Backdated to just a week or so before Mùchén's birth.

Hàorán had never encountered a pregnant woman before. In truth, he has never really witnessed childbirth or the comings and goings of anyone weighed down by the expectations of children. Rìhé and he had never broached the topic of it. For a marriage set entirely on the foundation of must-haves and prompt doings instead of wants and desires was lackluster in comparison to one built upon love and resilience. This was not to say he did not love his wife. Hàorán would honor her until his breath turned cold and stiff, until his heart thundered no more, and his body withered away. But he could never afford her the frivolous feeling of love.

Not for lack of trying, because what man didn't want a beautiful, intelligent, and strong woman at his side, but the true hindrance was their circumstance, and it would always remain that way. She would seek love in shadowed corners and soft whispers, fleeting touches amidst a bustling crowd. And Hàorán would forever see it, and yet never comment on it. He would never take a lover, or prioritize his own happiness, not when it endangered hers. And if or when she chooses to have children, it will be by his hand that she is saved, that their children are titled and honored, whether it is his blood in their veins or not.

Could a love be any stronger?

Love was a foreign thing to Hàorán. The acts of it were easy, the gifts and the words, but the feelings that stirred in his chest could never find grip on the outside. It was as if they were stuck, broken enough to be hollow within. He could not be blamed, for how is a child to learn love without the love of a mother? Without the warmth of her heart seeping into his?

His own had died at the hands of Hàorán, himself. A son born to a weak, dying mother—this is what his father told him. But, alas, a son! An heir to a dying name! What did it matter if a woman was sacrificed in the process? If the babe lay suckling on a warm, decaying teat? This is all Hàorán knew of love. Of childbirth. Perhaps it was gruesome, perhaps it was morbid. Perhaps it was none of those things and still, everything Hàorán did not truly know.

But he approached it now, nevertheless, creeping into Kexin's den with nimble feet.

He brought nothing of true worth. No herbs, no perfuming flowers, no furs or prey. He simply brought the only thing he could remember of his own birth, the distinct smell that lingered through his childhood, his adolescence, and now his adulthood—hoping, if nothing else, that it might bring her the same comfort that it brought him.

—Honey.

Pregnancy did not sit well with the healer, and only in recent days had she conceded that she needed to slow down. Her belly was round with pups, she was producing milk, her appetite was lowered - all signs that she would be giving birth soon. A day she both dreaded and looked forward to, for she would finally be free of pregnancy, but then she would have the pups to contend with.

She... still wasn't certain how she felt about that.

Shēnléi was avoiding her. The Empress still glared. Hushed whispers filled her ears.

Still Kexin worked. Still Kexin would do what she was meant to do - to serve the wolves of Tianlong until she was physically incapable of doing so. Which... admittedly would most likely be soon. She'd fallen asleep in the back of the den she kept the herbs in, drooling into a pile of dried dandelion leaves.

It was the footsteps that roused her, and Kexin popped up, eyes round and the fur of her cheek covered in damp leaves. She looked a mess, exhausted and startled and ruffled from her impromptu nap, but she turned to face the general nonetheless.

"Jiang Haoran," she greeted, as though she were not, in fact, covered in dandelion leaves. "What brings you here? No injuries, I hope." Her eyes flicked down to the object at his paws, but out of politeness did not linger.