Chương 325: 5.4

Jewel glared at her middle. Normally through all her growth the line of her body was hardly different whether it was the width of her extensively long ribcage or equally sleek belly. Jewel was at least despite her still developing length almost always properly proportionate and consistent. Except as their stay in Ogien progressed that began to change. Now on the tenth night staying in the admittedly quite extensive rooms provided It was also getting to the point that she could not deny it to her husband.

"Do you think it was the fish?" Jewel huffed and wiggled herself, the difference in her mid section where the normally sleek lines of scales bowed outward feeling like she had swallowed boulders. Not exactly unpleasant but distracting all the same.

"When I had Gem I'd barely had fish before in my life Paul. I really don't think it has anything to do with my diet." Her husband chuckled, they had taken precautions for a few years. Jewel fasted for one season, then ate as much as she could stomach at the same time the next year. And through it all not a single thing had caused (or prevented) what Jewel was now suffering. She'd been a bit worried when Bethica's first child with Celsus was on the way but that had failed to 'quicken' her either.

Then she'd relaxed and the years had rolled on without incident. But now here Jewel was. Belly uncomfortably plump in a very familiar way. Miles away from home and apparently expecting another child at least. Most likely another Wyrmspawn if the accounts of feral wyrms were applicable to her. Possibly more than one, given she'd grown marginally wider over all since Gem's egg. Yet despite there presumably being more room she looked even more disproportionately wider then with her first spawn.

"Well was there anything different you were doing? When it started that is." Jewel huffed and shook her head, gently 'slapping' Paul on the back of the head with her tail.

"I don't know any more precisely when it started this time, than I did the last." Paul raised a brow at her and she sighed. Yes he knew she was better at noticing herself then that. But it made that this came upon her as a surprise somehow even more embarrassing. Jewel relented with a sigh.

"I maybe started feeling a little bit over full around the start of Debt's season?" Paul hummed.

"Well, I've got one idea." Jewel raised her own brow skeptically, the tone of his voice and the rhythm of his heart not filling her with confidence that this was going to be a serious suggestion.

"What, pray tell is your idea oh husband on the nature of immaculate conception in wyrms?" Paul grinned up to his wife. Not even hiding his mirth now as he spoke.

"Well my dear wife, it seems to me that you were quite preoccupied with my own lack of heirs. In fact from what I've seen in Valasect and those summer festival dances you provincials love so much that it seems like just about the right amount of time for you to start showing now-" Jewel squawked at her husband's joke. Gently batting him with the softest skin of her wing membrane.

"Paul! This is serious!" To which he could only laugh and lightly 'push' her assault off of him. Which she accepted. It's not like there was no laughter and relief in her own voice, but if she let him be frivolous about this now she'd never get any advice out of him! She was however careful to avoid waking her smaller self. Gem already knew and collectively she had decided that only having to remember this once was better. Stolen story; please report. Still as carefully as possible she 'fought' with Paul.

It was never a real struggle between them, but in the privacy of their own bed chambers they had made a promise. Paul and Jewel were to be equals when together in these moments. As close to man and wife as either could manage. It had its awkward moments. But what surprised Jewel was just how silly the two of them became over the years. It was a relief really. The possibility that perhaps they were not quite so abnormal.

After all, if they acted as the grandmothers and grandfathers did in Valasect how could their marriage not be a proper one? It warmed Jewel's flame. Finally Paul had enough of the gentle slapping between them.

"Alright, so it's another mystery of your majestic and magical self, So my oh so serious wife, given Gem's time to bake in your prodigious oven, when do you suppose you are due?" Jewel groaned at the jest but this too was proper for a husband. She wiggled her middle, trying to divine from the feel of her flame and her insides and just her overall self what that answer could possibly be. And to be honest she was only vaguely sure.

"I never got quite this round with Gem's egg. And it's not like the feral wyrms or beasts always have one egg." Paul poked her belly. But the muscle and flesh did not even dent against his finger.

"So twins? Maybe more? I suppose that could satisfy all of our family lines then. A child for Bathory and one Nádasdy. Gem can be of Rochford. Maybe a fourth could be for your mother's house?" Jewel gaped at the idea, but then again she could not deny the possibility. And it was at least somewhat sensible. Still she sighed and stared down at her body, at the way her belly was not how it normally was. Lowering her head down to be even with his gaze.

"I suppose that would be the most sensible. But Paul... If all else is the same. They will absolutely be like Gem. It will just be me again, multiple of me, not proper children." Which earned her a hard but well practiced rap of a knuckle right on her nose. Jewel and her husband had to practice that, just the right amount of force he didn't hurt himself on her skull or horns.

"Jewel! We've been over this, Bethica has been over this, in fact I think everyone has been over this with you. Just because they are-" He struggled to find a word, they all did, the nature of Jewel and her spawn was just so complicated and strange. Even now, only her sister/aunt Gwenn really seemed to not find some difficulty with it and she grew up with Gem!

"Just because they will be you won't make them any less children. You've said it yourself that you can feel that's not how it is." The Wyrm Countess of Viznove huffed heavily and with practiced care gently dropped her head in her husband's lap. Breathing in deeply enough to press his shoulders up with the air in her lungs.

"Yes, you're right, you're right they will still be children even if they are me." He rested his hand on her head and ran his fingers through the coarse bristly hairs of her mane. She could hear the way his chest swelled with a smothered yawn. It was getting late into the evening.

"I just wish I understood Paul. Why now? What's different? Is it traveling? Will I go gravid just from visiting Magarska? Then why didn't Gem get a sister when I visited the Capital? What is the cause of all of this?! I'm so tired of surprises. Every time it seems like we've settled the nature of me it's like the heavens take offense." Paul laughed.

"Oh, we both know they wouldn't dare be so inconvenient to you, my wife." Which got another groan from her.

"That just makes it worse Paul! Everyone else gets to blame the stars for their trials but who am I supposed to blame?" Her husband didn't have an answer, Jewel didn't really expect one. She was the Shining Countess Wyrm of Viznove. She could bring the stars themselves to polite attention if she tried. But it felt like she had less say and knowledge in the workings of her own body and self then any other woman alive. In her youth the word of the Veles had been confusing but encouraging.

But now Jewel was finding them somewhat haunting." There is no voice that can set your path, there is no vision in stars or deep earth that holds you but your own." She didn't feel particularly in charge of her own fate or path. But if the gods themselves said it was so? Then was Jewel somehow doing this to herself? The thought bothered her all the more as she dwelled on the uncomfortable heaviness in her belly. Why now?

"I don't know Jewel, but we will see our way through this." Paul's words at least soothed. So Jewel joined her smaller self in sleep.