Tasha’s POV:

I was inside the hut when the doorbell rang, and I hissed fiercely as I faced the entrance of the fake stump. Keegan echoed my hiss from a perch on the wall above. Taureen remained sitting on the couch next to the table as Aeria’s footsteps went down the hallway to the door.

“Tkael, Soranto, thank you for bringing the new scratching post. I would invite you in, but I doubt you’d even get through the doorway at the moment.”

“I assume the eggs are hatching?” The deep voice belonged to Tkael.

“We think so,” she replied, “Tasha won’t let Taureen touch them.”

Soranto joined the conversation. “Well, I certainly don’t want to see how she would react to my presence then. We’ll leave the scratching post here. If you need anything else, just let us know.”

“Thank you. Have a good evening.”

“You too. Send some pictures when you get the chance. I can’t wait to see how cute they are, and it’ll probably be weeks before I’ll get a chance if Tasha has any say in the matter.”

I snorted faintly as the door closed—he definitely wasn’t getting near my children. I turned my head to nuzzle the eggs once more, humming deeply to them. In response, they resumed their rocking.

They had been much closer to hatching than I had realized at lunchtime, and shortly after our evening meal, they had started trying to break free. Even as much as I trusted Taureen, I simply couldn’t bear to let him touch the eggs right now. He had been perfectly understanding and was content to sit on the couch beside the nest, watching through the entrance.

The hatching process could take several hours, and they had been going at it for at least an hour at this point. I wasn’t about to leave the nest anytime soon and simply stood guard over them like a broody hen. And heaven help any person who tried to stick their hand in the entrance…

The eggs were rocking and rolling to some energetic beat known only to them. The slightly larger egg had more cracks, so I suspected it wouldn’t be much longer before the hatchling inside freed himself.

The other egg was rolling all over the place—even managing to somehow roll up and out of the nest several times. I had to gently guide her back into the nest before pushing more sand around the rim to make it higher.

I seriously hoped my daughter wouldn’t have that much energy when she finally hatched. Even in the egg, she was trying to get into all kinds of mischief.

Time passed slowly as I thrummed encouragement to the two eggs. They occasionally paused to rest, but both shells were marred with several cracks from their efforts.

A prolonged crackling announced the arrival of my first child; the larger shell finally split open, letting the blue dragonet squirm free with his oversized wings sprawling in all directions. Like any baby, he cried out in distress and confusion. Thrumming louder, I nuzzled him in reassurance while I used my tail to flick the two empty shell pieces out the entrance.

Keegan and I had picked out several names, with the color of the hatchling’s scales being the determining factor.

I mindspoke the three in the room, “Dirk just hatched.”

Keegan trilled from under the heat lamp beside the stump, and joy colored his voice. “Now all that remains to be seen is what our daughter’s name will be.”

Taureen’s fancy scanner was able to determine their gender, but not the color of their scales. The three possible colors for a female were gold, red, and green—and thus, three possible names.

I moved my tail to form a shield around Dirk as his sister’s egg exuberantly careened in his direction as if she had him on her radar. My tail gently deflected her egg even as I started to lightly rub warm sand across Dirk’s damp wings to dry them. His scales would be very soft and delicate until they hardened over the next day or so.

His neck seemed far too flimsy to hold up his head, and it bobbed unsteadily when he tried to move it. The soft, blunt claws would soon harden, although it would be a few weeks before they became sharp.

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He had the appeal that most young creatures had, and like most mothers, I was convinced that he was as cute as a button. His oversized and uncoordinated wings made him look particularly adorable.

It didn’t take me long to clean Dirk and help him settle down for a nap. He managed to curl up into a tiny ball all on his own, although he needed some assistance with his wings.

His sister’s egg was currently rolling around me in laps.

Her laps weren’t exactly intentional. I had curled around her sleeping brother, using my tail, body, and wings to form a barricade, and she was simply rolling against my scales since the now-raised sides of the nest finally kept her contained in the nest.

I bumped her egg with my snout, humming more deeply. She responded with a few rather energetic rolls before pausing, likely to rest. Keegan poked his head into the entrance, and I stretched out my neck to bump noses.

