As usual, she was the first to wake up.
As soon as she opened her eyes, she could hear the quiet wailing from the adjacent room, starting to break into the silence of the morning.
She looked to her left where, flat on his back, Ares was still sound asleep, breathing noisily through the nose. She crawled closer to check his temperature and gasped when her hand touched his forehead. It was still warm but — thanks gods — it wasn't hot anymore. She exhaled with a rush, her hand tracing down to his cheek and staying there, and she closed her eyes, the wave of relief washing over her, lifting the heavy burden of the last several days.
The wailing turned into full-on crying by the time she jumped out of bed and headed next door, to get the little source of the noise out of bed.
She picked the baby girl in her arms and brushed the little chin with her thumb to wipe off the drool. "I know it's not me you wanna drool on, but lemme change you and make you breakfast first, how about that, huh?"
Having changed Melitta, she put her back into bed and, sighing as the wailing started again, she grabbed the baby bottle and headed to the kitchen. There was fresh milk on the counter, still warm; Kyrillos must have milked the cow just now.
Refilling the bottle, she realized that she couldn't hear Melitta anymore. Alarmed, she grabbed the bottle and rushed back to the room.
She bit her lip in a smile when she reached the doorway. Reclining on the bed was Ares, with Melitta on his bare chest; the girl kept trying to grab his beard and he kept catching the little fist, frowning in amusement.
"She's very needy, this one," he remarked, caught up in trying get the girl interested in his finger instead of his face.
"Well, now you know how I feel around you."
"Oh, come on, I'm not that bad."
"True — you're much worse than that," she said, poker-faced, but lost it and chuckled when she saw his expression.
"Oh really — well, that's rich coming from someone who loves snuggling so much."
"That's rich coming from someone who always initiates it," she teased back, biting her cheek not to laugh at his frown, which she knew was just him trying to suppress his own smile because they both knew she was right.
"Oh, yeah — so what — I do love it, sue me." He lifted his brows, the corner of his mouth curling up in a half-smile. "Oh, finally," he exclaimed when Melitta let go of his beard and grabbed his finger instead, trying to bite on it.
"Diversion successful," she said absentmindedly, her vision blurring when she stared too long at the tiny little fist tightly locked around his index finger.
"She has quite a grip, this one," he mused, inspecting the tiny fist with his other index finger.
Alarmed by the long silence, he looked up, and when did, he saw Xena's misty gaze transfixed on Melitta.
He drew in a breath. "Xena."
"Mm…"
"What if she was ours?"
Her chest rose abruptly, lips parting slightly, two heavy tears rolling down her face.
She swallowed the lump forming in her throat, her breath trapped in her chest. Of course she thought that, every single time recently; every single time she saw Melitta in his arms. It made her heart tighten, like something was clutching at it, every time. She didn't know why, exactly, it just did. And knowing that he felt the same, it made it real, made her feel exposed.
Breathing through her mouth, her eyes cast down, she remained silent, everything she couldn't utter streaming down her face.
"I don't know why, it was the first thing I thought when I first held her," he smirked, gazing at the child in his arms, his brows furrowing as the object of his attention looked back at him with her little mouth wide open, huge blue eyes looking up into his dark ones.
She stared, silently mesmerized by the scene in front of her, waves of feelings and memories crushing her more with each passing moment. „Ares… you know we shouldn't get attached to her…"
"Yeah, we shouldn't have gotten attached to each other, and look how that worked out," he countered, looking up, piercing her with a gaze that made her swallow hard, her breath short; it felt like he just pulled her into his arms; how the hell he was able to do those things to her — it both fascinated and frightened her.
She wiped her nose, smirking. "Exactly what I mean…"
"Xena — you know they're not coming back. Those kids are orphans now."
"Well now that you're not dying anymore, I can finally go look into that," she said, and took a deep breath, suddenly overwhelmed when it occurred to her what he was suggesting — that he was even mentioning it in the first place — well, with the parents gone, the girls would stay here anyway, there was no question about it, but — somehow, the fact that it was him who brought this up — that he wanted them to keep the kids — it made her look at him with such love that she felt her throat close up.
"You're not going by yourself," he warned her with a stern glare.
She rolled her eyes, exasperated. "Oh, gods, here we go again…"
"Xena, I'm warning you—"
She cut in, not letting him finish. "Ares… let's drop it for now… we can't go till Gabrielle's back, anyway."
"When is she coming back?"
"Let's hope it's soon." She sighed.
And then sighed again, realizing that — she couldn't wait to get out, for at least several hours, take Argo and catch the wind in her sails — but she couldn't say that without getting him all worked up. Seriously, they needed to have a talk about this, because — as much as a part of her loved seeing him so protective — if he expected that she was going to be on his leash for nine months, he had another thing coming.
