Archive of Our Own

The night in Menagerie was thick as Velvet, pressed flat and dense against the old wood of the Belladonna house. Blake paused at the top of the steps, one hand on the ornate brass knot of the large door, the other hand a fist around the fraying strap of her duffel. She held her breath to keep from trembling. There was nothing in the wind but the distant sigh of surf and, closer, the skitter of tree lizards in the dry grass. She had come home to the same house a thousand times – half-walking, half-running, hair a mess and heart in her throat – but she couldn’t remember it ever feeling so alien, so quiet. Even the porch lamp seemed to burn with restraint, its light blunted and soft, pooling around her heeled boots without reaching the edge of the landing.

The door wasn’t locked. Of course not. Even after everything. Blake eased it open and braced herself for the ceremonial welcome, for Ghira’s voice booming from the kitchen or living room, for her mother’s arms sweeping her up and making a scene of it all. She tried to prepare a face for the moment: the right smile, the right angle of apology, as if the pose could fool anyone who knew her blood. But the house was silent. No laughter, no voices, not even the clatter of a mug in the sink. It felt less like a return and more like a trespass.

The warmth inside was immediate and complete, swallowing her whole. The scents of the house came net – jasmine and old books and a faint, metallic tang of tea left steeping too long. She let the door sigh shut behind her and kicked off her shoes. Her toes, still sensitive from the boots, curled against the welcome rug lining the main corridor. The rug was familiar: beige, soft, worn down by decades of feet before hers, and stained dark in places with old, unremembered stories.

Blake moved in silence, gliding past the mudroom and toward the faintest flicker of light in the living room. She barely recognised herself in the hallway mirror: hollow-cheeked, eyes sharp and hollowed to amber slits, a mouth that seemed to belong to someone older, harder. She adjusted the duffel across her chest and tried not to look at her ears, the way they dropped and twitched with every step.

She found her mother exactly as expected: perched on the far end of the sofa, knees drawn up, a throw blanket around her shoulder and a paperback in her lap. The room glowed with the diffuse, buttery light of a single lamp, its shade old enough to be retro and frayed at the edges. There was a mug of something hot at Kali’s elbow, steam still rising. The only other movement was the lazy sway of the ceiling fan overhead, stirring the light into soft, elliptical halos.

Kali didn’t turn at the soft sound of footsteps. She just closed the book around her finger and said, as if they’d never been apart, “Did you know the fisherman’s wife at the east pier named her son after your father? Swears he’s the spitting image.” Her voice was easy, gentle, but not light: it carried the weight of years, and the razor edge of being a chief’s wife.

Blake nearly smiled. “He’s probably more responsible, then.” The joke landed heavy, but she didn’t have the energy to try again.

Kali set the book aside, lifting her mug with both hands, and let a long moment stretch between them. She didn’t ask where Blake had been or why she had only written twice in the last six months. She just patted the sofa beside her – invitation or command, it didn’t matter – and waited.

Blake hesitated, but only for a breath. She let the duffel slide to the floor and curled into the seat, careful not to let her thigh touch kali’s. It didn’t matter. Kali’s arm wrapped around her instantly, blanket and all, drawing her close with a strength Blake had never been able to escape – not as a child, not as a Huntress-in-training, not even as a runaway she pretended to be at Beacon.

For a while, they said nothing. The only sound was Blake’s own heart, loud and arrhythmic, and the faint hum of the fan overhead. Kali's hand found the space between Blake’s shoulder blade and traced slow, absent circles. It was the same gesture she had used when Blake was a toddler, angry and fevered and refusing to sleep; it hadn’t changed in almost two decades, and it had always worked. Blake was too tired to resist, and too raw to hide.

Kali’s hand shifted, moving up to the nape of Blake’s neck, fingers working small knots out of the muscle. “I can make you something to eat,” she said, softer this time. “Or tea. Or both.”

“I’m not hungry,” Blake murmured. The lie wasn’t worth defending.

