A red stain seeped out from between Diana’s legs. Ryder immediately panicked.
The baby.
Diana clamped her knees together and gasped, her face twisting in pain. Once again she beseeched Michaela and Diego. “Please, there's something wrong.”
“I'll get Melissa and Maggie,” Michaela said, and hurried out to the hallway where the two doctors waited.
Ryder forced himself to be calm and brushed a kiss across Diana’s temple. “Darlin’, you're bleeding. We need to slow it down, so keep still, okay?” Otherwise, she and the baby might bleed to death within a matter of minutes.
“Try...ing.” She huffed out a few short breaths, and he could see her struggle not to writhe in pain.
“You're in human form,” Diego said with a frown when he came to the bedside. “But...that's impossible. The transformation takes days before you can control it.”
Ryder drew the sheet over her body as unexpected relief slammed into him. She was in human form again, despite Diego’s words. “Obviously not impossible, Diego,” he said. “She's got something too valuable to lose to the demon.”
Diana offered him a strained smile. “Two somethings.”
Maggie and Melissa rushed into the room and went right to work.
Diego excused himself. “I'll be downstairs if you need me.”
Ryder stepped back from the bed as Melissa took Diana's vitals and Maggie switched her IV bag. “This is to rehydrate you, and give you something to ease the contractions,” Maggie said.
The two women were the picture of efficiency and gentleness, and Ryder had complete confidence in them. Diana sought his gaze, and he moved closer to his wife to let her know he was still there. “I'm not going anywhere, darlin'.”
She smiled shakily, “I'm not, either.”
He knew she would fight as hard as she could, as hard as she had during the transformation, making an almost miraculous recovery from a turning that should have taken a couple of days at a minimum. But then, she’d had had both elder and Slayer blood to feed on during the change. He couldn't discount what that might mean for now...and for the future.
Diana had never been like any other human he had known, and he suspected that in this next phase of her life—her undead one—she would be just as unique.
Hour after hour the three of them handled her bouts of discomfort and changed out her medications, but as the witching hour approached, her contractions were coming harder and faster. After one particularly brutal round, Diana collapsed onto the bed, her body bathed in sweat. As Maggie examined her, it was obvious that Charlie didn't intend to wait for much longer. “She's dilating fast,” Maggie said.
Melissa said to Ryder, “Maybe you should wait downstairs. Maggie and I can handle this.”
“You think I didn't see my share of births when I was a doctor?” he asked, shoving up the sleeves of his sweater.
Melissa stilled his actions. “This will require more delicate hands than a Civil War surgeon, my friend.”
“Fine. Then I can help keep her steady for you.” He slid into position behind Diana and pulled her back against him, offering support and comfort.
Another punishing contraction ripped through her and she cried out.
***
Diana was trying hard not to fight it, but her body felt pummeled from both inside and out. Tired from controlling the pain, she worried she didn't have the strength to pull through the birth. The warmth brought to her by the transformation had fled, and the chill in her core that had worried her for so many months was back.
“If you need to feed, I'm here for you,” Ryder said.
“Whatever happens, save Charlie,” she told him, and moaned deep in her throat at the feel of the baby pushing and stretching her.
“Easy, Di,” Melissa said. “She’ll be here soon.”
Diana rested back against Ryder until the next round hit her even harder, yanking a guttural moan from her.
She bit her lip hard to stop the next cry, but the need to push intensified. Suddenly, Melissa and Maggie were urging her on, telling her to push and help the baby.
She arched her back and pushed like crazy, pain searing across her midsection. She screamed, and held Ryder's hands in a death grip as her world become one big, massive hurt.
And then suddenly, like the pop of a soap bubble, the pressure was gone, and a loud complaint pierced the peace of late morning.
Charlie's first wail of life.