Thunder From Heaven

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"So," Lupin said tiredly, flopping back onto the couch with a resounding cry of indignant springs. His armful of cub stirred with a childish impression of a world-weary sigh, and Lupin found himself liking the sound for its lack of realism. At least Fern's cubhood hadn't been entirely spoiled.

"It's just you and I now, I suppose."

"'S okay, Tala Lupin," the cub reassured softly, shifting again. His cheek resting against Lupin's cloth-draped belly felt warm and yielding. "I"ll be good, an' 'll take care o' you an' Scammony, too."

He paused.

"An' Da... Da'll be okay."

"You don't have to worry, Lupin, Sorrel will be okay. He's just got a little cold, he'll be over it in a few days..."

"Of course he will," Lupin agreed in a strained whisper, hardly sure who it was he was agreeing with. "He'll be fine. We'll just... wait for him here. He said we should do our best, remember? Keep the house for him while he's gone, and not worry."

"I r'member, Tala Lupin."

They subsided into silence. The clock on the wall ticked with a rhythm halfway between comfort and annoyance.

Tired, Sineult had said. Was this how it was going to go? Just a little tired in the morning, and by afternoon he'd been running a fever like the cubs before him, and his throat had dried out so that he could hardly speak and still, he'd refused to drink anything until Onyx reminded him of their cubs' health. He had drunk a few swallows of water then, and his valiant attempt had been met by a quick trip to the bathroom, Onyx leaning over him to hold his sweat-soaked hair out of his face while he hacked up breakfast along with the meagre cupful of liquid. That was when Onyx had told Lupin he was taking his mate back.

Onyx had called in sick to Sineult's little flowershop job, which he had still been going to every morning, dutifully. He wouldn't be going in again soon. Then the redhead had called in to whatever higher powers he worked for, too, and spent most of an hour in argument with them to change deadlines. In the meantime, Sineult had curled up on the living room couch and tried with near pathetic anxiety to not breathe on anything, 'in case he left germs behind'. He had issued a few orders across the room (being sure to warn Fern and Lupin away whenever he thought they might be too close) to his brother: keep Fern well fed, keep the house, as well as he could anyway because Sineult didn't really mind if it got a little dirty, he just didn't want them to get sick while he was gone because of a dirty house. Make sure Fern didn't get burned in the kitchen. Make sure that he picked up his toys, every night before bed. Keep up their hope.

Lupin was very sure that he could handle every one, except maybe the last.

Then there was Fern to look after, because, though Fern hadn't seemed to be badly upset by this newest development, one could never tell with cubs. Lupin didn't want worry or fear to bottle up inside Sineult's son like it did inside himself. He wanted to talk with the cub as much as he could; perhaps, over time, that would help both of them.

But for now, there was supper to be cooked. After that there would be housework, and he might give Fern a bath, and maybe, if he could find enough things to do, he would be too tired to worry or dream by the time night came.

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The knocking on the door had turned into pounding by the time Sedge got to the door and pulled it open. Onyx's pale, anxious, upturned face greeted him. The scent of pregnancy overlaid with the bitter, spoiled-meat scent of sickness assaulted Sedge's nose, making it suddenly loathsome for the cub-bearer to breathe. Onyx's mate's straw-yellow hair was loud against the drab green of his paint-smudged shirt.

"Sineult's sick," Onyx blurted breathlessly, his voice cracking over the sentence. He had the younger Kindred slung limply in his embrace, as if too weak even to hold muscle tone, and the cub-bearer's breathing didn't sound too well. Swallowing back the need to throw up, Sedge opened the door wider.

"Da's in the back," he managed to offer. "But you shouldn't- I mean, they're moving some more in, so you shouldn't take him back there. Sit down, I'll go get him." With that he fled, gulping down frustrated tears and hoping that Onyx didn't notice how eager he was to get away.

Jessamine had explained during the long talk they'd all had when Sedge and Oak first brought their twins over, about Lupin and Sineult's pregnancies, mostly to explain why Lupin was no longer there in a house where he had been a constant fixture for about five years now, but Sedge had never considered that the pregnant ones might fall ill. A few days before he hadn't even known that Sineult was pregnant, and now here he was, cubs and all, getting ready to die. Though Sedge knew that it wasn't fair to think that way, it was so hard to be upbeat. There was such a little chance of anyone pulling through safe, considering the way the situation was heading, and every new patient felt like one more reason why his own twins wouldn't possibly pull through. It hurt to think that way. It felt like a betrayal of his cubs.

He peeked in through the three doors one by one, and of course Jessamine was on the other side of the last one, still turning two of the cubs into their new beds, not knowing what was waiting for him at the opposite end of the hallway. Sedge, caught up deep thought, hardly even saw which cubs it was.