Kali hummed, not pressing. She changed tactics, fingers drifting higher until they brushed the base of Blake’s ears. The touch startled her. She flinched, expecting interrogation, scolding even, the list of things she’d broken or left behind. But the hand just lingered, petting gently at the soft fur. Kali didn’t speak, didn’t chide, didn’t even look at her. It was an old, practiced kindness – one meant to say “you’re home” without requiring a performance in return.

It undid her more thoroughly than any argument could have.

The next words tumbled out. “I didn’t know if I should come back”

That got a reaction. Kali’s hand paused, then firmed. “Of course you should,” the words were matter-of-fact, solid as the foundation. “You belong here, kitten.”

Blake stared at her lap, effusing to let her voice crack. “I left everyone behind. I left you.” She could feel her hands shaking in her sleeves. “I’m not – I’m not sure what’s left for me here.”

Kali’s grip tightened, not enough to hurt, but enough to make it clear that letting go wasn’t an option. “You don’t have to be sure. That’s why you come home.”

There was a sound at the back of Blake’s throat, half-sob and half-laugh. She wanted to be angry, wanted to push away, but it took all her strength just to hold still. “It’s not that simple.”

“Most things aren’t,” Kali agreed. Her voice was even, unhurried, but there was something urgent in the way her thumb stroked Blake’s ear, gentling it back into place. “But I know you, Blake. I know when you’re hurting. I know when you’re scared.”

A breath. “You don’t know how empty it feels.”

The admission hung in the air, more shocking than any confession about the White Fang or her failures as a teammate. Kali said nothing for a long time. Then she pulled Blake fully into her side, blanket swallowing them both. Blake didn’t resist. Her face pressed against Kali’s shoulder, where the scent of her mother was strongest – spice and honey and the faintest trace of sweet.

“You’re not empty,” Kali whispered into her hair. “You’re full of things you don’t know how to carry.”

It should have been infuriating. Instead, Blake found herself clinging to the words, to the softness in Kali’s voice, the certainty in it. She let herself sag, letting the warmth soak in. Her mother’s hand was in her hair, smoothing it down, then travelling in slow, anchoring lines along her back. There was no hurt, no demand, just a presence – a world refused to the radius of an embrace.

The silence changed quality, thickening. Blake noticed how close they were: her body tucked almost in Kali’s lap, arms and legs tangled under the blanket. Kali’s hand slid under her chin, gentle but inescapable, tilting Blake’s face up. The angle was too intimate; they were nose-to-nose, and Blake could see her own pain reflected in her mother’s eyes.

Kali thumbed away a stray tear, her touch lingering. “I’m here. You can lean on me. As long as you need.”

Blake nodded, a single, helpless jerk. She was already crying in earnest, silent and shaking. Kali pulled her all the way in, Blake’s head cradled to her chest, her mother’s heartbeat a metronome. For a while, Blake just let herself be held, the way she had as a child, the way she thought she’d outgrown.

She lost track of how long they stayed like that. The lamplight dimmed as the bulb hummed itself to sleep. The world shrank to the space between their bodies, to the hand at her scalp and the arms around her waist. Blake breathed in the scent of home, of safety, and something else – something almost electric, humming just under the skin.

It wasn’t until she shifted, seeking more of that warmth, that she realized how badly she was trembling. Kali made a soothing sound and pressed closer, her own body heat radiating like a hearth. She was bigger, softer, more solid than Blake remembered, and the difference made Blake feel smaller, younger, sheltered in a way she hadn’t been since leaving for Beacon.

Kali’s hand wandered to the side of her face, cupping Blake’s jaw, thumb tracing the line of her cheekbone. Their eyes met. Something passed between them, a charge, a sense that the room had become airless and close. Blake wanted to say something, anything, but her tongue wouldn’t cooperate. She just stared, wide-eyed and uncertain, and let herself be held.

Kali was the one who moved first. Not a kiss – at least, not at the start. She pressed their foreheads together, exhaling slow and deep. The contact was so deliberate, so deliberate and unhurried, that Blake’s panic gave way to a fuzzy, suspended sense of peace. She let her eyes flutter closed, her breath mingling with her mother’s.

