I felt what could only be described as a plug being pulled just before Mother’s water exited her body like a running river. I thought I felt the liquid touch my leg, but a cloth was suddenly thrust between my mother and me, which told me Eena was actively watching what was going on and taking steps to clean as Mother birthed. Mother’s pain was harder to fight. I wanted desperately to just force all the lights out instead of jumping around after them one by one, but I could not do so without risking the life of my sibling.
Pressure filled my head.
Using my lissa was harder than before, and I instantly knew why. It was not my pressure I felt but my mother’s. I pulled back the power of my lissa and took my hands away from her. When I opened my eyes, Father snarled at me for no longer helping my mother, and I fell back onto my behind when he shoved me. I lowered my eyes. His instincts were too wild to identify me as his own offspring.
“Serbak, stop it!” Mother growled. “He is our son. Our little brave male. Stop!”
Father nuzzled his nose against her face when she whined as another ache jolted through her.
“It is time,” I said as I climbed back to my knees. “Mother, you must push now.”
I stood and stepped back as Eena and Father helped move Mother into the birthing position on her hands and knees. Her body instantly reacted and made her scream as she pushed. Kol and I hurried to move around to her front so we were staring at her face and nothing else. Neeba, the Royal Healer, had to instruct Eena on what to do because Father would not let him touch Mother. Just another male looking between his mate’s legs was almost sending Father to the edge, but Eena and Mother kept repeating that he was a healer, and he was there to keep his mate and offspring safe.
This was the same old tale for every Maji family birth.
We only had male healers on Ealra, and males wanted to kill the healer who helped his mate give birth, so the females had to constantly talk him down. It was a tiring circle but a necessary one. Kol and I flinched as Mother bore down and pushed until her face darkened. It was a horribly stressful process, and I felt just awful that I had put my mother through this very scene when she birthed me.
I made a mental reminder with my comm for me to thank her later.
“Ezah!” Father suddenly barked my name as Mother screeched. “His head has crowned.”
My prince, Neeba’s voice reached me. The Revered Father seems to cope better with your aid. I fear he might kill me if I touch the Hailed Mother. My father is the one who aided in the birth of all the princes. I am too unknown to him for him to remain calm.
I sighed because I knew that Neeba was right. Father wasn’t doing well with his presence at all during this birthing. He had snapped, snarled, and growled at the male more times than I could count. He had even punched him at one point.
“Oh, Ezah,” Mother whimpered. “Would you help me bring him into the world? Please, vasha?”
I had told Mother I would not do this, but I could not refuse when she asked me in the midst of pushing. I quickly moved to the position of the Royal Healer, and I was surprised by how much I focused on my new sibling. I didn’t even look at anything else. He had a thick head full of light hair that I knew would be as white as mine when it was clean and dry. My heart pounded when his shoulders came into the world. More of him appeared with each passing second. I took hold of him and gently pulled as my mother pushed. Mother screamed, Father comforted her while still growling, and I delivered my new brother. One second, Mother was birthing him, and the next, he was in my arms.
Slippery and light in colour but healthy and heavy.
Repositioning the tiny bundle, I focused my lissa on him. I forced away the fluid in his nostrils and mouth until he spit it up, and almost instantly, he let out a massive cry. Eena and Father had already taken care of tying off and cutting the young’s cord while I watched. Father then turned Mother so she was sitting on her behind. She was both crying and laughing as Father had his face buried in her neck, mesmerised by her as he always was but even more so after she just birthed another of his offspring. I was beaming happily as my lissa searched for any sign of the young being unwell or injured, but there was none. I adjusted him in my arms as my eyes moved to between his legs, and I instantly froze.