Chapter 228

My birthday arrived with snow.

Not a dusting, not a light flurry, but a real storm, the kind that closed the passes and buried the paths and turned the whole valley into a white and silent world. The wind howled through the night, and by morning, the snow was up to the windows, thick and heavy and bright. No one was going anywhere.

We could not celebrate the way they wanted to. No gathering, no feast, no celebration. The village was snowed in, sealed away, and everyone was huddled in their own homes, waiting out the storm.

But my family was not about to let my birthday pass unnoticed. Not this time. Ever since I had mentioned, in passing, that they had missed the others, they had made it their mission to never miss another. Not that it was anyone’s fault. So much had happened over the years, so many births and journeys and battles and losses, that a birthday had simply never seemed like the most important thing.

But they had decided it was important now.

Aureon and Eryx were the first to move. They dressed in their thickest furs, kissed me goodbye, and announced that they were going hunting.

"In this?" I asked, staring out at the blizzard.

"In this," Aureon said, grinning. "We are going to catch you something big. A new fur cloak. The best one. You deserve it."

"Something big," Eryx echoed, his amber eyes bright. "Something warm. Something worthy of you."

"You will freeze."

"We will not freeze. We are beasts." Aureon flexed his arms, the white-and-black stripes rippling. "We are built for this."

"You are built for warm weather. You are a tiger."

"I am a tiger with determination."

And so they went out into the storm, two dark shapes disappearing into the white. And I watched them go with a mixture of worry and love, and then turned to the kitchen, because there was something I wanted to make.

A cake.

Back in my old world, birthday cake had been a given, a tradition, a simple joy. Here, in this world, there was no such thing, but I had figured out how to make one anyway. I had worked it out over the years, experimenting, failing, trying again. And now, finally, I had a recipe.

Krys’s Honey-Berry Hearth Cake.

Flour. Beaten eggs. Honey. Milk. Melted butter. Crushed berries. That was all. Simple, humble, the kind of thing that could be made in any hearth in any home. I mixed the batter slowly, folding the berries in, watching the color bleed pink and purple through the pale dough.

For the frosting, I whipped soft butter with honey until it was light and smooth, then folded in more crushed berries, giving it a sweet, tangy bite. It was primitive. It was messy. It was nothing like the frosting of my old world. But it was good, and it was mine.

The cake came out golden brown, slightly dense, moist inside, somewhere between a cake and a sweet bread. Not perfect. Not elegant. But warm and sweet and real, and the smell of it filled the whole house, honey and berries and butter, warm against the cold outside.

And the children smelled it before it had even finished cooling.

They came from every direction. From the bedrooms, from the rafters, from wherever they had been hiding during the storm. They materialized like a swarm, pressing in from all sides, their eyes wide, their mouths watering, their little noses twitching.

"Is that for us?" Jasper asked, already reaching.

"It is for me," I said, slapping his hand away. "But yes, you can have some."

"Can we have it now?"

"No. We wait for your fathers."

"Which fathers?"

"Aureon and Eryx. They went hunting. They will want to celebrate with us."

"Can we have a tiny piece while we wait?"

"No."

"Just a crumb?"

"Jasper."

"Just a corner. A corner is not a piece."

I sighed, long and deep, and cut him a corner. And then Atlas wanted a corner too, because Jasper had one, and Atlas could not be outdone by his younger brother. And then Ryder wanted one, because if Atlas was having one, he was having one. And then Chase wanted one, because he was hungry and the cake smelled like heaven. And then Levy wanted one, because she was the oldest girl and she deserved it. And then Niku and Sikai wanted one, because they were Levy’s brothers and it was not fair.

And then the cheetah boys, who had been lurking quietly, decided that if everyone else was getting cake, they would like cake too. And the serpent children, who had been pretending not to care, suddenly cared very much. And the pearlings, who had been watching with big silver-blue eyes, began to make small, sad noises until I gave in. And the wolf pups, who had no idea what was happening but wanted to be included in everything, wagged their tails and whined.

By the time I had cut corners for every single one of them, the cake looked like a hexagon, and I had eaten exactly zero pieces.

"One rule," I announced, holding up the knife like a weapon. "Birthday cake is for birthdays only. You do not get to demand it every week. It is special."

"But it is so good," Levy said, her mouth full, her cheeks bulging.

"Because it is special."

"We could make it special every week."

"That is not how special works."

"Mama," Ryder said, chewing thoughtfully, "you should make this every day."

"Every day is too much."

"Every other day."

"Every other day is still too much."

"You are being mean."

"I am being reasonable. There is a difference."

"You are being mean and reasonable."

"Exactly."

