My mate had Dr. Ahmad remove her implant the same day. We agreed with the doctor that regular follow ups would be wise as this was the first coupling between an Ordosian and a human on record. The doctor promised to come for an in-person visit once every other month, but Serena would send her bi-weekly self-diagnostics she performed with the medical pod, which had been reconfigured to account for our unique situation.
Within 48 hours of removing the implant, all the negative symptoms my mate had displayed vanished. Two weeks later, beautiful golden scales, even more gorgeous than I had imagined, graced my female’s arms and the line of her spine. A few scattered ones adorned her pelvic area. They glimmered under the sun, making her look even more like the Ashina she was to me. I’d insisted she wear sleeveless clothes and backless dresses as often as possible for all to see the stunning manifestation of our bond. To her delight, my mate also gained a noticeable increase in physical strength and more acute hearing.
Things didn’t go too well when Serena first communicated those changes to her parents and her decision to permanently stay on Trangor. A few months went by without them so much as responding to her calls or messages. But eventually, they rebuilt those bridges. They were family.
Although Serena learned how to ride a Drayshan on her own, she mainly stuck to sharing Dagas with me, which I certainly didn’t mind. She also fully integrated with our culture and helped expand it. While most of her time was dedicated to the hunter’s work of scouting and caring for the wilderness alongside me, she spent quite a bit of time with Salha learning the caretakers’ role. And Elder Krathi took great pleasure in teaching her the lore and history of the Ordosian people.
But the biggest immersion came from touring the countless tribes of Trangor. After our return from Tulma, word of Serena’s dancing prowess had traveled quickly. Naturally, our own tribe had demanded a live performance. Serena had done a different dance than the one at our second bonding, but just as spectacular. While Ordosians weren’t a highly social people, our artistically inclined tribe members performed once every ten to twelve days on the circle. Serena officially became part of that rotation. Not only did she mesmerize us with the ribbons, she also did incredible things with a ball and with oddly-shaped sticks that she called clubs.
At first, a number of hunters from other tribes came to Krada to get a peek. But as most Ordosian females did not travel away from their village, many clamored for Serena to come to them. It would be easier anyway to allow everyone to witness firsthand her incredible talent. So, travel we did, matching those performances with the long-range scouting schedule we had already planned.
The six-month deadline came and went. Although I’d already known that Serena was fully committed to our relationship, I still breathed a lot easier when it was officially over. The following month, we authorized another Federation Hunt, this time, for a far more lethal and insidious creature than the Flayers. With an even stricter selection process, the Federation hoped—and succeeded—in avoiding any regrettable incidents this time around.
On the last day of the Hunt, Serena announced she was pregnant.
Even now, I fail to understand how the walls didn’t collapse, I shouted so loudly with joy. Needless to say, I drove my mate insane from being overly protective. My mother came to stay with us to look after my female and her soon-to-be second grandchild. This both helped and made matters worse. For all that, Serena was grateful for the support. She was stressing far more than she would admit at the thought that something could go wrong with the first human-Ordosian offspring.
To my delight, she voluntarily stepped back from any scouting runs, even at the very beginning of her pregnancy when Dr. Ahmad said it would technically be safe. Instead, my mate dove into a project she’d been toying with for a while. She began to write a detailed encyclopedia of the flora and fauna of Trangor. Beyond facts and images, she included lore and folklore related to them, stories which she had gathered from the Elders of each village we’d visited. While it had been intended for off-worlders, it also became an educational reference for our own people.
To Serena’s dismay, she experienced her first contractions around noon, exactly six months and eight days after she announced her pregnancy. Thirty-four minutes later, we welcomed our little Sethe into the world. As Ordosian pregnancies normally lasted five months, when Serena’s neared the six-month mark, we assumed it would take the full nine-months humans did. Considering the speed at which she went from the start of labor to the little one coming out, she’d feared he was premature or in distress.
But our son was beyond perfect.
I stood transfixed as I gazed upon him. I had never seen an Ordosian with black scales. His shone like obsidian. Silver scales covered the rim of his hood while a smattering of them adorned his shoulders. By its size and thickness, his long tail marked him as a hunter and hinted that he would grow as massive, if not more, as my father. Sethe looked at his mother with silver eyes, the slit-shaped pupil a little wider than usual for an Ordosian. He smiled, his tiny fangs poking out.
“He is magnificent, my mate,” I said, my throat constricted with emotion.
“He is,” she said with a nod, tears brimming in her eyes. “He’s his father’s spitting image.” She turned to look at me with a world of love in her eyes. “The day Kayog told me I had to marry an Ordosian to avoid execution, I thought my life was over. I never would have imagined it was in fact the beginning of a fairy tale. Thank you for saving my life and for committing to me when I was too blind to see that my happiness was standing right before me.”
“Thank you for giving us a chance and for giving me the family I always dreamt of but didn’t think possible,” I replied, caressing her cheek with my knuckles. “I love you, my mate.”
“I love you, too, Szaro.”
