Bloodwash [Merodi/Kimi/Kenta]

[Aiko]

Koga instantaneously whipped around to face his gathering demons, who were already congregating around their leader and his mate with anxiety lined on their faces. [brown]“You heard her!”[/brown] the lead demon barked. [brown]“Get your sorry selves out of here and give her some privacy!”[/brown] There was a flurry to obey, and a mass of lean brown bodies streaming for the waterfall and the rain that awaited them beyond. In less than a minute, the cave was empty of all but the last fleeing hindquarters of the stragglers, who had gotten left behind in the rush, and it left the cavern feeling uncannily and unnervingly empty and unfriendly; Koga suppressed a shiver as he set his light eyes on his mate’s pained face.

Outside, the rest of the wolf demon tribe pressed together, some finding meager shelter under rocky outcroppings but most of them being soaked to their tanned skin. Sporadic shivers ran through the demons as they wrapped lean arms around themselves or fluffed out thick brown coats. Those who wore armor found that it did nothing to keep them warm from the elements, and the metal quickly grew cold. The hides they wore rapidly soaked and clung to their muscular bodies, but nevertheless, they leaned in on one another, muttering. “Merodi’s going to give birth now.” “No, that can’t be right.” “Sister? Giving birth? Really?” “It has to be!” “Shut up, you don’t know nothin’ about babies!” And it was in this way that the rumors spread amongst the whispering, shivering wolf demons as they waited to be let back into the warmth of the cave.

[ooc: If Sessh wants to skip ahead, we might as well have her give birth…]

[Lord Sesshomaru]

((good idea! XP))

Maybe later Merodi would feel guilty of sending all the wolf members, her 'brothers' into the rain. Maybe a lot later. She was occupied elsewhere. She barely even remembered how long she had pushed, how long the pain had lasted, how long she was drained of energy until that child was born, finally released from her.

Merodi collapsed in exhaustion, closing her eyes. The baby was crying and she smiled. Good and healthy. She just knew it. She wanted to sit up and hold hew new born, but she was too tired to move. She just looked up at Koga.

((don't know what i'm doing DX sorry))

[Aiko]

[ooc: I’ve never had children so I wouldn’t know… XD]

It was so… messy. Giving birth was, anyway. If Koga had even a slightly weaker constitution, he might have passed out. As it was, he hesitated, his cramped leg muscles bunched underneath him, staring at the wriggling, wailing, wet-looking baby. But after a moment, his heart went out to it, and in spite of whatever got onto his hands, he picked it up, stretching his unwilling muscles. It hurt to unbend his legs, but then he was holding the baby, looking down at it with a look of wonder in his widening blue eyes.

He looked down at Merodi, and realized his mate had been staring up at him. [brown]“It’s a girl,”[/brown] he said. The first thing that came to mind. He looked at his mate, and then looked at the baby. His daughter. A finger of some unidentifiable emotion – or perhaps it was several emotions – stroked the wolf demon’s spine. [brown]“So… do I clean her or what?”[/brown] he wondered aloud.

[Lord Sesshomaru]

A girl...

Merodi breathed out a wistful sigh. A girl. A little girl. She stared at the baby in Koga's arms. Hearing her daughter cry she was sure there was something she was supposed to do. Slowly she stood herself up, having a makeshift pillows to help herself keep straight. She reached out and took the baby from Koga.

"Yes, go get some water..." the deer's voice was a hushed whisper, her eyes on only her child as she cradled the baby in her arms. She gently wiped away the mess from the little girls face and mouth. She hummed softly to the baby.

"Tempa...that will be your name."

[Aiko]

A daughter. I have a daughter.

