Hideaway Strath ceathairéad

Now that the pain was over — along with the waiting and the worry and the wretched fear — Lotte could afford to bask in the relatively textbook birth of her children. She felt…emptied out. It was hard for her to focus on any one emotion, but the overarching theme that rocked her was joy. She managed a smile for Hemlock but merely rested her head on her paws as her children nursed, and her tail thumped heartily at the sight of her husband. Ignorant to his jealousy — in Lotte’s experience, a female gave birth alone or with another female, then presented her children to the homecoming warrior with a casual expression and a few boasting quips about how easy it had been — she greeted him with boundless warmth and love in her eyes. “I love you, rakas. You are my life — and you are a new father,” she drew breath to murmur quietly, her attention shifting to Dagfinn as he hunkered down beside Hemlock. Her argent eyes were very soft, almost a dove gray with contentment, as she glanced to the four little bundles at her side.

“This one,” she decided on a whim, recalling the names she had discussed with Arturo and casting her love a conspirator’s smile as she nuzzled the female twin with the wet of her nose. “She is Eirlys Dagny Fearghal — there are already enough Dagfinns and none better than you.”

The last thing was a more private affair, as Lotte quietly rose her eyes to her husband and then to Dagfinn with an apologetic frown. “There are two that did not live,” she said plainly, motioning toward the cold little bodies without looking directly at them. She would focus on her living children. “I do not know your customs for laying them to rest.”