Chapter 4
Chapter 4
Lexa would be lying if she said she wasn’t feeling a little jealous.
Gaia had arrived the day before, and she and Clarke had immediately hit it off.
The first few hours had been spent with Gaia asking both of them questions about their time apart and the separate ordeals they had faced before reuniting.
Clarke had spoken mostly openly with Lexa about her time as a wolf, but she hadn’t told her everything she had felt before that time. She had only told her some, but with Gaia there and requesting them to be as honest as possible, Clarke had delved right in.
The pain and utter devastation she had felt when Lexa left to fight Heda’s war had started the second Lexa had mounted her horse to join the other warriors.
She had guessed the depths of Clarke’s anguish but hearing her speak about it crushed her and made her feel like the worst mate in history.
She knew when Heda’s request had come that Clarke was not in favor of her entering the fight. They had finally gotten the life they had longed for, and Lexa left it to fight a battle that wasn’t hers. She should have known that her mate would react poorly, especially since she had practically brushed those feelings aside without considering what it would do to Clarke if she left.
In her mind, a summons from Heda was one to be answered, and she could acknowledge that she had looked down on Anya for refusing to fight for Heda. She had felt it was her duty. But what of her duty to Clarke, her sweet, gentle omega who fought like hell for her people but had only ever wanted peace?
It was not in an omega’s nature to fight, especially not in the way Clarke had been called to do so after first crashing to Earth. Her limits had been tested, and she’d nearly broken after Mount Weather, so it had come as no surprise that after she and Lexa mated, she vowed never to go into battle again.
Omegas were nurturers, healers, artists. Of course, there were those who were warriors, but it went against most of their nature to do so, so when Clarke had finally been able to put down her sword and stow away her gun, she had at last been able to lean into what came to her naturally.
She’d been the Coalition’s finest diplomat under Heda Lexa kom Trikru, dealing with matters in a sensitive yet effective way most alphas were not capable of. She had been pivotal in bringing peace to the lands.
Clarke had thrived simply being allowed to be an omega without the threat of being captured, tortured, or killed constantly looming over her head, and when she and Lexa had decided to step away from Polis and the responsibilities that went with it, she had blossomed…until Lexa had ruined it all by running when Heda called for her.
Her omega spoke of old wounds that opened when Lexa made her decision to leave her and go into battle. She’d been transported back to Mount Weather when Lexa left her standing there alone to fight for her people inside the Mountain without the grounders’ help.
She had felt abandoned the first time, but then they hadn’t been mated, and she had been able to power through, but this time, Lexa had left her after being mated for years and the feelings of abandonment returned a hundred-fold.
When Lexa didn’t return after the war was won, Clarke was so lost and empty, and so hurt that she couldn’t even bear to get out of bed.
Hearing Clarke speak of all this had Lexa wanting to get up and pace or punch the wall or have Clarke yell at her for what she’d done. She thought she should have to experience all the same pain her mate had.
She cried, and at one point, she sprinted into the bathroom to vomit because she was so overwhelmed by what she was hearing. Then she cried some more because Clarke had come in to comfort her.
She didn’t deserve it, and she wasn’t sure how she would ever forgive herself for the pain she had caused her mate.
When she came back out, Clarke returned to her seat near Gaia, but Lexa was unable to sit. She apologized to her mate over and over.
“Please come sit back down, Lex.”
Clarke beckoned her to sit next to her. Instead, she fell to her knees in front of her. “Why don’t you hate me?”
Fingers that were gentler than they should have been thread themselves into her hair. “I tried, and maybe for a little while, I did. Maybe somewhere deep inside there is still a part of me that does, but it’s eclipsed by the love I have for you.”
Lexa sobbed now and laid her head on Clarke’s knees.
“You came back for me, Lex. You brought me back from something that shouldn’t have been possible to come back from.”
“I stole you back from the happiness you had found.” It was true, Lexa thought. Clarke had escaped this unhappy life for a better one, and Lexa had dragged her back into it. “I brought you back to this unhappy place.”
