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

She didn't have an answer for him. He had done everything he could for their family; protected her over and over again, sought to track down and rescue Arielle, returned when he could. It should have been good enough.

Why wasn't it?

Ibis grit her teeth. She didn't know what to do. Worry for her new children flooded her, mixed with the lack of sleep and the hormones that seemed to outlast all her other sensations, and she was lost. The emotional reunion was spoiled by her biology just as much as her hubris.

I need time. She blurts, stepping back finally.

My children need me. Its only been... days, they're too little. She is shaking her head, thinking of them and all she must do for them; retreating mentally from the conversation and leaving him there, stranded, to decide for himself. As she turns from him she pauses, looking almost as if she might heave up whatever rests in her stomach.

Stay if that's what you want. If you can bare to do it. If you love me, A pause, a step. —but right now I must be a mother first. And maybe in time, he could become their father.