Elain woke up in the evening, tired and sore, but with a clear head. After Tyra had practically forced the pills into his mouth, it had taken a few hours for them to work, and as soon as Elain felt better, he and Tyra had fallen asleep.

Elain needed a few minutes to get these things straight in his memory, but when he finally realized that the worst was over, he rolled over to look at Tyra. The sire was still sound asleep, and when Elain carefully tried to reach over him to grab the bottle of Amsinol for another pill, he saw the red scratches covering Tyra's back. With a soft gasp of horror he almost dropped the bottle, but then stifled the sound to avoid waking his lover.

Elain, who prided himself on his self-control, had completely lost himself to the heat of seasonals, so much so that his lover would be paying the price for it every time the fabric of his shirt shifted against his back.

Elain was mortified. Never mind the fact that he had never actually experienced the full force of seasonals before, since he had always, always had a bottle of Amsinol available. Forests, that was no excuse for clawing Tyra, for the way he'd behaved.

Elain rose from the bed and quietly walked to the bathroom, determined to get some sort of salve or ointment for Tyra.

Elain found some disinfecting salve in his well-sorted bathroom cabinet and took the opportunity to wash his face and comb his hair. He sorely need a shower or a bath, but his knees were still weak, and if he used the tub, he was sure he'd fall asleep in there.

As Elain closed the cabinet, his gaze fell on an old, still unopened box of condoms that was chucked behind some shampoo bottles. He and Tyra had never used them, because both of them were clean and there had been no risk of impregnation, but now...

"Oh gods," Elain whispered, his face turning white.

Elain turned his back on the cabinet and slowly sank to the floor. He leaned his head back against the cabinet and stared at the ceiling in silence for several long minutes as he adjusted himself to the fact that he had completely lost control, but that he and Tyrallin had both been complete idiots as well.

Of course it was due to the fact that Elain had practically been out of his mind, and if he remembered correctly, he had left Tyra absolutely no room for protest or straight thinking. But nevertheless... it was no excuse.

Elain tried to take steady breaths as something akin to hysteria threatened to crawl up his throat. Unpleasant memories of a very similar situation filled his mind: another bathroom, decades ago, after he had woken up with only a vague memory of the previous night, but with the clear evidence of sex on his body. Marithia and he had thrown a little party right after his college graduation, and some bastard had spiked his drink with a drug that stimulated seasonals. Marithia had managed to talk him into going to the hospital the next day, and luckily Elain had endured no further consequences from that night. But after that, he had never drunk anything but water in company.

Although it was a different situation now, because he had been with the person he loved, the whole feeling of shame and helplessness was the same.

Distantly, Elain heard the sound of movement coming from the bedroom. A minute later, Tyra appeared in the doorway, wearing only a pair of boxers.

"Elain?" Tyra queried quietly. "Are you okay?"

Elain tried for an automatic answer like "of course" or "yes, I'm alright", but he couldn't. So he silently shook his head, not daring to look at his lover. Forests, he wanted to crawl into a hole and never come out again.

"Do you need another pill? I can go get the bottle for you," Tyra offered.

"No, thank you," Elain whispered. He could imagine Tyra's worried face looking down at him, and it made him feel even worse. "I'm sorry."

Tyra continued to hover in the doorway, feeling completely unsure of himself. "Don't be. Nothing to be sorry for," he replied. "Is there...is there anything you need?"

Elain took a deep, shaky breath. "Yes. A pregnancy test."

Tyra felt his skin go cold in a quick rush, and his mind shut down completely for a full minute. They hadn't...he hadn't...they'd been...Elain....

When his brain began to function once more, he put a hand over his face and looked away from Elain. "A pregnancy test won't tell you anything until at least two weeks after conception. A magically skilled lashran physician would be able to tell you right away."

"Then... could you please look up the downtown hospital's number? Or call Marithia?" Elain asked, trying to get back onto his feet. They had to clear this up right away, and if he focussed on the task, he could be able to pull himself together somehow.

Tyra went to Elain's side and offered him a hand. "It's after nine o'clock right now. We can't do anything until tomorrow morning."

"Oh damn," Elain groaned and took Tyra's hand after moment of hesitation. Then he remembered the actual reason for his trip to the bathroom and took the salve from the wash basin. "Let me put this on your back."

"My back? Why? What's wrong with my back?" Tyra asked, and he turned his back to the mirror and craned his neck to see over his shoulder. "Holy shit. Did you do that? I don't even remember feeling that happen."

Elain hid his face in his hand, his newly won resolve crumbling again. "I'm so sorry. I would never have... I would never want to hurt you!"