“This isn’t an unhappy place, Lex. Maybe it’s just not the happiest place that it could be right now.”
Her chest shuddered.
“Lexa,” Gaia’s voice brought her back to the fact that she and Clarke were not alone. “I want you to tell Clarke some of the things you felt on your journey back home.”
“I’ve already told her everything.” Lexa didn’t want to relive it, not again, and perhaps not ever.
“Then tell it to me.”
She didn’t want to, but she did, focusing not on the challenges she’d had, but instead on what she felt. She told her about her longing, regret, sadness, and fear. She told her of her struggles to keep going, and how thoughts of Clarke were the only thing that kept her running, kept her fighting to get home.
“Now tell me about what it felt like when you finally did get home and Clarke wasn’t there.”
Lexa didn’t want to answer that. Clarke didn’t need to hear about everything she had felt knowing that her mate had given up on her. Her wife had been through enough.
How could she tell Clarke that she felt lost, hurt, angry and betrayed? How could she tell her that she had howled in grief until she had collapsed? How could she tell her that she would have searched for her until she reached the ends of the Earth, and if she still hadn’t found her that she would have kept looking until it finally killed her?
“Lexa,” Gaia prompted.
She stood. “No. Clarke’s been through enough. I will not add more to that than I already have.”
“Lexa, beja,” Clarke begged. “We’ve been doing better, but we cannot heal all the way if you don’t share your side too.”
“Please don’t make me.”
Things were easier when she was Heda. She was allowed to hide her feelings and pretend she was emotionless.
“I don’t want to hurt you anymore,” Lexa declared when Clarke started to cry.
“You two will never be whole again if you cannot share this with each other.” Gaia was sympathetic, but firm. “Your spirits will grow apart until you are practically strangers to each other.”
“I don’t want that,” Lexa whispered.
“Then please open up to me.” Clarke’s watery eyes were hopeful.
Lexa did. She told Clarke everything, and they both fell to pieces.
Fortunately, Gaia was there to pick them up and put them back together again, not that it was an easy or fast process. It was long and arduous and it nearly broke them.
Unloading their feelings had brought the closeness they were beginning to redevelop to a screeching halt.
No longer did they share Clarke’s den in the closet, and they didn’t sit close together during meals anymore. They were back to sitting on opposite sides of the table, pushing their food around with their forks and hardly eating during mealtimes.
Gaia took to speaking with them separately, counseling them when the other was out of earshot.
During the time Gaia was with Clarke, Lexa found herself unsure of what to do with herself, but fortunately, she had an open invitation to head over to Anya and Raven’s any time. Unfortunately, she had taken them up on the offer and had ended up crying in Anya’s arms with Raven standings there awkwardly, trying to figure out how to deal with the formerly uncrackable Heda.
Lexa regretted ever contacting Gaia. The chasm between her and Clarke had been filling, but now it felt deeper than before, and she wasn’t sure how they would fill it again.
She had thought the purpose of airing everything out was to bring them closer together. Instead, it seemed to have had the opposite effect, and it was driving them apart.
“I’m going for a run,” Lexa announced one day after lunch.
About a week had gone by, and she and Clarke had barely spoken. They were still ruminating on everything that had been said.
Not bothering to wait for a response from either Clarke or Gaia, she stepped outside, and shifted without taking off her clothes first. What did she care about clothes at this point?
She took off running. It was the first time she had shifted since finding Clarke.
Living as her wolf for so long had been traumatic for her, and running now brought back memories that she would rather have kept locked away, but it didn’t keep her from enjoying the dirt under her feet or the wind in her fur as she ran as fast as she could, trying to burn off her pent-up energy.
Skidding to a halt, she found herself at the beach where she and Clarke had mated, the place she had been informed that her mate had made her final decision to become mindless.
The beach had been a happy place, but now it would be tainted forever.
It hurt. It hurt so fucking much that she lifted her head and howled. It was pitiful, and beneath her, but she was feeling sorry for herself, and she was afraid that she might have lost the only thing she had ever wanted, so she let it all out.
