Seaside Moors and all my body shakes,

@Aningan @Rosalyn @Rosencrantz @Raleska @Nieve @Marisol @Kasatka. no post order, gonna tag babies in subsequent posts as i ran to the last minute and things are still getting worked out LOL f to me

 

before the sun had dipped itself into a golden death, erzulie felt the familiar pains beginning to stir along her hips. the sea beckoned, and with one of her daughters following, the beta paced along the sands. her paws gripped the cool grains; the lap of the surf around her ankles grounded the harlot.
she breathed, and thought of reyes, of scarab.
she breathed, and grit her teeth, and cried a hoarse shout, crouching low upon the shoreline. 
the cramping ripples did not come again until she arrived to the den she had chosen. erzulie bid her companion leave, slipping into the darkness to begin her travails.
only her wife would be admitted.
but even after twilight, erzulie panted and lapped watered moss, a whine trapped in her throat, and still the children did not arrive.

Cameo unless addressed directly!

Nieve wasn't equipped for this. Not truly. Clementine was the one who was supposed to be good with herbs, but Clementine was so scarcely seen these days, Nieve wasn't even sure she was still around. There was Marisol, but Nieve knew so little of her wayward sibling that she couldn't say whether the rosy she-wolf was a suitable practitioner, either. So it fell to her to keep Erzulie's company, for that was all she was capable of offering besides food, and something told her that her dam didn't have much of an appetite.

It was nice to walk along the beach, but impossible to focus on the cold surf on her paws or the majestic beauty of the setting sun. Her eyes were glued instead to her cream-furred mother, who squatted and cried out with such agony that Nieve's ears nestled flat against her scalp. Maman! she exclaimed, but there was nothing more she could do than offer her body as an anchor should Erzulie require it to rise again.

After some time, the Beta retreated into her dug hole in the moors and Nieve paced some short distance away to keep watch, thoughts whirling. She ought to be excited about the arrival of her siblings, and some part of her was... but it was buried under a mountain of worry and skepticism. Worry that the pack would not be able to provide for them all. Skepticism that it would even be worth the effort, for the scars of her siblings' disappearances were deep enough that she couldn't help the low expectations she had for these ones.

Rosalyn heard, and as soon as she heard, she came.  As she ran towards the place Erzulie had chosen, she saw Nieve waiting outside, and she smiled despite her worry.  She gave their daughter a grateful look and a soft nudge.  Your maman will be fine, she reassured, then slunk inside.

I'm here, she said, soft. She did not approach right off, but waited.  She'd assumed she could enter, but a woman's space during her time could be desired or a burden.  At least this time she knew her own time lay months away... yet another indicator it was to be her last.

Her chest clenched to hear Erzulie's pained breathing, the hitch to her, but she kept the fear at bay.  It would serve no purpose now.

lurking in the background/cameo unless directly interacted with

The passage of time was not easily determined, not for a male that knew nothing of parturition. When he heard an anguished cry, that the children might be coming was not the first thought to enter his mind; he thought the worst, that something was happening—that someone was hurt. He sought the source with increasing worry, panic building as he heard a voice echo you’re too late. But when finally he reached them, he quickly found himself to not be alone, and those that came before hardly seemed troubled. Were they not under attack?

Confused, he approached, cautiously. There was something strange in the air, a scent he could not place. He wanted to ask Rosalyn about it, have her explain, but something kept him silent; a deep, instinctual knowing muted the male, kept him from drawing any nearer than next to Nieve.

Something was coming, something important.

welcome, babies <3

beneath the earth, erzulie struggled and gasped, nostrils filled with the scent of the earth. but the clean air that whispered beyond the entrance was sweet with salt, and there she heard the voices of the others.
rusalka was gathering.
momentarily the lithe figure of rosalyn eclipsed the moonlight, and then erzulie was reaching to her, wanting nothing more than the pressure of her wife's figure against her own. "why did i do dis again?" she gasped, a touch of maddened laughter at the edge of her words.
again the pains that cracked her from hip to hip; erzulie's throat opened with another cry, but she dug her claws into the earth of the whelping den, comforted herself with her wife's nearness, found grounding.
her body had done this before. it would do so again.
and so the harlot found trust, as her nape became matted with sweat and words evaded her tongue; the great toil of mothers was at hand and her strength burgeoned and billowed
her body shattered into a thousand pieces and then there were two.
the beta gasped, looking shakily beneath her outstretched thigh. muzzle lowered to clean away the caul, lap at the small mouth. a dark babe, but as the moonlight crept forward across the tiny body, erzulie saw the glint of dark coral mingled with the damp velveteen. "@Solaire," she breathed, nosing the fourth daughter of rusalka to her breast.
the pains began soon thereafter; she lay back against rosalyn and breathed, brow furrowing as the anguish limned itself into all parts of her, the powerful making of life that filled the earth with the fragrance of birth and blood; she thought of the sea and bore down until the moon itself separated from her form.
a second child, fifth daughter; even before she licked away the clinging film did erzulie see this one already resembled the polar boy who kept sentinel outside. "@Arcelia," the harlot sighed, nudging the babe alongside the first and gazing at them as panting ebbed her agony into a low dulling ache that would pass in hours to come.

