Chapter Text
Tiny fingernails dug into soft, brown cloth.
“I-it’s- It’s okay,” Gabrielle choked out reassurances not even a deaf person would believe as she hugged her baby close. “I’ll be with you. Always! A-and I love you always! This isn’t goodbye. W-we’ll meet again someday. I promise.”
Rather than throw her head back to howl at the sky, Hope blared her hurt into her mother’s shoulder, pressing, ever pressing, as close as she could to the bard.
“Please don’t cry,” Gabrielle begged the newborn though she herself was sobbing harder than she ever had in her life, albeit only internally. “Please.” The teenager abandoned her plea after a moment and simply held her child, not knowing how she’d ever let go. Her arms squeezed Hope tight, one hand alternately clutching and stroking her baby’s head while the other pressed and rubbed Hope’s back. Her chest caved in to try and mold itself to her daughter one final time. “I love you; I love you; I love you,” she whispered incessantly. I can’t do this. I must! There’s no way! There’s no other way! I’ll die without her. She’ll die with me. “Oh, Hope.”
No, no! Mommy, you’re wrong! Don’t leave me! Please!
At last, Gabrielle wrenched one hand away from her child. It clamped an iron grip over the lip of the basket on their rowboat. At last, shaking all over, she stood. She pretended that her ears and spine were made of metal too as she purposefully strode around the boat and back to the water’s edge. Nothing hurt, she told herself. This doesn’t hurt! Not her pulverized heart, eviscerated spirit, singed soul, shuddering lungs, leaking breasts, throbbing womb, or seared birth canal. I am not going to fall; I am not going to collapse! I will do what is necessary to protect my child no matter the cost to me.
Then her knees buckled. They hit the jagged pebbles hard, and that did hurt. Everything hurt in an instant, as inescapably and almost as much as bringing Hope into the world had.
All at once, Hope’s cries were drowned out by her mother’s. It surprised her such that she fell silent. Her attention stolen from her so, the baby became confused. What’s the matter, mommy? she desperately wanted to know.
But Gabrielle did not answer. She did not even look at her child. Instead, she glared at the basket trembling in her hand. A vast majority of her mind longed to dash it against the rocks too or throw it into the stream empty.
Picking up on her mother’s desire, Hope used her telekinesis to rip the thing out of the bard’s grasp and discard it.
Her mother scrabbled after it. “No!” she breathed in terrified disbelief, snatching it back before it even hit the ground. Then, she was laughing. Absurdly, manically laughing. “Whew! That was a close one! There’s some strong wind today, eh?” Gabrielle asked Hope, stopping short of actually looking at the infant. “Now…” Half out-of-body, she easily crouched, wedging the basket between her feet and laying her child in it. “Rest now, my love. Wh- Oh! Can’t forget this, hm?” she asked, retrieving her lamb figurine from her messenger bag.
Goewin’s medallion came with the toy, the piece of the chain still connected to it wrapped around its short, wooden leg.
With another gasp, Gabrielle instinctively flung the trinket into the river. “W-w-well! Don’t need that, huh? Of course we don’t!” she answered herself a quarter-second later. “And now that that’s out of the way—” Still, green-blue eyes refused to look directly at Hope as their owner bent forward to pass her lips over her baby’s forehead and set the wooden toy beside her daughter— “Be a good girl for mommy, alright? A-ahhh…” Those eyes closed, but in tangible pain. “AH!”
Flames flickered into a raging inferno along her skin, traveling the expanse of it before shooting up inside of her.
“D-Dahak, please!” the bard panted raggedly. “There, there, there’s no other way! I have no choice! Please!”
But the evil god did not relent. Though it was exactly what he wanted, his child separated from her mother’s positive influence and returned to his cult and the banshees, still, he punished the girl for making it happen.
“Oh, please; please!” she begged in tearful agony. The instant Gabrielle had to be surprised that she could speak during one of Dahak’s attacks, another scalding twinge bowled her over such that she nearly knocked heads with Hope.
One tiny hand alighted on her cheek, the other on her neck.
And just like that, the pain disappeared. Whether being defeated by or accommodating his child, Dahak stopped hurting his chosen one. His presence left them both.