She howled until she couldn’t howl anymore, and she was about to collapse to the ground when she heard an answering howl in the distance, an answering howl from home.
No, she thought. Clarke had promised not to shift because if she did, there was a very good chance that she might not ever shift back, that she might let go again and never return.
Lexa let out another howl and took off running back toward the house.
The pleasure she had just taken in the dirt under her paws and the wind in her fur became an irritant. All she wanted was to get back to her mate before something drastic happened.
Swamped with worry, she was terrified that she was going to be too late. She didn’t know what she would do if she got back, and Clarke was gone. What if she never got to hold her hand again, or tell her that she loved her, or snuggle in close to her after she’d had a bad day.
Clarke. Beautiful, tender-hearted, sensitive Clarke, who had picked her when she could have had anyone else but had fallen for her.
If Clarke shifted and lost herself again, then Lexa wouldn’t be shifting back either, but she would keep her mind, if only to stay close to her mate and keep her safe.
She halted in her tracks and howled again and thought the forest had probably never heard anything so pitiful.
How had they gotten to this point? How had their idyllic life been so completely turned upside down?
Was it her past deeds coming back to haunt her? Was it because she had been naïve and allowed Queen Nia to take Costia from her, or maybe it was it because she had allowed a bomb to drop on TonDC without warning her people because it would have put their inside man in jeopardy inside the mountain?
Her real fear was that it was because she had left Clarke behind at Mount Weather, and then again for Heda’s war.
She was being punished, and that would have been okay if Clarke wasn’t being punished too.
NO!
NO!
NO!
She was not going to allow the powers that be to fuck up her and Clarke’s life any more than it was. She was going to fix things. It didn’t matter that she had no clue how to do that, she would fix everything.
When she got back to the house, Clarke was waiting for her, but she was no longer the Clarke she had left.
Standing before her, on their front porch, was Clarke’s stunningly beautiful, golden wolf. Twice the size of her normal form with quadruple the strength, she was there waiting for Lexa with a snarl on her face, fangs bared, looking ready to take a chunk out of her.
Stopping, she tilted her head. Inside, her natural reaction was to want to snarl back, to lunge and tackle the smaller wolf to the ground, but it wasn’t something she would do, not to Clarke. Not ever.
It did appear, however, that it was something Clarke was able to do to her.
Growling, her mate flung herself from the porch and slammed into Lexa hard enough to send her skidding across the ground.
Lexa’s fought her instinct to growl and fight back. It was a struggle, but she knew she couldn’t fight her mate. She just couldn’t. Instead of doing what came naturally to her, she rolled over onto her back and exposed her neck.
If Clarke wanted to fight, she would have to do all the work. If Clarke wanted to take all her anger, pain, sorrow, and everything else out on her, she would let her. She would let her mate rip her guts and throat out if that was what she wanted.
Wasn’t it what she deserved?
If she could talk, she would tell Clarke that she had never meant to turn her into this.
Instead, she whimpered and went limp under Clarke, and she waited for her ferocious, feral mate to shred her to pieces for the things she had done to her.
Through their bond, she realized that somehow, miraculously, her mate was still in there. It wasn’t the mindless version of her she was expecting, and she whined again.
Further exposing her neck to her mate, she allowed herself to transform until she was lying naked, furless, and fangless under her mate.
She was completely helpless under Clarke in this form, and she supposed that was the way it should be.
A tear leaked from her eye as she looked up at her furious mate. “Do it, Klark. If this is what you need to heal, then do it knowing I will always be sorry and that I will always love you.”
Clarke’s head came closer, and her growling increased. Lexa shivered under the hot breath she felt on her skin.
“I’m sorry, Klark.”
She closed her eyes when she felt sharp fangs graze the skin of her neck. This was it.
It wasn’t how she had thought she would meet her end, but she believed it was fitting for all the pain and anguish she had brought not only her mate but countless other people during her lifetime.
Maybe Titus had been right all those years ago. To be Commander was to be alone. If she could have believed that, if she could have stuck to that, none of this would be happening, and the one person she loved above all others wouldn’t be hurting.
