Chapter 27: 27 - Not Ready

“Hey, are you alright?” Rogue walked into the bedroom to find Callida curled up in the fetal position on the bed, and it wasn’t even dinnertime — suspicious at best. This was the woman with seemingly boundless energy who almost never got sick and fought battles despite debilitating injuries, getting poisoned, or being barely alive. “Callida? M’lady? Are you alright?” he tried again without an immediate response.

“Oh…. Rogue, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize,” she muttered and sat up. “How long have you been standing there?” Callida asked, and Rogue noted the tones of exhaustion in her voice.

“Not long…. I thought you were getting better. Is your stomach hurting again? Are you getting sick? You’re not acting like yourself.”

“Yeah,” she sighed, leaning forward to rest her forehead in her hands and rub her eyes. “I don’t feel like myself.”

Concerned, Rogue sat down next to her and put a hand to her forehead. “You don’t have a fever,” he frowned.

“That’s good, at least,” she sighed and slouched back onto her pillow.

“How’s your stomach? Any pain?”

“No. No pain.”

“Are you just tired?” he prompted gently. “Are you not sleeping well?”

“Not really,” she winced. “It started a couple weeks ago with weird dreams that I can never remember but wake me up, and then I started getting headaches, which, if I’m not sleeping well, that makes sense. But now I’m nauseous too, ‘have been for the last week. Maybe the result of the headaches? Or maybe these are remnant symptoms from the poison? But it’s getting worse, not better. The dreams, the headaches, the nausea…. I’ve been pushing through it, but I threw up today. Primordials! I felt so bad. Coquus made me a special lunch in the mess hall, some sort of soup that’s supposed to be gentle on the stomach, but I took one whiff and that was it.” Rogue sat in silent thought for what was apparently too long for Callida’s patience. “Well, say something!”

“Sorry. I was thinking.”

“What about?”

“Your symptoms. You were feeling better from the poison, right? You’re eating full meals without any pain, your energy came back, you’re fully recovered as far as you can tell…?”

“Yes, yes. Yes to all of the above!”

He hummed in thought and ran the list of her symptoms: tired, weird dreams, headaches, nausea. Oh. “Callida, have you been feeling weirdly emotional?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?!” she snapped and teared up all at once.

That would be a ‘yes’. He had to fight himself to not laugh as mirth merged with a fluttery feeling in his gut. “M’lady, I think you might be pregnant.”

“Pregnant?!” she jumped off the bed to back away from him, and Rogue waited patiently for her to grapple with her reaction. “No! We were going to wait! We were being careful! I can’t be pregnant! I’m the freaking Lion General! I have way too much to do still, and I can’t–” He couldn’t help himself and started to laugh. “Rogue! This isn’t funny!”

“Be that as it may, you have all the classic symptoms. You–”

“This is all your fault!” she accused angrily.

He smirked. “Well, I sure hope so!”

“You–!” Rogue watched as the anger gave way to reluctant humor, and Callida sank to the floor where she laughed and cried simultaneously.

Rogue joined her on the floor, his hand finding her lower abdomen where the telltale energy of new life confirmed his suspicions. That’s when reality set in. She’s pregnant. Primordials, she’s going to be an incredible mother! ‘Good thing too, ‘cause I know next to nothing about being a father. Wordlessly, Rogue shifted to pull his (definitely weirdly emotional) wife closer while she regained control over herself.

“Well?” Callida lifted her head to meet his eyes, her own splotchy.

“Well what?”

“I’m assuming you just confirmed it.” He smiled and wordlessly hugged her tight, bringing her forehead close enough to kiss. “A baby, Rogue? Really? What are we supposed to do with a baby? Are we even ready for this?”

“At this point, there’s no going back. Whether or not we’re ready doesn’t really matter.” She started crying again, burying her face in the crook of his neck, and Rogue mindlessly stroked his fingers through her hair and breathed in her scent. Her hair was so incredibly beautiful and long, down to her waist. I hope our baby gets her hair. Our baby. “Callida, do you know that I love you?” She quieted her sniffles to listen to him talk. “We’re in this together.” Gently, because she was already in enough distress, Rogue lifted her chin and kissed his incredible, newly expecting wife.

“I love you too,” she said through a resolved, shuddery breath. “I love you even though you did do this to me.”

He laughed. “Primordials, Callida, I wish I could say I was sorry, but I’m too excited for that to be honest. That said, I am sorry this happened before you felt ready for it.”

She pulled away, and Rogue snorted at her puckering bottom lip protruding in a pout. “I wish I could be excited.”

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“Give it some time, M’lady.”

***

“Have you seen Callida, erm, the general?” Rogue sleepily asked one of the estate maids. They’d gone to bed early because Callida had been tired after her cry over the pregnancy, so he was up earlier than normal. She usually left for work before he woke up in the mornings, but it wasn’t even dawn yet.

“Oh, the Lion General left for work about an hour ago, just after first light,” she said with a small curtsy.

“Already?”

“She always leaves early… for work, that is. If you’re looking for her, she said something about training with her commanding officers before her council meetings.”

