Work Text:
The delivery room at the Desmond family’s private hospital was submerged in an unnatural silence. Anya Forger—now Desmond—lay in the bed, her breathing ragged, her body trembling not from the exertion of labor, but from the absolute shock that had paralyzed her.
In the head nurse’s arms, swaddled in an impossibly soft hospital blanket, was a baby.
A baby that wasn't exactly a baby.
It was a wolf cub.
With bright pink fur.
And unmistakable hazel eyes.
"No... it can't be..." Anya whispered, her green eyes wide as saucers, her face pale as wax. "What...? WHAT IS THAT?"
Her telepathy, her constant companion since she could remember, screamed the emotions of everyone in the room at her. The nurses were... calm. Professional. As if they were witnessing something completely routine. The doctor checked his notes with the same bored demeanor of someone filling out an insurance form.
And Damian.
Oh, Damian.
Her husband's thoughts were a whirlwind of panic, guilt, desperate love, and a strange resignation she had never detected before. It was as if he had been waiting for this moment, dreading this moment, for all the months of her pregnancy.
"Anya, please, listen to me—" Damian approached the bed, his impeccable suit wrinkled for the first time in his life, his normally perfectly styled hair disheveled. He reached a hand toward her, but Anya flinched, pressing herself against the headboard.
"DON'T TOUCH ME!" she screamed, her voice breaking. "WHAT DID YOU DO TO OUR BABY? WHAT IS THIS?"
The tiny cub let out a high-pitched whimper, and Anya felt a stab of instant guilt that was immediately crushed by sheer terror.
The head nurse, a middle-aged woman with a maternal expression, stepped closer with the cub. "Mrs. Desmond, your son is perfectly healthy. All his vital signs are normal. He's a strong little boy and—"
"IT'S A WOLF!" Anya almost fell off the bed trying to get away. "My baby is a WOLF! How can everyone be so... so CALM?"
Damian ran his hands through his hair, a gesture of frustration Anya knew well, but amplified a thousandfold. His thoughts were a tornado: "Damn it, damn it, I knew this would happen, mother warned me, why didn't I tell her sooner? It's my fault, all my fault, but how do I explain something I don't even fully understand myself? I love her too much, I can't lose her, not now, not after everything—"
"DAMIAN DESMOND!" Anya's voice sliced through his thoughts like a knife. "EXPLAIN TO ME WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW!"
The doctor cleared his throat discreetly. "Mr. Desmond, perhaps it's best if you speak with your wife in private. We'll wait outside with the baby—"
"NO." Anya pushed herself up, ignoring the post-partum pain shooting through her body. "No one takes... takes... THAT out of my sight until someone explains."
Damian finally met her eyes, and in them Anya saw something she'd never seen before: pure, vulnerable fear. Not the fear of a six-year-old being scolded by his father. The fear of a grown man about to lose what he loved most in the world.
"It's... it's hereditary," he finally said, his voice hoarse. "In the Desmond family. It's been this way for generations."
Anya blinked. "Hereditary? WHAT is hereditary?"
"Lycanthropy," Damian said, and the word dropped into the room like stones into a silent pond. "The Desmonds are... we can... Hell, Anya, we're werewolves."
Anya's world stopped.
In all the years she had known Damian—from that disastrous first day at Eden Academy when she'd punched him, through their complicated friendship, their awkward eventual courtship, their intimate wedding—never, NEVER had she suspected this.
And her telepathy...
"Your thoughts," she whispered. "There was always something... something I couldn't quite read. I thought it was just because you were... you. But there was a wall, wasn't there? Something blocking—"
"The wolf part," Damian nodded, his voice barely a whisper. "It's not human. Your telepathy can read human thoughts, but the animal part... it exists on a different frequency. That part can be blocked. That's why you never caught it."
Anya sank back against the pillows, her mind racing a thousand miles an hour. Fragments of memory bombarded her consciousness: Damian disappearing during full moons with vague excuses about "family business." Donovan's insistence that certain aspects of the family remain private. The way Demetrius always seemed... contained, as if holding back something wild beneath his cold exterior.
"Desmond babies," Damian continued, slowly approaching the bed as if nearing a wounded animal, "are born in their wolf form. It's... it's natural for us. It'll be a few weeks before he can shift to his human form. And then, as he grows, he'll learn to control the transformation."
"A few WEEKS?" Anya's voice rose an octave. "You're telling me I have to... I have to raise a PUPPY for weeks?"