“Ai gonplei ste odon,” she muttered under her breath, but Clarke still heard.
The golden wolf lifted its head and snapped its teeth at her before howling so mournfully that Lexa wasn’t sure that it wouldn’t bring tears to anyone who heard it.
When the heart wrenching noise ceased, the fangs returned to her neck. The fiercely sharp teeth pricked her skin but didn’t bite down.
Clarke whimpered and suddenly collapsed on top of Lexa, never letting go of the bite, but still not sinking in either.
Slowly, and what had to be very painfully, Clarke’s wolf turned back to human, but she never let go of the bite, in fact, she finally bit down harder, and her arms wrapped around Lexa tightly, lifting both of them in a sitting position until Lexa was practically in her lap. And still, she didn’t let go of the hold she had on Lexa’s neck.
It was a full ten minutes that Lexa sat helplessly in Clarke’s arm, the blonde never releasing her.
When Clarke did finally let go, she pulled Lexa in impossibly tighter. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“Klark.”
“I remember. I remember everything. How could I have given up on you like that after everything we have shared together? We had such a beautiful life, and I gave up on it because…”
“Shh, niron, please don’t cry anymore. You gave up because I didn’t come back. You went into abandonment.”
“I should have trusted that you would come home. I should have known that you would never give up on me, that you would never leave me, not by choice.”
Lexa shifted their positions so that Clarke was on top of her, not caring that Gaia was watching from the porch as they sat naked on the ground.
“I did leave you. I left to fight in a war that was not mine, one that I was under no obligation to help with.”
Clarke’s head fell to her chest, and Lexa was surprised when the blonde’s teeth latched onto her neck again, only this time, she didn’t bite, she suckled.
“I love you so much, Klark, and I promise, ai swega klin kom ogeda ai tombom (I promise with all my heart), that I will not ever, ever leave you again.”
Her mate finally let go again. “But that’s why you are you. You live to serve your people.”
“Not anymore.” Lexa was adamant. “Not ever again. I have served my people. I have done my duty, and now it is someone else’s turn. My purpose in life is no longer about our people. It’s about you.”
Clarke swallowed and lifted a hand to cup Lexa’s cheek. “How about we make it about each other?”
Gaia stepped off the steps and headed toward them. “Wiser words have never been spoken.”
Lexa agreed.
The Fleimkepa helped them to their feet. She bowed to Lexa but wrapped her arms around Clarke. “You got your memories back.”
Clarke looked down and away. “I did, and I’m so ashamed.”
“Why?” The two other women asked simultaneously.
“Because when I heard Lexa howl, I knew exactly where she was, and for some reason that filled me with unexplainable rage, only I didn’t know why because I couldn’t remember everything, and that just pissed me off even more. I felt like that was your fault.” When she lifted her head again, her eyes were glassy. “I wanted to hurt you. I’ve never wanted to do that before.”
“Klark, it’s understandable.”
The blonde shook her head. “No, it’s not. It’s unforgivable.”
“It was unforgivable for me to leave you.”
“No…”
“Niron, maybe it comes down to both of us making terrible, unforgivable decisions, and perhaps that is exactly why we need to forgive those decisions and forgive each other.” Lexa reached for Clarke and pulled her in close, pleased when her mate didn’t resist. “I forgive you, Klark, and I love you. I hope you can forgive me too.”
Small, pale hands clutched at Lexa’s naked back. “I do, Lex. Of course, I do.” Clarke was holding her like she’d never let her go, and the alpha was just fine with that.
“How about we take this inside?” Gaia suggested.
“Actually,” Lexa didn’t let go of Clarke, “I think that we might finally be in a place to help each other without your assistance.”
Gaia bowed her head out of deference to Lexa but said, “I mostly agree with that, however, I believe there are a few things I can offer you before I go to help you on your journey toward healing.”
Lexa frowned. All she wanted was to hold her mate in the privacy of their home.
