Hey friends, I know I haven't updated since 2012, but ….. here's chapter 5.

I kept smoothing my loose cotton clothes over my stomach, trying to figure out if I would be showing at all during the meeting. I turned to the side, trying to remember what I had looked like ten weeks earlier. I let go of the cloth, and my outfit took away any noticeable baby bump. Carter came up behind me, ready to leave. He rubbed his hands on my stomach, something he had gotten into the habit of over the last few weeks.

"Don't worry, no one will notice," he reassured me, "you look like you just ate a burrito."

I smiled, feigning flattery. "Thanks, but burrito or not, you know how people talk."

"What are they going to talk about? 'Oh my gods, did you see the queen gained five pounds?'"

I turned around to face him, "They will! Trust me; people pay a lot of attention to us." Carter kissed my forehead and rubbed my back. I rested my head on his chest, trying to ignore the imminent stress of our meeting. "We need to get going," I mumbled into his shirt. It was seven in the morning here, but already one in the afternoon in Berlin, and the two of us had a lunch date.

Because I had grown up around magic, I was constantly aware of how it affected me. I know how I would react to casting spells, or having them cast on me, or any other major magical events. Like stepping out of a room in New York and into a room in Berlin. But those major leaps had never bothered me before. So when I stepped into thirty-sixth nome, I could tell something was different. I didn't want to assume that Adali, the woman who ran the nome, would go so far as to ruin our tip over, but there was no doubting that something had gone wrong with our arrival.

"Do you feel that too?" I whispered to Carter.

"Feel what?"

"Something was wrong with the trip over, I feel different." I told him. He just shrugged.

"I don't feel anything, but let me know if you start to feel worse." He moved away from me as someone came up to greet us.

"Your majesties, this way please," He said, leading us into a long dining hall. The table was clearly meant to entertain a larger crowed, but was only set for four. Adali and her wife were already seated, and stood when we entered the room.

"Mr. and Mrs. Kane, good to see you again," Adali said as we took our seats. "Thank you for meeting with us. Unfortunately, there has been a large influx of magicians into the thirty-sixth, and we don't have the resources to continue to house them."

As she continued to explain her situation, and the resources she believed she would need to mitigate the problem, the kitchen brought out an array of German foods for us to eat. Carter looked at his plate, and then up at me; we had the same though – German food isn't the idea breakfast food. Still, it would be rude to refuse.

The unsettled feeling still hadn't gone away after a few minutes. I was taking sips of water and barely eating, just trying to focus on what Adali needed to get done. We had promised to send her more recourses, to relocate some magicians to new nomes. We were hammering out some details of the new budget, when the reason I had been feeling off came flooding to my brain, and out of my stomach. I hurriedly excused myself, and bolted from the room.

I heard Carter excuse himself as well and follow me down the hall, but I didn't have time to wait for him. I pushed open the door to the ladies bathroom, right before falling to me knees in front of the toilet and vomiting.

Carter came in only a moment later, and pulled my hair back for me. He rubbed my back, and said "I didn't think morning sickness started this early." I grunted in response, before getting sick again. "Can I get you anything?" He asked.

I managed to prop my head up enough to talk to him, knowing I wasn't out of the woods with this yet. "I need you to go and be diplomatic about this. Make something up about bad sushi or something."

Carter didn't let go of my hair. "Are you sure? That doesn't seem so im…"

I shooed him away, "This is going to happen every morning for the next ten weeks, you'll have plenty of time to talk me through it. Right now, we need to make sure we didn't offended all Ger –" I didn't get to the end of my sentence before retching again. Carter reluctantly stood up, and walked back outside.

After a few minutes, I finally felt like I was back to normal. I stood up, cleaned myself off the best that I could, and got ready to go back into the meeting. I needed to appear as normal as possible, before any rumors started to spread. If every magician found out I was pregnant, and then something happened … it would be much harder to deal with.

I took a deep breath and opened the door. The three of them were waiting for me in the hallway. Carter looked relieved when I finally came out, and the other two looked emotionless. Still, Adali offered me a comforting, "We hope you're feeling better." I smiled and thanked them before offering to get back to work.

"Actually," Adali, "given your condition, it might be better to resume this another day. Now that we have your word that our problems will be taken care of, and some progress forward, we have no problem resuming another time."

Before I had a moment to reassure them that I was fine, and that we could continue, Carter thanked them, and started walking us back to where we could open a portal home. Once we were out of earshot, I turned to Carter. "What are you doing? I'm feeling better, we could have gotten this settled today."

