Breaths are heavy, tongue is lolled out, and eyes are rolled to the back of my head. This is hell, I know it.

Another snarling howl of agony is sent into the air as hot air is expelled from my lungs. This one wishes to kill me, it wants to steal my life away and turn it into its own, but it will not. Delirium begins to set in as consciousness barely hangs on by a thread and it is with the final two pushes within the five hour labor that the beast is set free from my temple.

More snarls and eruptions of anger and pain echo within the stone den that I have long since claimed as my own until my vocals finally give out and my head drops to the floor. Heartbeats pound within my head as all other sound seems to fade away and within the darkness of the night it is difficult to tell if I have already died. My eyes flutter as they roll within their sockets until a singular moment of clarity overtakes me and my head swings drunkenly toward where the pup still lays encased in its sac. I grasp around for it until my fangs find purchase upon the elastic matter until it snaps beneath my weakened jaws.

The boy is released from his bonds and my thick skull sways back to fall upon the cool earth once again. My breaths are irregular and painful as my mind loses its grip upon reality. Will this really be the end? Eyes of pale blue and gold flutter once again, witnessing the looming shadow of Elijah, before they roll back into my skull and all consciousness is lost. Everything is black, blacker than any night I have ever experienced, and from this inky darkness comes the figure of one I had not realized I had been yearning for so long. Kiska.

”Mother. What are you doing?” the scene flies back into the past as the realm of Paracon opens itself up to me. The day is warm and thunderheads loom in the distance as Kiska now lays upon her back with paws in the air. Foolish, she is. Why is she acting like this? That is not how a monarch displays herself in any matter. The blue and gold of Kiska’s eyes turn to her and in that instant I am lurched to another moment in time among the bogs of what once was the swampland. I spy them from the bushes, Abraxus and Kiska, and it is on this day that I approach and realize who my true father is.

Colors and scenes flash by in a dizzying whirl as I am hurtled through time over and over again, reliving the most memorable moments in my years of existence. My breaths have slowed in reality and the bleeding from my vulva is unnoticed in the unconsciousness of my dreamlike state.