He wasn't going to ask about the reason for Gabrielle's absence; he suspected that she must have been off on a hunt for ambrosia, and he didn't feel like touching the subject for now. The last time he and Xena discussed ambrosia had left him pretty frustrated, and now that he was only just starting to feel better after a week of dying of the damn flu, he just wanted a break from all their arguing. At the same time, he felt it in his bones that she was about to start the subject any moment now, and the mere thought of it made him physically tired.
After they fed Melitta and put her to bed, they headed towards the kitchen to have their own breakfast.
When they were passing by their bedroom, she took him off guard, grabbing him by the arm and pulling him inside, closing the door behind them. She turned the key, looking him in the eye. Her eyes were strange, he couldn't make out the expression at all.
They were both silent when she took his hand and led him towards the window. There was a big chest there, right under. She moved it to the right, towards the darker part of the room, and pushed him down to sit on it, his back against the wall. Still silent, she straddled his lap, facing him, her back bending into that beautiful arch under his touch, her head thrown back. He grunted as she started grinding her hips against him, her muscles contracting so hard he could feel it through the fabric of his pants. He gripped her waist hard, the way he knew she loved, and kissed all over her neck and cleavage, lazily, softly, her little sighs and grunts making him long to be inside her, but somehow, he didn't feel like rushing; he wanted to take his time to enjoy the lazy calm of the moment. It clearly wasn't what she wanted, though; he gasped at how impatiently she freed him from his pants and took him in. His lids clamped shut at the feeling; by the gods, it always felt like the first time with her.
A thought crossed his mind briefly, amusing him.
"What?" she asked when she saw his smile.
He smirked. "Just realized I've never had that much sex with one woman before."
"Oh, you think that's a lot? That's just foreplay…"
"We were made for each other, you know that?" His palms full of her breasts, her cheek pressed against his temple, he could feel the heat of her every little quivery breath over his ear, pleasant current going down his arms.
"I'm so glad you're okay…" she whispered, stroking up the back of his head.
"You're not gonna get rid of me that easy."
"I don't wanna be without you…" she whispered feverishly, sniffling, the sudden confession making him a little short of breath.
He kissed along her jawline, encasing her in his arms tightly. "I'm not going anywhere…"
"I can't lose you… I'm gonna stuff the damn ambrosia down your throat, I don't care," she breathed shakily.
"Gods, I'm gonna come if you don't stop…" he buried his face in her neck.
"Every time you hold her, I imagine she's ours," she whispered, "and it's fucking killing me…"
"Fuck…" he growled, biting the inside of his cheek, fighting for breath, trying to hold onto the last bits of control left.
"I wanna have this child so much," she said, a breathless whisper turning into a broken moan as she reached back and sank her nails into his knees, grinding herself onto him shakily; and he had no idea how he made it to wait for her till now, but her words punched him so hard that when he closed his eyes, he thought his climax was going to smash his skull open.
Long moments afterward, her arms still around his neck, their bodies melted together, he was stroking up and down her spine, and trying to calm the storm in his head.
Damn ambrosia.
He was screwed if he ate it, screwed if he didn't.
He wanted this child more than anything — which he couldn't even fucking tell her, without risking striking a painful chord from the past — and he couldn't be mortal for that — his mortality was already becoming a burden to Xena — not to mention that now that she was pregnant, it was starting to drive him crazy, not being able to watch over her when she was out of sight, being unable to save her if anything happened — fuck no, staying mortal was not an option. Not anymore.
Then, once he ate ambrosia, Xena was going to hold a grudge, even if just because of the fact that he would be back in the war business — which wasn't optional, by the way, it was his fucking job — but she wasn't going to care — and that alone would already create one big minefield between them. Besides, how the fuck were they going to have a future when he was immortal and she and their children were going to die eventually? And being the maddeningly stubborn bitch that she was, she was never going to agree to eat ambrosia herself; he could trick her but then she would never forgive him for it — he would be in for having her bitch about it — for the fucking eternity.
This was now making his head close to exploding again.
"What are you thinking?" she asked when he let out a loud exhale.
He sighed. He didn't want to talk about it, not yet; not now. But he wanted to answer her, and he wanted to tell the truth — he knew it was important for her that he was truthful, even about little things, and so he tried to be; as much as he could afford it.
"About the damn ambrosia and how fucked we are either way, whether I eat it or not. But I can't think about it anymore, not now," he grunted with a frown.
He leaned into her touch when he felt her hand on her cheek.
"We'll talk about it when you feel better," she said, pressing her lips to his shoulder in a soft kiss, making an abrupt rush of gratitude flood his chest.
He cupped her face in his hands to look at her. "Thanks… for not pushing…" He planted an affectionate kiss on her lips.
"Thanks for telling the truth," she said, kissing him back. And she was indeed grateful. She knew he had only started paying attention to it for her, and she was appreciative of every instance.
He inhaled at the top of his lungs and let it out slowly. This — how she had just made him feel — it felt so fucking good it didn't even make sense to him, but it was — it was moments like this that made it all worthwhile.
