Charlotte kicked and screamed and Alo, hugged her and shushed her, "give your mother a minute little fire"."
Luna did not care about any of them for one long soft second, she sat with her daughter cradled in her arms and looked. Properly looked.
The curls, tiny and damp and springing tighter the more they dried, the black horns, delicate and glossy and strangely elegant on such a soft baby face, the impossible golden wings, folded now with little newborn twitches every few breaths, the tail, sleek and expressive already, curling around Luna's wrist as if it knew where comfort was. The eyes, god her eyes fierce gold and huge and bright under lashes so pale they almost disappeared against that flushed little face.
Luna kissed her again and then, because her brain was attempting to be useful through the flood of feeling, looked around sharply "clothes."
Theo was there instantly, holding out the stack she had brought. "I thought maybe," she said, and for the first time Luna noticed she was holding the sweetest little baby onesie Luna had ever seen in her life.
It was light pink silk, not the harsh shiny kind soft silk fine, beautiful, lined inside with a layer of gentler cloth for warmth and comfort, the tiny sleeves trimmed neatly, the front tied with little ribbons that looked ridiculous and precious and exactly right Luna looked up at Theo, still crying, and somehow smiled at the same time. "You're doing a good job, you know that?"
Theo face changed in a way that suggested no one said things like that to her often enough. "I try."
"Well, you're doing amazing."
The baby girl had quieted enough now that dressing her felt possible. Luna shifted carefully, still holding her close while easing the little silk onesie open with one hand. "Stay with mummy," she murmured. "I know, I know, we're doing rude things like sleeves and feet." The little girl protested faintly, then melted again the moment Luna pressed another kiss to her temple. She was so tiny every finger a miracle every little stretch of limb a dangerous attack against Luna's composure. The silk slid over warm new skin beautifully Luna tucked one golden wing through first, then the other, marveling all over again at how impossibly soft the membrane felt beneath her fingertips. She drew the ribbons closed with trembling care and sat back just enough to admire her handiwork.
The baby looked like a little storybook princess had collided with a dragon hoard and been born furious about it.
Luna laughed softly through her tears "you are outrageous."
The little girl blinked up at her and made another soft happy sound, then immediately turned her face in.
Luna's breath caught.
The shift from wonder to need was instant and primal and so familiar that something deep in Luna's body answered before she consciously processed it. Her breasts ached all at once, heavy and tender and alert. Milk let down sharply enough to make her gasp. The baby girl's mouth searched blindly against the front of her shirt, tiny motions growing more frantic.
Ash saw it at the same moment, his entire body tightened where he stood holding their sleeping son Archer noticed too Theo definitely noticed. Luna knew they all had because the air changed, thickened, sharpened around her in that way it did when instinct and tenderness and danger decided to share a room.
Luna looked up at Ash first because she knew he would be the most tense about this, standing there with his son in his arms and every line of him pulled tight enough to cut. "You don't have to stand so serious all the time," she said softly.
His gaze stayed on her and the baby rooting at her chest. "This is not a moment that encourages lightness."
That should not have made her smile, it did. She shifted her daughter a little higher "you can relax for a second."
"No."
The answer came immediately.
Luna nearly laughed again, but the baby was making increasingly urgent little cries now, and Charlotte the older baby's face crumpled.
Charlotte let out one thin warning whine that pierced directly through Luna's ribs. Then she started crying in earnest, offended and bewildered and deeply wronged by the sight of someone else occupying the space she considered hers. The sound startled the newborn girl in Luna's arms, who jerked and began to cry too, her little wings twitching with every sharp intake of breath.
"Oh no, no, no, no," Luna whispered immediately, instinct taking over.
She pulled Charlotte closer with one arm while keeping the newborn secure with the other, somehow managing to gather both babies against her chest. It was awkward and imperfect and absolutely overwhelming. Charlotte's little body shook with jealousy and confusion, face red and wet. The new baby cried because the bigger baby cried, because the room had gotten louder, because the world was too new and her mother's body smelled like milk and safety and she wanted all of it right now.
Luna kissed Charlotte first, fast and soft and repeated. "Shhh. Mummy loves you too, mummy loves you both. It's okay. It's okay." Then she turned and kissed the newborn girl's damp curls and tiny forehead. "Shhh, sweetheart. It's alright she's just loud she's dramatic we all love her anyway."
Charlotte cried harder for one offended second and then hiccuped. The newborn made a confused little noise and rooted again more insistently, tiny mouth opening against Luna's shirt. Luna felt heat flood her whole body, that raw hormonal tide that made everything feel close and tender and heartbreakingly physical. She shifted Charlotte a little lower onto her lap and guided the new baby toward her breast with shaking hands, still talking to both of them the entire time because silence felt impossible the little girl latched.
Luna closed her eyes it was always shocking, that first pull. Sharp and deep and ancient and grounding all at once. The baby's tiny jaw worked with ferocious concentration, one little hand splayed against Luna's skin, gold tail flicking in tiny contented pulses now that she had found what she wanted. Milk let down harder. Relief and ache braided together into something almost painful with tenderness. Charlotte, still jealous but no longer fully panicked, pressed close against Luna's side and cried a little softer, accepting the kisses and the touch if not the situation.
The den could have collapsed around Luna and she might not have noticed for a minute, the baby girl drank with the full selfish devotion of the newly born, her lashes fluttered, her tiny black horns brushed Luna's skin every time she shifted. Charlotte sniffled and grabbed one hand in Luna's clothes and glared with the solemn fury only a small child could manage. Luna kissed her again and again until the crying lost its edge.
"There," Luna murmured, voice rough. "There you go, i know i know, little love, this is rude, sharing is terrible mummy agrees."
Theo made the smallest sound in the back of his throat that might have been a laugh if he ever allowed himself such things. Luna looked up enough to catch him watching with that quiet dangerous stillness of his. "I like you better when you relax a little," she said.
"I am relaxed."
She gave him a look.
He did not smile. The denial was still obviously a lie.
Archer, still at the edge of the room, seemed to understand exactly why she looked at Theo like that and found it more interesting than he should have.
Ash definitely noticed Archer noticing the change in him was immediate and not subtle it started in the shoulders and moved outward, every instinct turning sharper.
Luna felt it before she looked "Ash."
His gaze did not leave Archer. "Yes."
"Why does it feel safer when you're touching me?"
That got him.
He looked at her then. Properly the anger did not vanish, but something under it shifted with the question.
Luna extended one hand, still balancing both babies with the natural lawlessness motherhood had granted her Ash stepped in automatically and set his free hand against her shoulder, then lower, palm broad and steady against her back where he could anchor her without disturbing the feeding baby or Charlotte's damp clinging misery.
"There," she whispered "that."
His hand remained where it was, hot and solid. "Because nothing reaches you while I'm there."
She just leaned a little into the warmth and said, "You don't have to guard me like that."
Ash looked at Archer again over her head "i do."
Archer's eyes cooled by a fraction. "You overestimate my intentions."
Ash's voice dropped. "The only reason I'm not killing you is because she's holding my arm" it was not a joke.
The room stilled around the words.
Luna stared up at him for half a second, then at Archer, whose expression did not change except for the faint tightening at one corner of his mouth as if he respected the statement more than he objected to it. Theo's attention sharpened. "You're lucky she likes mercy," he said to Archer
"I don't."