Primitive Instinct: The Journey Home

--Two Months Later--

“Fern!”

I looked up and smiled when I heard Roar calling for me from outside of our strange tent. I was packing up the last of our belongings to put into the sled for our trip to the sun camp of our new clan, which Roar had been eager to accept after our mating ceremony.

“Fern, you need to come quick,” Roar said, only halfway in the tent. “It’s Ivy. Her kits are coming.”

I gasped and ran out of the tent, following Roar to Osh’ri’ca’s personal tent where I could hear Ivy crying out in pain through a contraction.

“Fern!” she sobbed when she saw me. “Help me!”

“Out! Everyone that isn’t the father, get out!” I said and started shooing people out of the crowded tent, leaving only Osh’ri’ca, Ivy, a healer from another clan, Roar, and myself. I knew Roar wasn’t going to leave me alone. He hardly ever did, and I had no complaints about it.

“I can’t do this, Fern!” Ivy cried and I grabbed her hand for her to squeeze it.

“Stop that,” I scolded her and pointed to the cool water beside Osh’ri’ca for him to wipe the sweat from her face. “You absolutely can do this, Ivy.”

“I’m scared,” she said, staring at me with wide eyes. “Fern, what if they’re like me? You and I are adults, but babies!? They won’t survive this life.”

“Okay, shut the hell up,” I snapped at her and Osh’ri’ca growled at me, and Roar growled at him. “First of all, if these babies are like you, then I know for a fact, this world will be better. You are so smart and kind and even if you are squishy and helpless at times, you have a husband that I don’t doubt for a second would move a fucking mountain for you and these babies. Now, use your big brain and remember that babies are born in the Inuit tribes all the time and you know what? They survived.”

“They did,” she repeated and started panting as another contraction started.

“They did,” I nodded and rubbed her hand where she was trying to break my fingers. “Breathe, Ivy. Don’t fight it, but don’t push yet.”

She cried out again and I put my hand on her chest to keep her from trying to bear down, reminding her to wait.

“They aren’t close enough together yet,” I told her, and she nodded, panting heavily as Osh’ri’ca wiped her face again. “Pushing right now will exhaust you and tear you. Now, keep talking. How would we keep a baby like us warm here?”

“Furs,” she answered breathlessly. “Leather and furs.”

“That’s right. Feeding,” I asked her.

“We eat a lot of meat already, but we need vegetables, too, to make healthy milk,” she answered.

“You can do this,” I told her, and she nodded.

“I can do this,” she said as I looked between her legs.

“You are going to do this,” I told her. “You need to push. Someone has decided not to wait. “Osh’ri’ca, brace her up.”

He grabbed her other hand and helped me lift her upper body so when the next contraction came, she bore down hard and screamed as she pushed.

“That’s good. Breathe,” I told her and pushed her hair off her face when she groaned and sagged back.

“One more good one,” the healer said, and I nodded to Osh’ri’ca to move to get ready to catch his kit.

Roar came to help me hold Ivy up just she grunted, bearing down hard through another contraction. A very angry cry came, and Ivy’s eyes flew open as she looked around for her baby.

“A son,” Osh’ri’ca beamed as the healer took the kit to clean it and dry it quickly to keep it warm.

“See? I told you that you could do it,” I smiled at my friend as happy tears ran down her face. “One more, okay? Take a good rest while this one gets ready.”

I looked up to see Roar smiling at me softly and then he shook his head and tilted to where the healer was cleaning the kit. Tiny little ear and wet, black fur met my eyes as the little kit wailed loudly.

“Hey, Ivy,” I said softly, and she looked at me with tired eyes and I looked pointedly across the room. “Your son looks like an exact copy of his father.”

She turned and smiled hugely before her face started to pinch and her hands squeezed mine.

A little while later, another wail pierced the tent as a little girl came into the world and Ivy sighed in relief as Roar moved aside for Osh’ri’ca and I left her side to go help the healer.

“They are strong and healthy kits,” she said as she quickly cleaned the little girl, and I tucked the soft hide blanket around the boy a little more.

“I had no doubts,” I told her, and we took the two little ones to their parents.

Roar and I left, and I sighed and leaned into his side under his arm.

“You were strong for her,” he said as we walked home to start taking it apart.

“No. She was already strong on her own. She just needed to remember it,” I told him and then smirked at him. “You looked a little lost when Osh’ri’ca had you come hold Ivy up with me.”

“I’ve never been in the tent when a female birthed a kit. Having another male present for such a great occasion is not something many Mapok are capable of,” he said. “Tension runs very high for us when we are waiting for our kits to be born.”

“I noticed,” I giggled. “Osh’ri’ca is pretty calm about a lot of things. You, however, will not be close to calm, I think.”

“Not even a little bit,” he nodded, making me laugh. “When we reach the sun camp, I will leave you there to hunt for the hide to make our tent. I wish to have a home before we have kits.”

“I know,” I smiled up at him. “I’m okay with just me, you, and Diesel in our family right now.”

A few hours later, the huge camp had been broken down and we were all moving out of the valley on our way to the various sun camps. Since our sled was mostly empty, Ivy and the two kits were riding there under a little shelter I had made to help keep them warm and out of the snow as we traveled. Osh’ri’ca walked beside us with their sleds and would often look over to make sure the three of them were resting peacefully and grinning like a fool when he saw them.

“What are you making now, mate?” Roar asked after we’d been on the move for a few hours.

“Something to help Ivy carry them both while leaving her hands free,” I said and held up the straps of leather and mammoth hair I was stitching together while sitting close to Ivy and the babies in case she needed me for something. “Mapok children grow much faster than ours do. Soon, they’ll be too large for her to carry comfortably, so this will help her do that.”

“When they are too large, then I will carry them,” Osh’ri’ca said proudly.

“Obviously,” I chuckled. “But a mother wants to hold her children for as long as possible. It’ll make her happy. And I’ll tell her it was your idea.”

The male smiled and Roar chuckled, shaking his head.

“You know she’ll not believe it, right?” Roar told him and Osh’ri’ca shrugged.

In the time since we showed up, Roar and Osh’ri’ca had gotten close, often calling each other brother and hunting together. He’d actually gotten close to several other males in the clans, and he was really awkward, at first, but he was clearly much happier here than he ever was before. He was still quieter than any other Mapok, but I think that was more just his personality than anything. He was, after all, a hunter.

But he was not at all reserved when it came to me. He was fiercely protective and had no hesitation on voicing his displeasure when someone got too close for his liking, often in the form of a growl. The only ones he seemed to not have much issue with was Ivy and Osh’ri’ca. But the real intensity came when we were in our tent together.

Roar was insatiable and I learned quickly that I was his match in this as well. The night we were married, I found out that Balla were unique in having a mating knot. We ended up knotted four more times after the first one before we were too exhausted to keep going. Since then, we’ve been very careful so we didn’t end up with a kit before we were ready. Seeing Ivy with hers, though, made me wonder about when we were ready to have kits.

“You are troubled, Fern,” Roar said that night when we went to our tiny little travel tent.

“Not troubled so much as... hopeful, I guess,” I told him. “Curious, some.”

“About?”

“What our kits will be like,” I answered.

“Smart, like you,” he answered and kissed my lips softly.

“Resourceful, like you,” I laughed. “Hopefully with your amazing fur, too. So soft.”

He laughed and rubbed his paws on my back under my shirt a little bit.

“Mammoths are wonderful creatures,” he said and kissed me sweetly.