Broken Antler Fen well I'mma go down on a railroad track

He came to her every night. Striding purposefully through the dark, sometimes flanked by their grown daughters, but always when Ibis fell in to her deeper sleeps, leaving her in the morning at her newborn's first crowing. When Akavir's song came this time she was awake; blinking wearily at the den mouth as the sound passed through the air and caught in her ears.

Roswell was trying to latch on to a teat that was already occupied by Jasmine, with Diantha slumbering in an awkward crook of Ibis' groin after being shoved aside by her hungry siblings. The pinch of greedy puppy gums would have woken Ibis if she had been asleep. It was proof enough to her that this was not a dream.

Strange, though. A sweep of yearning made her heart ache. A distrust of that sound twinning with the urge to rise from where she had hidden herself and the new members of her family. After shushing the hungry children for a few minutes Ibis did rise; she felt guilty to leave them in their moment of desire but she had to see, she had to know for sure that it was him.

The call had come from the fen's eastern-most edge and it would take her time to reach it from the heart where she lingered, and she doubted if there was time to find a sitter. It was reckless — she was heartsick; but the babies would be safe and warm in the den, she told herself, drawing away from them and then racing across the blooming earth.

When she came upon him Ibis felt her body shiver, as if her legs were made of water and she would melt on the spot. She collided with him in a passable bear-hug and was consumed by the smell of his coat, the brackish and wild volume of his body, herself being so much smaller despite the added weight of motherhood. She could not speak and gasped instead, struggling to find words.

How was he here? It didn't really matter, did it? He had been gone so long — where? Where had he been? Where was their daughter, if not with him now? But Ibis couldn't speak, and instead sank in to the warmth of him.