When the kiss finally happened, it was more like a gradual collapse than a single decisive act. Their lips brushed, retreated, brushed again, until the third time, when Kali’s hand at Blake’s cheek guided her forward and held her there. It was soft, almost chaste, but neither of them pulled back. Blake’s whole body went rigid, then molten, as she realized what was happening. She tasted the honeyed tea on Kali’s lips, felt the heat of her breath, the pulse pounding at her own throat.

They parted, just for a second, eyes meeting again. Blake expected to see horror, regret – anything but the gentle hunger she found in Kali’s gaze. The next kiss was bolder, hungrier; Kali’s fingers inched behind Blake’s ear, holding her close. Blake responded before her mind caught up, mouth opening, catching Kali’s lower lip and drawing a startled sound from them both.

The blanket slipped off their shoulders. Kali’s hands found Blake’s waist, squeezing hard enough to anchor her, to keep her from floating away. Blake gasped, the sound lost in the kiss, her own hands scrambling to find purchase on her mother’s arms, her back, her hair. The world tilted; suddenly she was in Kali’s lap, straddling her, their bodies pressed flush from chest to knee.

It should have felt wrong. It should have felt like betrayal, or madness, or both. But all Blake felt was relief – a tidal wave of it, so strong her eyes blurred again, her breath hitching on a sob as she kissed her mother over and over, desperate to erase the last months of self-exile and self-doubt. Kali accepted all of it, hands roaming, moth gentling the rough edges, as if she had been waiting years for this.

Somewhere in the chaos, Blake heard her own name, whispered low and raw against her ear. It made her shudder, made her cling tighter. She let herself fall, let her body take over. There was no space left for shame, only for the heat, the need, the sense of being wanted – no, needed – in a way she had never dared hope for. When they broke apart, they were both out of breath, faces flushed, lips bitten red. Kali’s hands settled on Blake’s hips, steadying her. For a moment, neither spoke; they just stared, lost and found at once, the new reality crashing over them in slow, thunderous waves.

Blake’s voice came out hoarse. “Is this – are we–”

Kali just smiled, equal parts sad and triumphant. “If you want it, kitten. I won’t let you go.”

Blake didn’t trust herself to answer. She didn’t need to. She lunged forward, mouth to mouth, her hands in Kali’s hair, her whole body shivering with need.

This time, when Kali pulled her close, there was nothing gentle about it.

Blake didn’t just follow, she crashed into her mother’s embrace, teeth and lips and desperate hands tangling together. The last shreds of composure melted on contact. They toppled, graceless and hungry, onto the sofa, knees knocking and shoulders bumping, Blake’s thigh caught between the heat of Kali’s legs. The world blurred into sensation: breath sweet and heavy on her cheek, the rasp of a callused palm at her waist, the sharp, vertiginous plunge of kissing someone who had always, always been safe. 

The blanket tangled around their hips, clinging with static and warmth. Blake barely registered her mother’s hands at the hem of her shirt until they were sliding underneath, splaying wide over her stomach. The touch was so gentle, so precise, it hurt. She arched into it, chasing more, her own hands lost for a moment – gripping at Kali’s wrists, at her shoulders, at the silk of her hair. She needed to feel every part at once. She needed to be real, solid, and not a ghost. 

Kali nipped at Blake’s lower lip, then pulled back just enough to look her in the eyes. The question was there, naked and raw: are you sure? Blake swallowed, nodding so hard it snapped the tension like a whip. “Don’t stop,” she breathed, voice shredded and thin, and that was all it took. 

They tumbled off the sofa together, feet searching for footing, hands refusing to let go. Kali laughed – low and rough, not mocking but electrified. “Not planning to,” she whispered, and steered them, step by stumble, toward the shadowed bedroom up the stairs and beyond the hall. Blake’s back hit the doorframe, the jolt ricocheting up her spine and making her gasp, and then Kali was kissing her again, relentless, tasting the seam of Blake’s mouth until she let it open, until their tongues tangled and Kali’s hands slid up, up, cupping the full curve of her daughter’s chest.

