AN: this takes place in the same AU as "i carry your heart with me (i carry it in my heart"
CW: nongraphic description of childbirth
The sun, mocking Thrushpelt, drifts past sunhigh. He paces outside the nursery, wearing down the same path since Bluefur began kitting at dawn. He had known it would be soon; Bluefur had been listless, spending time outside the nursery and with him, pacing around camp like she was waiting for something. Featherwhisker had reassured him it was normal, but it rattled him to see his normally confident and assured partner look so bemused.
He listens for any sound other than the panting, but he can hear nothing. Spottedpaw pushes out of the nursery, and he jumps, trying to avoid a collision.
"How is she?" he asks, worry pounding in his words.
"She's fine," she says, pushing past him. She doesn't stop to say anything, hurrying towards the medicine den.
"Do you need something?" he calls after her. "Is she alright?"
Spottedpaw flicks an ear in response. "I said she's fine," she said. "I'm just getting some things for Featherwhisker.
"Come on," Rosetail says, brushing her pelt against his. "Let's go hunt."
"What if something happens?" he asks, anxiety kneading claw marks into his heart and breath.
"She's fine," Rosetail insists. "Featherwhisker and Spottedpaw will take good care of her." She guides him away, nudging him gently towards the tunnel.
He doesn't resist, but he stares at the nursery, his ears staying swiveled towards it.
"She's been kitting for so long," he says.
"Some queens do," she says. "Featherwhisker says Rainfur was kitting for almost a full day."
He kneads the ground anxiously, unable to stop his claws from unsheathing.
Rosetail sighs. "Come on," she says, "if you catch something, you can bring it to her when she's done. She'll be hungry."
Bluefur had barely eaten for the past quarter moon. White-eye and Featherwhisker had told him it was normal, but the thought of seeing Bluefur eat something again is motivating. Rosetail distracts him, challenging him to tricky catches, letting him strip feathers from a bird for her nest. He tries not to worry about Bluefur. She's giving birth in the nursery, with a medicine cat beside her. Plenty of queens wandered off for their kitting.
As the sun sets, he begins to calm, slightly. He's put the worst fears out his mind, and now, he lays in easy silence with Rosetail, passing memories of Bluefur between them.
Robinwing comes just past moonrise. "They're ready for you, now," she says, and Thrushpelt's heart beats faster.
"Is she okay?" he asks. He takes one of the voles in his mouth, Rosetail hurrying behind him, and starts walking past Robinwing before she even has a chance to answer.
"Yes," Robinwing calls after him, "she's delivered all of them."
He rushes back to the nursery. Usually, he'd hesitate before entering, but today, he cannot wait. He drops the feathers outside and rushes in, blinking as his eyes adjust to the dimness of the nursery.
"You have three kits," Featherwhisker says, and he does.
These kits are his. The swell of protectiveness and love and joy he feels is barely controllable, and it takes everything he has not to immediately abandoned all pretense of self control and wrap himself around his family, sit guard and prevent anything from harming a single hair.
Bluefur is exhausted, flanks heaving, and the kits still need to be groomed, but he stares at the four of them, and all he can think of is how much he loves.
They are his kits, in every way that matters.
He rushes to them. He knows she's not his mate, but she doesn't begrudge the way he presses his nose to her, the way he curls around her and smooths the fur around her ears.
"It's a tom and two she-cats," she says, giving one a gentle lick. Two of them have inherited her coat, but one has white patches spreading up from her stomach.
"She looks like you," Bluefur says. They both know he's not their father, but still, it's nice to think they look like it.
"Do you know what you're naming them?" Featherwhisker asks.
Bluefur doesn't hesitate. "Stonekit, Mistykit, and Mosskit," she says, her tail drawing across the suckling kits.
"Not going to give the father a chance?" he asks, and Bluefur says nothing. Featherwhisker has a curious look about him, like he knows more than he's letting on, but he doesn't press the matter. "I'll let you have some time with them," he says, "White-eye's litter has fallen asleep in the elders' den by now, so I see no harm in letting you rest until they wake-up."
Thrushpelt stares at his kits.
"I'll be their father," he says. "If you'll let me, I swear, just as if they were mine."
Bluefur turns her head back at him. She can't stretch to rest it over his shoulders, the way she usually does, but she still leans on him. "You would do that?"
Her eyes are still focused on the kits. They're still, now, content. Bluefur purrs, resonating through the den, and Thrushpelt matches her volume.
"I would do anything for them," he says, "I would do anything for you."
Mistykit squeaks softly, and Bluefur noses her gently. "I don't deserve you," she says.
"Nonsense," Thrushpelt responds. He gives one last stroke along her back, smoothing out her fur. "Let me groom one?"
Maybe Bluefur really does see him as the father, because she lets him take Stonekit without any fuss. He washes him, smoothing his fur down. Spottedpaw, most likely, had washed most of the kitting sac off of him, but his fur was still ruffled and wild.
He smells of Bluefur, of milk, of something soft that elicited a fierce protectiveness in Thrushpelt. As soon as White-eye returns, he'll be politely removed from the nursery. Toms never can stay long. He thinks he understands, as he breathes in the scent of Stonekit, smoothing down his fur and returning him to his mother's belly. He can't imagine what he would do to someone who threatened one of them.
"Are you hungry?"
She doesn't say anything at first. "I don't want to move," she says.
"I'll bring you something," he says, "and I have feathers for your nest."
She blinks at him, slow and grateful.
Carefully, trying his best not to disturb her, he extracts himself from her nest. He rubs his cheek against hers before he leaves, a pain in his heart pulling him back to them. He collects what she needs as fast as he's able, finding a still-warm vole for her, and scooping up the pile of feathers he made with Rosetail.
His mouth full, he slips back into the nursery.
The sight still catches him off-guard. Bluefur is washing Mosskit, and his heart twists painfully at how much he treasures this moment. She's purring, and Mosskit squeals, so high-pitched he has to strain to hear it. Bluefur replaces her as Thrushpelt places the vole by her feet.
She's hungrier than she let on, because she practically swallows it whole, finishing the whole thing before he's finished arranging the feathers around her.
"Don't you want to know who their father is?" she asks.
"Are you going to let me be there for them?" he asks, hoping the fondness he already has for the kits is obvious in the way he lies next to them, his head pressed close to Bluefur. He can smell her, and the kits, from here. He'll have to leave soon, and he might not be allowed back for ages, and he wants to remember this, wants to remember how it feels to be here with them.
"If you want to," she says, uneasy. She doesn't trust that he'll be here, he realizes, doesn't trust that he'll stay, even though she doesn't want him for a mate.
"I do," he vows, a purr overpowering his words. He pulls his tail over the kits, like he can protect them from any draft sneaking into the nursery. "I will be here for them every second you let me."
She nods, lying her head down, closing her eyes. "But still," she says, "don't you want to know?"
"No," he says, "it doesn't matter, now. I'll be their father."
She exhales, something gentle and almost a sigh. "They'll have the two of us," she agrees. "They'll have the two of us to love them."
He rests his head next to hers, pressing their foreheads together. He can hear a commotion outside the nursery, although it seems faint, like he and Bluefur have been ferried away from the clan. It must be White-eye getting ready to move back. He won't have longer here.
"Yes," he agrees. "I'll love them the same as any father."
He knows this to be true, the way he knows he'd die for any one of these kits, that he would fight to his last breath to protect every hair of their pelt, every whisker, every eyelash.
Stonekit, Mistykit, Mosskit, he thinks, I'm so happy you're here.