Athena settled in her den, shifting around. Her stomach was going to split with all of the weight it carried. Athena’s gentle eyes gazed around, then she emitted a sigh. She was several days overdue for her birthing. The pups inside her yearned to get out. She had been restless these past few days. She felt like a creek full with water to bursting.
Sindri’s Fire Queen stood. She could not sit anymore. She wiggled, then felt a rippling, sharp pain through her abdomen.
At first Athena thought it was one of the babies kicking. Again. For the past few days, they had been kicking, kicking, kicking. Sometimes, she swore they were biting her. But then it happened again, strong enough to make Athena’s knees buckle.
F u c k. She wasn’t really in labor, was she?
Evidently she was. For every three or four minutes, she cursed with pain. She felt like her stomach was on fire. Or being frozen off. One of the two.

Fade in, fade out

The two girls and little boy nursed at their mother. Helene, Asmodeus, and Vryko. Athena listed their names off in her head.
They were guaranteed a bloodline. Athena had scented the smell of blood on Wendigo, metallic and thick. It’d hung over him like a cloud. So, vampirism or elementalism? Or . . . both.
Athena hoped not a single one of them was a vampiric elemental. Power like hers was a responsibility in its devastating, huge self; two would be too much. All heavens, she’d really gotten herself into a mess.
How to train a vampire to control their bloodlust? Athena had the thought, then panted breathlessly. She’d forced herself to keep quiet during the painful birth; only Cato knew of the circumstances surrounding her pregnancy. She didn’t want Icarus or Hecate or Kalon or Soliel prying.
Although, she would have to tell them eventually.
She drifted off to sleep beside her suckling children.