It was a hard thought to get used to, even though Koga had had a few months to get used to Merodi being pregnant. As his mate took the baby – his baby, he reminded himself with a growing swell of pride – from his arms, he leapt to his feet, eager to obey. He rooted around in the piles of stuff left behind when his wolves had evacuated the cave until he came across a half-full water skin. He was at the waterfall in a flash, collecting the spray until the skin was brimming. With his keen hearing and an empty cave, the wolf demon heard the gentle, melodious humming of a mother to her daughter, and heard as that daughter, his daughter, was named.

Koga returned to his mate and his daughter and he crouched down beside them. His hands were full of the pouch that brimmed with chilly water. He stared at his child for a moment, unsure of how to go about cleaning the mess from it, and waited for instruction from his mate. She knew how to take care of a baby better than he did.

[Lord Sesshomaru]

Merodi hesitantly took her eyes away from Tempa. She liked the name, she liked it a lot. She smiled, looking up at Koga as he brought them the water. She paused, adjusting the baby so she could reach up and take it from him. "And a rag." she asked, slightly uncomfortable with having her mate to do things for her.

Merodi waited until he came back, placing the baby on the soft mat at her side. She cleaned Tempa with the watered rag, gently moving it across the baby's head and shoulders.

"Do you like the name Tempa?" she asked, concentrating on her. She frowned, looking up at Koga. "I-If you don't like it we can change it..."

[Aiko]

Koga quickly went to get the rag, plus some extras to wrap his daughter in to keep her from getting cold. The father crouched by his child’s side, and his eyes softened, brows relaxing, as he stared at her tiny, still-crying head as it got cleaned by its mother. He had to tear his eyes away from the baby when Merodi addressed him.

[brown]“It’s not what I would’ve picked--”[/brown] the wolf demon said. Actually, he would’ve liked a name like Kiba or Tsume, even if they sounded like names for boys. Something fierce-sounding would’ve been fitting for the child of the leader of the wolf demon tribe. But then, wary of hurt feelings on Merodi’s part, Koga amended, [brown]“Yeah. Yeah, I like it. Tempa.”[/brown] The wolf demon gazed back down at the soft head of Tempa, his daughter. A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth, corners that for so long had been turned down with anxiety. Hesitantly, he stretched his rough hand forward to pat the baby on the forehead. [brown]“My little Tempa,”[/brown] he murmured softly, in a voice almost akin to the one he normally reserved for Tempa’s mother.

And then the wolf demon’s gentled blue eyes turned back to Merodi. [brown]“She’s beautiful,”[/brown] he whispered, seeing that better now that the baby was semi-clean. [brown]“If she’s lucky, she’s gonna look just like her mom.”[/brown] At that, Koga sidled over, scooting close to Merodi so he could lean his cheek on Merodi’s soft, fuzzy shoulder for a moment. But even as he did, he remembered something.

Or rather, someone.

Or, to be more specific, several someones.

[brown]“Do you think the tribe can come back in now?”[/brown] he asked, turning his light eyes on his deer demon mate’s face.

[shokyo]

Kimi walked back to the cave, the waterfall covering it's entrance, and stopped. Why is everyone outside? hearing their comotion she added Oh.. Walking over to the wolf demons she asked one of them "Did Merodi...uh.. give birth or somthing?" she asked them, still woundering if there was another reason why every one was out here in the rain.

[Lord Sesshomaru]

Merodi frowned for a moment. What would have have picked? Should they have talked it through? The worry only lasted for a moment and he seemed fine with the name. With the baby clean she wrapped her arm, keeping her warm as she brought Tempa to her chest.

Merodi smiled, she couldn't seem to stop doing so. She enjoyed the time spent with her new family. Her mate and her child. Just the three of them, and the quiet serene moment. She blinked, suddenly remembering the others when he spoke. Frowning, she suddenly felt self-concious. She probably looked horrible!

"I-I guess they should..." The urge to fix her hair and maybe do a little pampering made her nervous...

[Aiko]

Outside, soaked from the raging elements even though the rain was by then lightening, the wolf demons farthest from the cave turned to greet Kimi as she joined their ranks, though only a few bothered to puzzle over why she hadn’t been inside with the rest of them. “We don’t know,” one said.

