Chapter Thirty-One
The party wound down before four a.m., and the house finally settled into a quiet sleep. Nobody had yet achieved REM when a bloodcurdling scream split the night.
“What the fuck?” Emesh sat upright, so fast he could have fallen out of bed. He groped for Douglas to make sure his mate was okay and got a heart-pounding reassurance.
“I’m good. But Emesh, does this happen often?” Douglas’ voice emerged thick with sleep, but Emesh knew he’d be ready to grab arms if necessary. The scream came again, high pitched and feminine. “That doesn’t sound like sex,” Douglas gulped.
“No. It doesn’t.” Emesh opened his head to the household, and the chatter hit him, panoptic.
I’m coming.
Get him…quickly.
All hands to me. Marduk’s voice called, and Emesh wanted to instantly obey, but Douglas hadn’t been given lessons in misting out yet. The summer god gave his mate quick physical directions.
“Anshar’s room, third one down the hall to the left,” he snapped before he disappeared.
Emesh popped into pandemonium. Marduk and Enlil were in the process of trying to subdue an extremely irate Anshar, who had morphed into his golden serpent persona. Emesh shifted his eyes to the bed where a hugely pregnant Lenore was attended to by Dr. Dani-Lee. Oh, gods. Anshar’s lady had gone into labor.
The gods had only witnessed this once before when Tess had given birth to Girin, and it had been totally fucked. As soon as Tess’s labor pains began, her husband, Marduk, had been overcome by the same pain, and he’d nearly destroyed the house before being restrained. Clearly, that’s what happened to Anshar now. Marduk ordered the them to subdue and drag away the snarling, combative god-creature.
“To the dungeons,” he panted. The serpent, now fully turned, put up one hell of a fight. More brothers joined the fray, and Emesh threw himself in with vigor.
“If we can get him to the chains…” Enlil got an elbow to the head, knocking him back on his ass. His wife, Candy, growled at the nonsense. She stepped forward and gave Anshar a good, hard punch, right in his dripping snout.
“That’s enough, beast-boy,” she growled. “Now, you behave yourself and let your friends chain you up, so we can take care of Lenore.” Somehow, she must have gotten through to him because his fight lessened by the time Douglas appeared in the doorway, and an entire contingent of gods muscled the Anshar-serpent in that direction.
You’d better move, Douglas. Lenore’s in labor and Anshar is sharing her pain and not doing well with it. He’s turned into the beast that lives inside him. We’re headed to the dungeon to chain him up.
I think I’ll pass on joining you in the dungeon.
Emesh understood where Douglas came from on that.
If you need me, I’ll be in the kitchen. It looks like it’s going to be a long morning and warmed up party leftovers will come in handy.
My thanks, Douglas, Absu replied. Normally in charge of food, he gripped one large dorsal fin, and couldn’t let go. I will join you presently once Anshar has been dealt with.
“I’ll keep you company,” Dagon grinned and slapped Douglas on the back. Anshar’s cousin had arrived late to the scene and didn’t join the escort, so he too volunteered for kitchen duty.
The restrainers―with the Anshar-beast in tow―turned to go, leaving the rest to attend to Lenore on the bed. The ladies shook their heads as the men dragged the serpent away. Damn. Emesh was very glad he would never have to experience his mate giving birth.
They fought and coerced Anshar all the way down the elevator to the bottom floor, unable to make him ‘poof’ in his present form. Probably for the best. In his state, gods know where he’d turn up. No. This was a matter of physically maneuvering him to a place where everyone would be safe until his shared labor pains wound down.
Douglas had been right. It would be a long morning.
The group eventually fastened the last of the locks on the dungeon cell―both lock and jail bars being made of osmium, the only metal impervious to a god’s strength―when a new sound split the air. Not quite as blood-curdling as the scream that had come from Lenore’s throat, it resounded loudly and none-the-less dramatic in its intensity.