"Hey, hey, come on now," Tyra said, and he quietly slipped his arms around Elain's slender shoulders and pulled him close. "Like I said, I didn't even feel it at the time. And I didn't want to hurt you either, but I bet your backside's burning, isn't it?"

Thankfully Elain put his head against Tyra's shoulder. "Just a bit," he admitted softly. "And you didn't hurt me. But I'm still sorry since I practically forced you."

A concerned frown wrinkled the skin between Tyra's brows. "There wasn't any forcing going on." He felt Elain give a small shuddering sigh in his arms, and he pulled away just a bit so that he could look at the lifebearer and meet his eyes, but Elain avoided his gaze. "Look, I know you're upset. Let's get some hot tea and talk a bit, okay?"

It was such a sensible idea that Elain couldn't deny it. His bathroom wasn't exactly the right place to calm down again, and he'd prefer a softer place to sit than the hard floor. He also finally remembered to grab his bathrobe and put it on.

They went into the living room, and after Tyra had left Elain on the couch, he went to the kitchen to make some tea. When he came back, Elain insisted on putting the salve on the sire's back first.

When Elain was done, Tyra leaned forward with his elbows on his knees in order to avoid getting the salve on the couch.

He watched as Elain took a sip of the tea. He hesitantly asked, "I thought...I thought you had told me a while ago that you were beyond seasonals?"

Elain put his cup down before he answered. He felt a bit better now. "Yes, I thought that they were over because my last seasonals were almost twenty years ago," he answered. "Guess I was wrong."

Tyra took a sip of his own cup of tea before speaking again. "Wouldn't that have been a bit early to be over seasonals? Did you consult a doctor about it?"

"No, I just assumed it since I never had seasonals very often over the years. And if the Amsinol had worked in the first place, it wouldn't have been a problem at all." Elain finally managed to look at Tyra. "I really didn't imagine that this would happen."

Tyra put his tea cup down on the coffee table and ran his hands through his thoroughly messed up hair. "Do you think you can get that appointment tomorrow? Do you want me to go to the doctor's office with you?"

Elain averted his gaze again. "I'll call my physician first thing in the morning, and I'm sure he can get me an appointment with a magic specialist. I'd like you to come with me."

Tyra stared at his cup of tea, focusing on the tiny fragments of crushed herbs at the bottom of the cup. "This is... I'm sorry. I should have realized..."

Elain shook his head. "We were both careless, and it was bad luck. It's just... we should decide what to do if..." He couldn't speak any further. Some time ago he had mused over the fact that Tyra would want children someday, and Elain himself had had a baby in his arms for the first time in his life and hadn't found it too bad. But the thought of having kids was still too foreign.

Tyra quietly rubbed his forehead. Did Elain mean...? No, Tyra didn't want to think about it at all. "We, well, we'll find out for sure tomorrow, right? We don't have any facts right now. We shouldn't make decisions without facts."

"No, you're right. It's just..." Elain quickly took another sip of his tea to calm his nerves. Tyra had also brought the bottle of Amsinol from the bedroom, and Elain decided to take another pill. "It's just that you would like to have kids someday, right? This may be our last chance."

Tyra took a quick, startled look at Elain. "But what about you? Is it something you want?"

Elain shook his head. "No, not really. I know it's strange for a lifebearer to say that, but I'm happy as I am, you and my work occupying my time. And frankly, I'm sure I wouldn't make a good parent."

Tyra shook his head. "I don't think you'd be a bad parent, but it's not strange to not want kids. Plenty of people don't want to be parents. But, oh, hell, I don't know." Tyra closed his eyes and rested his head in his hands.

Elain didn't know what to say, so he refilled their cups with fresh tea. Finally he said softly, "I'm really sorry, Tyra. We both didn't think it properly through when we decided to have a relationship, but despite all this I won't ever want to give you up. Nevertheless, in moments like these... I get the feeling I'm being unfair to you all the time. You had so much trouble on my account: disagreements with your parents, trouble with the scholarship and the press, and I know even your friends aren't too happy. And on top of it I'm not even the social type, even less one to have a happy family with."

Tyra finally looked at Elain, really looked at him. His cheeks were a bit flushed, likely from a too-warm temperature, his eyes were just a bit glassy and filled with worry, and he looked just so small and delicate haunched over in his bathrobe, completely unlike how he looked normally with his tailored suits and firm posture.

Tyra put a hand over Elain's mouth and pushed him down to the couch, climbing on top of him and keeping his hand in place. "Cut that out, you got it? We love each other, we chose each other, so stop with the fretting."

