Today my daughter hatched.
Merry’s party had seemed like such a good idea at the time, but it was such a headache. Even after having spent so much time ensuring the Queen could come, problems of course came up that morning.
“We shall be there as soon as we can,” the Queen said.
“If you can’t make it, it’s alright,” I said. “It’s just my friends and family.”
The Queen looked at me. “It is supposed to be our wedding party.”
“Well, we can do that later, if we need to,” I said.
“It is important to us to interact with your other loved ones. We will be there,” she said, before heading out.
After that, it was just setting up for the party, but I very quickly realized I was just getting in the way of aides and others who’d set up parties for government functions a million times before. So I just took a walk through the Peak instead.
I ended back up at the Queen’s garden, and went outside. I hadn’t had time to get it fixed or anything yet, so it was still a mess. A pile of dead plants.
But sometimes you just have to make space to be able to do what’s really important.
I flexed my wing a little. I hadn’t really had reason to, but it felt right, in the sun. Then I went back inside.
By the time I made it back to the chamber we were using for the party, things were nearly set up. Food was being brought in. There was a large “Congratulations!” banner on the wall that was more than I really wanted but I wasn’t going to tell them to take it down. It felt too official, though. I wanted this to be intimate, not some government thing. But everything seemed to be official at this point. I could already tell there was going to be a lot of that, going forward. I wasn’t going to be able to escape it. Everyone who learns my title starts bowing to me. It’s frustrating, but not worth the fight, I figured. Clearly someone was making that etiquette decision without my input.
“Are you alright, ma’am?” one of the aides who arranging food on a table asked.
“Hm?” I said.
“You’ve just been staring for a while,” she said. “Is something not right?”
“I’m sorry, just thinking,” I said. “Everything looks great. Thank you.”
She gave a little bow and went back to work, which was immediately interrupted by Flare.
“Woah, look at all this food!” he said, hurrying over to the table.
“Calm yourself, terror,” I said. “Let’s wait until everyone gets here.”
“It looks good though,” he said, looking at the spread. “All nifty and fancy!”
“Please, help yourself,” the aide said, smiling. “I’m just working on plating it all nicely.”
Flare grinned and stuffed a little sandwich in his mouth.
“You could at least wait until everyone else gets here,” Clementine said, who had, at some point, entered with Tyrion.
“Oh, right, Mommy, Clemmy is here! With the other guy!” Flare said.
“I’m the ‘other guy’ now?” Tyrion asked.
“Well, I don’t know you!” Flare said.
“Flare, this is Tyrion, Tyrion, Flare,” I said.
“Hi,” Tyrion said. “You’re Clementine’s big brother?”
“That’s right!” Flare said. “And you are…?”
“I guess we’re going with boyfriend now,” Tyrion said, smiling a little sort of embarrassed smile. “Which is a new thing for me, but hey. And I’m… well, I’m also the father of your Mom’s Egg.”
“What!” Flare said.
“You missed a lot, playing with the humans,” I said.
“So you’re… what are you to me?” Flare asked, wondering.
“Flare, let’s do not this right now, alright?” Clementine said. “We just started dating and Tyrion and Mom broke up quite some time ago now. We don’t need to figure out his place in all this just yet.”
“I just want to be appropriately happy to see him and stuff,” Flare said.
“Gloria!” Maude called, and I took that as reason to extract myself. She and Coral were walking towards me, smiling.
Coral slapped me on the back, her fin still a little wet from swimming in. “I cannot believe you actually did it! You ladykiller!” She laughed.
“Yeah, well, sometimes dreams come true,” I said, chuckling.
“Seriously, though, congratulations to ya’ll,” Coral said. “Been hauling and haven’t had a chance to say it before now.”
“It’s alright,” I said, smiling. “I’m glad you could make it, though.”
“Same, same,” Coral said.
“You still look happy, Glory,” Maude said, smiling. “That’s good, that it’s not fading.”
“Maybe I’m too busy to hate it yet,” I said.
“I doubt it,” Maude said, chuckling. “You’re not happy unless you’re busy anyway.”
I shrugged and smiled.
“Oh, come here…” Maude said, and we both hugged each other. “I think we’re past the worst of it, if we’re having a party. We can hug and be emotional now.”
