Qianhuang refused to let Chiaki do anything even slightly difficult. He fixed all the food, made her a looser dress out of the Aurochs hide, brought in water and heated it for her baths. She got a taste of how the rest of the female population was treated all the time.
Right now though her feet were swollen and she was again in the presence of the village healer Harvey. He was rubbing her feet. "How have you been resting?"
"Uh, well." Chiaki put a hand on her belly that had to start swelling and made it so much more real that there were tiny lives growing inside of her.
Harvey nodded. "Good. And the herbs I gave Qianhuang to add to your food and teas?"
She smiled. "I don't feel like I'm constantly needing to eat, so something in them is working."
Harvey smiled back. "Perfect! No sickness in the morning?"
"None." She shook her head.
Harvey glanced back at Qianhuang and placed a hand on Chiaki's belly. There was a small fluttering under his hand. "Movement is good, but you are a little small for this stage. The cubs might be small or there might not be many, I can't tell just yet. But they are strong, so don't worry." He pulled his hand away. He sat back and smiled at Chiaki. "Your pregnancy is progressing fine, I suggest elevating your feet if you notice they're starting to swell again."
Qianhuang cuddled his mate as the healer left their home. "I'm so relieved."
Chiaki ran her hands through his long hair. "See, just normal things. Harvey isn't worried."
"I'm just... even though it's been a few weeks... I can't help worrying that because none of the other white lions ever took a mate I might not be able to have cubs... they're small, they could be the snakes..."
"It's okay, calm down." She continued to run her hands through his hair. "We mated when I was fertile, before you left for the big hunt at the end of Autumn. When I mated with Curtis, the timing was wrong. The cubs are yours." She insisted, keeping her mate calm. Eventually Qianhuang calmed under the tender care of his mate. It was a common event, with him still worried about his ability to sire offspring.
"My mate is so wonderful!" Qianhuang boasted to himself as he worked on a new wrap for himself out of the stripped horse pelt that Chiaki didn't seen to want made into clothing for herself. He'd turned the Stink Bear pelt into a hood for her, it was the best fur for that because when ice froze to it, it was very easy to brush it away so it didn't melt and make the fur wet.
She was sitting just outside of the house, despite his desire she stay inside. But she'd been trapped in the house for weeks and she'd made her own desire for sunlight known. It was the warmest part of the day, just after the sun reached the highest point in the sky. He'd ask she return inside as soon as the sun got too low and before the temperature had time to become too cold.
The feeling in the village was subdued, though fewer had died this cold season than the last, it was still only half way to the warmer days of the light-rainy season. The second half of the cold season would be harsher, the lower the food reserves dropped the higher the chances lives would be lost.
"Harvey said that his medicinal plants are running low." Chiaki said as she watched Qianhuang. She was bundled up in her Winter clothes, with foot wraps and coverings on her hands, the hood Qianhuang had made her was pushed back so she could feel the sun on her face.
"Yes, more females than normal are expecting litters... and several people have been sick."
Chiaki nodded.