“Give me one more hour of your time, and then I’ll go stay with Anya and Raven. I am overdue for a visit with them anyway, and that way, if you need me, I’ll be nearby.”
Three days had passed, and Lexa and Clarke hadn’t stepped foot out of the house, though once or twice, Lexa had caught her mate staring out at the pond.
“If you want to hunt the duck, Klark, go hunt it.”
Clarke shook her head. “No, that wouldn’t be right. It’s practically domesticated…because of me. I used to feed it all the time.”
“Then how about we go to our beach today? You can hunt anything you want on the way or chase the birds on the sand.”
“I’m not ready to leave the house yet,” Clarke confessed, patting the cushion on the couch next to her, beckoning her mate to sit.
Lexa did and was relieved. She wasn’t ready to leave the house either, but she would have it that was what Clarke had wanted.
“We can go if you want to, Lex. I want to do things with you that make you happy.”
“You make me happy, Klark. What we are rebuilding makes me happy.”
They had spent the last three days mostly talking and reminiscing.
Now that Clarke had stopped apologizing for wanting to hurt her, they had been able to make progress.
They were being fully open with each other, and as Gaia had suggested, they would speak about something that had happened during their long separation, but then they would follow that with a happy memory, and now that Clarke had her memories back, she was sometimes effusive about the things that had made her happy.
Even though she had heard it a few times already, it still floored her to learn that what made Clarke the happiest was making Lexa happy.
In the years they had been together, Lexa had realized that Clarke was a giver. She gave all of herself to Lexa. She enjoyed doting on her, buying little presents, or when they were still in the Tower, going out of her way to make sure the ambassadors and diplomats didn’t do anything to piss off her mate.
There were so many things that Clarke did for her, and she had taken them for granted, but at the same time, they realized that she had done the same things for the blonde.
Clarke had Lexa’s hand in her lap and was toying with her fingers. “Do you remember the time I wanted to go out jogging, but in human form instead of as a wolf?”
“I do remember.” Lexa laughed. “You were about two miles into your run when the bottom of your right shoe came off, and you got so angry that you shifted so you could run back home and get another pair.”
“You laughed so hard at me that day because when you saw me, that damned shoe was still stuck around my ankle.”
Lexa snorted. “You came walking in, completely naked, except for that shoe. You didn’t even realize it was still attached to your foot. It had slid up your ankle and was twirling around with each step you took.” She grabbed the hand that was playing with her fingers and kissed it. “I still have that shoe.”
“No, you don’t. I threw it away.” Clarke was certain. Lexa could see it on her face.
“I took it out and stashed it in a memory box,” Lexa confessed.
“What memory box? I didn’t know you had one of those. Why didn’t you ever tell me you had one?” Clarke growled halfheartedly.
“Please don’t be mad, niron. It’s something I started right after the first time I met you.” Lexa leaned forward, preparing to stand. “I’ve been collecting things for years and was going to give it to you on our next anniversary, but maybe I should give it to you now.”
She stood. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.”
She went into the room that they had dedicated as an office but rarely used, and then she dug around the closet floor, pushing things out of her way until she was able to lift the floorboards, and then she extracted a plain wooden box.
Carrying it out to Clarke, she set it in the omega’s lap. “Open it.”
Her mate moved it to the table. “It’s an awfully big box.”
“It has a lot of memories in it.”
Clarke lifted the lid. “Lex.” Her voice wobbled as she sifted through the contents. “There’s so much.”
“If I could have, I would have saved everything.” Lexa pulled out the battered shoe. “I told you I had it.”
Inside the box were little doodles that Clarke had drawn during boring meetings to pebbles she had picked up on the beach. There was one of her braids that Lexa had kept the one time her mate had decided to cut her hair shorter, and dozens of other items that if a stranger were to look at them, they would think them a hodgepodge of junk. They weren’t junk to Lexa. They were the memories of a life well lived with her mate.
Weaving around her mate’s waist, she let her head rest on Clarke’s shoulder. “Maybe I should have given this to you while you were struggling to get your memories back.”
