by Leia Stone
I’d failed them all.
It was better for my mental health if I just didn’t think about it, so I shoved it into a deep, dark box in my psyche and didn’t go there.
The bear and elk and other psychotic animals only seemed to attempt attacking Sage when I wasn’t around, so we went everywhere together, which was fine by me. The curse was real. I’d seen enough over the past three months to believe that.
Sage held up the perfect white fluffy rabbit skin pelt and grinned. “I think we have enough for the winter baby blanket.”
I nodded. “Definitely. We can stitch it up today.”
We’d prepared for the birth as best we could for two women who knew jack shit about having babies. The biggest issue was the placenta. I knew you had to clamp the cord before you cut it or you’d risk losing all of the baby’s blood. We gathered all the knowledge we had about labor from every movie I’d seen, or stories she’d heard of, and we decided that the scene from Wanderlust where the hippie chick carries the placenta around in a bowl next to her baby until it naturally falls off was safest.
I was young and healthy. We had no reason to believe giving birth would have any serious complications. “Back in the Renaissance times, fourteen-year-olds popped out a baby a year and had no idea what they were doing,” Sage had told me.
I had no idea if it was true, but it made me feel better.
The swollen feet were likely because I did a lot of hiking and housework, more than a normal pregnant lady who lived in the city. Even with Sage’s help, there was so much work to do.
But everything was going to be fine. I truly felt that in my bones.
“Your boobs are getting gigantic. Sawyer would be sad to miss this,” Sage said, and then her face fell when she realized she’d spoken of the past. “Sorry.”
I gave her a light smile, trying to pretend I wasn’t fazed by the comment. “Yeah.”
Sage and I had endless conversations about what the note I’d plastered to the wall meant.
I found it! It’s right off the well-worn path. Plain as day once you trust.
We’d decided that he meant to finish it, trust … and never did, or it had been erased. No one would be that cruel, right?
“Trust what?” I would scream on a daily basis. But not today. Today, we had decided to not talk about or go looking for the cave. Today, we were a mom to be and auntie to be excited about a baby.
For the next three months, I was just going to focus on being a mom with my best friend, and worry about everything else after that.
“If you want to name her after me, I won’t care. I mean, I am going to be the best aunt ever.” Sage plopped the rabbit meat into the pot.
I chuckled. “Yeah, that won’t be confusing at all, calling both of you Sag—” I gasped, clutching my belly as it tightened and went rock hard.
Sage froze. “Braxton Hicks?”
The pain was intense, so intense that I couldn’t speak for a moment.
“Maybe?” I said, breaking out in a sweat. I’d been getting a lot of these false labor belly tightening things over the past month, but that one was … different.
She stood, rushing around the cabin and into the adjoining nursery room I’d created. “We are going to pretend labor has started anyway, okay? I don’t want your water breaking on the mattress pad.”
She was right. We’d talked about the birthing plan, and we both agreed we should try to keep the beds from irreversible damage, as there was no replacing them.
“Okay, but I think it’s another false alarm.” I’d had a lot of those this week.
Moving to stand and make my way into the adjoining room that Sage had prepared as a birthing room, I was racked with another painful contraction mid-stride.
Okay … this was more than the fake contractions I’d been having all week. I rush-waddled into the room to find Sage laying out the deer skin suede on top of the clay bricks I’d fired. I’d finally mastered the art of firing clay in a deep hole inside the earth. I just dug a hole, put the pots or bricks inside that I had shaped from the natural clay mud, and then shoved a bunch of twigs and dried grasses in there and lit them.
It worked! This was a game changer. Sage even made the baby a little clay rattle with stones inside; it was adorable.
“I think it might be the real thing,” I told her just as wetness trickled down my legs. I froze, looking down at the clear fluid dripping to the floor.
Looking up, I met Sage’s panicked gaze. “Okay, it’s go time! I’m gonna boil water and wash my hands.”
Holy crap.
