A Visitor - 13.08.2009

[Tersias Tara-Hisakata]

Tersias was quite happily humming to herself as she cleaned the now much bigger den. Since Kiba's visit, they had dug out two or three small rooms spanning off the large central room. It was nice to have space for the pups, but it meant more cleaning. Every so often she would pause and stroke the small bump below her belly gently. It was a little bigger now, about the size of a grapefruit.

[Mira-Neiva Fadiele-Koudo]

Mira peeked through Seirei and Tersias' doorway, to see Tersias busy cleaning the Den. "Hello," she said, entering the main room properly. "I thought you might want some company, and maybe some conversation while you were cleaning."

[Tersias Tara-Hisakata]

"Mira!" she smiled warmly, "How lovely of you to stop by, do come in" she waved at Mira as if to indicate to come through the passageway into the main room.
Stopping her cleaning for a bit, she sat down "Don't mind me cleaning, I've just nothing else to do. Seirei's insisting I'm not to do anything strenous, blablablabla" she laughed "He's such a Mister Silly. Anyway, care for a drink?"

[Mira-Neiva Fadiele-Koudo]

"As long as you do not harm yourself, I am fine with it," said Mira. "And I would not decline a drink." She smiled at Tersias. "If you need help cleaning or anything, just say."

[Tersias Tara-Hisakata]

Tersias laughed, "It's easy enough, that's why Seirei still lets me do it" she smiled. She walked over to a small cupboard and fetched two cups "Is tea ok?" she asked, fetching a tin of tea leaves and a strainer.

[Mira-Neiva Fadiele-Koudo]

"Tea's fine," said Mira, nodding. "So how far gone are you now?" she asked, peering at Tersias' bump. She sat herself near the fireplace, waiting for Tersias to come back with the tea.

[Tersias Tara-Hisakata]

She chuckled "Only a few days" she smiled. "Amongst my people, though, the length of a pregnancy varies according to the size of the litter, so you begin to show almost immediately" she made a cup of tea with cold water for herself, then heated the kettle for one for Mira. "As do cravings, hence my having cold tea instead of hot" she smiled, bringing the two cups of tea over and sitting down.

[Mira-Neiva Fadiele-Koudo]

"I see," said Mira. She had wondered why the vixen had used cold water instead of hot. She took a sip from her own cup, the hot beverage not quite scalding her tongue. She put it back down. "In my homeworld, mothers only ever have one or two at a time, though there has been the odd occasion where three cubs were born."

[Tersias Tara-Hisakata]

She chuckled, "If only we were so lucky. Amongst my people, it is quite against the norm to have less than 6 or 7 cubs. However, my family have always had slightly smaller litters than average, my mother especially." she looked thoughtful "If my aunts are anything to go by I shall probably have 4 or 5, but then again as Seirei is a wolf, my guessing probably means nothing" she took a sip of her drink.
"Generally speaking, pregnancies among my people are one week long for every cub in the litter. Obviously it is not quite so exact as that, but it generally works out that way, more or less."

[Mira-Neiva Fadiele-Koudo]

"So basically, the less cubs there are, the quicker they develop because there are more nutrients divided between them than if there were more cubs," she said after taking another sip. "Makes sense, though I'm not sure if it means much to you. I don't know how thoroughly you have been educated. My parents were clan leaders, so we were the most educated in our clan."

[Tersias Tara-Hisakata]

"My mother was a military nurse and my father was a diplomat-turned-soldier" she laughed, "Seema had a full military training, including the educational side of it, but I had none at all, I regret to admit" She stroked her bump gently "Now sometimes I wonder if things would have turned out differently if I had gone to the war like Seema, but..." she sounded distant "But now we have a war of our very own it would seem" she sighed

[Mira-Neiva Fadiele-Koudo]

Mira sighed as well. "Yes, it would seem so. My homeworld was on the brink of war itself, and now Tialka is in danger of it, too." She looked at Tersias sadly. "Hopefully, it will not last long."

[Tersias Tara-Hisakata]

Tersias sighed. "And Seirei shall have to fight, while I sit at home playing the happy housewife. This is stupid, I want to help, Mira! I want to fight!"

[Mira-Neiva Fadiele-Koudo]

"I know you do, Tersias," said Mira comfortingly. "But while you are pregnant, you can't. If your cubs were already born, I would offer cubsitting them for you, since I do not like to fight." She shook her head. "But this is not the case, so it cannot be."

[Tersias Tara-Hisakata]

Tersias sighed. "I'm happy to be having cubs, and I love the idea, I really do, just it's such an imposition" she laughed "It gets in the way of life, you just can't do anything! Especially with Seirei as the father, I love him to bits but he gets so protective. And it's just such bad timing. Not to mention the hassle with Seema"

[Mira-Neiva Fadiele-Koudo]

"Yes, he does get like that, doesn't he?" she asked rhetorically, a musing tone in her voice. "Maybe one day he'll realise that he doesn't need to protect everyone. But I think that's just the... uh, Prince-ness in him."

[Tersias Tara-Hisakata]

Tersias looked at Mira kinda funny "Prince-ness? I take it this is some bizarre in joke?" Her mind was racing - she'd never heard anything about this before.

Seirei had never said anything about being a prince. What else wasn't he telling her?

[Mira-Neiva Fadiele-Koudo]

Mira blanched. Oops... I didn't know he hadn't told her... She sighed. "A long time ago, he was a Prince in his homeworld. A lot of things happened that I don't think I should tell you without letting him know first. I shouldn't have let slip that he was a prince."