176. Echo

176. Echo
Echo

The world narrows to the smallest sound I have ever heard—the most beautiful, heartbreaking little cry. For a long, suspended heartbeat, I cannot move. I cannot breathe. Pain rings through every part of me, my body trembling from the last contraction, but none of it exists beside the sight of the healer lifting a tiny, wet, squirming form into the soft lamplight where I can see them properly.
“Congratulations,” she whispers, voice thick with reverence. “You have a healthy baby boy.”
A boy. My son. My heart gives one single, aching pulse and then seems to unfold, raw and too large for my ribs. The healer lowers him gently back to my chest. He's warm, small, trembling with new life. His weight is so light it startles me. His skin flushed from birth, his tiny fists curled, and his mouth still open, whimpering as he instinctively searched for warmth. His cheek brushes my collarbone, and something inside me breaks open completely.
“Oh…” The sound that escapes me is not a word. It is wonder. It is disbelief. It is love so immediate and consuming it steals every thought from my mind. Nicholaus leans over me, breath shaking, eyes shining with tears he doesn’t bother to hide. His hands hover above the baby, trembling — as though he wants to touch, but fears he might shatter the moment.
“He’s perfect,” he whispers, voice barely a breath. “Echo… he’s perfect.”
I can’t speak. I run a fingertip along the curve of our son’s tiny shoulder, marvelling at the impossibility of his existence. He shifts, nestling closer, his whimper fading as his face presses into my skin. His heartbeat — gods, I can hear it — a soft, fluttering rhythm, steady and strong. Alive. He’s alive.
The healer clears her throat softly, her tone gentle. “My king… would you like to cut the cord?”
Nicholaus freezes, not with hesitation, but with a rush of emotion that sends tears tracking warm down his cheeks. He nods once. The healer places a small pair of silver scissors in his hand and lifts the cord slightly.
“Here,” she murmurs. “Just along this line. A small, firm snip.”
Nicholaus swallows hard, then bends beside the bed. His fingers steady around the scissors. Our son lets out a tiny sound of protest, a soft mewl, and Nicholaus pauses, breathing through the moment as though it is sacred.

Then with one snip, the cord parts. Our child is fully, wholly in this world. Nicholaus lowers the scissors with trembling hands. He presses a kiss to our son’s head, then another to my forehead. His tears fall into my hair.
“I’m so proud of you,” he whispers. “Both of you.”
The healer gives a small nod. “Queen Echo… we still need to deliver the placenta and clean you. May I take the baby for a moment?”
I shake my head instantly, tightening my hold. “No. No, I—”
Nicholaus touches my cheek. “Give him to me,” he murmurs. “Just for a moment, my love. I won’t let him go.”
His voice grounds me. I look at our son again — his limbs tucked close, his eyes still squeezed shut, his tiny chest rising in small, new breaths — and my arms soften around him. Nicholaus holds out his hands, and I lift our son carefully into them. The sight of him leaving my chest sends a strange, empty ache through my body, but something else replaces instantly — awe. Nicholaus holds him as though he has been waiting all his life for this exact moment. His hands curve around the tiny body, supporting his head, his back, every fragile piece of him with reverence I have never seen from him before. His shoulders shake, and his lips part on a silent exhale that cracks down the middle.
“Our son…” he breathes, barely audible.
Nicholaus makes quick work of wrapping our baby in a warm blanket, then cradles him in his arms. Our baby’s fist curls into the fabric of his father’s shirt, and Nicholaus lets out a soft, choked laugh. While the healers move around me, helping me through the final stages, I cannot look away from them. Nicholaus sits in the low chair beside the bed, our son tucked against his heart. The firelight paints them in warm gold — father and son, breaths falling into the same rhythm. Nicholaus hums something under his breath, a melody I’ve never heard before. Soft. Unsteady. Full of too much love to contain. The healer presses on my abdomen and murmurs something about bleeding, about aftercare, about rest, but the words wash over me like distant waves. My body aches. My legs tremble. Sweat cools on my skin. But none of it exists compared to what I’m seeing. My child. In his father’s arms. The world’s first future in two hundred years. Nicholaus brushes a knuckle down the baby’s cheek, marvelling at the tiny, perfect jawline, the little curve of his nose. He leans back slowly in the chair, rocking our son gently.
“You’re so small,” he murmurs to him. “So strong already. You fought so hard to be here.”
He pauses, his voice breaking into something unguarded, tender.
“And I will spend the rest of my life making sure you are safe.”
Our son stirs, letting out a soft grunt. Nicholaus smiles, eyes full of awe and disbelief and devotion all at once.
“Echo,” he says without looking away, “look at him…”
As if I could look anywhere else.
The healer adjusts my blankets and steps back. “Your queen is stable,” she tells Nicholaus. “You may bring the child to her once she’s comfortable.”
Nicholaus rises so carefully it steals my breath — as though he thinks the floor might break if he moves too quickly. He crosses to the bed and sits beside me. When he places our son on my chest again, the world realigns. The warmth. The weight. The tiny heartbeat fluttering against my skin. Everything inside me softens, settles, blooms. Nicholaus rests his hand over both of us — over my heart, over our son’s small back, anchoring us into the same space, the same breath, the same future. Tears fill my eyes but do not fall.
“This is him,” I whisper. “This is ours.”
Nicholaus leans in, his forehead touching my temple, his voice low and reverent.
“Our family begins today.”
And in the quiet glow of the fire, with our son sleeping between us, I finally understand: This is the moment every choice led us to. This is the future the kingdom prayed for. This is the life we were meant to claim. Together.