"Onyx is here," he breathed instead, and began to relate the rest, but Jessamine was already passing through the open door, alarm printed plainly on his face and in the strained lines of his retreating back. Sedge followed him back out, feeling the sick, churning feeling of someone mesmerised by a frightening or disgusting experiment. He didn't want to go back out there. His feet wouldn't let him stay.

"Who is it?" Jessamine wanted to know. Their feet tapped out rapid tattoos on the floor of the hall as they walked almost at a run of panic, and Sedge couldn't exactly think around the noise of that and his own thoughts, yet somehow managed to come up with the desired answer.

"Sineult, it's Sineult. He's carrying him-"

"Carrying him? Did you ask how long he's been sick?"

"No, I didn't," Sedge quavered, feeling suddenly stupid and hating it. "They just got here. 'M sorry..."

But Jessamine waved an impatiently reassuring hand. "All right. I can ask. He'll need a bed, though, and I just took up all of ours except for the ones we're using. Do you think you could double up with Jade, maybe? You don't want to sleep in Mem's bed. I can move him out on the couch, I guess, or I can take it. We'll just need to free up the bed in the room Mem's using, because it's clean, no pictures or knickknacks or immovable furniture. Closest to the others, too."

"O- okay," Sedge stammered, wondering what in the world his da-in-law had just said. Jessamine must be in as much confusion as Sedge himself, the younger cub-bearer mused, and was a little ashamed to find that it made him less unhappy.

There was no more time to concentrate on feeling much of anything after that, because the two slid out of the windowless shade of the hall into the warmer colours of late afternoon, soaking the living room carpet in rich gold and the pair occupying the couch in the middle of it all in a bright corn-yellow glow. Onyx's head, bent tiredly over his mate's, caught the sun in a halo and became licked with flame.

"Onyx?"

At the sound of Jessamine's voice, Onyx lifted his head. The flames receded from about his face, leaving it shadowed, with more than just the darkness of the physical world.

"Sineult's sick," he said again without prelude, sounding rather like an exhausted, bewildered cub. "He said this morning that he felt a little achy. By lunchtime he had a fever, so I thought I should bring him here. I had to get off work. He's sleeping now..." His head drooped again. "I should've brought him sooner."

"It wouldn't have done you any good. There's not that much I can do," Jessamine told him softly and honestly. "I can give him an opening, but I can't make him pull through. The cub will make him work for that. Sineult is stubborn, and he wants this cub. Just remember that."

Onyx sighed. "All right. I'll try. But can I stay with him? I mean, I want to, but I left Fern and Lupin alone at the apartment, and I don't know if I should leave them there... But I can't keep running back and forth." The redhead shifted to look more closely at his tana, his blue eyes pleading for an answer. "Do you think Lupin will be okay by himself? Taking care of a cub's not easy. Fern will do his best to behave, but I don't know... And Sineult won't want me to leave them if they're not okay."

"I think they'll be fine," Jessamine said, nodding decisively. "For tonight, at the least. Lupin's taken care of his share of cubs since he moved in here, and while I think you're right and it may wear on him, especially in his condition, one night won't hurt. Fern is good at taking care of his da, and he'll do the same for Lupin. Maybe later we can find somewhere closer for them to stay. I think a few of the new ones who just came over would be happy to take them home, and I know they'll take good care of them."

Onyx's forehead crinkled. "Who just came in?"

"Birch and Topaz fell sick earlier. Willow's down with it too - he's the Rantes' healer, do you remember him?"

Looking mystified, Onyx shook his head.

"Ah, well. Neither did your brother. He used to drop by the shop often, when you two were little cubs, before the humans got all enamored with buying herbs. He knew your da well, and now that Birch and Oak and Pine have all married Rantes, we've gotten a lot more acquainted." Jessamine sighed, rubbing at his own head.

"At any rate, I trust them. They would take good care of Fern and Lupin, and their homes are a little closer than yours. They live in the country on the other side, further from the city. Willow and his husband, Heather, keep a nice big farm. They deal with the paperwork and the government and all of it, which is more than I could do without being found out or losing my mind."

"Maybe... that would be best, then," Onyx replied softly, when he had thought it over for a minute. "I'll have to think about it."

"That can wait a little while. For now, you sit here with Sineult while I go and get you some of the medicine we've been handing out. Sedge, go tell Mem and all to clean out his guest room, would you?"

Quickly, Sedge nodded. The scent in the room was starting to be overpowering, so he couldn't understand how Jessamine could talk so calmly through it. It was like being in the room with a dying cub, a miscarrying cub-bearer, or a birth so hard that it sucked the very life from both parent and cub. Sedge was only too happy to go in search of his husband and comfort.

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