Epilogue
An unexpected spring blizzard raged outside, the wind howling and pelting the longhouse with ice and snow.
Before Eadlyn had introduced him to God, Aevar would have seen it as a bad omen.
Even now, he struggled not to let those feelings take hold.
He sat unmoving at the center of it all, hunched forward at the main table, hands clasped before him.
He stared at the flames in the hearth, but he wasn’t really seeing them.
Eadlyn had gone into labor just after dawn.
Now the sun had long since vanished behind storm-darkened clouds, and it had to be well past midnight.
Her cries echoed from their room in waves, every one of them striking Aevar like a blade to the gut.
He couldn’t ignore them, and yet they were agony to hear.
Around him, his father and brothers, Kian, and Heida sat in uneasy silence. They spoke occasionally in hushed tones, but every time a cry came, the words died on their tongues. Their faces were drawn and subdued. Even Braan sat with his fingers laced, bouncing one knee in a tense rhythm.
Aevar struggled to breathe and tried to pray instead. He had whispered more prayers since this morning than he could count, but his thoughts kept slipping back into old, familiar darkness. The day he had lost Thora and Brenna. The silence. The grief. The shattering.
He clenched his jaw and reached up to grab the silver cross at his neck, pressing it hard into his palm. Please. Spare her. Spare our child. Let this time be different.
Footsteps approached. Aevar looked up as his father crossed the floor, a mug in one hand.
He offered it without a word. Steam curled from the warm ale.
Aevar accepted it out of habit more than want, took a sip, and set it aside.
His father didn’t speak, just placed a firm hand on his shoulder and gave it a squeeze. The weight steadied him.
Another cry came from beyond the door, this one longer and harsher. Aevar gripped the edge of the table hard. He bowed his head, forcing himself to breathe, to trust. A moment passed. Then another sound—piercing and unfamiliar. A cry, but not Eadlyn’s.
Aevar froze. The world narrowed to that sound alone. Thin and new but powerful. A baby’s cry. It came again, more forcefully now. Not the weak, fading whimper Brenna had made before the silence. No. This was a shout to the world that life had arrived.
Aevar pushed to his feet, barely able to stand under the weight of hope swelling in his chest. Around him, the others broke into smiles and muted cheers, but Aevar couldn’t celebrate yet. Not until he saw them both. Not until he knew.
The minutes that followed were a blur of pacing, heart-thundering silence, and unanswered questions. He kept his attention always on the door.
Finally, it opened.
Móthir stood there, her face aglow. She motioned to him. “Come.”
Aevar didn’t hesitate. He rushed across the hall and followed her into the room.
Immediately, he found Eadlyn. She lay propped against a pile of pillows, her skin pale and glistening with sweat, strands of hair clinging to her face.
She looked spent. Fragile. His heart nearly stopped, but her eyes met his, and in them he saw strength. And joy.
“I’m all right.” Her voice was soft and full of everything words could never say.
Aevar crossed the room in two strides. The fear in him hadn’t released until this moment. He sank down beside her on the bed, and for a breath he just stared at her, drinking in her smile. Then he looked down.
Wrapped in soft linens and cradled in her arms was a tiny, perfect face with a dark crown of downy hair. The baby’s eyes were closed, cheeks flushed from the effort of birth, a tiny fist pressed near its mouth. Wonder struck him as if it were the first time all over again.
He reached out with trembling hands, and Eadlyn passed the child into his arms.
“Meet your daughter. Eliana. ‘My God has answered’.”
They had decided on the name months ago, choosing to trust God would indeed answer their prayers for a healthy child and safe delivery, and He had.
The weight of her, so small, yet so real, stole Aevar’s breath away.
Tears caught in his throat, and he swallowed them down hard as he pressed a kiss to his daughter’s brow.
She shifted in his arms and let out a soft, sleepy murmur before settling back into stillness.
Eadlyn reached for his hand, and he took it, their fingers knotting together like the final thread in a tapestry only God could have woven.
Together, they sat there in the lamplight, the blizzard raging beyond the walls, but within this room was only warmth. Only love.
Only answered prayers.