The children grumbled, but they kept eating, and the corners kept disappearing. Levy ate hers in three bites and then stared at the remaining cake with the intensity of a predator. Jasper tried to sneak a second corner and was caught red-handed. Atlas, ever the negotiator offered to trade his future birthday cake for a bigger slice of mine. Ryder simply took what he wanted and hoped no one noticed. Chase ate his so fast he got a stomach ache. And the cheetah boys, all three of them, managed to get frosting on their faces, their hands, their shirts, and somehow the ceiling.

"How did you get frosting on the ceiling?" I demanded.

Kaizen looked up. "Huh."

"Hu," Tavren agreed.

Zarek just licked his fingers.

The little ones were worse. The pearlings, my delicate sea daughters, were covered in cake, their azure hair sticky, their little faces smeared purple with berries. The wolf pups had eaten theirs so fast they were already sniffing around for more. And the serpent children, who never got messy, were somehow the messiest of all, green hair tangled with frosting, emerald eyes bright with sugar.

I had to physically guard the rest of the cake with a knife, standing over it like a soldier defending a fortress. Every time I looked away, a small hand crept toward the plate. Every time I looked back, a small hand retreated. It was a war of attrition, and I was losing.

And then, finally, the door burst open, and Aureon and Eryx stumbled in.

They were covered in snow from head to toe, their furs white, their hair wet, their breath fogging the air. And their arms were full of something heavy and warm and enormous.

"We got it," Aureon announced, triumphant.

"It?" I asked.

"The beast," Eryx said, dumping the carcass onto the floor with a grunt. "A big one. The biggest we could find. We will clean it later and make you a cloak. The warmest cloak in the whole valley. You will never be cold again."

I stared down at the dead animal, enormous and shaggy, its fur thick and silver-grey. "You killed this in a blizzard."

"We did."

"You are both insane."

"We are devoted."

"You are insane and devoted."

"Same thing."

"You went out in the worst storm of the year."

"It was not that bad."

"There is snow up to the windows."

"We are beasts. We are built for this."

"You are a tiger from a warm climate."

"I am a tiger with determination."

They beamed at me, unrepentant, and shook themselves like dogs, spraying snow across the entire kitchen. The children shrieked. The mates shouted. And then Aureon saw the cake.

"What is that?" he asked, his whole face lighting up.

"A birthday Cake."

"For your birthday?"

"For my birthday."

"Can we have some?"

"You just got back from the worst storm of the year, you are dripping wet, you brought a dead animal into my kitchen, and the first thing you ask about is cake?"

"Yes."

"Then yes. You can have some."

They descended on the cake like they had not eaten in weeks. Aureon cut himself a slab the size of his hand and shoved half of it into his mouth before he had even sat down. Eryx cut an even bigger slab and ate it standing up, his amber eyes closing in bliss.

And the other mates, who had been quietly pretending not to be interested, immediately abandoned all pretense.

Leon appeared from the doorway, sniffing the air like a hunting dog. "Is that cake?"

"It is cake."

"Cake," Ravin said, materializing beside him, his golden eyes fixed on the plate.

"Birthday cake," Veylan corrected, though he was already reaching for a knife.

"For Krys."

"Which means we should help her eat it."

"Obviously."

Soryn, Aureon, Caelion, and Eryx all descended at once. Within seconds, there were six grown males crammed around the table, jostling and shoving, each of them trying to cut themselves the biggest piece. Leon and Ravin nearly came to blows. Veylan used his elbows with ruthless efficiency. Soryn simply reached over everyone with his long serpent arms and took what he wanted. Caelion laughed so hard he dropped his slice. And Aureon and Eryx, the ones who had actually earned it by braving the storm, were pushed to the back of the line and protested loudly.

The children were outraged.

"You cannot just take huge pieces!" Jasper shouted.

"We are bigger," Leon said.

"You are not that much bigger!"

"Big enough."

"That is what Aureon said!"

"And he was right."

"Mama!"

I sat down, exhausted, and watched the chaos unfold. The whole house was loud and warm and sticky with frosting, and outside the snow kept falling, thick and silent, and somewhere in the middle of it all, my entire family was fighting over a cake I had made.

"Birthday cake," I announced, over the noise, "is going to be a tradition now."

Everyone went quiet.

"Every birthday," I continued, "we make one. Every single one. And you all will learn to share."

Levy’s eyes went wide. "Every birthday?"

"Every birthday."

"Even mine?"

"Even yours. Especially yours."

She screamed, and launched herself at me, hugging me so hard she knocked the wind out of me. The other children cheered. The mates grumbled, but they were smiling. And Aureon and Eryx, cake still smeared on their faces, looked at me with such love that my chest ached.

It was not the celebration they had planned.

But it was good. It was ours.

And in the corner, the carcass of the beast lay waiting to be cleaned, and somewhere in the future, a cloak would be made