He whispered back, "Yeah well food poisoning doesn't really limit itself to morning hours like the real problem. If we're serious about people not catching on, you've gotta be out of commission for at least the next twenty-four hours."

I took a deep breath; he was right of course. But the morning sickness development was going to start to present some new challenge. "How are we going to keep covering this up? We deal with a lot of time zone jumps. Who knows when this could happen?"

"I guess we're going to have to make it work until we can start telling people."

Once the portal was opened, we found ourselves back in Brooklyn house, where Jaz was waiting for us. "Are you two all right? The medic in Berlin called me, and told me that Zia was sick."

"I'm fine, just not feeling well."

Jaz looked at me skeptically, clearly not buying into the excuse. "Will you at least come to the infirmary so I can make sure you're fine?"

I smiled, "Sure."

I was sitting on one of her examination tables, looking at the various potions she used for healing. I figured none of them were on the approved prenatal care list.

"So, what are some of your symptoms?"

"Just vomiting."

Jaz looked up, expecting me to add something else to the list. "That's it. No fatigue? No cramps? Any lingering nausea?" I had been feeling tired, and nearly always nauseous, but if I told her that, she would have caught on in a moment.

I shook my head. "I mean, I'm not completely one hundred percent but I don't feel like I need to be in bed all day."

She nodded and wrote some things down on a chart, before handing me a purple vile. "What's this?"

"It will settle your stomach."

"Is it safe?"

Jaz looked at me, "You've never worried about what I've given you before, why start now?"

I didn't know what to say. I couldn't just tell her that I was pregnant and worried that they mystery purple liquid would give my unborn child bat wings. But I also couldn't lie and say that I didn't trust her medical skills.

I guess I was quiet for a little too long, because she put the vile back. "So, tell me, how have you been feeling for the last few weeks?"

"I've been a little tired, I guess, stressed, but nothing too strange." I told her.

She checked off a few more boxes on her clipboard. "Have you started taking any new vitamins or prescription medication?"

I thought of the bottle of prenatal vitamins on my bathroom counter. "No."

"And when was the date of your last period?"

"It started two Thursdays ago," I answered, probably too hastily. Jaz looked at me, and I tried to give her a convincing smile.

Jaz smiled back at me, "When was it really?" She sat on the examination table with me, and put down her clipboard.

I took a deep breath, "Thirteen weeks ago."

Jaz smiled wide, and pulled me into a hug. "Congratulations! Do you have everything you need? Have you seen a doctor yet? When did you find out?"

I laughed, "We found out a little over a month ago. Everything looks good so far."

Jaz hugged me again. "Can I come to the next doctor's visit? I'd love to see the baby!"

I smiled, "I don't see why you can't, as long as they let you in the office."

"Oh, I'll be there. And the delivery room. You'll need a medically and magically trained friend there in case anything goes wrong."

"Of course," I told her, "one more thing, though. We haven't really started telling people, just in case anything goes wrong. So can you …"

"I won't tell anyone. Ugh! I'm so excited for you!" She stood back up, and helped me down. "If you need anything, feel free to ask. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to start planning your baby shower."

We walked out of the infirmary together, and Carter stood up off the couch. "Is everything okay?"

Jaz smiled, "Don't worry Dad, just your average case of morning sickness, she'll be fine." Carter's eyes widened. "What? You didn't think I would figure it out."

Carter laughed and rubbed the back of his neck, "Should've figured. I'm glad you know now so we can start asking you all the strange baby questions."

"That's what I'm here for. Now, you both need some rest, and you've got a lot of work to do."

When we got back to our apartment, I sat down on the couch, and closed my eyes. "How long until we should start telling people?" I asked Carter without looking at him.

"Soon, probably. People are going to start noticing soon. We can't keep this under wraps for very long." He sat down next to me, and rested his head on my shoulder, and his hand on my small bump.

I put my hand on his, "There's a baby in there." I said, it was a revelation I had nearly every day still.

"I know I put it there."

"In six months, it will be a full person."

Carter laughed, "Yup, and we get to take care of it together."

I closed my eyes again, trying to imagine how different our lives would be in six months. "Do you think it'll be a boy or a girl?"

Carter rubbed the bump, "Oh it's a boy, I can tell."

I laughed, "How can you tell?"

He pulled me closer, "Just a really strong feeling."

"Well," I said, "it's inside me, and all I feel is heartburn."

Carter laughed and kissed me. "We'll find out in a few weeks."

Carter got up to keep working, and I stayed where I was, leaving my hand on my stomach. I knew it was too early to feel the baby move, but, for the first time the whole pregnancy, I was ready for whatever came next.