Blake was shaking so hard she thought her knees would go. She let her head fall back against the wall, letting Kali’s mouth travel along her jaw, her throat, the slope of her collarbone. Each kiss seared, each nip and scope branding her as real, as present, a someone who could be wanted this much. She let herself moan – a little, just a tremor in her voice – and felt Kali smile against her skin, felt her mother’s hands find the button of her bottoms and pop it free with ease. 

Blake’s fingers hooked in Kali’s waistband and tugged them closer, pelvis to pelvis, the friction between them became dizzying, infuriating. “I need you,” she managed, the words barely more than a whisper.

She didn’t need to say it twice. 

They collapsed onto Kali’s bed in a snarl of limbs, Kali’s hands everywhere at once: peeling Blake’s shirt off, palming her breasts through the bra, pulling her arms overhead for one sublime moment of helplessness. Blake’s ears twitched and fluttered, her body a live wire. When Kali kissed her again – hard, open-mouthed, teeth flashing – Blake kissed back with everything she had been holding inside for the last six months and half a lifetime. 

It got sloppy, fast. Clothes came off in pieces: shirts hiked up to armpits, trousers shoved to mid-thigh, socks lost to the void beyond the bed. Blake’s bra snapped at the clasp, sending one strap curling down her arm, and then Kali’s mouth was at her nipple, sucking and teasing, biting just shy of pain. Blake arched off the bed, hands clutching at Kali’s hair, and felt her own cock straining, trapped between her belly and the hot press of Kali’s thigh.

She was too far gone to be ashamed. Kali ground down on her, pinning Blake to the mattress with her weight, the evidence of her own arousal blatant, impossible to ignore. Blake felt it – hard, insistent, perfectly matched to he own – and bucked up into it, the friction lighting her nerves from spine to scalp. The next moan was louder, desperate, not even her own voice.

Kali took her time, drawing it out, kissing from Blake’s chest to her navel, fingers sliding along the ridges of muscle and the soft hollow below. Blake writhed, nails digging into the sheets, hips canting up for more. She nearly sobbed when Kali finally, finally peeled her jeans all the way down, catching her underwear in the process. Her cock sprang free, flushed dark with need, twitching in the cool air.

Kali didn’t hesitate. She stroked Blake – firm, confident, like it was the most natural thing in the world - her palm slick and sure, thumb tracing the bead of pre at the tip. Blake’s entire body jolted, her ears flattening to her scalp, her toes curling. She wanted to hide her face, to bite her knuckles, but Kali’s hand around her cock was too perfect, too grounding, too much.

“Mum, please–” she heard herself say and hated how fragile she sounded. Hated, and loved it. 

Kali hushed her with a kiss, then guided Blake’s hand to her own length, harder and thicker than Blake’s, nestled among the lush curves of her hips. Blake squeezed, and the sound Kali made was worth every ounce of embarrassment. They stroked each other, hips grinding, cock pressed together and sliding in slippery, delirious friction. 

It was obscene, and perfect, and so much better than any half-forbidden fantasy Blake had tried to murder in her own mind. 

Kali’s hands mapped Blake’s body, memorizing every inch: the lean muscle, the softness at her hips, the trembling in her thighs. She bent down, teeth catching Blake’s ear, and whispered, “I want you to remember this, kitten. Every night you’re gone, I want you to feel me inside you.”

Blake shivered, her body bucking involuntarily. She nodded, but the words snagged in her throat.

Kali coaxed Blake onto her stomach, strong hands guiding her to the edge of the bed, feet flat on the floor, ass up and waiting. Blake’s ears, useless in the heat of the moment, twitched against her head. She tried to look back, to see her mother’s face, but Kali pressed a hand to the small of her back, holding her still.

The anticipation was torture: the brush of Kali’s fingers between her legs, the blunt head of her cock nudging at Blake’s folds. Blake was soaked, so slick she could feel it pooling on her thigh. The first push was slow, careful, a tease. Then Kali’s cock was inside her – just the tip, then an inch, the n more – and Blake gasped, knees buckling, hands scrabbling for purchase on the comforter. 

