Today I sat down to work on my original story and instead wrote this.

Elanor Trevelyan trailed her fingers through the fat, bristly heads of wheat. A good harvest this year. A welcome sign.

Wheat for prosperity.

She snipped a few stalks, carefully placing them in the basket hanging in the crook of her bad arm and slowly made her way through the field toward the stone cottage. Smoke trailed into the air, smelling faintly of boiled linen. She chuckled—Cullen's templar past was far behind him, but the discipline would never leave him, she suspected. Then she winced as a sharp pain coursed through her. She counted, breathing slowly, and the pain faded.

She had some time left. Walking through the warm sun, she reached the small garden to the right of the cottage. Weeds had made inroads since her latest distraction, but she would get back to it in time. She sorted through the rows, plucking a few blossoms of Andraste's Grace, their sweet fragrance lingering on her fingers. These too went into the basket.

Andraste's Grace for the Maker's favor.

The pain came again, quicker than she had expected, and a groan escaped her lips before it faded. From an open window of the cottage, she heard Cullen. Or rather, she heard the absence of his usual clattering around. He'd heard her. She wouldn't have much time now. But only one more thing left…

Elanor put two fingers in her mouth and gave a piercing whistle. Leo, the mabari that had adopted Cullen the day they got married, bounded straight over the wall where he'd been sunning himself. He nosed her outstretched hand with friendly greeting.

"Come on, boy. Time to prepare."

A friend to guide her.

Leo gave a happy bark and then, when she had to stop again as the pain hit, sidled up close beside her, offering his sturdy body as support as he licked her hand.

"Good boy," she gasped, and then Cullen was at her side, taking the basket and putting his arm around her distended waist.

"Stubborn woman," he grumbled. "Orlesian ladies would have been abed hours ago at the first indication of birthing pains, not hunting for traditional good luck charms."

"Blessings," she corrected, kissing his cheek. "And I am not Orlesian. He smelled and looked as if he'd been scrubbing every inch of the house with lavender soap and vinegar. She'd have the cleanest birthing bed in the Free Marches.

Mia stood inside, folding cloths, her sleeves rolled up to her elbows. She looked up as they walked inside and took the basket from Cullen. "You got everything then…. " She frowned. "Where's the friend?"

Elanor laid her hand on the mabari's head.

Mia smiled, the corners of her eyes crinkling in a way that reminded her of Cullen. "Very Fereldan of you."

"I'm learning."

Then the world narrowed to a point as pain began to radiate out from her spine, tightening like a hand on the grip on a sword. She was vaguely aware of Cullen's alarm and Mia's swift directions, and then she was on the bed, gasping, yelling curses in Tevene that Dorian would have been proud of.

And later, there was finally quiet except for the mewling cry of new life and a hollow, deflated feeling in Elanor's belly. The baby arrived in her arms still smeared with birth fluid, arms and legs flailing in the cold, vast room until Elanor wrapped her in a blanket, using the corner to wipe her eyes and down the bridge of her nose. Water trickled in the background as Mia washed her hands.

Cullen sat on the bed next to her, so she shifted over—pain bloomed, but briefly and somehow muffled as if it was in a different room—and she cradled herself in his arms, much like their baby was in hers.

"Well," he said, and his voice was shaking. She knew if she looked up, his eyes would be red, like hers. But she couldn't look away from their daughter.

"Elizabeth," she said, trying out the name they'd chosen months ago. "Lizzie."

"Lizzie," Cullen repeated, and kissed her in the waning light of the day.