Rogue felt his gut clench. It was still a little vague to him what Callida did all day as the Lion General, but training?! Oh, Primordials! Callida training? With swords?! WHILE PREGNANT?! She could get hurt! The baby could get hurt! Rogue left a very confused maid to wonder why he was in such a hurry. But he was in such a hurry. Literally overnight, a switch had flipped in his brain. He’d had to really work hard to not smother Callida with his concerns for her safety, but hell would freeze over before he’d let her put their child in similar danger. When he’d started to feel angry, he had no idea, but by the time he found Callida in the training arena, definitely training with swords (blunted, but that was immaterial), Rogue was ready to spit fire. “What do you think you’re doing?!”

Distracted by his sudden arrival, Callida looked away from her sparring match with Commander Arum and took a solid punch to the shoulder that knocked her backwards and off-balance. Rogue saw red. “Hold, Arum,” Callida grinned. “Nice punch, by the way.”

“Thanks,” Arum chirped happily. “I’ve been practicing with–”

“Callida!!” Rogue interrupted by aggressively yanking his wife away.

Her happy, affectionate smile to be seeing him so unexpectedly fell hard. “Rogue?”

“What do you think you are doing?!” he repeated.

“My job? It’s Thursday. I always train my commanders on–”

“You CAN’T. DO THAT. ANYMORE! Not in your condition! You just got punched!” Rogue could see that she was rattled and trying not to cry as he very publicly scolded her in front of all of her men, but he couldn’t swallow his building temper. “What makes you think that any of this is ok?!”

“Rogue, please,” she whispered and took his arm in an effort to sooth him while she blinked back tears. “Please, not here. We can talk about this later.”

“LATER?! It could be too late by then!”

“Rogue, please!”

“No! It’s one thing to jeopardize your own health with these insane risks–”

“Rogue–”

“–but it’s not just about you anymore!”

“Rogue!” she warned.

He grabbed her shoulders to square up against her. “Primordials, Callida! You’re pregnant!” All around them, soldiers gasped, no longer able to pretend like they weren’t listening to this spat. Callida hung her head in embarrassment as the tears broke free, eventually knocking Rogue’s hands off her shoulders so she could push past him. “Callida!”

“Go home, Rogue,” she said, barely audibly with her back to him.

“Callida!” He snatched at her arm and almost immediately found himself looking up at her from the hard ground.

“I said ‘go home’. We can talk about this later,” she snarled lowly.

“You can’t do this,” he growled back, rising to his feet.

“I have a job to do here.” She turned on him, and Rogue took an unconscious step back as his tearful wife seemed like she was ready to throw a punch of her own. “Go home and cool off.”

“You are putting the baby’s life at risk!”

“I’m doing my job; my mother did hers while she was pregnant with me.”

“And that’s somehow an excuse?! Prioritizing your job over the life of your child is… is irresponsible! And selfish! And terrible parenting! If this is how you’re going to be before the baby is even born–!” He knew he’d gone too far even as he said it.

“You think I’m going to be a terrible mother,” she stated numbly, terrifyingly quiet, her tears drying and her face hardening. “Don’t you?”

“Callida–”

“Don’t you!”

“I didn’t–”

“Well you should have thought about that before you KNOCKED ME UP! Get out of here, Rogue! Now! Go! Before I do something I’ll regret!”

“Callida–”

“GO!!” She turned away from him and drew her sword, every muscle in her body rigid and on high alert. “AGAIN!” she shouted to her men who nervously obeyed.

“G-General, are you sure–”

“I said, ‘again’,” she spat at Arum who shrank back looking helplessly between Callida and her husband, eventually drawing his sword to obey orders and return to his sparring match with her.

Rogue forced himself to leave as the clashing of steel resumed. His fury had been supplanted by guilt, fear, and something approximating grief. Callida had never truly lost her temper with him before. She’d gotten upset once or twice, sure, but…. Oh, crap. He’d gone too far. Publicly. In front of her men. Men who looked up to her and practically worshiped the ground she walked on. He’d accused his wife of being a terrible mother, which he didn’t really mean — didn’t mean at all, actually. He’d humiliated her, degraded her, and spilled a sensitive secret she likely wasn’t ready to share. And now he felt nothing but regret.

Except, there was also fear, and not the fear of the baby being hurt in some way, though that was also present. This fear was building a precarious shrine to his doubts and insecurities. She doesn’t need me. And when it came right down to it, she really didn’t. Callida was the single most capable, most driven, most independent woman he’d ever met. He was fiercely attracted to her because of it, and now he’d thrown those same qualities in her face as though they were bad things — as though they made her less — less worthy, less loving, and less deserving of being loved…. And somehow less of a mother, something that she was already feeling woefully unprepared to be.

Primordials, I screwed up. He wanted to turn around, find his wife, and hold her, take everything back, assure her in no uncertain terms that she was the most wonderful person in the world and the one he would forever love the most. But that look on her face. If he tried to approach her now, she’d probably rip his head off. Better to let her cool down a little first.