“Now what?” Marduk took stock of the direction of the yell. It didn’t come from Lenore’s direction. Tess? What’s going on upstairs? Marduk sent it broadband.
Looks like something’s in the air this morning. Holly is going into labor too. Better lock up Dagon.
“Ahh, damn,” Marduk sighed and ran a hand through his dark hair before stiffening.
Holy crap! The knowledge hit Emesh and the thunder god at the same time
“Shit,” The summer god howled aloud. “Dagon is with Douglas.”
The group dissipated as one upward to the kitchen.
****
Douglas held his own against the dark serpent, dancing a few feet away, brandishing a kitchen knife. “Don’t come any closer,” he soothed in a voice dead calm. “I get it. Your wife is in labor, too. Let’s have some nice clam chowder and talk about baby names. What do you say?”
A nasty growl from the Dagon-serpent had the hairs standing up on the scruff of Emesh’s neck.
“Okay, guys. On three,” Marduk whispered from behind Douglas. “One…two…three.” The gods skirted Emesh’s mate and piled onto Dagon before he knew what hit him. The dark serpent disappeared under a bunch of flailing arms, and before the boss could count to three again, the disconsolate god had been wrapped in a length of osmium chain, unable to get his clawed hands free.
“Smart thinking, Marduk,” Enlil gestured his head toward the thick links, and Emesh, along with the others, gaped, astonished that the thunder god had maintained the presence of mind to grab a set of chains from the basement before taking leave of the dungeon.
“Thanks. Let’s wrangle him to the basement and give Anshar some company today,” Marduk smirked. “They can talk about fish…or whatever the hell serpents snarl at each other. I’m tired of this cluster-fuck,” he groused. “Anyone else going rogue on me?” He gave the evil eye to Enten, who quickly held up both hands.
“Glory’s not due for another two months. I’m cool.”
“Yeah,” Marduk lifted a lip at Enten, “that’s what I’m worried about.”
Emesh brought a hand to his mouth. He hadn’t thought of it before, but multiple-birth labor pains for Glory and Enten were going to suck. And when it came time for winter’s children to be born, the group should plan ahead. July would be no time for the world to get hit with a blizzard. Care would have to go into planning for the birth of the twins.
By the time Dagon had been dragged off and secured, a haggard group sat in various spots around the kitchen, mainlining coffee and grumbling. Every now and then, one of the women would make an appearance with an abrupt shake of her head, grab ice or some such thing from an appliance, and disappear back upstairs.
Charlie eventually stalked in, concern all over her face as she grabbed her husband, Absu and dragged him to his feet. “Sweetie. In the confusion, neither of us checked on Maity.” She was clearly as upset with herself as with her husband at their oversight. “She’s been upstairs, hiding under her bed this whole time.”
Emesh stole a glance at the clock. Nine a.m. Nearly three years old, but way beyond her years, the poor kid would have been terrified for five hours. Emesh heart sank that no one remembered her.
“I finally found her and told her what happened which calmed her a little, but she needs to be out of here before things ramp up.” Charlie stabbed a finger at the morning paper that sat on the table in front of them. “I saw an ad yesterday. There’s a circus in town. I think they have a show at ten. Can you take her and get her mind off things here?”
Absu wrapped his arms around Charlie, hugging her close. “Of course, I will, sweetheart. And I’m sorry.”
Charlie’s shoulders slumped. “It’s more my fault than yours. I got…caught up.”
Absu gave another squeeze and looked around at the brothers. “It’s nobody’s fault,” he assured them all, then neatly turned the subject. “Who wants to join me at the circus? I would relish company on my excursion.”
“Count me in.” Ishkur loved his little, many, many times granddaughter and had the perk of being solid around her because of blood-lines even though he had not yet found his Chosen.
Ninurta, Dumuzi, Shamash, and Lahar, the remaining invisibles quickly agreed to the journey as well. Anything to get out of the house.