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There was a lot to do around the temple once they had returned from their very short holiday, but Grendel had not been around for nearly so much of it as he would have liked. Obligation to his domain always kept him busy, and knowing full well what the future might hold always made him put duty first over anything else. There were many occasions when he simply longed to be at back home at the temple, helping out Ravnos as much as he could with whatever time together they allowed, but that did not seem to be in the cards.

Too often he arrived back at the temple during the day with the Disciple already asleep, and their two eggs tucked into the bed next to him. Grendel would, as always, delicately transport them back to the nursery where they were meant to be, before climbing into bed next to Ravnos, flinging an arm around him and waiting for the moment when he would awaken again.

However, one morning, things were quite different.

Grendel arrived back at the temple as usual at some ungodly hour after dealing with some new catastrophe. He had teleported himself to the bedroom, again like usual, only to find that, for once, the eggs were not tucked into the bed. Well, good. It would save him an extra trip.

Except that something niggled at the back of his mind. He knew he should go and check on them, though his gaze swept longingly over Ravnos, stuck in the bed. Sighing, he resolved himself to just take a quick peek, and within another blink, he was in the nursery.

And that's when he noticed it. A sound that was unfamiliar to his ears and yet somehow so well known. The light cracking of an egg.

Grendel froze. It couldn't have been what he thought he had heard, could it?

Another cracking sound, a little louder than the first, and he drew himself closer to the crib, where he saw for himself the tiny fissures that were forming over each little egg.

Oh wow.. They were hatching.

THEY WERE HATCHING!

....And Ravnos was asleep.

Well. s**t.

When Ravnos awakened, Grendel could usually feel it. He could sense his stirring mind and often the Disciple would begin to move shortly after, like a corpse reanimated (and really...that's pretty much what he was). Right now, however, Grendel didn't feel anything. He didn't sense when Ravnos woke up. He was too hyper-focused on the little crib with the two eggs nestled next to each other. He took a few steps closer, gazing at them with some unfathomable look in his red eyes.

In this much closer proximity, he could see how deep the cracks and fissures along the eggs ran and could hear both tiny children as they worked to escape. There were little sounds coming from both eggs.

And then, he heard Ravnos calling him at the same time that the smallest fist imaginable broke its way free from one of the eggs.

Relief. The Disciple was awake.

Dracian, come to the nursery, please. Came the Gods hopefully calm reply, though he was feeling anything but. The other egg had now begun to rock a little more violently as well, the sounds from within becoming increasingly more agitated.

Grendel, a bundle of nerves and impatience, was beginning to wonder what was taking Ravnos so long. Somehow he thought that, surely, the Disciple would have come running at the summons (that pretty much never happened and yet, he had managed to convince himself that it should). Staring down at the eggs, he had no idea if he was supposed to be doing anything. Should he help them out? Just watch? The one egg did not seem to be having much difficulty, though the other continued to move, its tiny contents thrashing about inside with little growls of irritation.

He sensed Ravnos at the door before he heard the Disciple speak, but he glanced toward him as he moved into the room, and took a step to the side to allow the Disciple room to stand next to him.

"Yes. Well, that one appears to be." He gestured towards the one which now had two arms free. "The other one..." He shrugged, and frowned. Maybe that baby was defective. It certainly sounded like it might be.

While he might not have said it out loud, the God was glad for Ravnos being there in that moment, because while neither of them had any experience raising children, he still deferred to him when it came to these matters, believing the Disciple to be a much better authority on what to do then he was himself. His fingers were gripping the edge of the crib while he continued to look between the eggs, but he blinked when Ravnos spoke to him, telling him what to do.

He hesitated before turning away and doing what he was tasked with. Surely everything would be okay now with Ravnos there to keep a watchful eye over things. He moved towards the dresser and was just reaching for a blanket when he heard the shattering of eggshell and the barely detectable breathiness of the Disciples voice.

A boy.

His gaze darted back, Apparently one had hatched, the moment he had stepped away. For some reason that felt a little unjust. He snatched up two blankets and returned to the crib side, silently holding them towards Ravnos, because he had no idea how to wrap a child, but his gaze was fully on the baby the entire time, and an odd feeling twisted in his chest.

He was silent for a moment, time, for him, held suspended. When he spoke it was hushed, and in a tone not often heard from him.

"Kieran. My little dark souled one."

Perhaps he did have some paternal instincts after all because when Ravnos turned to him with the baby boy in his arms and offered him out, the God only hesitated very briefly before carefully taking him and settling him into the crook of his arm and next to his chest. This one seemed to have quieted quickly once he had gotten free. He blinked up at the God with large eyes and then yawned and closed them again.

"It is okay, then? You do not mind?" He asked because he felt it should have occurred to him sooner to run the name past Ravnos first. He did not want to ruin this moment by overstepping.

He broke his gaze away from the baby in his arm to look back into the crib, watching when Ravnos helped the next one free itself. He smiled when it was revealed to be a girl.

"She is feisty." His voice was still quiet, but not like it had been before. He nodded at the name Ravnos chose. It was only fair, and he thought it a very nice name as well. "All that work to be free and you have restrained her again." He chuckled a little, grinning at the way she hissed in protest.

Not at all like Kieran, who had pretty much gone silent the moment he was freed from his egg and did not seem to mind being wrapped up in the slightest.

He shrugged his shoulders, not really having a reason to believe that Ravnos would be unhappy but wanting to make sure nonetheless.

He could not stop looking at them both, gaze moving from Kieran to Vadoma and back again. The little boy in his arms had opened his eyes again and seemed to just be taking everything in, silent and stoic, much like the father who held him. Grendel wondered if that meant he would have a temper as well.

With his luck...probably.

Finally, he lifted his gaze to look at Ravnos and moved closer to him, letting the babies be in closer proximity in the process. He tilted his head forward to rest it against the Disciples, briefly, just a short moment of connection between them before he pulled away again and asked one very pressing question.

"Now what do we do with them?"

Grendel wasn't sure about the loving part. Was that something he would learn to do over time or was it instantaneous? He definitely looked at the babies and felt something, but he did not equate it to love. He loved Ravnos. These small beings? They were a product of that love, of something special he had never let himself have before. But he did not love any of his children. Tolerated, yes. Felt responsible for, certainly.

He began to feel slightly uncomfortable thinking about it, so he stopped, and focused on something else. Ah yes, a second crib. That he could manage. Though when he looked at the size of the current crib, and the size of the babies, and the way Kieran now seemed to stare at his sister, Grendel hesitated, his free hand only half raised.

"Perhaps later, when they are bigger? They might feel more comfortable together for now."

In any case, that was not quite what he had meant when he'd asked Ravnos the question. "Should we do anything with them now? Do they need anything?" Such as, well, food. Though the God had not until now even given any thought about how they were meant to feed them, or even what.