Tatiana al'Pillan, mother of two
Echoing Cries


Tatiana’s eyes followed her sister’s movements as she cut the newborn’s umbilical cord and bathed the blood from him. His tiny hands were fisted and his eyes were squeezed tightly shut as he wailed his distress, not liking this new place compared to his warm, comfortable home inside his mother’s womb.

“Oh, Ariel…! He’s so precious. Did he really come from li'le ol' me?” Tanya gasped as Raven carefully laid the little boy in the crook of her arm. Her eyes, beginning to droop with exhaustion, looked down at her son with pride. She forgot about her discomfort and all the pain she had been put through as she looked into his stormy eyes. Those eyes, now open and curiously looking about, alighted on Raven and stared.

Her twin seemed to be caught up in the newborn’s penetrating gaze for a moment, then looked away and breathed an exaggerated sigh of relief as she commented, “Thank the Light his appearance doesn’t match his father’s.”

Tanya grinned, her face sweat-drenched face lighting up with wicked amusement. Her husband’s plaintive calls came from beyond the door, sounding distressed and pitiful. Tanya couldn’t muster up enough strength to call out to him. Through their bond he knew she was all right, but he also knew that she was still in pain.

Tanya sighed, relieved that the ordeal was finally over. And she had a beautiful baby boy out of the deal. She relaxed her legs, still propped apart from when she had pushed the infant into the world, and smoothed the sheet over her stomach. A stomach that, if she had her information right, should have been a whole lot flatter.

Tatiana frowned, looking over at her sister. “Ariel, shouldn’t my tummy be shrinking now?”

Raven dropped a gentle hand atop her belly—and then closed her eyes in absolute weariness. “Ah…sis?”

Tanya looked at her sister curiously, but was sidetracked when a sudden contraction took hold of her. “Ariel! I’m in no mood for more pain!” she wailed, clenching the bed sheets in one fist and trying hold her infant loosely in her other arm.

“It’s all right, Tanya. We’ll make it through this,” Raven said softly, prepping the room again for another arrival. It only took a moment and she was back when the next contraction grasped her. “You know what to do, sis.”

And, as tired as Tanya was, she bared down with all her might. Little mewling sounds of distress emitted from the back of her throat as she pushed, the only indication of the pain and discomfort she was feeling. She could feel an incredible stretching that she would never be able to explain to anyone who had not experienced it before.

It seemed an eternity of contractions and Raven had her pushing during each one. She heard her twin murmur that the head was out, then Tanya heard another infant’s wail enter the room.

“It’s a girl!” Raven crowed, hurrying the wash the newborn of blood and cut its cord.

The new sound, that of another baby, frightened the little boy in Tanya’s arms and he began to wail, echoing his twin.

Tanya laughed happily, hearing the twin cries. Tears streamed down her cheeks as her own twin placed the baby girl in her arms.