Chapter 51

By the end of their adventure, Meggie and her men returned with enough jewels and gold to fill her husband's vault, but that feeling in her gut had not changed. Meggie somehow knew that she was expecting a child. It wasn't as some had hinted at, she didn't feel another life growing inside of her, but that didn't explain this other feeling that gripped her heart. As if her purpose had somehow changed and now as Meggie faced that possibility, she didn't know what to do. Because if she was on the cusp of being a mother, Meggie didn't know what to do, and she found she was as scared as she was ever going to be. And as she prepared herself for that Meggie knew she couldn't guess at this anymore. She had to know for sure that she was going to have a baby, so she did what she had to in order to have that truth. Meggie hadn't seen a doctor since she had had to lock the one who had saved her life once in the dungeon. It wasn't that she was reluctant to trust another person, it was that she hadn't had the chance to find someone else or at least that's what she told herself. Now though she couldn't let anything make her hesitate. She could be bringing another life into this world. A life that could very much be solely on her to raise. Meggie tried to pretend like that was not something that scared her as she arrived home with the knowledge in her mind that she would be leaving again in search of someone that she hoped wouldn't betray her the way her last doctor had. Meggie left the compound again looking as normal as she had been since being with Capricorn. She wore a simple summer dress and as she had dressed, she had stood facing the mirror in her room, and she found herself looking at her stomach. She could feel something bigger than herself being born into her. A dull excitement that she didn't understand started to bloom inside her just before being stamped down by her own doubts in herself that kept her staring into the mirror.

"I could be having his baby and he might never get to see our child. This may be our Odyssey" thought Meggie as they left the compound that day finding the thought ironic as she was suddenly highly aware of the six guards she had brought along as the car drove farther away.

"What is our mission here, my lady? Will we be doing another attack?" whispered the guard closest to her. The way his voice broke the silence startled her as she gazed fixedly out the window of the moving car. She found herself looking at him without anything to say. She didn't want to tell anyone that she was pregnant until she knew for sure. The truth was that she wanted Capricorn to be the first to know if she was. It left her unsure what to say. Unsure if she should just admit the truth of their expedition or find a creative lie, but in the end, she decided upon a half truth.

"Now that I've had to lock the doctor away, I'm in need of another person to serve our medical needs. We are going in search of that someone" said Meggie simply. She knew they wouldn't question her further. She was grateful for that as they drove farther down the road and just like that, they were silent again. Meggie was grateful for that as well as she watched the scenery pass by them as they drove. They didn't make a sound again until a village came into view and as they pulled closer, Meggie wondered if she would find who she was looking for here. When she found the local doctor, it was easier than she thought.

"He looks trustworthy" thought Meggie when she met the doctor, stepping into his office to see him standing in the single room with a kind glow to him.

"Good day, doctor" said Meggie as the man walked up to her that kind glow never leaving him as she looked him over taking note of his balding head and his stumpy stooped stature that went well with his small pigs' eyes.

"Good day, my dear, what can I do to assist you today? You don't look unwell" said the doctor who according to the sign above the door was named Dr. Lewis Kepler. As he spoke the question, the man looked over her shoulder at the two guards that had joined her inside. At the question, Meggie was almost afraid to say the words in front of them even as she knew if it were true that they would know that truth one way or another. Yet she still hesitated until the doctor had stepped closer his eyes always seeming to blink and squint at her as if it would help him see her more clearly.

"You can, doctor…I think I may be pregnant…I need you to tell me for sure" said Meggie watching as the man let his guard down before her eyes. He smiled at her and beckoning her closer, he welcomed her into his office.

"Happy to help, come inside— "said the doctor stopping when he noticed the way the guards were closing in on him.

"No, you will be coming with us. Gather anything you should want or need, rest assured everything else will be provided for you. Please don't make a scene or struggle, I would hate to have an issue" said Meggie calmer then she ever dreamed she'd be.

"I don't relish hurting people who don't deserve it, doctor, and you are one of those people. Please, don't cause my guards any trouble" whispered Meggie stepping closer into the circle of his personal space now her eyes looking directly into his so that in that moment something seemed to pass between the two of them. He didn't struggle or fight them at all.

