Chapter Text
It had been several weeks since the final battle.
The war between the Veilguard and the Evanuris was over, and the Veilguard had prevailed. Time had passed, and somehow, the earth kept turning when no one expected it to. The sky was still intact. Most of the dead stayed that way. Lanterns blazed green in the Grand Necropolis, lighting the old stone, and the bell continued to mark the hours with its slow, dignified sound.
And Ivy was here.
That, more than anything, remained the miracle around which Emmrich arranged his days.
She had moved into his apartment so naturally that it still surprised him when he stopped to think about it. Her books sat next to his. Her blanket draped over the chair by the hearth. A ribbon had shown up on his writing desk three days ago and stayed there, though neither of them knew where it came from. She slept in his bed, drank his tea, snuck sugared fruit from the dish in the sitting room, and somehow made the place feel, almost dangerously, like home.
He had thought peace would be solemn.
Instead, peace walked barefoot through his rooms in the morning, naked and wickedly his.
He adored her beyond sense.
So when something changed, he noticed.
On the first day, it was only tiredness.
Ivy woke later than usual, and even then, she sat at the edge of the bed before standing, one hand braced next to her, her head bowed as though the room required a moment to become trustworthy.
Emmrich paused with his hand on a button of his waistcoat.
“Dearest, did you have a restless night?” he asked.
She peered at him through the fall of her ebony hair. “Your question implies that you slept well.”
“I am not presently under discussion, my dear.”
Her smile appeared, but just a little too late. It was only a brief pause. Anyone else would not have noticed.
Emmrich understood perfectly.
By the afternoon, she seemed better. That evening, she curled up next to him on the sofa with a book in her lap and fell asleep halfway through criticising the author’s ideas concerning possession.
Emmrich lowered his gaze to her, one hand gently sweeping her hair away from her face.
Tired, he thought.
The world had almost been destroyed. Fatigue was permissible.
On the second day, she barely ate.
Her tea remained unsipped and became cold next to her. Normally, Ivy drank tea with the determination of someone holding back from violence, but this time she left it until a thin film formed on top of it. She took one bite of toast and set it down, as if it had let her down.
Emmrich peered over the edge of his cup.
“I have seen dead bodies with more eagerness for food,” he stated calmly.
“That says a great deal about the company you keep.”
“Undoubtedly. My professional circle is endlessly stimulating.”
Ivy smiled at his dry humour, but her hand moved down to her stomach. She rested her palm there for a second, smoothing out her clothes as if to calm a worry she had not yet realised.
Emmrich’s focus intensified, though no comment came from him.
At lunch, the smell of roasted vegetables made her pause in the doorway for a brief moment. Then she recovered and walked. She mumbled under her breath about the weather being invented just to get on her nerves.
By supper, he had begun arranging the details in his mind.
She seemed tired. Maybe slightly nauseous. She was sensitive to smells and had little appetite. Rested a hand over her stomach more times than he could count.
He had not spoken yet.
He could have asked her a hundred questions, but that would have been careless. Ivy was not a problem to solve out loud before thinking it through.
So Emmrich watched her.
He observed her with the same intensity as one strains to hear a shift in breath in the darkness. Genuine love makes you sensitive to the most subtle signs of a person’s health, especially when those signs are out of the ordinary for them.
That night, she stood facing the window in his sitting room, a single arm folded loosely across herself, the other hand resting low against her middle again.
A thought came to him.
Quietly at first.
Pregnant.
It was not a sure thing—not exactly. It was a possibility so brilliant that he almost turned away from it.
A child.
Their child.
Not yet, he had belittled himself.
Emmrich kept himself from getting carried away. He understood the difference between speculation and certainty. The physical form presented complications. Tiredness could look like many things. After war, fear, and grief, the body could be unpredictable.
Still, the thought persisted.
On the third morning, Ivy woke up pale.
Her pallor was subtle, not enough for immediate observation by others. However, Emmrich noticed the weariness on her face, the deliberate manner in which she sat upright, and the way she shut her eyes after sipping the drink he offered.
He sat next to her.
She looked at him for a moment, sleep still softening her features, then frowned.
