Ayden raked a hand through his hair as he stepped outside, then let out a heavy sigh and wiped his wet face on his shirtsleeve. He could still hear her scream a moment later, though it wasn’t as loud here. Tess had always dealt with pain well, it was all part of being a fighter. Monsters hit her, she was even stabbed with a sword once, but she had never been in enough pain to make her scream before. That terrified him. It made his heart ache and his gut twist. He prayed again that it would be over soon and that she would be okay. Though Sera assured him that everything was fine, his stomach was still tightly knotted.

“Remind me to never get Sera pregnant.”

Ayden startled at Matt’s voice and turned around. He hadn’t noticed him sitting against the wall of the house. “Yeah,” he said weakly, trying for a small smile, but it didn’t work.

Matt took a drag of his cigarette then gave a smoky sigh. “I can’t believe that’s normal,” he said, nodding up to the second story window. “And it’s Tess.” He shook his head. “I thought I was hard on her, but this makes that submission match we had look like nothing. She didn’t even yell like that when I broke her… never mind.”

Ayden just stared at him, trying to fight back more tears. He cringed when he heard another scream. “I hate that I can’t just use a healing spell,” he mumbled.

Matt nodded. “Guess cleric magic doesn’t help that much.”

Ayden shook his head. “It’s natural, so she says there’s not a lot that her powers can do. There’s nothing broken to fix, so to speak.”

“How much longer?”

“Sera said it’s almost over. Which is why I got kicked out. Said she couldn’t focus with me stressing so much.”

Matt nodded again. “What happened to your arm?”

Ayden looked down at his red wrist that had scratch marks on it. “Um… Tess.”

Matt was amused by that. “I heard some of the names she was calling you.”

“She doesn’t mean it” Ayden told him. “She’s just… in a lot of pain.”

Matt smiled. “I know. It’s just funny to hear when she always punches anyone else who says anything bad about you.”

“Well I—” Ayden stopped when another sound came through the upstairs window, but the cry wasn’t from Tess this time. It was a baby. His eyes grew wide as he met Matt’s gaze. Suddenly, he hurried into the house. Matt put out his cigarette and followed.

When he got to the room, Sera was holding a tiny infant over a bowl of water as she washed it carefully. Tess was lying on the bed, under the covers now, looking pale, with messy hair that clung to her sweaty skin, and her cheeks were wet with tears.

Ayden rushed to her side, “Are you okay?” he asked worriedly. She seemed too tired to say anything and just nodded weakly. He kissed her softly, then sighed in relief. He laid down beside her, pulling her gently into his arms. She leaned against him and closed her eyes.

When Sera was finished cleaning the baby she asked, “Do you guys want to see her?”

“No,” Ayden said without hesitation.

Sera nodded, then walked over to Matt. “I want you to name her,” she said, handing him the child. He didn’t move, didn't even breathe for a moment. She smiled encouragingly. “Hold your daughter,” she told him, saying it purposely to let it sink in. Still he hesitated.

Finally, with a deep, steadying breath, he let her situate the baby in his large arms. It was strange to see him look so scared, and not because of some horrifying monster, not because of the threat of pain or death, but because of a tiny infant. But as he looked down at the little girl, his eyes grew misty, and in that moment, he fell completely in love with her. She was his.

Tess was sitting on the bed, propped up against pillows and, though it had been two days since the delivery, she still looked worn-out. Ayden sat in a chair on the other side of the bed, the book he’d been reading to her laying in his lap. Their attention was on Matt now, who stood, smoking a cigarette while he gazed out the window.

“So, what did you name her?” Tess asked.

“Sequoia,” he answered quietly.

“Pretty.”

“Interesting choice,” Ayden said.

“Why?” Tess wanted to know.

“Sequoia is a type of redwood tree that grows near the ocean,” Ayden explained. “There’s a lot of them in the Ifori forest, and in the southwest corner of Brunya Forest, near the mouth of the Belthon River.”

“Okay,” she said, not getting the relevance.

“We camped along the Belthon the night after we left the Canaras Islands,” he added.