Okay … it was time. After all these months of preparing, I was about to have a baby out in the woods with no pain meds.
“Remember all those movies you told me about that had the women on their hands and knees?” Sage asked.
I nodded, slipping free of my giant loose dress and sitting naked and cross-legged on the floor. Sage and I had seen each other naked a hundred times; this was going to be no big deal.
“I think you should try that, on all fours, and then sitting or rocking might help the baby come out?”
Being on my back with all this belly weight pressing down on me was hard anyway, so that was a good idea.
“Maybe I should shower,” I called out into the house as Sage had disappeared. “What if there is bacteria on my legs and it gets on the baby?”
“Okay, I’ll boil extra water, but I’ll need to go to the artesian spring tomorrow to get more, because I don’t want to leave you right now,” she called back.
And she couldn’t go to the spring alone, or a tree, or elk, or whatever, would try to kill her. But I didn’t say that.
“Okaaaaahhhhh…” A contraction hit me mid-sentence and a growl ripped from my throat.
Motherfucker, this hurt way worse than I thought it would. How had this happened so fast? Didn’t women labor for like hours? I mean, I was having that rock hard belly and cramping all day, but that hadn’t been labor, right?
“I feel like I have to poop!” I yelled, and Sage rushed into the room wide-eyed.
Her hands were scrubbed clean and dripping wet. “Are you sure, or are you going to go poop outside and a baby is going to pop out?”
My eyes widened at the thought.
“Oh God, don’t scare meeeahhhh!” Another contraction hit me and the urge to poop or push consumed me.
“Screw the shower, Sage, I think the baby is coming,” I said through gritted teeth.
Sage ran forward as I popped onto all fours and she positioned herself behind me like she was going to catch a football. “Ohmygod, I see some brown baby head hair!” Sage screamed.
Shock ripped through me at that. “How is this happening so fast?” I asked, before another contraction hit. When I yelled, Sage told me to push.
I did, and my entire vagina felt like it split open. Red hot pain sliced between my legs so fast I felt like I was going to pass out.
“Shifter births are quicker, I think. My mom said something about it, but I never listened,” was all Sage offered. “She’s stuck halfway, Demi, I can see the tip of her ear. I need one more push and I can pull her out.”
The pain was unbearable, so much so that my legs shook and I wanted to pass out. I burst into sobs. This was too hard. It hurt too much and I wanted Sawyer here. I wanted my mom, I wanted a fucking epidural.
“I can’t,” I whimpered. “It hurts.”
“Demi Calloway-Hudson, you are the strongest woman I know. You can absolutely do this!” Sage yelled.
My belly seized up again as the pain of another contraction hit me, and I held my breath, pushing with everything I had.
I pushed so hard I was sure I was going to push out my organs! There was a searing pain, like someone had lit my vagina on fire, and then a giant relief. I collapsed to the ground, trembling as the throbbing between my legs lessened.
“It’s a … boy,” Sage said beside me, and then burst into tears. “A beautiful boy, Demi. You did it!”
I rolled
onto my back as I burst into sobs. My eyes searched the space until they landed on Sage and the naked flailing baby in her arms.
He let loose with a big cry, and Sage and I both erupted into relieved laughing.
I did it!
Reaching out, she lay him on my bare chest, and I peered down into his deep blue eyes. Seeing those eyes, his tiny perfect button nose, and thick mop of dark brown hair, it formed a sob in my throat. He looked just like his dad. I’d stopped reliving the memories of Sawyer in my head the past few months; they were too painful. Sawyer the day I met him at Delphi, Sawyer when he proposed, Sawyer kissing me. Now all of those memories came rushing back and my unbridled joy was mixed with a deep yearning for this baby to know his father, for Sawyer to see what perfect creature we’d created.
“Oh my God, he’s a mini Sawyer.” Sage knelt on the ground with me and looked down at him. “Crap, we didn’t brainstorm boy names!”
