Hope For Tomorrow

Upon returning home from constructing the magical barrier around the forest, Baldirak had gotten an earful from Kenina. All he could do was listen and watch while she paced their den, going on about his recklessness. Kenina's flames tended to flare when she was mad, so by the time her rant ended, the den was almost too hot for the Twilight King to breathe. While she sat muttering things under her breath, Baldirak reminded her that he couldn't have allowed her to perform such a task. Since learning that Kenina was carrying eggs, the EarthWing had demanded she not exert herself in any way and leave all the "king-and-queen" duties to him. He wanted his mate to relax and focus on growing healthy eggs. "And how am I supposed to relax when my mate goes and performs some seriously powerful magic that petrifies his leg?" Kenina had pointed out. Baldirak had had a hard time answering that one.

Sleep eluded the Twilight King that night, but not because of worry over his tribe's future, as had been the case during the monster apocalypse. Instead, it was excitement. Baldirak was going to be a father. It was never something he'd ever considered in the past, not during the two times he'd potentially found a mate, not when the human invasion of Gnosis had left EarthWing numbers dangerously low, and not even when he'd raised his nephew. But every day since Astral had told him of Kenina's infertility and promised to fix it, Baldirak suddenly found himself looking forward to having Hatchlings of his own. Could it be that he'd actually always wanted offspring? What, then, had held him back at all those other opportunities?

About an hour before sunrise, Baldirak lifted his head and looked over at Kenina. She was curled up beside him, her flames keeping his underbelly warm. He found himself thinking of how they started out. Kenina's previous mate had only been a figurehead and, perhaps mostly because she didn't know anything about him yet, she'd treated Baldirak in much the same way. Whenever she noticed him dealing with FireWings and NightWings, she would swoop in to take charge or scare those dragons into listening to him. Though his EarthWings constantly complained to him about itBaldirak never minded. He knew Kenina was just concerned about things running smoothly between the three tribes, and probably nervous about having a then-strange dragon as her mate. The latter always had puzzled him. Kenina had known Tenebris for years, surely he would have been the better choice for her, whether the partnership was meant to only be political or not. As he gently nuzzled her and moved to get up, Baldirak recalled the first time they slept in the same den. Kenina had been against it at first, insisting that Baldirak would be too uncomfortable. He won her over by pointing out that sleeping in separate dens wouldn't paint the picture of unity they needed to get the tribes to coexist. The EarthWing had actually been uncomfortable even with Kenina sleeping as far away from him as possible, but he refused to show it. In the little spare time he had in the early days of the alliance, Baldirak would sneak off to FireWing territory, to their capital. Over time, he got used to the high temperature. Then, one night, without even thinking about it, he laid down beside Kenina and curled up around her and went right to sleep. He'd woken up to a very stunned FireWing Queen trying to figure out why he would suddenly not only sleep on the same side of the den as her, but right next to her as well. Baldirak had found her confusion very amusing as he explained his "training" to her. He could see the question of why in her eyes and his answer had simply been, "Why not?"

After a long drink of water, Baldirak made his way back to the chamber he and Kenina slept in. He wanted to make a nest for their eggs--even though it would be a while still before they needed one--and the sleeping chamber seemed the natural choice. He didn't want to wake Kenina, though. And, he realized as he made his way to the mud chamber, he wasn't even sure what sort of nest to construct. How many eggs was Kenina carrying? They were going to be half FireWing; should the nest be somewhere warm? Should it be soft or normal? Wait, what was a normal nest anyway? How big should he make it? Baldirak might have hopped around a bit if he'd still had use of all four legs. After rubbing some mud on his underbelly--the horrendous wound he'd suffered from the Shyi still hadn't completely healed yet--the Twilight King left the den and flew to the FireWings' capital.

The FireWings were happy to see their King. Their appointed Sentinel--one of three dragons who made up the Twilight Sentinels, an elite trio created to protect the Twilight Imperium in absence of the semigods--greeted Baldirak and filled him in on various happenings deemed necessary to report. The Twilight Sentinels had the authority to act as stand-ins for their respective leaders, done to allow the FireWing and NightWing capitals to function as normal while Tenebris and Kenina had their focus on Twilight Spire in the early days of the alliance. Baldirak listened to the report and passed along a message from his own Sentinel. Perhaps because their King and Queen were mates, the EarthWing and FireWing Sentinels often kept in contact and consulted each other. And then the Twilight King made an unusual request: to see some FireWing nests. As he'd expected, everyone's first question was whether the Queen was expecting. At the moment, the only ones who knew of this were Vilkas and Baldirak's Royal Guards Hapax and Hamnet. Kenina hadn't sworn the three of them to secrecy, yet Baldirak had a feeling she wasn't ready to announce it just now. He'd been meaning to ask her about that... maybe today. But for now, he told the excited-looking FireWings around him that he was simply researching how FireWings made their nests, so he could conduct his building projects at Twilight Spire accordingly.

The Twilight King returned home more knowledgeable but still no closer to figuring out a nest design. There were few FireWing hybrids to be found in the heart of the territory since they couldn't handle the heat as well. Most of the nests Baldirak saw were surrounded by fire or lava. He'd learned that this was both a requirement and a preference--FireWing eggs needed to be kept warm during incubation, and the presence of fire or lava itself acted as a natural defense against predators. Baldirak wouldn't need to worry about predators. But what about the heat? Was it necessary for a hybrid egg? Surely not, or FireWing hybrids wouldn't exist. Returning to the den with a pile of leaves and grasses, Baldirak went to the mud chamber. On the flight home, he'd had an idea. Why not just create an earth nest that can be lit on fire if needed? After mixing the leaves and grasses in mud, Baldirak carried the mass to the sleeping chamber. He went to the side he and Kenina slept on the least often and began digging a hole. After three feet, he dropped the mud and foliage mixture in and used it to coat the sides and bottom. It took two more trips of gathering and mixing to create the thickness he wanted. Then, he covered the bottom with as much moss as he could find--he wanted to make sure the eggs landed on something soft.

Once he was satisfied with the nest, he sat back and studied it, tilting his head slightly to one side. Was it big enough? Baldirak laid down and curled up around the nest. His body encircled it but there was plenty of room for him to adjust his position if he wanted. But what if Kenina was the one lying beside the nest? Would there be too much room to move for her? Baldirak glanced over at his mate and wondered if he could move her over to the nest without waking her up... No, better to let her sleep. A rudely awoken dragon was not a happy dragon. He decided the size was good enough for now--besides, he didn't know if Kenina would like it--and sat up. He yawned and considered trying to sleep--at least until Kenina woke up--until he felt tremors in the earth alerting him to Vilkas' arrival. Oh well, sleep could wait. Baldirak met his nephew in the reception chamber and left with him to go attend to a dispute.