Ring the bells, Sound the gongs

speech,





Finally after what felt like hours she heard Vereux's voice, but he didn't come in. She blinked with confusion and whined, but moments later Devin arrived, mentioning that her husband was sitting outside, afraid of her birthing. Her ears flicked back and her hormone, pain-ridden emotions flared, making her glare and growl in Vereux's direction, but any anger she might have felt got caught short by another heavy wave of pain. She gritted her teeth till the worst of it passed and then she followed Devin's instructions and lapped up the herbs he had placed in front of her. She pushed any thoughts out of her frame of mind and simply let herself fall into a steady rhythm.

It took far longer than she had anticipated for the first of her children to be born. She strained with each push, but she tried her best to relax like Devin had said. By the time her first pup was born she already exhausted. She quickly realized why when she turned her head to clean up the first born. It was easily one of the largest pups she had ever seen. Oh she hoped they all weren't this big! She cleaned her first son the best she could with long rasps of her tongue, seeing the lighter shade of slate-blue that covered him along with the silver markings on his back, legs, and face, the colors clearly reminiscent of his parents. She smiled and gently nudged her squealing newborn toward her stomach just in time for the contractions to take hold again.

With a tired groan she started pushing yet again, but luckily it seemed that her first born would be the worst of her troubles. The next wasn't quite as large as the first, but after she got the silver pup cleaned off she saw that this was another boy. All sons so far it seemed. This one looked very much like herself with a mostly silver coat and a few darker markings. She guided her second son over to lay next to his brother at her stomach and gave each of the pups a small lick before resting her head back down on the ground. By now the rest of the world was blocked out of her senses. She didn't know if Vereux had joined her or if Devin was still there or if Amalia had finally come. She had fallen into what felt like a trance, mechanically pushing with each contraction that gripped her tired body and letting her instincts take over.

The third came without much struggle, another boy. This time the slate-blue almost gray coloring took over the most of his form, looking much more like their father than the other two. Pale gray touched his paws, tip of his little tail, and the bridge of his nose. Each of them looked very different and yet had enough similar characteristics to make it very clearly that they were all siblings. Three healthy boys. She thought that surely that would be the end of it, but her contractions said otherwise.

Four. Four fairly large boys. Gods, that would explain why she had gotten so large. She tiredly cleaned up the last of her first litter, intrigued by her youngest's split coloring. The top of his body was a lighter gray color while his legs were the darker blue-gray that ran heavy in their genes. He also had touches of white on the back of his neck and the tip of his tail along with darker gray on his ears. Quite the mismatch of colors. With all four of her sons resting along her stomach she sighed and gazed at them with a mixture of exhaustion and pride. Her sons. Her and Vereux's first litter. They were finally here.