She’d never felt so full in her life. Not just stretched, but claimed, as if every nerve ending was being stitched back together from the inside out. Kali moved with patience, rocking her hips in slow, shallow thrusts, letting Blake adjust. The sound of their bodies was the only music in the room. 

Blake’s world shrank to the points of contact: Kali’s hand at her hip, anchoring her; Kali’s cock, driving deeper with each thrust; Kali’s other hand, roaming her back and sides, caressing, encouraging, owning her. She couldn’t breathe. She didn’t want to.

When Kali finally bottomed out, hips flush to Blake’s ass, they both froze. Blake whimpered, shaking, her body fighting the urge to come instantly. Kali bent over her, lips at Blake’s shoulder, whispering praise and filth in equal measure.

“You’re perfect,” Kali said, voice trembling now. “So tight – so fucking beautiful–”

Blake moaned, and that was enough. Kali set a rhythm, slow at first, then faster, each thrust a little deeper, a little rougher. Blake’s hands fisted in the sheets, her own cock trapped beneath her, grinding into the bed with every movement. She was lost, ruined, already on the edge.

Kali’s grip at her waist shifted, one hand sneaking up to Blake’s throat. The touch was featherlight at first, just a suggestion, but it sent a spike of heat through Blake’s entire body. She pushed back into it, silently begging, and Kali obliged: fingers closing with just enough pressure to remind Blake whose arms she was in, who owned her now.

She came without warning, vision going white at the edges. Her cock pulsed between her legs, a sticky mess she couldn’t have stopped if she tried. Kali didn’t stop, didn’t even slow down – she fucked her daughter through it, chasing her own climax, her hand tight at Blake’s neck and her mouth flooding Blake’s ear with promises, confessions, endearments that melted into nonsense. 

Blake’s world had become pressure and heat. The bedroom had collapsed into a single axis: her mother’s body, her own body, the place where they connected – slick and obscene, so full she could barely keep from coming again already. The air felt thick enough to drink. She could smell herself, and Kali, and the spent, iron tang of their sweat. 

Blake’s voice had shattered. She meant to say “more,” meant to beg, but the sound that came out was just a sob, broken in half by the impact of Kali’s hips slamming home. The wordless, animal noise didn’t even embarrass her. Nothing could. Not after what she had already let happen. 

Kali’s hand was a vice on Blake’s hip, keeping her form squirming away, using her own momentum to pull her daughter back onto the cock with every stroke. The other hand alternated – sometimes it dug into Blake’s ass cheek, spreading her wider, sometimes it pressed flat against her lower back, pinning her. Once, when Blake tried to arch her spine and get leverage, Kali simply clamped a palm over her tailbone and forced her down, holding her there while she pounded away. The possessiveness of it made Blake whimper, made her want to be ruined, to be used and left a mess. 

She had already come once, she thought. Or twice? It didn’t matter. Her cock was pinned between her belly and the edge of the bed, leaking helplessly onto the sheets, every vein and verve ending lit up and screaming. Each time Kali thrust deep into her cunt, she felt herself twitch and drool, and each time her mother’s hand let up on her back to stroke or squeeze her shaft, it sent a fresh shudder through her gut. 

Kali was fucking her so hard the headboard knocked the wall in rhythm. “You can take it,” Kali growled. “I know you can.” The words fanned the fire inside Blake, made her clamp down around the cock buried in her, made her want to scream yes or please or just her mother’s name. She didn’t even know if Kali was talking to her as a lover or as a daughter, and she didn’t care. It was both. It was always both.

When the hand slid from Blake’s hip up to her throat, she froze. The grip was gentle at first, just fingertips brushing the underside of her jaw. Kali pressed in close, her chest and belly hot against the curve of Blake’s back. “Breathe,” Kali whispered, right against her ear, and for one awful, electric second, Blake thought she’d pass out just from the sound.