She gaped at Matt. “The night we…”

Matt turned to meet her gaze. “It’s not what you’re thinking.”

“Then what?”

“That’s the night I made the decision to let you go instead of sacrifice you,” Matt told her. “We’d just finished sparring and you’d walked off into the woods. I sat there watching Ayden mend your boot and I asked him why he did everything for you.” He smiled a little at the memory. “I can still see that look in his eyes when he said he loved you. At the time, I didn’t understand what that look was. I didn’t understand the relationship you two had, and I definitely didn’t understand love at all. But I knew I envied you. No one had ever been with me the way you two were with each other. The playing, the laughing, the trust and care. It touched something in me. Something I didn’t even know was there.” He paused for a moment, looking off into the distance as if seeing it play out before him. “I decided not to kill you because I didn’t want to take that away from you.”

“Later, when I saw you coming out of the river naked, well…” He huffed a small laugh. “I forgot my good intentions. But the next morning, it actually hurt me to see you crying because he’d left. That only pissed me off. I think that was the first time I’d ever felt anything close to guilt. Then, when we were at the temple…” He shook his head. “I just couldn’t do it.”

“You were his, and somehow I knew he’d forgive you. I’m mean, he’s your puppy after all.” He shot a small grin at Ayden who smiled back, then grew serious again. “I wanted you to have what I couldn’t. And that’s why I risked my life for you, why I risked everything… because of your love for each other. It broke through everything and got to me. It’s only because of both of you that I’m here today. If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t have Sera… I wouldn’t have anything.” He took a drag and blew the smoke out slowly. “So, that’s why I named her Sequoia. Because it was in the redwoods that you changed the course of my life.”

“Oh, Matt,” Tess whispered and held out a hand to him. He smashed the end of his cigarette between his thumb and finger before tossing it in a trash can, then went to sit beside her. She pulled herself into his arms and hugged him. It was silent for a while as she cried and he just held her. Finally, she told him softly. “I love you.” It was the first time she had ever said it out loud.

The words made him blink back tears of his own. He took a deep breath. “I love you too, Tess,” he murmured, then pulled back so he could look at her. “And I promise I’ll do my best with her.”

She beamed at him. “I know you’ll be wonderful. Thank you for keeping her.”

“Thank you for letting me.” He kissed her forehead and stood up. He looked at Ayden who nodded and smiled. Matt smiled back, and then left the room.

Ayden set the book aside and laid next to Tess. She immediately snuggled into his arms and continued crying. She couldn’t seem to stop crying for very long since Sequoia was born. Sera had told him that it was normal for women to feel very emotional and often very sad after they gave birth. And even though giving up the child was what Tess wanted to do, it was still hard on her, she was still giving away a part of herself and she felt the loss of it. Ayden still worried. It hurt him to see her like this.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Yes,” she practically sobbed. “Everything’s just… a lot.” She closed her eyes and cried softly against his chest.

He kissed the top of her head and tried to keep himself from crying too. He held her close and sighed. “I love you so much, Tess,” he whispered into her hair.

“Thank you,” she mumbled.

“For what?”

“For… being here… for being you.” She sniffed. “I just… really love you... and need you.”

His arms tightened around her. “I’ll always be here with you. You’re everything to me, Tess. You’re my world.”

Ayden and Sera stood near the house a week and a half later, watching Matt and Tess spar while Sequoia slept in her bassinet just inside the door. Neither Tess nor Ayden had held the baby yet, it was too soon. Tess wouldn’t even look at her. For now, they both just kept their distance.

Tess fell to the ground with the force of a blow and Ayden hurried to her when he saw her sleeve getting soaked with blood. She cursed under her breath as she got back to her feet. Matt stepped back, waiting, though normally he would have kept attacking. She stood still for a moment to let Ayden heal the cut on her upper arm, but she didn’t like it when he asked if she was okay. “I’m fine!” she fumed. “Go.” She shoved him away from her and lunged toward Matt, attacking again.

“Maybe you could ease up, Matt,” Ayden suggested a few minutes later.

Tess clenched her jaw and glared, but Matt answered. “She’s fine. Me being soft won’t help.” He swung at her again as he said it.

