Jim's keen hearing picked up the unmistakable sound of the front door opening, over the hiss of running water. He felt himself relax, glad to know that Claire was finally home.
His relaxation was very short lived, however, when the bathroom door burst open a fraction of a second later. He yelped, hackles raising in alarm.
Claire, from her side of the shower curtain, buried her face in her hands and let loose a muffled cry of frustration.
Jim slumped against the wall and sighed with relief. For a split second he had been worried that he was about to be attacked while in a less than ideal position- a long held fear of his that he had, miraculously somehow, managed to avoid in his near decade of trollhunting.
"I take it Merlin's place wasn't as fun as you'd hoped?" He ventured sheepishly.
"That annoying wizard!" He could hear the clipping of her boot heels as she began pacing back and forth. "He shows up for the first time in months and he's just no help and-! And of course he's just being an ass, as usual. 'Well, I thought you knew-,'" she began in a near perfect imitation of Merlin's cadence, "'-Didn't anyone ever tell you about the birds and the bees?' He just- ugh!"
She stormed out of the bathroom and Jim listened to her receding footsteps as she moved toward their bedroom.
He shut off the water and gave himself a good shake to dry off. Probably a good time to call it with the shower.
Now clean and redressed, he entered their bedroom to find Claire laying face down on the bed.
"So, wait, Merlin's back?" Jim asked, puzzled.
Claire, not lifting her head, made a defeated sound and tossed her hands up in a "I have no clue" gesture.
Jim hummed thoughtfully. Her frustration and exhaustion hung so heavy in the air it was nearly tangible.
He sunk down onto the mattress beside her and pulled her into his lap. Claire huffed, leaned into his chest and curled her legs around herself.
"He was just there," Claire began. Jim's arms coiled around her small frame and he rested his chin on her shoulder. "He was just standing there, about to leave, and it was sheer luck I even caught him. For all I know, he's been popping in and out and I just haven't been around to catch it."
She pressed her temple to his and scrunched her nose as his hair tickled her face. His stony skin was pleasantly warm from his shower but his hair was still damp and cooling rapidly. She was too tired of everything to care.
"He knew about the wombmates," she said after a moment and felt his ears prick at her words. "Like, way, way before we ever did."
"How-?" Jim made a confused sound. "But he never said anything to you?"
"Nope. Not a thing," she responded. "In fact, he said he thought we already knew."
"But how could we?" Jim's brows furrowed. "We didn't even know it was possible to…?"
"Exactly."
"Did he at least give you any tips or advice on anything we should be looking out for or, you know, anything?" Jim ventured. He wasn't even sure if that was information the wizard would be privy to, but if anyone was, it would be him.
Or at least he would assume so.
"I didn't even get a chance to ask. I looked away for literally two seconds and he just-," she snapped her fingers, "-poof."
"...Wait. Not to change the subject, but," Jim said after a few moments. "Did you say 'wombmates?'"
"I did." Claire responded, grinning despite herself. "I thought of that on the way back, but I was too angry to give it the proper appreciation it deserved. You just totally rolled with it too, like you knewexactly what I was talking about."
Jim groaned, unwrapping himself from around her to lean back onto his hands. "In my defense, I'm exhausted. My brain's too tired to function properly."
Claire giggled. "No, I get it. It was kinda cute, though."
She leaned forward to gently press her lips to his. When she pulled back, the smitten grin on his face made her laugh.
He could handle being "cute" if it meant Claire's unhappiness had dissipated- even if just for the moment.
"Have you eaten yet?" Jim asked.
Claire actually had to think about it for a moment. "No. The plan was to eat when I came home, but then the wizard happened."
"Alright," he stood, taking Claire with him. She squealed with surprised laughter and clung to his neck as her feet dangled a good couple feet above the ground. "What are you and the wombmates in the mood for?"
"I bumped into that fish vendor troll on the way back home," Claire said. "He gave me like this huge fish that I didn't really know what do with it so it's just sitting on the counter in the kitchen."
