Watermelon #2
In the hallway, I catch Agents Tairui and Ailun in a brief argument about posting schedules. Their bickering has a rhythm to it now—practiced, almost comfortable. It lasts exactly three exchanges before they notice me watching and snap to attention, color rising in both their faces.
“Your Highness,” they say in unison.
“Spring wedding,” I say.
Ailun’s mouth opens to protest. Tairui suddenly finds the ceiling architecture fascinating.
I keep walking.
Tianlong finds me in my chambers, curled in his smallest form on the windowsill where the afternoon light makes his scales gleam like liquid gold. Ancient eyes fixed on something I can’t see. He does this sometimes—goes distant, like he’s watching centuries instead of scenery.
“The hatchling grows, little dawn.” he observes.
“She’s a honeydew now, apparently.”
“I do not understand your species’ obsession with measuring offspring in edible plants.”
“Neither do I. The physician seems committed to it.”
“I have been researching.” He says it like an admission. Like dragons don’t research things, and he’s been caught doing something embarrassing. His tail flicks once—the only sign of discomfort.
“Researching what?”
“Hatchlings. Human hatchlings. They are—” He pauses, ancient face arranging itself into an expression I’ve never seen before. Something like concern. “Alarmingly fragile. For the first several months, they cannot even support the weight of their own heads.”
“Yes.”
“Dragon hatchlings emerge capable of limited flight within hours. Fire-breathing takes approximately eighteen months to develop, but basic mobility is immediate.”
“Human babies emerge capable of screaming. That’s about it.”
“Fire-breathing could be a developmental goal to aspire to.”
I can’t tell if he’s joking. With Tianlong, it’s genuinely difficult to tell. Three thousand years of existence gives you a very dry sense of humor, and he’s spent most of those years watching humans make the same mistakes over and over.
“You’re worried,” I say.
“I am not worried. I am... prepared.” His tail flicks again. “There is a difference.”
I decide not to argue. Three thousand years of dignity is a lot to protect.
The pain hits at midday.
Sharp. Low. A tightening across my belly that makes me grip the edge of the table and forget how to breathe for a long, terrible moment. The room contracts to the size of that single sensation—pressure and pulling and something that feels wrong and right at the same time.
This is it. This is happening.
Four to six weeks, the physician said. Approximately. Babies don’t follow schedules—babies are chaos wrapped in potential, tiny dictators who arrive when they decide to arrive, and apparently this one has decided that “approximately” means “right now.”
“Ren,” I manage.
He’s there. Of course he’s there—he’s been within arm’s reach for weeks now, as if proximity alone can keep anything bad from happening. His hand finds mine, steady and warm and certain in a way that helps me remember how to breathe.
“The physician—”
“Already summoned. Jing sent word the moment she saw your face.”
The palace mobilizes.
Wei appears with a guard rotation that seems excessive for a birth and absolutely standard for a military operation—three units, staggered positioning, someone stationed at every corridor junction between here and the physician’s quarters.
Jing materializes with her scrolls, already cross-referencing symptoms against her research, muttering about dilation timelines and historical labor durations.
Mei simply appears, because Mei always appears when something is happening, silent and watchful and probably already running through contingencies I haven’t imagined.
The physician examines me with brisk efficiency while everyone waits and I try not to scream. Another contraction crests—stealing my breath, making my fingers dig into Ren’s hand hard enough to bruise. He doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t let go.
“False labor,” the physician announces.
The room exhales.
“False labor.”
“Braxton Hicks contractions. Very common in the third trimester.” She’s already packing up her instruments, calm as if she didn’t just sprint here expecting to deliver an imperial heir. “The body is practicing.”
Practicing.
My body is running drills. Unauthorized drills. Rehearsals for a performance I’m already dreading, without consulting me about the schedule.
“How long,” I ask, “will the... practicing... continue?”
“Until actual labor begins. Could be weeks. The contractions may become more frequent as you get closer.” She pats my hand again. “Rest. Hydrate. Try not to worry.”
Try not to worry. About the unauthorized practice contractions that feel exactly like real contractions, happening on a random schedule until whenever my body decides it’s done rehearsing.
“Wonderful.”
The room clears slowly. Wei to his perimeter checks, probably adding “false labor responses” to his briefing document. Jing to her scrolls, muttering about updating her timeline projections. Mei to whatever shadows she occupies when she’s not materializing at convenient moments.
Ren stays.
His hand is still in mine. His thumb moves against my knuckles. He doesn’t speak. He rarely speaks when speaking isn’t needed—one of the things I’ve learned about him. Silence isn’t absence. Silence is presence without pressure.
“I hate everything,” I say.
He doesn’t argue. His thumb continues to move against my knuckles—slow, steady.
“The waiting. The not knowing. The—” I gesture at my entire self, at the belly I can’t see past, at the body that’s decided to practice pain for its own amusement. “Everything.”
“I know.”
Just that. No platitudes. No reassurance. Just I know—like he’s been paying attention, like he sees exactly how hard this is and won’t insult me by pretending otherwise.
“Not you.” The words scrape out. “Never you.”
His hand tightens.
“Never you,” I say again. Quieter.
His eyes meet mine and there’s something in them that looks like everything I’m afraid to name. Not just love—I know that word now, I’ve been forced to learn it. Something bigger. Something that includes love but goes past it, into territory I don’t have maps for.
The baby kicks.
“The baby is stubborn,” he observes.
“She gets that from both of us.” I shift, trying to find a position that doesn’t make my back scream. “Well. From you.”
“I am not stubborn.”
“You waited seven months over a comma.”
“The comma was incorrect.” His voice is mild, but there’s that thread of steel underneath—the same tone he uses when discussing treaty violations.
“Seven months.”
“The construction required a semicolon. The comma fundamentally altered the meaning of the passage, creating an ambiguity that could have been exploited in future negotiations.”
“Seven. Months. Over punctuation.”
“I was right.”
“You delayed a trade agreement for half a year because you disagreed with someone’s grammar.”
“I was right,” he repeats, and now he definitely sounds like an emperor—the man who’d set a palace on fire over a correctly placed semicolon and call it a matter of principle.
“The revised document proved my interpretation was correct. The opposing ministers were forced to acknowledge the error publicly.”
“That’s stubborn.”
“That’s principled.”
“That’s stubborn disguised as principled.”
“Accuracy in language is the foundation of effective governance. A misplaced comma in a treaty can mean the difference between peace and war.”
“I’m going to enjoy watching you argue with our daughter.”
Something shifts in his expression. The stubbornness softens into something warmer, something vulnerable. “She’ll win.”
“Obviously.”
“I’ll let her.”
“Obviously.”