"Technically, he's your baby—"
"HE'S A WOLF, DAMIAN!"
The cub whimpered again, louder this time, and something in the sound pierced through Anya's panic. It was a sound... hungry. Vulnerable. Scared.
Against her will, her eyes were drawn to the small bundle in the nurse's arms. The pink fur looked soft and fluffy, the little ears were flattened against his head, and those hazel eyes—Damian's eyes—were staring at her with an expression of pure, infantile need.
Her telepathy finally reached the cub, and what she found took her breath away.
They weren't thoughts in words. They were sensations: hunger, cold, confusion, and an overwhelming desire for... Mommy. Mommy. Where's Mommy? Mommy smells good. Mommy warm. Want Mommy.
"Oh," Anya whispered, feeling hot tears prick her eyes. "Oh, no..."
Damian correctly interpreted the shift in her expression. "Anya, I know it's a shock. I should have told you sooner. I'm a coward, an idiot, I know. But please..." his voice broke, "please don't reject our son. He... he needs you. Even as a wolf for now, he's our baby. He's part of you and part of me, and I—"
"Give me my baby," Anya said suddenly.
Everyone in the room froze.
"What?" Damian blinked.
"Give. Me. My. Baby." Anya stretched out her trembling arms toward the nurse, who shot a quick glance at Damian before carefully stepping forward.
The weight of the cub in her arms was light, warm, and utterly real. Anya stared down at him, this impossible wolf-pup with fur the same shade of pink as her own hair, with floppy ears and a little black wet nose, and those eyes, those damn Damian eyes looking up at her with complete trust.
The cub nuzzled against her chest, seeking warmth instinctively, and let out a tiny sigh of contentment.
Mommy. Found Mommy. Mommy here. Safe. Warm. Good.
"I am so angry with you," Anya said finally, looking at Damian with tear-filled eyes. "So, SO angry. We are going to have a very long talk about the FAMILY SECRETS you apparently forgot to mention before we GOT MARRIED."
"I know," Damian inched closer, carefully sitting on the edge of the bed. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I'll tell you everything. The whole story. Every detail about the Desmonds we've always hidden. Just... please, don't leave us."
Anya stared at him, then looked down at the cub in her arms, who had begun making little suckling sounds, instinctively searching for food.
"This is so stupid," she murmured, gently stroking the cub's soft ears, surprised by how natural the gesture felt. "This is so incredibly stupid. I'm a telepath married to a werewolf, and apparently we just had a wolf-pup. My life is insane."
"Our life," Damian corrected softly, placing his hand over hers. "If... if you still want it to be 'ours.'"
Anya sighed, a long, exhausted sound that held years of surprises, secrets, and complicated love.
"I still haven't picked a name," she said finally. "How am I supposed to name a puppy?"
The relief that flooded Damian's face was so intense it was almost painful to witness.
"We give him a human name," he said quickly. "Because he IS human. Just... temporarily furry."
"Temporarily furry," Anya repeated, and then, against all logic, she started to laugh. It was a hysterical, exhausted, near-breakdown laugh, but it was laughter.
The cub lifted his little head, his tiny ears perking up, and clumsily licked Anya's chin with a small, rough tongue.
"He already loves you," Damian said softly, watching the scene with an expression of absolute adoration. "Just like I do."
"Idiot," Anya murmured, but with no real venom. She looked at her son—her wolf-son, her impossible and perfect wolf-son—and felt something give way in her chest. "Okay. Okay. We can do this. Somehow, we'll make this work."
"Yeah?" The hope in Damian's voice was palpable.
"Yeah," Anya sighed, leaning back against the pillows as the cub settled against her. "But Damian, I swear to all that is holy, if there is ANY other family secret—bat transformations, garlic allergies, pacts with supernatural beings—I want to know NOW."
Damian opened his mouth, closed it, then said very carefully, "How about you rest first and we have that conversation later?"
"DAMIAN."
"My grandfather could talk to crows, but that's really minor compared to—"
"DAMIAN DESMOND, I SWEAR—"
The cub between them yawned hugely, showing tiny milk teeth, and fell asleep with the absolute confidence of a loved baby.
Anya looked at him, then at her nervous werewolf husband, and thought that maybe, just maybe, her chaotic, secretive family was exactly what she had always needed.
Though she was definitely going to need a book on puppy care.
And therapy.
Lots and lots of therapy.