He only looked at her from time to time as he gathered his things, including a machine that he said would show her the baby if she was indeed pregnant. As she watched him, Meggie couldn't help wondering why he was coming with her without a fight. She knew her guards were serving their purpose, but the doctor hadn't even tried to run. Yet as the thought passed, Meggie saw something in the way he looked at her. A fatherly gaze that she had once believed Mo to have but compared to her own father this man's gaze held something far more pure. It was then that Meggie knew that he was coming for her. For some protective instinct that he felt towards her despite not knowing her at all. Meggie both appreciated it and failed to understand it.

"Somehow he knows that I am in great need of him" thought Meggie in that moment suddenly letting that failed understand dissolve into a sense of gratitude that was still there when he was sitting across from her in the car as it drove away. Once it was clear that the doctor was one of them, the guards treated him as they would any guest of her husband, and even the doctor seemed to sense a change in their demeanor. Meggie was glad when they arrived at the castle again. She let the guards help the doctor to his quarters and going to the throne room, she waited for him to find her there. She knew the guards would bring him soon enough and as she waited, she couldn't help thinking of her husband, and what his reaction might be if she was going to have his child. She didn't sit in her own throne that day. She felt some need to be close to him, so much so that she found herself sitting in his throne. Somehow as she placed her hands on it, she could feel him, and that soothed her as she waited for news that she didn't know if she wanted or not. And yet that wasn't entirely true. Because as she sat with her hands on the stone, they began to drift until her hands were cradling the small swell of her stomach, and she wondered if a baby grew there. She wondered if that child would find her lacking as a mother and what she would say when it asked about its father. She wondered if he would still be away or if he would get to see it born. So many questions with no answers and in that moment, Meggie found that she was glad for the silence that existed in her wait.

She was nervous. Because though part of her wouldn't admit it, Meggie knew that her purest truth was the fact that she wanted this child, and she wanted Capricorn to want that too. This child, if it were growing inside her, felt vital especially when she thought of the one, they had already lost at the hands of their parents. The truth was that the loss of that baby had made her long for a child. It was a longing that she had hidden from Capricorn even after things had become as they were supposed to be between them. Meggie let herself face that longing as she sat there in that moment. Yet she didn't let herself hope for it in quite the same way as she wanted to. Because she didn't want to feel a disappointment that was meaningless if she found herself not with child. She was startled out of that thought though, for suddenly there was a single guard right in front of her, and those thoughts were stamped down as she shifted to the persona of a queen that she had had to develop.

"The doctors all ready" said the guard her heart jumping at the thought of what was coming. In that moment as she undressed to allow the doctor to examine her, Meggie wished Capricorn were there. She didn't want to go alone into that room to hear whatever news might be waiting, but she didn't want the guards in there with her either. So, it was just the doctor and herself in the same room where another doctor had served her once, but somehow this doctor felt different than that man had been. Everything remained silent as he ran his tests and checked her over for things that she didn't know until he was looking at her and Meggie knew he now had the results that would answer all her questions. He was very kind the whole time and when he told her she could sit up, Meggie found him smiling at her.

"You were correct, Miss, you are expecting a child" said the doctor making Meggie beam.

"This may be a strange question, but…how long exactly have I been pregnant?" whispered Meggie feeling somewhat out of breath. This news made her almost giddy and she could see it then. Their child that would look the perfect combination of Capricorn and herself. And yet she wished he were here receiving this news with her. The doctor seemed to sense this as he smiled at her in that fatherly way she had noticed before.

"You are nearly two months pregnant, my dear. Now, I assume you want to tell your husband, and if you would like I can assist you in delivering the news. I do find some wives like having a doctor present at the time" whispered the doctor his words made everything stop. She wasn't sure what to tell him. She couldn't tell him that her husband had been read into a book to conquer the land there. Yet that wasn't the only thing on her mind. For she still didn't know how Capricorn would feel about her having a child now. This wasn't the time to be bringing a child into this world. It made Meggie silent, so much so that the doctor laid a hand on her shoulder as if to help her in her decision.

"What if he is upset? I couldn't bear it if he were" thought Meggie looking from the doctor's hand on her shoulder to her own as she twisted them in her lap.

"I am his wife, but I have no idea how he will feel about this. He may want children, but now is not the time for us to be bringing said children into our lives" thought Meggie trying to withstand her own emotions as she played out in her mind the many things, he could say about this, both good and bad.