“What?”
“You ask that as though I have accused you of something.” His mouth curved faintly, and he took her hand. “My darling, I need to inform you of what I suspect.”
Her gaze became clouded with concern. “Emm, that opening is awful.”
“For three days straight, you have been experiencing tiredness. You’ve barely had anything to eat. Certain smells have unsettled you. You appear paler than I prefer, and you’ve been touching your stomach when you thought no one was watching.”
Her lips parted.
He continued gently. “And unless I am very much mistaken, you are late.”
Ivy went very still.
There.
The moment the understanding reached her.
He watched it pass across her face: confusion first, then denial, then a fragile dawning that appeared nearly too delicate for the sunlight. Her free hand moved slowly to rest over her stomach.
“I hadn’t…” Her voice thinned. “I hadn’t even thought.”
Emmrich kissed her fingers.
“How did I not think?” Tears had already started welling in her eyes.
“My love, you have been recovering. And it’s because you’re incredibly skilled at overlooking your own discomfort until it becomes undeniable to everyone around you.”
A small, breathless noise escaped her. Somewhere between half laugh and half sob.
“You think I’m pregnant?”
His throat contracted.
“I think,” he said, and there his voice relinquished its perfect smoothness, “you might be carrying our child.”
Silence followed.
It was not empty. It was alive, the type that made the fire seem to burn more quietly in the fireplace.
“Can we… how can we know?” she asked.
The thought of something practical helped him feel steadier. “There are alchemical tests. The old methods work well enough if they are conducted correctly. The first sample of the morning is best.”
Her stare found his. “You can make one?”
At that, some of the tension eased from his face.
“My heart, I have identified funerary poison from just three grains of residue and the odour of burnt citrus. I would be ashamed if I could not handle this.”
She laughed at once, though tears slipped down her cheeks while she did.
He reached up and brushed them away with his thumbs.
“And if you’re wrong?” she whispered.
“Then I am wrong,” he shrugged. “We might be disappointed, or even relieved. Both may be possible. But listen to me when I tell you this, my darling, nothing will change between us.”
That much, at least, he could give her honestly.
What he did not say was that hope had already settled within his chest, and sawn had never seemed so far away.
*****
Emmrich did not sleep. Slumber remained elusive. He lay next to Ivy through the long, quiet hours and listened to the sounds of the apartment around them.
He heard the old stone settling, the soft crackle of the fire, and Ivy’s slow, warm breathing beside him.
At the first greying of dawn, he moved out of the bed.
Ivy murmured at the loss of the comfort of his arms embracing her, but did not wake. Emmrich lingered next to her. Her hair lay dark on the pillow. One shoulder had slipped free of the blanket. In sleep, without wit or defiance to armour her, she looked younger. Softer. Dearer than anything the world had any business allowing him to keep.
He drew the blanket carefully over her.
“Stay warm, my love,” he whispered as he kissed her forehead.
Then he went to prepare the test.
The worktable near the sitting-room window had been arranged the night before with scrupulous care. A white ceramic bowl. Two narrow phials. A spoon. Mortar and pestle. Various dried herbs.
After a split-second hesitation, he opened the little cedar box he kept in the secured drawer of his desk.
Within lay a small paper packet of dried Shroud’s Kiss petals.
If this morning were to become one of the cherished mornings of his life, then let the old ritual have something beautiful in it.
His hands were steady while he worked. That, at the very least, he could control. He ground the herbs into dust and added other items in careful measure. The petals went in last, brittle and silver-white, dissolving slowly beneath the pestle.
Outside the window, the Necropolis lamps continued to burn in solemn rows, though the sky beyond them had begun to pale.
Behind him, the bedroom door opened.
He turned immediately.
Ivy stood in the doorway wearing his robe, tied poorly at the waist, her hair loose and sleep-tangled around her shoulders.
For a moment, all the herbs, bowls, and preparations faded into the background. What mattered most was that she was there.
“I was rather hoping you would slumber a little longer,” he said.
“I didn’t like waking up to you not being there.” Ivy rubbed her eyes and came to kiss Emmrich on the cheek. “And I really have to pee.” Her gaze travelled over the table, then returned to him, more tender now, and more apprehensive. “Is it ready?”