She was holding her own well enough, it was just that her balance was off, she got tired too quickly and her body was a bit sluggish. Still she forged on, refusing to take a break, becoming angrier, and more frustrated with herself every time she made a mistake. Matt was the only one who wasn’t telling her to take it easy, to not to push herself.

“So, what is the surprise?”

Sera jumped and whirled around as her father came up behind her. “Ugh,” she complained, “Don’t scare me like that.” He was the only one who could, with the elven ability to make his feelings completely neutral, she didn’t feel him coming. 

Cael laughed as he hugged her and kissed the top of her head. 

“Sure took you long enough to get here.”

“We were traveling.”

Lotus came closer to hug her daughter. “We just got your letter yesterday.”

The fight drew Cael’s attention away and he watched for a moment. “Is this the first time she has sparred since the baby was born?” he asked.

“Yes,” Sera answered. “And she’s being way too hard on herself.”

“She always has,” he said. “You can tell us the news in a minute.” As he walked over to where Tess and Matt were, they stopped fighting. Cael shook his head at Tess. “You are not helping yourself by getting angry. You are only losing focus.”

She just looked at the ground, panting with exhaustion.

“Come, you are finished for today,” he said in his authoritative but gentle voice. He stepped closer and grabbed the daggers from her, giving them to Matt, who took them and walked back to join the others.

“I just keep… messing up,” she told him.

He rested his hands on her shoulders. “I know. But do not expect so much of yourself. Your body has been through a lot. Having a child is no small thing. It will take some time to fully recover.”

“I just want to be normal again… I hate this!” she said, starting to cry.

He pulled her into his arms and held her. “You will be, but you must be patient. You cannot run before you walk or you will keep stumbling and falling. You will never make any progress that way.”

“I know,” she mumbled. “It’s just stupid. I shouldn’t have to work on stuff I’m already good at.”

He pulled back slightly so he could look down at her. “You need to come home and train there,” he told her. “Matt is not a good person for you to work with right now.”

She leaned her head against his chest. “Yeah,” she agreed.

“Falcon and I will be there,” he promised. “And we will help you get back to normal.”

She took a deep breath. “You should talk to Sera first.”

“Yes.” He kept an arm around her as they walked to the house.

Sera went to the bassinet and scooped the baby into her arms as everyone sat down in the living room. Tess snuggled into Ayden’s arms on one couch, while Lotus and Cael took another. Matt stood nearby where he was joined by Sera a moment later. Ayden saw the way Matt looked at his new daughter, and every time he did, he knew they had made the right decision. Matt was completely head over heels for the little girl. Ayden would tell Tess later, when she was ready. For now, she kept her gaze and attention away from the baby altogether.

“You already knew about them having the baby,” Sera started. Though it was obvious that her parents had already figured out what the surprise was. “Well, Matt and I have decided to keep her.”

Lotus was beaming. She held out her hands and Sera put the baby into her arms.

Cael seemed more interested by his wife’s reaction and smiled at her adoringly. “So, does this mean you will stop nagging me to have another child?” he asked lightly.

She tried to give him a stern look, but failed, she was too happy. She sighed and nodded. “Yes, this will do wonderfully. But let’s move to Chendal so we can see her all the time.”

“Of course,” Cael said easily. “I figured you would want to.”

Lotus gave him a big smile, then looked back at the little girl in her arms. “Hear that? Grandma and Grandpa will be here for you all the time.”

“Most of the time,” he corrected. “We will still travel.”

She just nodded her agreement and asked, “What’s her name?”

“Sequoia,” Matt answered.

Cael studied him for a moment, making the same connections that Ayden had since he knew the whole story. However, his conclusions took him to the truth. “Symbolic?”

Matt nodded.

“The beginning of a new life?” Cael asked.

“Exactly.”

“I like it.”

“Thanks.”

“I’m tired,” Tess whispered to Ayden. “I’ll be upstairs.”

“Do you want—”

“No, stay. I’m fine.” She gave him a small smile as she got up.