“I’ll bet she did, though,” another added.

“Shut up! ‘Course she didn’t! She’s probably having another one of her mood swings!” a third argued.

The wolf demons bickered amongst themselves, half forgetting their newest member if she didn’t add her own opinions to the argument, until Koga leapt out from the spray of water from the swollen waterfall. He shook his head for a brief moment, scattering droplets from his long, dark hair, and blinked at the mass of his demons that was gathered outside the cave. The wolves, once they noticed their leader’s appearance, quieted and turned to him, only to be surprised by the broad, somewhat silly grin that stretched Koga’s face, by the lightness that tempered weariness in his brilliantly blue eyes.

Forsaking preamble, he announced, [brown]“I have a daughter, and her name is Tempa!”[/brown] He laughed throatily, heartily, and maybe a little hysterically.

In spite of their leader’s unusually mirthful mood, the rest of the wolves added their voices to cheering, though one muttered to his neighbor, “Told you Merodi was having a baby.”

As Koga spun around and leapt back into the cave, the braver wolves trickled in after him, just to be followed by the rest when the first weren’t sent back out. As the demons poured into the cave, their skin and clothing damp, they instantly made for Merodi, crowding around her and the new baby. “Is that her? Is that Tempa?” they kept asking, staring curiously at the little drying bundle in their leader’s mate’s arms. Their leader was there, too, staring down at his daughter with undisguised pride in his baby blue eyes.

[shokyo]

Kimi was the last one to walk back into the cave. Tempa...I guess thats a nice name. I wounder which side the child took she thought as she looked over at the crowd of wolf demons that gathered around Merodi. I'll see her daughter somtime... not now thought.. she sat down on the cold rocky floor closing her eyes as she layed her back against the side of the cave. She began to think about her conversation with Kenta and how Koga would react if he found out she sat and had chit chat with ,what koga calls him, the tresspasser instead of forcing him away from the lands and that she was going to meet him once a month now.

[Lord Sesshomaru]

Merodi blushed under the stares and questions of the wolf members. She wished she could clean up, get rid of this mat she was on, probably horrible to look at. She dared not to and even tried to hide it with her legs without touching the mess.

The baby cried whined and struggled in her mother's arms for a moment. Her eyes were closed but surely she could hear the sudden group of strangers. Merodi kept her eyes on the baby, placing her finger in Tempa's mouth and the child quieted, sucking on the object placed in her mouth.

"Yes, this is Tempa..."

[Aiko]

Koga smiled to himself, staring down at his daughter. Such a strange thing, that he would be a father. He would never have expected it from himself. But here, and now, it had happened! He knelt just a little behind Merodi, so he could look down at tiny Tempa with his blue eyes abnormally wide. Bending a little, he rested his chin on the deer demon’s shoulder, even though his gaze never left his daughter’s face. After a good deal of yammering on the part of the other wolf demons, the leader straightened up, giving them a stern look. [brown]“Alright, you’ve seen her. Let Merodi and Tempa have a little peace!”[/brown] Gently, he went to lift Merodi onto her feet, willing to carry her if she wasn’t able to support her own weight.

[brown]“And somebody clean this mat up!”[/brown] he ordered as he guided or carried his mate to a spare mat that was conveniently lying in a more private corner of the natural cavern.

[Lord Sesshomaru]

Merodi blushed in emberassment as she was lead away. Only worse was how noticable it was with Koga yelling. She stood on wobbly legs but handled it the best she could, holding Tempa in her arms who still sucked on her finger. She sat herself down, turning herself away from the rest of the group. She would have to get over her nerves or she'd never be able to feed Tempa with so many people around.

Through time and effort Merodi would get used to feeding Tempa, and caring for a child which she did by a whim alone. This was the times she missed her mother the most, for someone to ask if something goes wrong.