I chuckled, looking into those deep blue eyes as he searched mine curiously. “Creek Curt Calloway-Hudson.”
Tears ran down my face in thin rivulets as baby Creek started to make an “O” with his mouth, before finding my nipple.
“I think that’s a perfect name.” Sage’s voice was thick with emotion. “Also, I never thought I would say this, but I’m going to get the placenta bowl.”
I burst into laughter, and Sage did too. I was so glad she was here. What a gift loyal and true friends were.
I grinned, looking down at my perfect baby boy. “Your Auntie Sage is a little crazy but you’re going to love her.”
I placed a kiss on his soft head and he clamped a hand around my finger. My heart throbbed in that moment, because Sawyer should be here. This was so beautiful, I couldn’t imagine raising this child without my mate.
“We’re going to find Daddy, okay? Don’t worry,” I told Creek, and then the exhaustion pulled at my limbs and I lay my head back to rest.
Three months later…
I didn’t know whether to celebrate being here one year or cry. Baby Creek was three months old and could now hold his head up, so we didn’t need to worry about the floppy neck he’d had the first two months. I was sleep deprived as all hell, but Sage was such a huge help. Sometimes I just woke up in the middle of the night and Sage was holding the baby to my chest so he could breastfeed, then she would change him and bring him back to his bassinette.
We’d made some tightly packed cotton diaper pouches, but mostly we let him be naked and tried to take him outside often to pee or poo. I was probably completely psychologically damaging him by treating him like a dog in potty training, but we were doing the best we could. Slipping Creek into the carrier Sage had made me, I stepped outside to find her.
She was washing some tubers outside in a large clay pot. We knew nothing about when to feed a baby food, but baby Creek had started grabbing for our food at mealtimes, so we’d decided to try some mashed potatoes today.
“Hey, I was thinking of meditating for a bit, do you mind looking after him?” I asked Sage. “He’s just fed.”
Her hair was waist-length and braided into a thick red rope at her back. When she looked up at me, she smiled. “Absolutely. Come to Auntie, sunshine.” She dropped the tubers and held out her arms.
I quickly unslung him and handed him off. “Thanks.”
I’d been searching for a deeper meaning to everything lately. The universe, God, whatever Astra believed, something that would give order or meaning to my life in the grander picture. I just felt like there was a missing piece here and that it might be something spiritual within me that was broken and needed fixing. I began the meditation a week after baby Creek was born and I’d been doing it daily ever since. It helped with my stress of not being able to get back home, and the feelings of hopelessness quickly eased.
Today, I was going to search deep within myself and ask myself what I still needed to trust, because now that I had Creek, I couldn’t imagine raising him without his father and grandparents. And I missed my pack: Astra, Arrow, Willow, and even Rab. Today I would start cave hunting again on a daily basis until we got out of here.
Stepping away from Sage and the baby, I walked to the edge of our little meadow and sat down on the smooth flat rock that overlooked the steep embankment that led to the trickling creek, the creek I’d named my son after.
One year. One year ago today I entered the woods for my alpha trial … I told Sawyer I would see him in three days. I said three days and it had been a year.
Willow’s baby. The Paladin land. I’d ruined everything.
A sob formed in my throat but I swallowed it down. Now was not the time to be emotional. I’d spent a year having a pity party for myself. Now was the time to suck it up and get out of here.
Closing my eyes, I took in a deep cleansing breath through my nose and then exhaled through my mouth. The bubbling sounds of the creek water coupled with the rustling of the leaves put me into a calm state.
Plain as day once you trust.
The words of my ancestors looped in my head.
I found it. Trust. Plain as day. Trust, trust, trust.
I’d had a thought late last night. What if the trust was different for each alpha? What if Run never trusted the land, or his own heart, or something like that? What if each alpha had an issue trusting something in life and coming out here forced you to confront that?
Chills ran the length of my arms at the rightness of that thought.