passage into the world of the living was not easy; genesis was the first tribulation of a lifetime and all she could do was bear it. her eyes, ears, nose shut, scarcely aware of her own existence, only feeling. there came a great cold and she shuddered with shock, suddenly yearning to go back into the darkness from where she came. there was no way back, and she found herself unable to navigate, but soon she was comforted by a warm wet blanket which cleaned away her fear. and then she discovered the second sense- taste- and she suckled away hungrily, knowing this was the first thing she ought to do to make her way in this world.

Rosalyn didn't need to be asked twice.  As Erzulie reaches for her, she pressed close, offering the only grounding she could.  The mother's body would do the rest, but perhaps with her near the comfort would bring ease.

She didn't answer but gave her a knowing look, then began to groom her ears in a soothing ritual.  It would be worth it after, but for now, she knew it did not feel as though it were.  She remembered the pain dimly.

After a tryin time which she felt only distantly.... it passed in a blur... there were two. Two daughters.  Rosalyn beheld them silently, and was unable to speak for a length. They are perfect, she finally said, and tucked herself alongside.  For the moment, those outside were forgotten.  Is there anything you need?

Within the womb, there was naught but darkness. A warm but deep, unyielding darkness. At times she swore she could hear the hushed whispering of those beyond this realm of hers, gentle murmurs; incoherent speech, nothing to be understood or even heard in full. And come the day of her birth, these thoughts would all be forgotten, stolen away and replaced by new, developing senses. Those fantasies of the womb would hardly be anything more than dreams to be dreamt beneath starry skies—until, one day, they would fade entirely from her conscious.

An event to mark her beginning unfolded quicker than she could comprehend, the warmth of creation stripped away and her first sense discovered: touch.

The touch of a soft tongue against her body, working away the sac that encased her.

The touch of the ground against her abdomen, chilled and uncomfortable.

And finally, the touch of a sibling against her side, radiant and squirming—a surprise! And pleasantly so. The child titled Arcelia wriggled her way as close to the mass she would soon know as her sister as she could get, taking comfort in her presence. In doing so, and with the assistance of She Who Gives Life, the child soon found a teat to claim as her own, which she latched onto with ease. Within seconds, she was lulled to sleep by the filling of her stomach and the comfort found in existing.

cameo <3

Raleska had missed the first cry that split the stormy skies, but by the time Erzulie had retired to her den and whelped, Raleska arrived. She had been thinking at length of all the maven had provided for her - not just in her company, but in her words. In her wisdom, experience. She knew nothing of childbearing or the exhaustion that it entailed, but she had wanted to leave something as a token -- and so, arrived belatedly with a seal's flipper in her jaws.


She saw Nieve pacing in the distance, and watched as Rosalyn's form slipped into the den. Understanding the unspoken taboo, Raleska did not come close -- but she placed the seal's meaty tail near the entrance, and then prowled off to join Nieve in her rovings up and down the strand.

"only you," erzulie breathed. a kiss to her stalwart wife's jaw, and then she was crooning to their daughters. she wondered how aningan would think of them, for he was young. but he had the guidance of his fellow leaders, who had been mothers themselves before.
"i am so tired," erzulie admitted, lying chin upon paws. stay with me a while, and then tell them, she wished to say, but her jaws spread in a wide yawn and she drew them closer as she drifted to a light slumber.

Rosalyn nodded silently, then lay down, head resting on her wife's side gently as she stared at the new lives they'd now be responsible for.  She smiled, content.

In a bit she'd rise and deliver the news.  For now, she watched over, captivated by their small movements and the gentle heartbeats surrounding her.

last from me!