The hand closed around her neck. Not tight enough to choke her, just enough to remind her that she was held, that she couldn’t get away even if she wanted to. Kali slowed the pace, long deep thrusts now, the cock grinding so high inside Blake that she saw spots in her vision. With every push, the hand on her neck squeezed a little more, then let go, then squeezed again in time with the movement.

“Good girl,” Kali murmured, and the words snapped the last string of willpower Blake had. She let her head go limp, let herself drool into the blanket, let her body go soft and pliant, nothing but a vessel for her mother’s needs. Each time the grip around her throat tightened, she felt her own cock spasm, felt herself ooze onto the sheets, felt the tip of Kali’s shaft catch inside her and send a new wave of heat up her spine.

She didn’t realize she was sobbing until Kali eased her up, hooked an arm under her ribs, and hauled her upright. Blake’s ears were ringing. The pressure in her neck faded, replaced by the grounding anchor of Kali’s arms around her chest. Kali kept them joined, cock still buried to the hilt, and maneuverer Blake up and back until she was sitting in Kali’s lap, both of them on their knees on the ruined mattress.

Blake trembled, boneless, as Kali’s free hand swept up from her belly to cup her breast. She shuddered again when Kali pinched her nipple, rolled it between strong fingers, and then reached down to wrap her fist around Blake’s leaking, half-hard cock. The palm was slick with sweat and slickness, the grip just on the edge of too much.

“Listen to me,” Kali said, low and hungry. Her lips brushed Blake’s ear. “You’re not going anywhere. Not now, not ever.” The rhythm started again, this time with Kali rolling her hips upward, fucking Blake from below while her hand milked Blake’s shaft in perfect counterpoint. The new angle made everything sharper, more overwhelming. Blake’s vision went watery at the edges. She locked her hands around Kali’s wrists, unsure if she was trying to pull away or to anchor herself.

“I want you to feel this,” Kali panted. “Every time you think about running. Every time you try to disappear. I want you to remember how it feels to have me inside you.”

The hand on her cock moved faster. Blake tried to beg, tried to say “please, Mum, I can’t,” but all that came out was a thin, ragged gasp.

“Come for me,” Kali whispered. The command was absolute. “Spurt for Mommy.”

It was enough. The world went white and silent. Blake’s cock convulsed in Kali’s grip, hot pulses splattering across her own stomach and thighs, then slower, each one draining her hollow. Her insides clenched hard around Kali’s length, and that set Kali off, too. The next thrust came with a wordless growl, and Blake felt the heat flood into her, so thick and deep she thought it would never stop. She felt every twitch and jerk, every shudder of Kali’s body behind her. She imagined the come pooling inside her, imagined herself filled and bred and ruined forever, and the thought was so perfect she let herself collapse backward, slumping into Kali’s embrace.

They stayed like that for a long, endless minute. Blake’s body sang with aftershocks, tremors running from the top of her head to her curled toes. Kali kept her arms tight around Blake’s chest, now more cradling than restraining, rocking her slowly back and forth. The air in the room felt cool on Blake’s skin, but she didn’t shiver – her mother’s warmth was all she needed. 

The hand at her throat let go, slid up to stroke the line of her jaw. Kali pressed a kiss to Blake’s temple. “You did so well,” she murmured, and Blake felt her eyes sting again, this time with gratitude.

She didn’t trust herself to speak, but she didn’t have to. Kali just held her, the way she always had, the way Blake had always needed.

After a while, Kali eased them both down onto the mattress, spooning close, their bodies still joined. Blake curled into comfort, her own breath slowing, her mind finally quiet for the first time in months. She’d always thought she was running away to protect them – her family, her mother, everyone she had ever loved. But here, in the circle of Kali’s arms, she realised maybe she had just been waiting for someone to catch her. 

She let herself drift, let the room fade away. There was nothing left but the hush of Kali’s heartbeat, the scent of sex and home, and the promise that she was finally, truly, never alone.

