Names.
They were such an everyday part of life, and yet, when faced with the prospect of giving a name to a new life ....Shen Lei had found herself faced with a monster she couldn't fight or kill. A monster that was just there in the great blankness of her mind, increasing as the days went by.
She couldn't keep calling her newborn daughter "baby", though it could be argued that the baby herself wouldn't mind or even know for at least a few months. But there was the problem, wasn't it' While the newborn dozing in her arms had months, years, a whole lifetime ahead of her ....the Slayer who had borne her did not.
The time was coming, Lei knew. For a while, as her pregnancy progressed, she had been aware that the call in her blood to fight the darkness that pressed in all around them had faded a little, no doubt in reaction to the new life growing inside her. For a while, she had been able to ignore that call, to focus as Miranda wanted her to - on being healthy and looking after the baby girl sleeping under her heart. But now, just days after the birth, she could feel that call coming on stronger, that awareness that she was not doing as she had been chosen to do.
She was twenty-five years old. She had a newborn daughter. But she was a Vampire Slayer, and no Slayer expected to live much beyond twenty. Even here in Rhy'Din, where the dangers were fewer, there were nests of vampires who wanted her gone, packs and gangs of monsters who felt the dangerous presence of a Slayer in their midst and wanted it eradicated. There was nothing she could do about that. But there was something she could do for her daughter.
She had begun it months ago, shortly after Rufus and Miranda had given her no choice but to come and live on the Grove, close to them. With Miranda's gentle encouragement, she had started to write letters, put together birthday messages for those birthdays she knew she would never see. Only a fool in her position would expect to see each year roll by unaltered, and Lei, for all her faults, was no fool. The wooden box she had procured specifically for that purpose was filled now - birthday cards until the age of ten, letters for those landmark moments that would come in the life she would not be allowed to witness. Little trinkets to given to a daughter who would never truly know her mother.
Her will had been written, too; adoption papers laid out, ready to be signed when the inevitable happened. Rufus, the closest she had to a father since her own had perished, and Miranda, who wanted so much to be a friend and mother to her ....they were the only ones she would ever trust with the precious life she held in her arms. When she was gone, it was to them she would entrust her daughter, knowing that the little girl would be loved like no other. That her little girl would have not just a mother and father, but a big sister, too; adult and child cousins; children her own age who looked on her as family. She would not want for love.
But before all this, she had to have a name. Lei had spent hours poring over books, reading what felt like the entire internet, and yet nothing had truly leaped out at her as a fitting name for her daughter. Until this morning, when a whim had sent her searching for a specific meaning, and the names that were associated with it. Rufus - red headed had brought her in turn to a list of names that bore a similar meaning, and one name in particular that had made her smile. She had known, then, what she was going to name her daughter.
So here she was, at the Governor's Office, registering her newborn daughter, preparing to collect her birth certificate. With the sleeping baby nestled in one arm, she let the pen in her fingers move easily over the dotted line, setting down the name she had chosen. Rowan - for Rufus, who had done his best and would never stop trying; Mira - for Miranda, who had given up everything and regained it, and would love the child for her own sake; Laelynn - meaning flower of peace, a hope Lei held deep in her heart that her own child would never be forced into the life her mother had led. And Bennett, not Shen. Let the world forget that there had ever been a Shen in Rhy'Din. Let one innocent life grow up unhindered by the animosity her mother's name drew from many quarters.
Rowan Mira Laelynn Bennett. Such a big name for such a little person. Lei smiled as she kissed her daughter's warm forehead, tucking her close as she waited for the birth certificate, preparing to return to the Grove once again.
No matter what happened, no matter when the inevitable came, the choice had been made. Her daughter would grow up safe and loved. And that, really, was all that mattered.
They were such an everyday part of life, and yet, when faced with the prospect of giving a name to a new life ....Shen Lei had found herself faced with a monster she couldn't fight or kill. A monster that was just there in the great blankness of her mind, increasing as the days went by.
She couldn't keep calling her newborn daughter "baby", though it could be argued that the baby herself wouldn't mind or even know for at least a few months. But there was the problem, wasn't it' While the newborn dozing in her arms had months, years, a whole lifetime ahead of her ....the Slayer who had borne her did not.
The time was coming, Lei knew. For a while, as her pregnancy progressed, she had been aware that the call in her blood to fight the darkness that pressed in all around them had faded a little, no doubt in reaction to the new life growing inside her. For a while, she had been able to ignore that call, to focus as Miranda wanted her to - on being healthy and looking after the baby girl sleeping under her heart. But now, just days after the birth, she could feel that call coming on stronger, that awareness that she was not doing as she had been chosen to do.
She was twenty-five years old. She had a newborn daughter. But she was a Vampire Slayer, and no Slayer expected to live much beyond twenty. Even here in Rhy'Din, where the dangers were fewer, there were nests of vampires who wanted her gone, packs and gangs of monsters who felt the dangerous presence of a Slayer in their midst and wanted it eradicated. There was nothing she could do about that. But there was something she could do for her daughter.
She had begun it months ago, shortly after Rufus and Miranda had given her no choice but to come and live on the Grove, close to them. With Miranda's gentle encouragement, she had started to write letters, put together birthday messages for those birthdays she knew she would never see. Only a fool in her position would expect to see each year roll by unaltered, and Lei, for all her faults, was no fool. The wooden box she had procured specifically for that purpose was filled now - birthday cards until the age of ten, letters for those landmark moments that would come in the life she would not be allowed to witness. Little trinkets to given to a daughter who would never truly know her mother.
Her will had been written, too; adoption papers laid out, ready to be signed when the inevitable happened. Rufus, the closest she had to a father since her own had perished, and Miranda, who wanted so much to be a friend and mother to her ....they were the only ones she would ever trust with the precious life she held in her arms. When she was gone, it was to them she would entrust her daughter, knowing that the little girl would be loved like no other. That her little girl would have not just a mother and father, but a big sister, too; adult and child cousins; children her own age who looked on her as family. She would not want for love.
But before all this, she had to have a name. Lei had spent hours poring over books, reading what felt like the entire internet, and yet nothing had truly leaped out at her as a fitting name for her daughter. Until this morning, when a whim had sent her searching for a specific meaning, and the names that were associated with it. Rufus - red headed had brought her in turn to a list of names that bore a similar meaning, and one name in particular that had made her smile. She had known, then, what she was going to name her daughter.
So here she was, at the Governor's Office, registering her newborn daughter, preparing to collect her birth certificate. With the sleeping baby nestled in one arm, she let the pen in her fingers move easily over the dotted line, setting down the name she had chosen. Rowan - for Rufus, who had done his best and would never stop trying; Mira - for Miranda, who had given up everything and regained it, and would love the child for her own sake; Laelynn - meaning flower of peace, a hope Lei held deep in her heart that her own child would never be forced into the life her mother had led. And Bennett, not Shen. Let the world forget that there had ever been a Shen in Rhy'Din. Let one innocent life grow up unhindered by the animosity her mother's name drew from many quarters.
Rowan Mira Laelynn Bennett. Such a big name for such a little person. Lei smiled as she kissed her daughter's warm forehead, tucking her close as she waited for the birth certificate, preparing to return to the Grove once again.
No matter what happened, no matter when the inevitable came, the choice had been made. Her daughter would grow up safe and loved. And that, really, was all that mattered.