Elain could only nod since he was cut off from answering verbally. Normally he would have been offended by such a behavior, but right now all that mattered was the serious, almost solemn look in Tyra's brilliant hazel eyes. Such confidence, such trust lay in them that Elain suddenly felt ashamed for doubting.

Tyra removed his hand and gave Elain a quick kiss, but then swiftly moved away and sat back up again because that damned tempting scent was still lingering on the lifebearer's skin.

"I love you, and I love that you're thinking of me, about the fact that I want children, even though you don't. That's more than enough for me. Anything else, we talk about tomorrow." Tyra scratched the back of his neck. Actually, parenthood wasn't something he was anywhere near prepared for at the moment, either.

Despite all his worries, Elain couldn't help but smile a little. He was deeply moved in a way he couldn't really explain, but he was sure that nine of ten sires on Wyndrah wouldn't have answered like that. "You are really wonderful, you know that? I still don't know how I deserve you." He gave his lover a quick kiss on the cheek, reminding himself to keep the distance.

Tyra found himself uncontrollably following after Elain, after that sweet scent, in order to give him a proper kiss on the mouth, but after the barest contact, he pulled back with a groan. "I think I'd better sleep on the couch. It'll be a while before I can get back to sleep, though. I'll, um, work on some homework for a while."

"Alright. And don't forget to eat something," Elain reminded him. "I'll take a shower and try to sleep a bit."

He got up from the couch, taking the Amsinol with him, before he remembered something very important. "Oh gods, I totally forgot about Velvet! She needs her food, poor thing." As he went to the kitchen to remedy that problem, he found a quick note from Marithia beside Velvet's cat food, telling him that she had been taken care of the cat in the morning. Feeling a bit less guilty, he refilled the food and water bowls. As soon as Velvet heard the distinct noises, she came out of her hiding place under the corner seat and snuggled against her master, purring. Obviously she liked his smell as well.

Elain laughed, gently petting her.

Elain looked up to find Tyra setting his emptied cup of tea on the counter.

Tyra's mouth twisted in a half frown. "The cat gets to rub against you but I don't?" He shook his head and left the kitchen. "That's just not fair at all."

Elain gave Velvet one last pet before he went after Tyra. "I'm sorry. But you said yourself it would be best to keep some distance until I'm through with seasonals."

Tyrallin sighed and thought to himself, Not fair at all.

Then he went to find that bottle of Amsinol so he could take one for himself.

~*~

Early the next morning, Tyra and Elain headed out for the Downtown Hospital. As they had hoped, Elain's physician had been able to make him an appointment with a lashran doctor who specialized in magically monitoring pregnancies.

Elain was fidgety and nervous while they waited, but he relaxed visibly when the doctor showed up: a tiny, young-looking lifebearer with a gentle smile that could only be described as maternal.

"Mr. Silvestri? I'm Doctor Landir. Please come in. And your companion as well, if you like."

They followed him into the examining room.

The doctor shut the door behind them and gestured to the cushioned table with a sheer paper stretched across it. "If you would have a seat, Mr. Silvestri? And could you tell me what it is that you need from me today?"

Tyra found a chair in the corner to sit in.

Elain did as he was told, still looking a bit apprehensive. But then he said, "I went into seasonals the day before yesterday because my Amsinol had expired, and had unprotected sex. So now I need to know if I might be pregnant."

"Ahh, I see," the petite lifebearer said. His eyes seemed to involuntarily dart over Tyrallin before returning to Elain. "Well then, there's no real need for you to strip down and put on a gown. It's easy enough for me to tell. If you'll just untuck your shirt for me, I simply need to put my hand on your abdomen for a few moments, if you don't mind." Dr. Landir put down his clipboard on a counter and pulled a sterile glove from a dispenser.

Elain complied. He had taken enough Amsinol to last for hours, but clothes still felt a bit more scratchy than usual on his skin and he was careful in untucking his shirt. For a second, he looked over to Tyra in a silent plea for assurance - it was the first time that he really needed it.

As the doctor slipped a gloved hand under Elain's shirt, Tyra noticed Elain's gaze and mouthed a silent "It's okay" to his lover.

The doctor was quiet for a moment, and his hand pulsed hot against Elain's tummy.

A small frown creased the youthful features. "You said you went into seasonals the day before yesterday? From what I'm reading, it seems like you've only just started. You still have at least thirty-six hours to go."

Elain frowned. "How is that possible? I was hoping it would be over soon. I need to go back to work, and I can hardly walk into a room full of sires like this..."

Dr. Landir gave Elain a wry smile. "Oh, it's possible all right. I can explain more in a minute, but for the moment, I need to concentrate." A line furrowed between the doctor's brows, and he stared firmly at the place where his hand was hidden beneath Elain's shirt.