Run loved my mom, that much was clear, but did he struggle with that love of a city girl? Did that stick him here for three years? Did he feel something was wrong with him for loving the enemy?
A great wind ripped through the canyon then; the leaves rustled as if trying to speak to me.
I breathed in slowly, feeling closer than ever to figuring this out.
“What don’t I trust?” I whispered out loud.
I trusted my heart, my love for Sawyer, this land that had kept me alive for years. I trusted all of that.
‘Yourself,’ my wolf whispered softly, startling me. ‘Your body.’
My throat tightened as images of my rape flashed through my mind. Silk sheets, muffled screams, blackness.
Shame. Defeat. Betrayal. Weakness.
The sob that bubbled to the surface now was too big to gulp down, so I opened my mouth and let it rip out of me as it transformed into a howl.
My wolf was right…
I’d stopped trusting my body the night I was raped. I was ashamed I couldn’t protect myself, ashamed I didn’t scream louder or fight harder. Ashamed that I didn’t do more to get Vicon arrested, although I knew that wasn’t true, that I wasn’t in the wrong, and had nothing to be ashamed of.
When I couldn’t protect myself, my soul split in two and my wolf had to protect us, had to be the badass, the strong one, the one I could always rely on when things got tough.
But hadn’t I just survived out here in the middle of the freaking woods with bears and the threat of starvation and pregnancy … all on my own? My wolf was with me yes, but she’d barely done anything to help out here. I fetched the water, I hiked the mountain, I hunted the meals, I built the addition to the cabin with my strong hands. I pushed a baby out of my damn vagina with no pain meds, not my wolf.
I was a badass and I needed to trust myself. This human part of Demi was anything but weak. Anything but full of shame.
Tears flowed down my cheeks as my throat tightened with emotion. “I trust myself,” I whispered.
“I trust my body.” I broke into a sob, my throat tightening to the point of pain as I tried to hold back my tears.
Something inside of me mended itself then. I couldn’t say exactly what it was, but it fused together in that moment … a rightness, an effervescent filling up the darkest part of my soul. I could trust myself to get us out of here. Just because my wolf and I were split didn’t mean we weren’t the same.
I was her, she was me. We were one. I saved myself that day with Vicon, and I was going to get us hom
e now. Today.
My eyelids snapped open and I jumped up from where I sat.
“Sage!” I yelled, running full speed to where she was cutting the tubers with baby Creek on her back.
She looked up at me in alarm.
“I’m going to find the cave. Right now. I know where it is,” I told her. I didn’t actually know, but I knew it would reveal itself to me. I felt it.
True to our promise, I hadn’t gone looking for three months, I’d just spent time figuring this whole mom thing out.
She stilled, hands shaking slightly. “Did you?”
“Trust myself!” I burst into tears. “I needed to learn that I could trust myself to protect my body. Something I was never able to do when I was fifteen because of my attack.”
Sage dropped the knife, tears forming in her eyes as she nodded. Stepping over the pile of diced tubers, she opened her arms and pulled me into a hug. My face leaned over her shoulder, and then I was staring into the deep blue eyes of my baby.
This baby needed his dad. We needed to be a family. I needed Sawyer.
“Mommy’s going to get us home, okay, baby?” I told him.
This was the only home he’d ever known, but I wanted so much more for him.
My parents needed to meet him. Raven. Sawyer. I wanted my family.
Baby Creek blew spit bubbles with his mouth, giving me a gummy grin, and I pulled back from Sage. “Let’s go together, and then when I find the cave, you can wait outside with Creek?”
I didn’t want her attacked while I was gone. These woods were constantly trying to kill her if I wasn’t nearby.
She nodded. “Okay … you seem really sure...”
There was such a knowing inside of me—I just couldn’t explain it. “Sage, we’re going home. Today.”
Her eyes filled with more tears, and I walked into the cabin, grabbing a black chalk stick and writing an addition to the sentence that I had plastered on the wall. One day Creek might be out here, and he would find this.