Clarke stopped her exploration to gaze at her mate.
“I didn’t want it to hurt you if you looked and couldn’t remember the significance of some of these things.”
“That was smart. I don’t think it would have helped, not then, but it is helping me now.” The blonde picked up a random item. “What is this?”
Lexa blushed. “It’s the napkin you used the first time we ever shared a meal.” She snatched it and put it back in the box.
“Why would you keep something like that?” Clarke snatched it back.
The heat across Lexa’s cheeks rose. “It has your lip prints on it. I used to stare at them, and for a long time, it carried your scent.”
To her utter shock, soft lips suddenly landed on hers, but this wasn’t a simple peck of a kiss. Clarke’s hands wove into her hair, and she deepened the kiss, touching Lexa like she hadn’t in over a year and a half.
It left Lexa breathless and speechless and incredibly happy, and after that kiss, they were no longer afraid to touch each other, in fact, they had a hard time keeping their hands to themselves, and it led to Clarke dragging Lexa to their den to make love.
They spent hours exploring and learning each other again, reconnecting in a way that only loving mates could. Later, they would wonder why they had waited so long to be intimate. It brought them back together the way nothing else could.
“I love you” was said numerous times, but the words weren’t needed, not anymore. The love they shared was palpable.
They spent two more days together in the house, and when they finally reemerged, life was better, and nearly all the pain had been forgotten.
Life wasn’t perfect. No life was, but they were going to strive for as close to perfect as they could get.
They were standing by the pond.
“It looks like it is a good thing you restrained yourself from hunting the duck. Look.” Lexa pointed. The bird was sitting in a nest.
Clarke smiled. “She’s brave to bring new life into this world.”
“Do you think so?” Fear pooled in the pit of Lexa’s stomach, thinking that Clarke might be talking about not wanting to have pups after all they had been through. She must not have hidden it well because Clarke caught onto her thinking.
“I didn’t mean it like that, Lex, I promises. I meant that it’s already hard for me not to go out there to hunt and kill the duck. Her ducklings might not be safe from me either.”
Filled with relief, Lexa watched as the duck sat dutifully on her eggs. “I think she and her ducklings will be fine. You haven’t gone after her yet. You’ve shown incredible restraint.” She turned to stare at her mate.
Clarke still had shadows under her eyes, and she still looked slightly haunted, but she was so much better than she had been even just a few days ago.
Lexa wondered if she had a similar look.
Even so, her mate was as beautiful as the day they had met. “This may be the wrong time to ask, so please don’t get mad at me when I do, but do you think that sometime in the future you would still like to have pups with me?”
Clarke regarded her for a long time. “Of course, I do. I want it badly, but we are nowhere near ready for that. Not anymore.”
Lexa bowed her head. “I know.”
“You know that’s not a no, right?”
“I do, and you are right. There’s a lot more work that we need to take care of ourselves before we can even think about taking care of someone else. I just wanted to know if it was still something you wanted.”
“It is.”
“I’m glad. Me too.”
It took three years for Lexa and Clarke to feel like they were ready to expand their family. Until that time, they worked on strengthening their once unbreakable bond, and now they were stronger than ever.
Fortunately, their road to recovery had come easier than they had thought, especially with continued guidance from Gaia, and the help of their friends and family.
At first, Lexa had thought to keep Gaia at arm’s length, thinking she had done everything that she could for them, but she had been wrong, and now, not only was the Flamekeeper their counselor, but she was also a good friend whom they visited often in Polis.
They had also taken several trips on their own, including one to where Clarke’s den had been. The blonde had wanted to show Lexa her home, but it had been taken over by a particularly fierce badger, and there was no getting near it.
Clarke hadn’t minded. It made her happy to know that her den had been taken over by a creature in need.
“Would you like to go for a walk, niron?”
There was no more shifting or running for Clarke. She was heavily pregnant with the Coalition’s first known set of triplets, and both parents were over the moon.
Clarke liked to say it was one pup for every year they waited.
“I’d love to walk, but I don’t know how far we will get,” was her mate’s answer.