The trolls of New Trollmarket had a surprising mentality of "it takes a village" when it came to child rearing. Since Claire's condition had become more well known, many of the vendors had taken to trying to feed her when she passed through.
While she appreciated the sentiment, it could be a little overwhelming at times, especially when she had to politely inform them of the limitations of a human diet if they offered her something unconventional.
When the cattle herders had approached them, for instance, it had taken quite a bit of explaining as to why they couldn't just accept an entire calf.
"Oh, is that what I'm smelling?" Jim, smirking, buried his nose into her neck and sniffed loudly. She squirmed with ticklish laughter and he couldn't imagine a more wonderful sound.
Jim slipped out of bed and padded down the stairs into Blinky's library before Claire woke the next morning.
"Hey, Blink-" he stopped at the foot of the stairs, surprised to find the elder wasn't alone.
A large yellow troll was sitting on the table in front of him, his severed arm sitting gray and lifeless beside him as Blinky tended to his now arm-less shoulder. The yellow troll's expression was shame-faced beneath the steely gaze of a third troll; his spouse, Jim assumed.
"What's, uh…?" The Trollhunter gestured vaguely to the scene in front of him.
"Bah," Blinky grunted, one of his eyes flicking up from his task to fix on Jim. "Nothing to concern yourself with, Master Jim."
Jim raised a hand in a cautious wave. The wounded troll opened his mouth to speak but when his spouse gave him a fixed look, he quickly shut it.
"Were you in need of something?" Blinky asked, ignoring the exchange.
"Uh, yeah," Jim approached the table and watched Blinky work. "I was just wanting to see if you'd be cool with me and Claire kind of taking the day off?"
Blinky turned his head to look at him, surprised by the suggestion. "Well, of course. You both deserve time to yourselves every now and again. I wasn't aware you were waiting for my permission to do so."
"Well, no," Jim shifted his gaze to the severed arm. "I'm more letting you know we won't be available, I guess? I mean, if there's an emergency-"
"No need for concern; I've got you both on speed dial," Blinky assured with a grin.
Jim had attempted to let Claire sleep in, but, thanks to her natural circadian rhythm, she was up and out of their bedroom while he was still in the middle of preparing breakfast.
Hair still messy and practically swimming in one of his shirts, she took a seat at the counter. Her gaze settled longingly on the coffeemaker across the kitchen.
"We're taking the day off," Jim announced, sliding a plate in front of her.
Claire dragged her gaze from the coffeemaker, to the eggs he'd made for her and stared up at him, blinking her eyes owlishly. "Day… off?" She tilted her head.
"Yep." Jim chuckled.
"Like," she squinted her eyes suspiciously. "Off-off?"
"Completely off," Jim confirmed. "Absolutely no trollhunting crap. Unless something huge happens, anyway."
Claire looked uncertain as she picked up her fork. "I don't know… we still have a lot to take care of before I get too big to do anything."
"I like how we're still pretending you're not going to keep working until you're actively giving birth." Jim teased, brow quirked playfully.
Claire snorted, managing around a mouthful of egg: "How does one passively give birth, Jimbo? Please- educate me."
Jim shook his head, leaning onto the counter as he began to eat his own breakfast. "Really, though. One day isn't going to hurt us. We've more than earned a little time off."
"I guess you have a point," Claire allowed and offered him a smile. "Life's a balance, right?"
"Right," Jim agreed, returning the smile.
Her gaze dipped down toward his hands and her eyebrows raised as she recognized the spoon he was consuming, mid-bite. "Hey- wait! I think that's one of mine!"
Jim laughed, leaning out of her reach as she took a swipe at him. "Nuh-uh. This was in the free-game drawer; it's free game."
Despite her earlier reservations, Claire was the one leading the way through the tunnels beyond New Trollmarket, horngazle raised high to light the way. Not that Jim's half-troll eyes needed the guidance through the darkness.