It wasn’t long before Lotus and Sera were talking about the baby’s room. “Come upstairs, I’ll show you. We got the prettiest quilt from the high priestess.” She took Sequoia from her mom and handed her to Matt. He still looked a bit scared every time he touched her, but he took her without hesitation. Cael rolled his eyes as he followed the women upstairs at his wife’s insistence.

Ayden smiled. “It’s gonna take me some time to really get used to that I think,” he told Matt. “It’s so strange to see you with a baby. Like a bear holding a buttercup.” He chuckled softly.

Matt tried to glare, but couldn’t manage it and just ended up smiling. “Shut up.”

“My mom said that you don’t know anything about love until you have a child,” Ayden told him as he watched Matt looking down at his daughter. “And that you can never love anything more than you do them.”

Matt looked over at him knowingly. “And you never want to love anything more than Tess.”

Ayden smiled. “No.”

“I don’t think it works like that,” Matt said. “Not like I’m an expert on love.” He laughed softly. “But I don’t love Sera any less, watching her with Sequoia… I just love her more. Though I understand what your mom was saying, too. I don’t even get how I can love her so much when I barely even know her. I mean she can’t even do anything.” He shook his head and smiled down at her. “But… look at her.”

Ayden chuckled. “You’ve gone all sappy.”

Normally Matt would have hit someone for saying that to him, but now he just smiled more. “Hold her and you’ll be just as bad.”

Ayden hesitated, glancing at the stairs, and then nodded. “Okay.” He stood and took the child into his arms. And then he felt like it had been a mistake. He hadn’t felt any of the sense of loss that Tess had to deal with before now. He wasn’t the one who had held the child for nine months.

Matt frowned at him. “You okay?”

Ayden took a deep breath and nodded. “Yeah. She just didn’t feel like part of me… until now.” He brushed a finger tenderly across her cheek.

“Well you can’t have her back.”

Ayden smiled. “She belongs to you. It’s just… strange. I can feel the magic in her,” he said quietly. “But what’s weird is that it feels like mine. I couldn’t feel magic in others when my mom was alive, and it didn’t feel like this with my grandmother at all. It’s just… I don’t, it’s hard to explain.”

“So, she’ll be a mage,” Matt said. “A powerful one, like you, huh?”

“Not quite as powerful, Tess barely has any ability so that makes it less. But she’ll be a good mage someday… if she wants to be.”

“When do people decide that?” Matt asked.

Ayden shrugged. “Whenever. For most people it takes a while for them to have enough mana to cast anything, I think the average is still fourteen. The growth rate of mana that’s not being used is very small. It depends on how much you’re born with as well. There are some people who have so little that they can’t cast until they’re forty or even older.”

Matt looked bored with the information. “Yeah, so what about her?” he wanted to know.

Ayden handed Sequoia back to her father. “She’ll probably have enough by two or so.”

“Why so young for her?”

“Because I’m one of the handful of truly powerful mages that are left.” He said it hesitantly, not wanting to admit it. “So even though she’s Tess’ child, she’s still got a good deal of power.”

Matt looked a little worried. “You have to buy spell scrolls and read them though before you can cast, right?”

Ayden nodded. “Yes, though you don’t have to be able to read normally. If you have magic in you then you can read arcane writing. Writing it is a whole other story. Anyway, you can’t join the Mages Guild until you’re sixteen, or twelve with a parent’s approval, and you can’t buy spells until you’re a member.”

“But you said you’ve been casting since you were six,” Matt pointed out.

“I would have been casting before that if my father had allowed it. But my grandmother runs the Mages Guild in Brunya City. She gave me spells. It’s against the law to give spells to people underage, but most people do. The Mages Counsel never actually enforces it unless a child causes a problem.”

“So you could just as easily get spells for Sequoia.”

“Yes,” Ayden agreed. “But I won’t unless you say it's okay. She’s your daughter, it’s your decision.”

Matt just nodded, looking unsure.

Ayden smiled reassuringly. “She won’t even realize she has magic for a long time if you don’t tell her. It’ll always be there though, like a hidden chest, but it doesn’t have to be opened.”