“If you get tired, I will carry you back. Don’t forget that your nomon (mother) said you need to keep as active as you can.”
Clarke groaned. Her mother was uptight about her carrying so many pups and had been hounding her about not doing enough and doing too little at the same time.
It was driving the omega crazy, and finally Lexa had stepped in and taken Clarke to their new home away from home, one she had built in secret at the back of their property. It was hidden in a mess of trees and shrubbery. It didn’t amount to much more than what most people would call a shed, but she preferred to call it their tiny home.
It was a place they could escape to when life got to be too much for them. They could hide or get away without actually leaving home, and it was exactly the retreat they had both needed.
It drove their friends and family nuts when they would disappear without a word, not answering calls on the radio or answering the front door when someone knocked. Only Anya knew of their little hideaway, and she had been sworn to secrecy.
She was also the one person they would contact to let know where they were so that she could assure the others that they were okay.
To this day, not everyone trusted that when they left that they would come back, and it hadn’t mattered how many assurances they had given. People like Raven and Abby didn’t always believe that if they disappeared, they would find their way back home again.
It was why Anya was their advocate. She would assure everyone that she knew where they were, and if they were really needed, they could get back home within a matter of hours.
No one needed to know that it would really only take a few minutes.
They had also never converted Clarke’s den in the house back into storage space, and more often than not, they would sleep in there. They both preferred the confined space to their large bedroom.
“You know that my mom wants me to go to her hospital when I am ready to give birth,” Clarke mentioned.
“I remember.”
Abby Griffin had made quite a name for herself as healer, and Heda had allocated her quite a large sum of resources to build the best clinic in the Coalition.
“I don’t want that. I want to have our pups here.”
Clarke stumbled but Lexa was there to catch her. “I’ve got you, niron.” She made sure her omega was steady before letting go. “On the subject of where you give birth, it is up to no one else but you. You are the one carrying our children. You get to decide where you want to be when they take their first breath.”
“It’s up to you too,” Clarke argued.
“You know I don’t like your mother’s hospital. It’s too sterile and uninviting. I want our pups to come into this world at home.”
“Mom’s going to be so mad.”
“Doesn’t matter. I know she cares about you, Klark, but if she is concerned, I will arrange for all of her equipment to be delivered here. She can set up a state-of-the-art birthing room right inside our house. We have plenty of room.”
“Let’s not worry about it for now. We’ve got two more months to go.”
Lexa placed her hand on her mate’s hugely expanded belly. “I don’t know, hodnes (love), if you make it another month, I will be surprised.”
Clarke looked down at herself and frowned. She’d been complaining about her belly for several months now. She hated how big she had gotten, but Lexa loved it and thought her as beautiful as she had ever been.
“I hope you are right because I am ready to get our sons and daughter out of me.”
It turned out Lexa was right. Their babies were born exactly one month from the day they had that conversation. Clarke had been able to stay in the comfort of their own home, and she hadn’t had any problems during childbirth, though rumors had to be squashed that the sire had fainted when her mate’s water broke.
Clarke was lying on their bed, two pups in her arms, the other in Lexa’s. “Niron, you are the most amazing person I know. You have given me a life I don’t feel I deserve, and now you have given me three perfect pups. Thank you for being in my life. I would be nothing without you. Ai hod yu in (I love you).”
Her poor mate was exhausted but smiling. “I need to thank you too. There would be no me without you, literally. You have given me everything I could have ever wanted in this life.” She leaned in and took in a deep breath of one son’s wispy hair. “We’re parents, Lex,” she whispered reverently.
Lexa shifted her tiny daughter in her arms. “It feels surreal, especially after everything we went through.”
“It does, but now we know we can overcome anything as long as we are together.”
“And we also know that there is nothing that can tear us apart.”
Clarke grimaced but shifted over in the bed. “Come get in with me. I need a nap, but I also need you and our pups near.”
Lexa complied and carefully got into bed, making sure not to wake up their children.
“I love you, Lex, so much.”
“I love you too, hodnes.”