He reached farther in to gently nuzzle the blue hatchling before backing out of the entrance. There wasn’t enough room in the stump for both of us with a nestling and ambitious egg underfoot, but it wasn’t long before Keegan returned with a small bowl of fruit and stuck his head and shoulders in the entrance.

I ate a few pieces while Keegan nudged Dirk awake with a croon. Dirk might have been soundly asleep a moment before, but the sound had an immediate effect and he began creeling for food.

It was kind of surprising how much food he managed to eat before instantly falling asleep. Keegan reluctantly backed out of the entrance; he didn’t really want to leave, but the small opening pinched his wings and sides. My daughter’s egg did another lap around me.

Several laps later, I finally pinned her egg between my hands. The activity inside stilled as if she was shocked that I had curtailed her movement. It didn’t last long though, and shortly afterward, she resorted to knocking around inside the egg once more. With her efforts no longer being converted into momentum, the cracks spread rapidly across the egg.

Finally, at long last, one section of the shell broke off, and a scarlet snout stuck out of the hole as she took her first real breaths of fresh air. The small egg tooth on the end of her nose would fall off within hours. I sent a mental image of the tiny red nose to the others, trying to include them as best I could.

Tessa’s nose withdrew into her shell as she began rocking and banging around again. I carefully broke a few pieces away from her air hole, enlarging the opening.

It was as much assistance as I dared give her. Forcing the hatching of any bird or reptile was often detrimental to their health, and I wasn’t about to take a chance with my daughter when she was doing a perfectly fine job on her own.

Before too much time had passed, she managed to break free, squeaking in alarm at the sudden lack of confining walls. I dried her off as Keegan brought more fruit. She ate just as much as her brother had before falling asleep.

I finally stood up with a tired sigh, regarding the two tiny balls of blue and red scales curled up together. My wing muscles were stiff, and I really wanted to stretch—something that wasn’t really possible in this small shelter.

Considering they were sleeping soundly and shouldn’t wake for at least another hour, I decided to take a break while I could. I squeezed through the narrow entrance before stretching my wings and arching my back as my claws sank deep into the sand. Once finished, I shook my scales until they chimed as I looked around.

Taureen was still on the couch beside the end table, where he had been since the eggs had first started seriously rocking. The sun hadn’t set yet, so I assumed that roughly three hours had passed, which was about average according to the other dragonets.

The long wait didn’t seem to bother the ever-patient Kymari though. “How are they doing?”

“They are sleeping at the moment, although I doubt that will last long.” I looked at the bowl of fruit on the edge of the table. “We’re going to need more fruit than that before the sun rises.”

He looked at the bowl in mild surprise; it currently held more than what I normally ate in one sitting. “I’m not sure how they can possibly eat that much, but I’ll bring more out before I go to bed.”

Having previously helped feed several nestlings, I knew what I was up against. Thankfully, there was always a large stockpile of fruit in the kitchen, so it wasn’t as if we would run out. I was capable of getting the fruit out of the preservation shelves and cutting it up, but I knew Taureen preferred to do it.

I asked Keegan, “Can you watch the nest for a moment?”

“Of course.”

After three hours, I really needed a bathroom break. The Kymari lavatories were similar to the old human ones, and it was possible for the dragonets to use them. A shallow dish of water and a soft towel on the counter allowed us to rinse off our hands and feet.

The youngsters would use a litter tray with sand until they weren’t so clumsy, although I would be cleaning the nest for the first couple of days. Taureen had been kind enough to sew small scraps of leather into gloves so I didn’t have to touch their “presents” with my bare hands. The wild dragonets usually used leaves for this chore.

I was just thankful that I’d only have to do it for a couple of days. Dirk and Tessa would be mobile enough to walk by then, and by the end of the week, they’d be able to fly. A clumsy flight, but flight nonetheless.

Dragonets grew up quickly. From what we had seen so far, by the end of their first year, they were basically young adults and almost as big as their parents, although it would be about five years before they were fully grown and mature.

That was a long way in the future though; they weren’t even an hour old yet, and they had a lot of growing ahead of them.