“Th-thank you, sweet girl! Thank you!” Tears of joy mixed with no small part of sorrow streamed down Gabrielle’s cheeks. Her much larger hands held Hope’s in place. Memories of her child helping her deliver the afterbirth and giving her strength in other moments of weakness flickered in her mind as well. “Oh, my love. You make everything better. I don’t know how I’m ever going to live without you.” She pulled away from her baby and, locking her gaze on the sparse grass across from her, unsteadily rose to stand once more. “But I won’t take away your chance to live just to preserve myself. I swore to you I’d never be that selfish again, and I meant it! You’ll see! I hope- …I hope you’ll be able to understand one day. I…”
Silky, honey-colored locks flew when Gabrielle shook her head, a melancholic smile hitching itself to her face. “I’m going to miss you so much, you know that?” Unconsciously and yet keenly aware of each step, the teenager shuffled as far as she could go without letting the river run over her boots. Once more, she free-fell into a crouch and nearly lost her nerve. This is it. Cascading eyes drifted to tiny fingernails digging into their toy. Her own shaking hand lifted the rolled blanket she planned to use as a decoy with Xena, clutching it close instead of her child. “What can I-” Her broken heart lit in a flicker. It’s worth a shot. Anything is. “Aphrodite, please keep my baby safe. Teach her love, goddess. Let her be filled with it.” An impassible lump formed in her throat and cut off her plea when she let go of the basket carrying her Hope. Goodbye. Then she turned and ran for the rocky hill, hearing the echoes of her soul’s cries get fainter and fainter.
Hope could not believe what was happening. For the first several seconds, she lay frozen, uncomprehending. The next, she even convinced herself it was a game. The swoop downward had been like the ones she had felt while “flying” above Gabrielle the previous night. But deep down, she had some understanding of the truth. The telepathic connection between mother and child, stretched too thin, snapped at last and forever. So, the helpless infant cried.
Softly at first, growing ever greater in volume and frequency to do battle with the churning water, Hope wailed. There was no way even a heavy sleeper like Gabrielle could miss her howls. She’s going to come get me soon. She’s going to pick me up. She’s not going to just leave me alone. She can’t! What she heard next struck her with a terror she had never known.
I can’t! her father feigned crying out in similar panic. I am a fire god! I can’t get to you on the water!
Father! Father! Help me! Hope implored him.
I can’t! What has your mother done? She’s not only thrown you away, but she put you out of my reach! Oh, she is a heartless shrew. She even tricked you and got you to send me away when I was trying to help you!
No; no! NO! Father! Whether Hope understood or believed Dahak about her mother was not the issue. All that mattered was the fear. Help me! Please help me! Come get me!
If I stretch out my hand to you, the flimsy thing you are in will burst into flame, and you will burn up. And if you try to come to me, you’ll drown. …I guess I must let you go too.
NO! NO! FATHER!
Warbling voices answered in the god’s place. “Do not fear, sacred one. We will retrieve you once the river carries you to our forest. Just hold on!”
Hope bawled all the more emphatically. No! Now! Now; now; now! Hold me now!
“Ssh,” a gentle voice she had never heard before coaxed her. “It’s okay. I’ve got you, little baby. I won’t let anything bad happen to you.”
Wh-who are you? the tiny child wondered, both more and less afraid.
“I am love. And I will keep you safe.”
Hope responded with a tremulous request. H-hold me.
“Gladly, sweet pea.” And Aphrodite did. Though she did not move from her stunned, devastated vigil over Gabrielle as Xena caught up to the girl at last, the goddess wrapped ethereal arms of love around the infant. She did not know the circumstances of Hope’s existence, who or what the demigoddess was, but still, Aphrodite stayed with Hope in spirit. Too, she conjured a canopy over the basket to shield the child from the setting sun and cooling temperatures, the wind over the water. “Rest now, little one. I’ll get you where you need to go.”
The constant rushing of the river became a haunting lullaby much like the chanting that her mother had been captive to days ago did.
Comforted and not, trusting and yet not, Hope cried herself to sleep.