Ben remembered then. They were engaged in the search for the black unicorn and each had, on separate occasions, gone to the Earth Mother for help in the quest. She had told them then that they were important to her and specifically charged Ben with protecting Willow. When the quest was finished and the secret of the unicorn discovered, Willow had revealed to Ben what the Earth Mother had confided in her—that one day they would share a child. Ben had not known what to think then. He was still haunted by the ghost of Annie and not yet certain of his future with Willow. He had forgotten the Earth Mother’s prophecy since, preoccupied with the business of being King and lately of dealing with the old King’s son, Michel Ard Rhi, who had almost succeeded in stealing away the medallion that gave Ben power over the Paladin, the King’s champion. Without the Paladin, Ben could not continue as Landover’s King. Without the medallion, Ben would have a tough time just staying alive.
But all that was past now, the threats posed by the appearance of the black unicorn and Michel Ard Rhi ended, and what surfaced from the memories of those events was the Earth Mother’s prophecy, a promise of yet another change in an already indelibly changed life.
Ben shook his head. “I don’t know what to say.” Then he caught himself, his eyes snapping up. “Yes I do. I know what to say. It’s the most wonderful news I can imagine. I thought I would never have a child after Annie died. I had given up on everything. But finding you … And now hearing this …” His smile broadened and he almost laughed at himself. “Maybe I don’t know what to say after all!”
She smiled back, radiant. “I think you do, Ben. The words are mirrored in your eyes.”
He reached over and pulled her close to him. “I’m very happy.”
He thought momentarily of what it would be like to be a father, to have a child to raise. He had tried to imagine it once, long ago, and had since given up. Now he would begin again. The impact of the responsibilities he faced sent him spinning. It would be hard work, he knew. But it would be wonderful.
“Ben,” she said quietly, drawing away so that he could see her face. “Listen to me a moment. There are things you have to understand. You are no longer in your world. Everything is different here. This child’s coming to life will be different. The child itself will likely not be what you expect…”
“Wait a minute,” he interrupted. “What are you saying?”
Her gaze fell, then lifted again, steady but uneasy. “We are from two different worlds, Ben, from two different lives, and this child is a joining of both, something that has never happened before.”
“Is the baby in some sort of danger?” he asked hurriedly.
“No.”
“Then nothing else matters. It will be ours, whatever the mix of its blood and history. It will be the best of both of us.”
Willow shook her head. “But each world remains a mystery in some ways, yours to me, mine to you, and the differences cannot always be easily explained or understood …”
He put a finger to her lips. “We’ll work it out. All of it.” He was firm, insistent. He misread entirely the nature of her concern and brushed her words aside in his haste to experience the euphoria he was feeling. “A baby, Willow! I want to go tell someone about this! I want to tell everyone! C’mon! Let’s get up!”
He was out of bed in an instant, springing up and rushing about, pulling on his clothes, charging to the window and yelling wildly with glee, coming back to kiss her over and over. “I love you,” he said. “I’ll love you for ever and ever.”
He was dressed and out the door before she had even left the bed, and the words that perhaps she would have spoken to him were left forever unsaid.
He went down the castle stairs two at a time, bounding as if he were a child himself, humming and talking and whistling, buoyant as a cork. He was a man of average size with a hawk nose and frosty blue eyes. His brownish hair had begun to recede slightly, but his face and hands were smooth and taut. He had been a boxer when he was younger, and he still trained regularly. He was lean and fit and moved easily. He was approaching forty when he first crossed into Landover, but he didn’t know how old he was anymore. He sometimes felt as if he had quit aging altogether. This morning he was certain of it. He could feel the pulse of Sterling Silver beneath his feet, the beat of her heart, of her lifeblood, of her soul. He could feel the warmth of her stones and mortar, the whisper of her breath in the fresh morning air. She was alive, the home of Landover’s Kings, a thing of such magic that she sustained herself and relied only on the presence of a Master to function. When Ben had first come to her, twenty years of neglect had reduced her to a tarnished wreck. Now she was restored, polished and shining and vibrant, and he could sense her thoughts as clearly as his own when he was safe within her walls.