"Oh, hey," Claire suddenly called out, winding around the corner. "What's this doing here?"
Jim came around the bend and found her standing beside a motorcycle, her fingers dancing along the handle bars. She quirked a brow in his direction.
"I didn't think you still rode this."
Jim shrugged, resting his palm over the seat. "I don't. I moved it out of Trollmarket because, you know. I never have time to use it anymore but I don't want to scrap it either."
Much like the vespa he'd helped build in high school, the motorcycle had been a project he'd really thrown himself into when they had first began construction on New Trollmarket. It had been a private, secret affair, something he would chip away at whenever he was alone.
Solitude had been a luxury at the time, and something he had been starved of since their departure from Arcadia.
Now it served as a fossil from his late teens, when he had been confused about who his new hybrid self was and who exactly he wanted to become as a person.
It had spawned from a dark place in his life, but it had been involved in the creation of some pretty great memories, all the same.
"Think the Trollhunter will ever ride again?" Claire asked with dramatic infliction, waggling her fingers for effect.
Jim laughed. "Someday. Who knows, maybe I can find a car seat attachment and a couple of little baby helmets."
"I like the implication that they'll have to share a car seat." Claire remarked with a grin. She pressed the horngazle to the wall and, with a flourish, drew a perfectly practiced semi-circle.
A portal opened up and they were staring out into the New Jersey Barrens. They had arrived at the tail end of a sunset, when the sun had sunk just low enough into the horizon to not pose a threat.
Jim took Claire's hand and they stepped out into the wilderness. The portal fizzled out behind them as they stepped onto a path leading out through the trees.
They immediately fell into pleasant conversation, surrounded by familiar trees and serene outdoors.
This was their getaway. When they first had been struggling under the weight of their trollhunting responsibilities, they would take frequent trips through those trees. It was one of the few things that helped to keep them sane. And, at the time, offered one of the few opportunities they had to be alone together.
Before Blinky's library had been completed and the heartstone still only stood roughly about twelve feet tall, the three of them- human, half-troll, and elder- had lived together for a time, and still did, in all technicality. Time passed, individual rooms were carved out of the unfinished apartment above the developing library and, before long, it had taken on the form of a significantly more rustic, but very human abode.
With the completion of his library, Blinky had taken to heading up into the apartment overhead less and less and, by way of unspoken agreement, it had become exclusively Jim and Claire's after their entry into adulthood.
"We still haven't even started talking about names," Jim realized suddenly. His eyes widened as that thought sunk in. "Oh my God, we still don't have any names yet. And we're like halfway through this whole thing."
Claire was silent for a moment. "I like Mateo."
"Ok, well, that's one," Jim allowed, "but we still don't know what we're having."
"Ok, so we need two boy names and two girl names. We can do this right now, don't even worry about it," Claire tapped her chin. "Mateo and… William."
"Like, Shakespeare?" Jim grinned.
"Yeah. I think it's fitting, considering we sort of, kinda met through the play back in high school." She explained with a shrug.
It did seem pretty fitting, he had to admit.
She nudged him playfully. "Ok, now you, Romeo ."
"Uh," he scratched the fur along his jawline thoughtfully. "Emily?"
"That's a cute one," Claire said with an encouraging nod. "And?"
"Aaaand… Violet. Like the flower."
Claire puzzled at him. "Why after a flower, specifically?"
Jim gasped. "Did you forget about our first born?"
It took a second for the memory to resurface. "Ooooh, you mean Petunia? The same first born you blew up ?"
"The very same," Jim said with a nod and gave the side of her abdomen a gentle poke. "I promise not to blow these two up."
Claire suddenly stopped, gaze settling on the faded scorch mark splotched across the trunk of a nearby tree.
"Wait a second," she approached the tree and brushed her finger over the mark. "I think I know…" She trailed off and moved to step off the path and between the surrounding trees.
Curious, Jim trailed after her. She picked her way through the foliage, horngazle raised as she located seemingly randomly scorched trees.
