She wasn’t as good at keeping track of her surroundings anymore, it seemed. She was completely oblivious to Tembovu’s gaze watching her as she tried to manage the tree, and Marembo was awful at his job as well as he seemed to run in the complete opposite direction of the Elephant King. As she began to push the branch onto the tree, the swiftness of Tembovu caught her off guard. “Oh – I didn’t know you could move that fast, my love.” She teased, as his concerned words reached her ears. They flickered in a slight annoyance, and she laughed it off quietly.

“I think I can handle it.” She admitted, perhaps a bit sheepishly as she went to try and move it once again – but she was stopped as Tembovu’s head reached around to stop her from moving the branch. Immediately, her brows lifted and she gave a look to Tembovu that nearly screamed ‘you’re kidding me, right?’ Did he think she couldn’t handle a simple log? (Though in all fairness, it was too large, but she wouldn’t admit it.) And suddenly, as she tried to push her pregnant body against Tembovu’s massive size, a sharp pain continued to grow even larger in her belly.

“Oh – Oh, no.” She admitted, backing away from her lover’s side and away from the tree and the log. The pain began to grow in spurts, with even shorter times between each rippling pain. “It’s happening!” She offered a wide grin as her eyes searched for Tembovu’s. Another pang of pain caused her to carefully lower her protesting, swollen body to the earth. She left herself open for Tembovu to help in any way possible, in any way he saw fit while she did the job of giving birth to their child.

Pain rippled through her stomach yet again and sweat glistened off her gilded coat. She measured her breaths, having been used to the action now. This would be her fourth birth, and out of all of them, none of them were as troubling as the first one. She only hoped it continued to get better from here on out. After quite some time, she felt relief as the child was born. She heaved her breaths, doing her best to stay as calm as she could during the process, but worried if anything had gone wrong. Out of all of her births, this was the first one that had a witness. Her eyes sought Tembovu’s for a moment as she lifted herself toward the child, aiming to clean the baby.

It was a girl, and she was beautiful. Gilded skin in an almost mirrored pattern of Tembovu’s and her own, with the most beautiful black markings sliding across her face. But something seemed wrong. And worry grew further and even further as she began to nose the little girl. She began to clean the filly, to clear her nose and everything else, and yet something still didn’t seem right. She looked to Tembovu frantically, with a pleading look in her eyes to help, or find someone who could. At least the child was breathing; however small amount it was.

"Rex talks!"

rexanna & tembovu

I wish I had done everything on earth with you.