Chapter Twenty
Blaze
“I’m home.” As I entered the front door, I found it strange that I didn’t see Kirin watching some show on television or hear him playing with his toys downstairs.
Instead, I was met with silence. The living room was dark and only the light over the kitchen sink was on.
Though I was sure I’d seen the light on in the egg room when I’d pulled into the driveway.
After taking off my shoes and hanging up my coat, I tiptoed through the living room and down the hallway. The light was indeed on in the egg room, but I couldn’t hear anyone inside.
Had something happened? Was there an emergency and they’d had to leave right away? Surely, I would have heard about it at work. Maybe something worse happened. Perhaps the community wasn’t as trustworthy as I wanted to believe.
As I peeked around the corner, I saw Ladon and Kirin on either side of the egg, staring at it.
“What’s going on?”
“Shhh,” they both hushed me while my mate waved me over.
Ladon pointed to a crack near the top of the shell. “It happened as soon as Kirin got home from school. Like this baby is anxious to meet its big brother.”
I wrapped my arms around my mate from behind and kissed his cheek. “Well, I’m anxious to meet our baby, too.”
The egg shook.
I held my breath, understanding why they were both so quiet when I came home.
Another fracture formed, meeting the first one.
Then a peep sounded from within.
Ladon ran his hand over the egg. “Come out, little one. Come out and meet your family.”
More peeps. The egg rocked a bit. A bang from within. Then there was a hole.
It was tiny, but enough for the hatchling to dig its egg tooth into and make its way out.
I wanted to help it, open the egg up and see my child, but every dragon shifter I knew told me to let it come out on its own, that it needed that fight and that knowledge. Not for its human form but for the dragon side.
“Blankets,” I whispered, remembering that we’d need to wrap our baby once it made its first shift. “Where are the blankets?”
“Right here.” Ladon reached behind him and set them on the edge of the nest.
Kirin held out his hand to show me a metal fire truck. “I brought this to show the baby when its born, so it knows that our father is a firefighter.”
My heart warmed. It was only recently that Kirin started referring to me as his father rather than Blaze. “Remember though, the baby won’t be able to play with your toys right away. They’re too small.”
“That’s okay.” Kirin drove the truck over his palm. “I don’t want to share all my toys. Just some of them. Plus, the baby has their own toys, too.”
“Exactly.” I returned my attention to the egg, noticing something poking out of the slightly bigger hole. Our baby was trying its hardest.
A fracture split down the side. The egg shifted. Then a large piece broke off the top, revealing the little brown hatchling. It peeped and glanced around as the rest of the egg cracked away.
As the cooler air of the house reached its scales, our baby dragon went through its first shift, changing into human form. A little, pink-skinned bundle with no scales or a tail. A boy. He wouldn’t be able to shift back into his dragon form until he reached puberty.
I grabbed one of the blankets while my mate picked him up. Once we had him wrapped, Ladon held him to his chest and let him feed.
I held Kirin in my lap as we sat across from my mate and my new son. “What do you think we should name him?”
“Peep.” Kirin reached forward and ran his hand over his brother’s head. “That’s the first noise he made.”
I chuckled. “It’s a cute name, but I think your dad had a couple others in mind.”
“Brayden.” Laden glanced over at us as he wrinkled his nose. “I already told you both his name would be Brayden if he was a boy.”
I smiled, enjoying the moment with my family. Not the one I expected to have but the one that was meant to be. The one that made me and my dragon happy.