with mockery as she purses her lips teasingly.
"Won't you sit with me?" And all Abe can feel is the press of her lips against his, absent one moment and there in the next.
Please R&R! Feedback of any kind is always appreciated! ;)