“I've been trained not to think of myself as a father.”

  (Small Fry Chapter 1)

            Declan grinned like an idiot – a tearful idiot – but an idiot nonetheless.

            “Since you said ‘daughters’ and not ‘daughter’, it means I’m let out of the doghouse sometime.” He tried to joke.

            “Lucky me.”  I said flatly, as I turned back towards the window.

            Just then he laughed loudly as he leant on the kitchen sink.  He seemed to be laughing in pure relief!  He was guffawing like a man who had just been granted parole, in the face of a death sentence.

            He wiped his eyes on the back of his hands, “I can almost picture her now.  She’s going to be tall and she’s going to make all of the boys work hard, by beating them in school and in sport.”

            "Why do you say that?"

            Declan continued, “She’s going to be half of you and half of me.  I’m gonna teach her how to repair her hover-car if it breaks down.  You’re gonna teach her soccer and help her with her homework.  When she's not studying with you, she’ll be in the kitchen helping me cook.”

            “Maybe we shouldn’t be placing all these expectations on her yet.” I said warily.  “I mean, your last expectation was that she was going to kill her mother!”

            I thought these words would have wounded him, but they did the exact opposite.  Instead, Declan stood closely to smile down as his large hands moved to sit on my hips.  His bright blue eyes fixated on my dark blue ones, before he lowered his face to gently bump foreheads.  His spiky, dark blonde hair mixed in with my long, black layers.

            “B, ever since I was 14 years old, I've been trained not to think of myself as a father.”  He confessed with his eyes closed.  “It was the age when the Lokoti Werewolves told me that I could never take a human woman for a mate, for risk of harming her or turning her.  I thought if they’re scared of me changing her, then they probably wouldn’t want me to have kids that were like me, either."  

            That gave me pause, as his words and the emotion behind them hurt my heart.  I watched him speak with his eyes closed as I felt his hot breath on my face.  Although I was still furious with him, I didn't pull out of our embrace.

            He continued, "I fell in love with you when I was 17 years old but remember, I had to wait until I was nearly 21 until I could have you, when you changed at the age of 18.  Then you were married off to Grant and I had to wait five years before we were reunited.  This only compounded the idea that the pack thought the risk of me breeding with you was far too great.  Then it came out you were so-called barren and you couldn’t give Grant kids?  I thought, 'she was meant to be mine all along!'  Then for 273 years, I got to enjoy the marriage bed, without worrying the world about what the marriage could produce.  Now a baby makes three?  I’m sorry I didn’t run out and buy a bottle of champagne and a cigar.  For nearly 300 years I was taught and self-taught that I wasn’t father material, because I could plant rotten seed.”

            My eyes widened in further alarm, as I never knew his self-hatred was buried so deep, it was thoroughly rooted in his psyche.

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“This child will be part Lokoti Werewolf too."

“This child will be part Lokoti Werewolf too.” 

(Small Fry Chapter 1)

            “Tell me again you don’t have a bad feeling about this?” He rasped out, as if he were having difficulty breathing.  “Tell me how you’re gonna live through this?”

            “As Aunt B said, this child will be part Lokoti Werewolf too.”  Ki reminded.  “Maybe this baby will be exactly half and half?  I’ll keep a close eye on Aunt B, I promise.  You two won’t be alone, no Lokoti Werewolf ever stands alone.  You know this yourself, Uncle.”

            But Declan didn’t seem to hear, he was too busy staring at his mate. 

            “Tell me B, what can you 'see'?  Tell me what you ‘see’ in ours and the baby's future.”  He pleaded. 

            Next, he watched me turn to walk into the shadowy kitchen.  The whole house darkened in fact, as the sun was taken away from the grey clouds which were heavy with snow.  As if I were in a trance, I wandered over to the kitchen sink to stare out the window at my garden. 

            The grass was still short as the cold weather stagnated its growth.  I saw the bare branches of our Jacaranda Tree bend in the strong wind.  Then I stared at my withered garden plots, which were waiting to be buried under the thick snow of a long winter.

            Our small, two bedroom, two story, brown wooden cottage with its stone chimney; sat on top of a hill in the community centre inside the vast Lokoti National Park, in the Alaska Range.  Our home was normally cosy with life, love, cooking and company.  We had family, tribe and pack whom we intermingled or hunted with.  Our life could be called 'quiet' by some, but when you had to hide your supernatural state, where and how we lived was ideal.

            The signs of winter coming, also represented signs of something else to come.  Our home would be changed forever, as would be the people inside it.  As if to confirm this, I saw a snowflake fly past on the icy wind.

            I wasn't experiencing any visions, whilst I stared hypnotically at life outside.  Just as I could have bad feelings which warn of danger, I felt several new sensations.  They didn’t fill me with a sense of dread, instead they filled me with a sense of purpose.

            “Our daughter isn’t going to be a Circulator.” I spoke quietly, almost unsure of my own words.  “She’s going to be the eldest of three sisters and none of them will be 'Light People'.  I am the last Circulator to be born.”

            Suddenly, the window rattled loudly from a gust of wind, as my Jacaranda Tree bent back and forth.  I watched the snowflakes begin to fall thick and fast, but from the gale they fell in a sloping pattern.  I watched the many white dots cover the grass. 

            “The timeline has to make adjustments to Declan’s altered state of being.”  I said softly.  “Because their mother changed their father, our daughters will be born, but not as Circulators.”

            Then I felt my mate come to stand beside at the sink, as his greater body-heat radiated outwards.

            “Daughters?”  He asked hopeful.  “No boys?”

            A tear slipped down my cheek, as his relief didn’t bring me happiness, but disappointment.

            “And what would you have done if it was a son?”  I challenged.

            “If we had a son who was half Lokoti Werewolf but wasn’t a Circulator?  I would do exactly what I’m going to do now.”  He said firmly.

            “And what’s that?”

            “Give his mother a kiss and a cuddle and help her raise the little troublemaker.” He emitted a small smile.

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