The last vestiges of sunset clung to the Menagerie coast, pink draining slowly from the low clouds as the horizon turned black and absolute. Inside the Belladonna house, the night was layered: thick, warm, and weightless, every surface aglow under the honeyed lamps and soft-lit windows. Blake sat cocooned in a patch of old sofa, the cushions caved around her hips, a threadbare blanket scrunched under her thighs. The world beyond the glass was quite save for the ocean’s lull, a white-noise hush that made the living room feel even more private, as if the tide itself stood guard at the door.

She’d fallen into this evening the way one might step into a familiar old dream. Her mother

 had pulled her down beside her after dinner, arms looping around Blake’s shoulders with a hold so practiced it barely needed words. Blake went without protest. The shirt she wore (her mother’s, technically, swaddling her belly and chest in soft cotton) was a size too big, and yet it barely managed to contain the gentle roundness of her pregnancy. It stretched, subtly obscene, over the curved rise of her stomach, the lower hem not quite reaching her thighs. She didn’t bother with pants; it was a lazy sort of evening, and the only person who might judge her was herself.

Blake’s bare toes poked out from beneath the blanket, tapping against the edge of the coffee table with each new kick or nudge from inside her. At first, she’d been hyper-aware of every movement, every flutter – each one a reminder of what she had done, the line she had crossed, the impossibility of ever running from this particular consequence. Now, she had almost grown used to it. Almost. Sometimes, in the quiet, she felt more like an incubator than a woman; sometimes she felt like a miracle. Sometimes she couldn’t tell the difference. 

Kali’s presence beside her was a living thing: all heat, soft hair, and steady breath. She wore a dressing gown in a shade of blue that made her skin look sunlit even in the dark, the collar falling wide enough to bare her collarbone and the slope of one shoulder. She held a mug of black tea in her left hand, the steam painting little crescents on her cheek. The other hand had not left Blake’s body for the better part of an hour – sometimes resting on her shoulder, sometimes sliding down to cup her elbow, but mostly just drifting in slow, lazy loops over the taunt skin of Blake’s stomach. Whenever the baby kicked, Kali would press her palm flat, fingers splaying in delight, and let the smallest, move private smile split her lips. 

They’d been talking about nothing and everything. The sort of conversation that only happened in the valley between exhaustion and sleep, where words didn’t need context and laughter didn’t need jokes.

“Do you think Dad is going to lose his mind when he finds out what you want to name her?” Blake asked, eyes half-closed, head pillowed against her mother’s shoulder.

“I think your father would’ve named you ‘Tiger’ if I hadn’t intervened,” Kali replied. “He’s a soft touch, really. Besides, you’re the one with final say. You’re the one carrying her.”

Blake ran her tongue over the inside of her cheek, searching for a rebuttal, but nothing came. She let the silence sit, filling the air between them with nothing but the sound of the fan overhead and the gentle shush of the tide outside. She wondered, for the hundredth time, whether she would’ve ever pictured a life like this. Even after everything, after all the blood and exile and coming home to ruins, Blake hadn’t believed she’d end up somewhere so… calm.

She shifted, awkward in her new centre of gravity, and let her knees flop to one side, her bare feet tangling with Kali’s in the narrow space. The movement sent a ripple through her belly, and she sucked in a little breath as the baby elbowed her ribs from inside.

Kali’s hand stilled, then pressed more firmly. “That one hurt?”

“Not really,” Blake said, but her face must have given her away. Kali’s touch gentled, fingertips rubbing soothing circles.

“You were always a kicker, too,” her mother said softly, a note of nostalgia in her voice. “Ghira used to say you were trying to claw your way out, even before you could walk. He’d lay his head on my stomach and swear you were plotting.”

Blake huffed a laugh. “That tracks.”

“It’s good to see you laugh,” Kali said, almost to herself. The hand on her belly slipped up to Blake’s chin, nudging it gently, so their eyes met. “You know, you don’t have to keep waiting for the other shoe to drop.”