Watching her drift from burned tree to burned tree, Jim came to a realization. "Wait, is this where we chased down that helheeti?"
Claire hummed an affirmative. "Which meeeeans… ah- ha !" She pointed to a patch of grass, beaming at him as she said: "And this is where we made the wombmates."
"No way," Jim moved to stand behind her and scanned the area. His gaze fell on a set of gouge marks on a nearby tree, set only a couple feet above the ground- where he had knocked his horns. "Oh my God, it totally is."
He could remember that fight well; the mad dash to try and contain the rogue helheeti, the terror that it was going to cause a forest fire, the rush of adrenaline following its defeat and the… afterwards .
"That's crazy," Claire mused, sweeping the horngazle over the patch of grass, trying to locate any other tell-tale marks or anything left behind. "And we had no idea we'd be here, four months later, about to have two babies."
Jim snorted. "Not a single clue."
He was quite for a moment, thoughtful, and Claire looked at him.
"You ok, Jim?" She touched his arm to get his attention.
"Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine," he assured quickly. "It's just… we're halfway there. It feels like you were telling you were pregnant just yesterday and, today, we're already halfway through it. It's just… insane."
"Totally insane," Claire agreed. "I mean, in just a few months we're actually going to meet these tiny little people we didn't even mean to make."
"It's so… surreal."
Claire watched him, noting the anxious furrow of his brow and the tension in his shoulders.
"Hey," she said suddenly and grabbed his hand. He blinked down at her as she extended her arm to point skyward. "Wanna do a little star gazing?"
Jim looked uncertain. "Is that… safe?"
Claire tsked in disapproval. "I'm not made of glass. I think the twins and I can sit in a tree without any need for concern."
"Ok, fair enough," Jim said, hands raised in apologetic surrender.
He scooped her up into his arms and crouched down. Branches raced by as he launched them both toward the ideal vantage point- a branch near the top that was stable enough to support their combined weight.
The expanse of tree tops rippled around them, swaying under the force of the crisp wind. Higher up, the air was definitely colder, making the approaching shift in seasons more evident.
The sky overhead, void of the level of light pollution they had back in Arcadia, was vast and open- almost overwhelmingly so.
"You're quiet again," Claire whispered, resting her hand under his chin and giving an affectionate scratch along his jaw.
He leaned into her touch and sighed.
"Anxious brain. Sorry." He explained softly.
"What's up?" She said, tone gentle. She was always willing to listen when he had concerns.
"This feels like the first time we've been together- just us- in like a really, really long time."
"That's because it is," she answered honestly. "The last kind-of day off we took, we ended up with them," she added playfully, touching her belly.
It was meant as a joke, but there was some truth to her words.
She saw his ears pivot downward, clinging to the sides of his head.
"Then how in the world are we going to have time to raise a kid- two kids, at that?" Came his near silent question. "I don't want to be an absent father."
The significance of his confession nearly broke her heart. He'd been without a father for most of his life and, much as his mother loved him, she had been forced into a position that required a significant degree of absence on her part too.
"We'll make time." She responded, with an optimistic confidence he didn't quite share. "Besides, I don't think it'll be all that hard."
Jim fixed her with a look.
"I mean, ok, it's gonna be hard," Claire corrected quickly. "But, with how everyone in Trollmarket has been acting toward me lately, I think, when the time comes, delegating jobs is going to be a lot easier than we think it's going to be. They seem to kind of already be wanting to pull their own weight.
"And, with our families back in Arcadia, and I guess the entirety of the Trollmarket trolls, these kids are going to have more extended family members than they're going to know what to do with." She gave him a quick peck on the cheek. "These kids are going to be so loved its unreal."
Jim huffed and offered her a sheepish half smile, his anxieties not quite satisfied, but he was feeling a little better. "Sorry. This was supposed to a nice day off. Not all heavy."
Claire coiled her arms around his shoulders and held him tight. Her cheek pressed against his and she looked back out over the treetops.
"I still think it's nice."