“I would hope so,” I said, and licked her cheek, before holding out a claw for Coral, and pulling her into the hug.
“Now, you go do your host thing,” Coral said. “We’ll go get some food.”
“Yeah, pretty sure working the crowd is part of your new job description,” Maude said.
“You’d know, you wrote it,” I said.
“I didn’t write it, exactly. I just pulled a lot of examples and things from the archives,” Maude said.
“And then chose which examples they should follow and how to follow them,” I said.
“Maybe,” Maude said, smiling. “But seriously, Glory,” Maude said, tilting her head towards Ivana and Plato, who were standing in a corner and clearly did not know what to do.
“Yeah, I’m on it. Enjoy yourselves, okay?” I said.
They nodded, and joined Flare, Clementine, and Tyrion at the tables of food.
I headed over to Ivana and Plato.
“Oh, hello, ma’am,” Plato said, giving a little bow. “Congratulations once again on your marriage!”
“Thanks,” I said, and looked to Ivana.
“What?” she said.
“No congratulations from you?” I asked.
“Fuck off,” Ivana said. “You don’t need it from me. You married the Queen.”
Plato chuckled. “Perhaps that is a near-unbelievable feat worthy of congratulations, ma’am.”
“Traitor,” Ivana said.
Plato chuckled some more.
“Yeah, sure. Congratulations and whatever,” Ivana said. “You know I’m on your side, nearly died for you holding the Queen at bay, you shouldn’t need me to say things like this.”
“It’s still nice to hear,” I said. “Thank you.”
“Where is the Queen anyway?” Ivana asked.
“She had some business to take care of, but she should be here soon,” I said. “But for now, just get some food and mingle.”
“I’ve never been one for mingling,” Ivana said, and sighed. “Maybe I should get used to it, though.”
“Let’s at least go say hello to Miss Maude?” Plato asked.
“Yeah, sure, kid,” Ivana said.
A soft hint of music hit me from the food table, and I turned to see Philly hovering in the air, filling a plate with food with her glowing magical claws.
“That’s a lot of food,” I said as I approached.
“Oh! Hi, Gloria,” Philly said. “I… yeah, it’s a lot of food. But I’m starving. Merry and Myrmidon are walking all super-slow with Baroness and the adjudicator escort, but I couldn’t stand it any longer… I’ve been flying more today….”
“I’ve seen you eat that much, but it’s still hard to process, with you so small,” I said.
“Yeah…” Philly said, taking a bite of food. “I’m doing the eating and I feel the same way.”
“Does it feel okay, being away from Merry?” I asked.
“It’s odd?” she said. “This idea that I can just get around alone is odd… even when I was a human, in human lands, I couldn’t do that… it was kind of nice, just flying in here.”
“Philly!” Merry called out.
“I’m here, Mom, I’m fine!” Philly called back.
“As I suggested, she was just fine, my sweetest,” Myrmidon said, smiling.
“Dagger followed me anyway,” Philly said. “I was just fine.”
“You weren’t supposed to notice,” Dagger’s voice said.
“I was just guessing, but I guess I was right,” Philly said, smiling.
“Mm,” Dagger said, materializing nearby.
“Were you worried, my dear sibling?” Myrmidon asked.
“Maybe a little,” ey said, body spiking a little defensively.
“How are you doing, Gloria?” Merry asked. “The Queen isn’t here? Is everything alright?”
“Yeah, it’s fine,” I said. “She had some work to finish up, but she should be here soon.” I looked over to the corner, where the adjudicators were building a perimeter around Baroness. “Hold on, let me deal with this…” I hurried over there.
“Gloria,” Baroness said.
“Please be careful, ma’am,” one of the adjudicators said.
“Thank you for escorting her,” I said. “We’ll let you know when we need you to help her back outside.”
“Ma’am, the lich is…” the adjudicator started.
“Baroness is a friend and a citizen. She’s fine. Go wait outside so she can enjoy the party,” I said.
“…yes, ma’am,” the adjudicator said, and they started heading out.
“You did not need to do that,” Baroness said. “I understand my nature. Also I do not particularly know what one does at a party.”
“You just talk and enjoy being close to everyone, you know?” Merry, who had apparently followed me over, said. “And eat! But I guess you can’t do that part… But the rest is fun, you know?”
“There are a lot of people here,” Baroness said. “I am surprised to know most of them.”