After a few more moments of tense silence, the doctor pulled away. He stripped off the medical glove. "You're not pregnant."

"Thank the forests," Elain whispered, feeling as if a huge weight had been lifted off his shoulders. Not knowing had been the worst part of it all.

A quick glance a Tyra showed him an equally relieved face, but there was something else in those beloved hazel eyes that Elain recognized after a moment as disappointment. He quickly busied himself with tucking his shirt back into his pants with slightly shaking hands, trying not to think about the look his lover gave him.

"Tell me, Mr. Silvestri," Dr. Landir said, "what sort of history of seasonals do you have? When was your first instance, your most recent instance before this one, and how frequently do you tend to get them?"

"I had my first when I was twenty-eight, I think," Elain tried to recall. "After that they came about every ten years, except for the last time, which was about nineteen or twenty years ago. Therefore I assumed I was already over them."

The doctor was silent for a moment. He calmly took a seat in a rolling chair next to the counter.

Eventually, he spoke up again. "It's a common misconception that lifebearers 'get over' seasonals. Our potential for fertility never truly goes away, as it does with human women. It simply gets locked away, in a sense, for reasons that are still mysterious to us. The fertility is still there, but we don't know how to access it. But that's all rather more involved than we need to get into here." The doctor cleared his throat. "Pardon me, but I tend to go off on tangents regarding the subject. In your case, Mr. Silvestri, many lifebearers might mistake the infrequency of seasonals for a lack of fertility. What I sense from you, though, is that your body's cycles in particular are influenced by situation. That's not entirely uncommon, although it isn't quite the norm."

"What do you mean by 'situation'?" Tyra asked with a frown.

The doctor shrugged toward Tyra and gave Elain a half smile. "Simply put, the more frequently and consistently you receive sexual stimulation, the more regular and frequent your seasonals would be, Mr. Silvestri. Theoretically, a long dry spell followed by a lot of fast and furious action could very well land you in a bout of three-day seasonals." The doctor swayed in his rolling chair briefly, and it made the small lifebearer look almost child-like. "Perhaps you've heard the phrase 'A pleasured lifebearer is a fertile lifebearer.' Well, there's actually plenty of scientific evidence to back that up."

Elain stifled the urge to cough. What the doctor said was all too true, considering his past sexual relationships which where extremely scarce considering the normal lashran sex drive.

"So that means I have to expect getting seasonals more frequently from now on?" Elain asked.

The doctor's lips twitched, and he looked at Tyra, who was blushing to the tips of his ears. "I suppose so, for at least a little while longer. I'd guess that you have another ten or fifteen years of normal fertility, but after that, I estimate your fertility will start to naturally drop off."

Elain nodded. Although he wasn't looking forward to more frequent seasonals, it also meant that he and Tyra had a lot more timing thinking about the possibility of having children some day. A lot could change in ten or fifteen years, and considering how much Elain's life had changed alreadysince he knew Tyra, he guessed that nothing was impossible.

With a much, much lighter heart, Elain said, "Thank you very much, doctor. Anything else I need to know?"

Dr. Landir shook his head. "Not unless either of you have anything you'd like to know. However, if something changes along the line and you'd like to try for children, I highly recommend you talk to me again or to another specialist so that we can increase your odds. If you only get to take a few shots, you'd better make them good ones, right?"

"Yes, I'll keep that in mind." Now Elain fought a blush, too. It was surprisingly easy to talk about those private matters with the gentle and friendly Dr. Landir, but it was a bit embarrassing nevertheless.

He briefly looked over to Tyra who was still flushed and looked utterly adorable.

The doctor rose. "Well, I suppose that concludes this visit. Feel free to straighten up, and you can get your receipt for the visit from the receptionist." The lifebearer took his clipboard and left the room

Slowly, Elain slid off from the examination table and straightened his jacket before he went over to Tyra, smiling. "I'd say that was good news."

Tyra rose and gave Elain a weak smile. "Definitely. For some reason I still have butterflies in my stomach, though."

"Yes, me too," Elain admitted as he exited the examining room. "Let's get some coffee or tea to calm down. And then I'll have to tell Conroy that all my appointments need to be cancelled for the next days."

"Okay, good," Tyra said. "I don't really want any other sires sniffing around right now." He had to resist the urge to slip an arm around Elain and do some sniffing of his own.

Elain laughed softly. "No, me neither." He took the receipt from the receptionist, and they went to the elevator to exit the hospital. Outside was a beautiful, sunny day, and now both of them were finally able to appreciate it.

To be concluded...