Meggie remembered in that moment that day when she had awoken after Mo had shot her. Capricorn had been holding her hand, he hadn't left her in the aftermath of that moment, and there had been pain in his eyes when he told her that she had lost their first child. He had felt that pain, but not as strongly as she had. It had always been understood between the two of them that they both wanted children someday, but then he had set out on this quest which had put any thought of the matter from both of their minds. That was until now, when it loomed heavy, and Meggie found herself expecting a child that may never know its father. Suddenly, she was all the more aware that she might never see Capricorn again. That he might never get back to her or if he did, it might truly be something out of the Odyssey. It might be years, and, in the meantime, she might be left to raise this child on her own. That scared her as much as anything else in that moment as Meggie's thoughts wouldn't stop running wildly from within her head.

"No, I'll tell him" whispered Meggie leaving without another word.

"But how am I going to tell him? This isn't something he should read in that journal. I should be telling him in person, face to face" thought Meggie as she left the doctor, her feet making her roam through the hall in an effort to stave off the pounding in her heart. She couldn't wait to tell Capricorn, but sitting on her bed, she looked at her journal as it sat on her bedside table. She didn't want to tell him that way.

The truth was Meggie wanted to see the look on his face when she told him. Whether that look was good or bad, happy, or angry, she wanted to see it, and touch him with her bare hands as she spoke the words to him. She didn't want to simply write them on a page in that journal and wait for whatever response he would send back to her. She wanted this moment to be real between them just as it might have been if he was still here with her. At this point, Meggie suddenly found she didn't care if he was angry about the news or happy. She wanted him to be overjoyed, but truly his feelings would not change the outcome or the reality of their situation. Meggie still wanted to tell him, and she didn't care if she had to take the potion and risk it all to do it. She felt like it would be worth it to tell him this news. Yet even as that thought was blooming in her mind, Meggie placed her hands over her stomach, and thought of her child. For it couldn't be known whether the potion would harm it, but Meggie knew it was a risk she might have no choice in. She didn't want to harm her child. She would never willingly choose that path, but for Capricorn, to have this true moment with him felt worth the risk. After all, someday that same potion might be the only way Capricorn would meet his child, but Meggie didn't allow herself to dwell on that as she fingered the pages of her journal. In those deciding moments, Meggie found herself reading their messages to one another that they had shared so far even the angry ones from the very beginning of his journey. She wanted them to make her decision for her and in the end, they did. As she came to the end of their messages to the blank pages that waited to be written on, Meggie knew she had to take this risk, and run with it. It was a chance that she had to make because this was a moment, she wasn't willing to sacrifice for this cause he had chosen. With that decision made, Meggie found herself opening her journal fully, and taking a pen in hand, she started to write. The first word she wrote was his name, but after that the words got much harder. She found that her hands shook the whole time as she sat on her bed waiting for the right words to come to her. What could she say without saying what she needed to outright? Would he even be able to take the potion, so she could tell him? None of it came with a real answer as she simply wrote what her heart told her to. Those words turned out to be incredibly simple.

Capricorn,

I know you said it would be too dangerous to risk taking the potion anymore, but something has happened that in my opinion gives us no other choice. I must speak with you face to face. It is very important and something I cannot tell you more of within the pages of this journal. I just need you to trust me and please, if you can do so safely, take the potion, so we might have a moment to speak just the two of us. Please let me know as soon as this might be possible.

With all my love,

Your queen,

Meggie

She closed the journal without waiting for his response. She would know when it came as she laid on her bed. As she was sending that message to him, Capricorn was doing just as Meggie had been doing days before. Running on horseback through villages to terrorize those who dared get in his way. He was the Adderheads man again and it paid off as he helped the man rise in his power again all with the true intention of toppling him all at the same time. Capricorn was burning a path for himself to be king again and yet when he looked at his journal, something inside him soared when he saw a message from his queen.

"I wish you could see my reign of fire, my love, it would make you so proud" whispered Capricorn before he had even read what she had written. The Adderhead had even asked him and his men to stay in the barracks of his castle.

They were making their way back and making camp in the woods for the last time when Capricorn saw her message. He looked at her words and he knew Meggie wouldn't have asked him to risk taking the potion without ample reason. He found Gemini in her tent and he hoped she would think it safe to see Meggie. He had been working hard towards his purpose and needed to see his wife. He needed Meggie. After so long, Meggie's words written in a journal weren't enough anymore. He only wondered what Meggie could have to tell him.