“You’re better connected than you know,” I said.
“It is… a nice feeling,” Baroness said. “I will not move from this spot, for everyone’s safety, however. I hope this will not hinder the party.”
“Not at all,” I said. “Thanks.”
“I should instead thank you both. For the countless things you have done for me,” Baroness said. “I am here due to this assistance. I get to watch my children have a family.”
“You’ve done plenty for us too, you know?” Merry said. “So much for Philly and me…”
I smiled. “It’s what friends do.”
“…yes. You are correct,” Baroness said.
Everyone talked and chatted about this and that for some time. Eventually an aide pulled me aside, and asked if it was okay to bring in the cake.
“We should wait for the Queen,” I said.
The aide looked at me, confused. “But the Queen is in her chambers. Is she coming?”
I took a moment. “Let me check on that,” I said.
I apologized, and hurried to our chambers.
The Queen was there, holding our Egg, which was glowing very brightly.
“Gloria,” she said. “We are sorry about our tardiness.”
“Is everything alright?” I asked.
“We… are nervous,” she said. “We are not used to being nervous. We thought we might calm down a moment. So we retrieved the Egg, to bring to the party. But that was not enough, so we came back here to prepare. But we suppose that turned into quite some time.”
“What’s there to be nervous about?” I asked. “We’re just going to eat some cake.”
“We are to be in a chamber of people important to you,” the Queen said. “Maude, we understand. We are also close to Maude. We have interactions with Nobody, of course. But so many of these others, we were not there. We have missed so much. And we worry we will not be able to connect with them.”
“Look, the whole idea of getting married so fast was because of just that, right?” I said. “We’re trying to make up for lost time. And everyone knows that. It’s not like you’re going to be expected to be someone you aren’t.”
“It is difficult, wanting them to not see us as Queen, but instead your partner.”
“I’m sure it is. But seriously, they get it. They helped get us to this point.”
The Queen nodded, and then her expression changed.
“What?” I asked.
“The Egg moved,” she said, looking down at it.
The Egg was glowing so bright.
“Fuck,” I said. “Set it down.”
The Queen did so. “It’s hatching,” she said.
I nodded.
We watched as it moved, and cracked.
The Queen used a big claw to pull me closer to her. I didn’t mind in the least.
And then, out peeked a small, Green head. It looked around for a moment.
The eggshell lost its balance, and fell over, and it immediately started crying.
“Oh, come now, there’s going to be so many worse falls than that,” I said. “Just wait until you learn to fly.” I picked the little dragon up, and started cleaning it off even as it cried and cried. “Looks like a girl,” I said, smiling. “Suppose we’ll see eventually, though.”
“She is beautiful,” the Queen said. “This is… incredible…”
I offered her to the Queen, and she took her. The size difference was huge, but she held her so very carefully. “Hello, child,” she said softly.
“You’re a Mom now,” I said.
“We suppose we are…” the Queen said, wiping a tear away. “We hope we can do right by this little one.”
“You will,” I said. The Queen handed her back to me, and I did my best rocking her, trying to calm her down. “We never talked about a name.”
“Did you have one in mind?” the Queen asked.
“…yeah,” I said. It had been something I’d been thinking about a long time. Since the Egg came into my life. “Not sure if you’d like it, though.”
“Tell us.”
“I think we name her Reliquary,” I said.
The Queen was silent for a bit. I looked to her. Our eyes met.
“Yes,” she said. “Reliquary.”
“Thank you,” I said.
I held up Reliquary, and looked her over. She couldn’t decide if she wanted to keep crying, or if she was done. “I’m glad you’re here,” I said.
That set her off crying again.
I chuckled and pulled her closer again, rocking her a little. “Yeah, yeah, I know… it’s scary outside the eggshell…”
We spent a bit more time calming her down. Once she was finally quiet, I looked up at the Queen. “Well, shall we go show off our new daughter?”
“We would like that. As well as the cake we were promised earlier.”
I chuckled. “Hopefully they saved some for us.”
We headed to the party and enjoyed that cake. Everyone made appropriate oohs and ahhs at Reliquary, even Ivana.
My whole family was in that chamber. Family, friends… they were all there. And now it’s one bigger. The little girl sleeping next to me in her crib right now.
Thank goodness for that.