“Nearly.”
He presented the delicate glass container to her, handling it with all the grace the item permitted.
“I’m afraid this is the part of the process where romance has to take a short break.”
Ivy stared at the vessel in his hand.
Then, despite the tension in her face, she laughed.
“Only you,” she said, taking it from him, “could make that sound tender.”
Emmrich cupped Ivy’s cheek just as she was about to head to the bathroom.
“No matter what happens, my dear,” he murmured gently, “we’ll go through it together.”
Her eyes shone.
“I love you.” Her lip quivered.
“I love you, too.”
The wait was unbearable.
Ivy returned and positioned her sample beside the basin with remarkable care.
Emmrich took the spoon.
There were moments like this. He believed that life presented numerous significant occasions, such as battles, funerals, solemn vows, and public commitments witnessed by others and a stone.
A room at dawn. A bowl. His sleeve became Ivy’s anchor as her hand seized it.
He added the sample to the tincture, measured carefully, and then stirred.
The liquid clouded.
Ivy drew in a breath as she watched.
At first, there was no colour. Only the pale swirl of herbs and dust turned in the bowl like a strange haze. Then, very slowly, a ring of tint appeared at the surface.
Faint at first.
Then deepening.
Gold spread in thin lines, like sunrise mixing with milk.
Emmrich stopped breathing.
There was no ambiguity in it.
Positive.
Ivy looked from the bowl to him.
“Emmrich?”
He set the spoon down with extreme care.
His hands were shaking, and he found that inconvenient.
“My love,” he said.
His speech failed him.
He tried again.
“My dearest heart, you are pregnant.”
For one suspended heartbeat, she did not move.
Then her hand flew to her mouth, and a cry escaped her.
“Oh.”
It was such a small word. Inadequate for what had just happened, for how the room appeared different, for how the dawn seemed bigger, and for how Emmrich felt himself change inside.
Ivy came into his arms on a shaking breath, and he gathered her close with both hands. She clung to him, laughing and crying together, her face pressed into his shirt.
He closed his eyes against her hair.
Pregnant.
Their child.
He had spent much of his life dealing with endings. He knew the names of old kings, the rituals of funerals, and the feel of a hand cooling before the soul left the body.
However, this…
This small golden answer in a bowl.
The woman he loved in his arms.
This life beginning so quietly beneath his hands.
He did not know how to contain it.
“My love. My dearest heart.” Emmrich kissed her crown, one hand rubbing soothing circles on her back as she wept. “For days I had hoped this to be true.”
Then she was crying again, and he was kissing her forehead, her cheeks, the corner of her mouth, every tear he could reach before she caught his face between her hands and kissed him properly.
“Does this make you happy?” She moved back slightly to get a better look at him, her cheeks glistening with tears. “Is this what you want, Emmrich?”
He stared at her.
“Happy?” he repeated softly. “My dear girl, I am thrilled. I am so delighted I scarcely know what to do with myself.”
That made her cry harder.
He smiled, despite his own eyes had begun to fall, and wiped her tears away with both thumbs.
“There now,” he uttered, though his own voice was hardly more steady than hers.
He did not mean to or decide to, but his hazel eyes moved to her stomach as if pulled there.
Nothing had changed. No curve. No visible sign. Only Ivy, in his robe, warm beneath his hands, alive with a secret so new that the world had not yet learned how to show it.
His breath halted.
Carefully, slowly, he lowered himself to his knees before her.
Ivy’s fingers tightened in his hair almost immediately.
“Emm...”
His hands came to her waist first. Reverent as he loosened the robe just enough to press his palm against the thin fabric over her lower stomach.
Still flat.
Still ordinary.
Only now it held the centre of his world.
His composure broke.
His shoulders dropped and his breath left him as if he were giving in. Ivy’s fingers moved through his hair, soothing and shaking.
“Our child,” he spoke quietly.
Above him, Ivy made a small sound.
Then, as if making a vow and filled with astonishment, Emmrich bowed his head and kissed her stomach.
“Hello, little one.”