Blake blinked. “I’m not–”

“Kitten.” The nickname was velvet, layered with so much history it could barely stand on its own. “You flinch every time someone opens a door. I’m not going to vanish on you. None of this is going away.”

For a moment, Blake wanted to argue, to insist she was fine, to reel off all the ways she’d prepared herself for loss. But the protest crumbled on her tongue. She was tired of pretending. Tired of wearing armour, even when no one expected it.

Instead, she leaned into the touch, letting her eyes drift shut as Kali’s fingers traced the shell of her ear, then trailed down to stroke the side of her throat. It was grounding, real, even as the rest of the world felt impossibly far away.

They sat like that for a while, just breathing. The baby rolled, and Blake let out a low, involuntary sound – a cross between a yawn and a moan, the sort of comforted noise she would have been mortified by if anyone else was in the room. Kali only smiled, and with her freehand, reached over to tip the mug to Blake’s lips. 

“Drink,” she coaxed. “You need to keep hydrated, especially this late.”

Blake obeyed. The tea was strong, bitter, and slightly oversweet, the way she liked it. She drank and let Kali’s thumb brush away a stray drop from her chin when she was done.

For a brief, golden minute, there was no past or future. Just a Faunus woman, the daughter she’d raised, and the child they’d made together – woven into a single, tangled knot on a couch that had seen better days. 

Eventually, Kali broke the silence. “If you want to go back to Beacon, or Vale, we can. I’ll make it work. But you don’t have to run, Blake. You never did.” 

Blake opened her mouth, but instead of words, she found only a wave of emotion – thick, raw, impossible to name. It wasn't just love; it was a kind of peace, too. The peace of finally being allowed to rest. The peace of being claimed, utterly, by someone who had every right to do it. 

She turned, shifting until she was almost sitting in Kali’s lap, and pressed her nose into the hollow beneath her mother’s jaw. The scent of her was as familiar as oxygen, and it made Blake want to purr, to burrow, to never move again.

Kali’s arms gathered her up, blanket and all, and held tight. “I love you,” she whispered, right into Blake’s ear, as if it was a secret for them alone.

“I love you too,” Blake said, muffled by skin. “I love you so much it hurts.”

A little pressure on her chin again, and then Kali was tilting Blake’s face up, kissing her – slowly, deeply, with all the time in the world. The taste of tea, of warmth, of home. Blake melted, her hands fluttering up to clutch at Kali’s neck, needing an anchor. She let herself drown in the sensation, the lips moving over hers with patient certainty, the tongue that coaxed her own to play, the gentleness that hid just enough hunger to make her shiver.

When they parted, Kali didn’t let her go. She pressed their foreheads together; eyes closed and kept her palm flat on the globe of Blake’s belly. It was as if she was staking a claim, a promise, or maybe both.

The baby kicked again – hard, insistent, almost as if protesting the sudden intrusion. Both women snorted at the same moment, and the laughter wound through the room like smoke. 

“She’s going to be trouble,” Blake said, nose wrinkles. 

“She’s going to be perfect,” Kali replied, nuzzling Blake’s cheek. “And if she takes after you, we’re doomed.” 

Blake let her mind drift. Once, she’d seen this place as a prison – a museum for the girl she had tried so hard to kill off. Now, it felt more like a chrysalis. She’d changed, irreversibly, but not into something monstrous or alien. She was still Blake Belladonna, daughter of Kali, daughter of Menagerie, daughter of her own mistakes and choices. 

She was also going to be a mother. The thought terrified her, and thrilled her, and made her want to cling to Kali’s hand forever.

“Once this little one’s out,” Kali said, voice sly and a little wicked, “how about you be a good girl and put a new sibling for yourself in my belly next time?”

Blake’s ears flattened in shock, and a flush crept up her neck. “That’s–” She had no words. She thought it, maybe, in the back of her mind, but hearing it out loud set her pulse hammering. 

Kali’s thumb traced Blake’s lower lip, coaxing it down. “I think it’s only fair, after what I did to you in my bedroom all those months ago. A kiss to the brow, softer than breath. “You’re going to be a wonderful mother.”