Raised Among the Halls of Stone: 2

Ophelia was organized. She had to be. She was 34, and Claire at sixteen had been born when she was 18 and just starting college. An accident, though she would never even breathe that word to Claire.

Claire turning into a sorceress, her boyfriend (nice boy but a bit of a flake), into some kind of chosen warrior—and then a half troll…

Had challenged her. But they were both mature, and Ophelia had granted them her blessing along with Javier and Jim’s mother.

And she’d also made certain to ensure that Claire had an up to date implant. Ophelia loved her daughter and Claire was as organized as she was, but they were close and Ophelia wasn’t about to pretend that her daughter would never have any sexual thoughts until say, she was thirty.

That was left for Javier when he was in his “my little princess shall never grow up” mood. But Ophelia wanted to make certain that Claire had a child when she was ready, and wanted one.

Needless to say, with all of that preparation, “Mom, I have a baby” coming four months after they’d left was…

Okay, Ophelia’s first thought was that evidently magic could do everything. Then the phone conversation continued, and her next thought was what lunatic puts a baby in a rocket?

Then she was hastily canceling appointments, calling Barbara and she, Javier and Barbara were heading to the East Coast along with Krell and Douxie, who evidently was also a wizard.

The trolls had camped out in a little cave complex, according to Claire’s phone call, using old ‘not my problem’ wards to keep people from noticing. Douxie had helpfully noted that in the bad old days, such wards were often used to keep people from noticing places where lone humans tended to vanish.

Just what I wanted to know—that horror movie shows about hidden farms weren’t actually entirely fake.

But they landed at dusk, Krel leaping out to see the ‘starship,’ audibly wondering what kind of idiot human could use a baby as a test pilot. Ophelia and Barbara went straight to the little tent that Jim and Claire had set up, Claire feeding Clark with a bottle.

“He’s drinking formula,” Claire said, in her “I’m in charge mode,” “But we thought you should—“

“It’s fine, Claire,” Barbara had her medical kit including some gifts from Krel and Aja. “Can I?”

“Oh, of course, Mrs. Lake—“

“I think we’re beyond that now, Claire, call me Barbara.”

“Um, okay,” Claire said, the girl who had fought, and nearly died, to a sorceress nervous about addressing her boyfriend’s mother by her first name.

“Mama,” Claire said. “I… Well, I know you gave me the talk, but this was unexpected.”

“And not in the normal way,” Ophelia said.

Claire turned red. “Mama, we didn’t—we haven’t—“ Next to her, Jim was slowly turning a darker color than trolls normally were.

“I’m kidding. But why don’t we let Barbara check out little Clark?” she said. The baby was adorable, and definitely not fussy.

Probably due to the experience of being shot out of a rocket.

The two walked away from the tent, Jim remaining by his mother. Ophelia paused, looking down the long slope. The sun had gone down, but the light reflecting off the clouds turned the sky red, a few houses visible, their lights gleaming. The two sat down on a stone, still warm from the sun.

“So, has Mr. Blinky found the Heartstone?”

“Merlin helped him.”

Ophelia blinked. There was anger—no—fury in those words.

“Where is it?”

“Well…” Claire shrugged. “Merlin isn’t great with maps evidently. The cave complex extends under both New Jersey and parts of Manhattan.” She sighed. “We were just going to stay with the Trolls, but now, we’ll find a house. One close enough to a gateway for Jim to go…” Claire giggled. “And in a good school district, I guess.”

“Claire…” Ophelia paused. “You can do this. If you want to. I trust you, so does your father, but…”

Claire looked at her mother. “But?”

“Even with all that happened. Jim, you, Toby, the Trolls, we’d hoped that you could, once they got settled, enjoy being… young again. You’d never be a child again, that’s why we gave you our blessing, but just have time to find yourself. But if you take this on…”

“No more late night band gigs?” Claire asked, smiling at the memory of her mother’s disdain for her music skills.

“You’ll always be afraid,” Ophelia said. “Is a sniffle just a sniffle? When they get older, you’ll wonder why they aren’t in when they should be. Did something happen? You’ll always judge yourself…” She shook her head. “Or worse, you’ll realize that maybe you put too much on your daughter’s shoulders too early, and you should have been happy rather than judging.” She blinked a few times. “When I had you, I was going to college, but… yes, late night studying, groups going out to enjoy the evening, I was 18 and I had to stay in, because babysitters were expensive, especially ones I trusted.”

“Did… you regret it?”

“No, Claire, but it was hard, now and then.” Ophelia looked at her. “But you sounded determined on the phone, so…why? Is it because you found him?”

“That and…” Claire looked down, her shoulders hunched.

“Claire?”

“Merlin’s magic made Jim… sterile,” Claire finally said. “Just like Morganna possessing me, made me infertile. We’ll never have a child.” Her shoulders shook a little bit.

Ophelia was struck dumb for a moment. Claire was a fighter, she’d seen that on Eternal Night, and afterwards. She enjoyed sports but she wasn’t… what was the term her friend in school, the theater critic had? Right, she wasn’t a “Man with tits.” Claire loved plays, dresses and when she’d put Enrique to bed once, she’d confessed to her mother that she sometimes dreamed of a day when she’d be putting her own child into his crib.

And now…

“Oh, Claire…” Ophelia said, as her daughter burst into tears, and she took her in her arms.

They would never qualify to adopt a child. Too many questions. If they give this up… Her entire line of questioning about whether or not they’d prefer to allow the child to be adopted died.

She’d seen trolls walk under a burning sky, been flown here by an alien…

And if Aliens and Trolls existed, maybe God had taken a hand, two teenagers sitting under the sky just in time to see a falling star…

“Claire?” she said.

“Yes, Mama?”

“You’ll need a house, but some people are going to be judgmental. I want a promise from you.”

“Yes?”

“No Curses.”

Claire laughed, the sound a little stifled. She sniffled, then nodded. “No curses. Not even little ones.”

“Good. Now the first thing, once we get back to Barbara, is to start talking to you and Jim about how to handle this. There’s one thing…”

“Mama?”

“You’ll need to get married. It’ll clear up questions…” Ophelia nodded. “And Emancipated.”

“What?” Claire paused, then nodded. “If we’re just with a child and we’re also kids…” She paused. “I’d have to ask Jim…”

Ophelia looked down at her daughter. Claire looked nervous, and thoughtful.

Good. She expected it, but she was happy to see that Claire was really thinking about this. She also had that determined look on her face.

“You’ll have to talk to your abuelita, she’ll want to be there for the wedding.”

Suddenly Claire looked panicked. “She… wanted to see me graduate college.”

“I did, after having you, so I don’t see why you can’t…”

“We’re going to have to tell her about the trolls…” Claire stared. “What if she…”

“Would you like me to break the news?” Ophelia said. “I think that the trolls might have their own ceremoney.”

“Yes. But…” Claire paused. “Where?”

“Arcadia? You’ve got the trolls to their destination and they can handle things for a time, but California has no limits on marriage age, and it automatically confers emancipation… and the family court judge got to watch you and Jim fight an army of evil trolls.”

“What about Papa?”

“I’ll… talk to him. And give him tranquilizers if need be.”

“Mama!”

“Your father seems to still see you as a five year old, now and then…” Ophelia paused. “But this is forever, Claire… Whether it works or not, you’ll never be able to go back.”

“It seemed a lot more romantic on Romeo and Juliette.” Claire stared at the sky.

“Romeo and Juliette killed themselves in the end,” Ophelia pointed out.

“Yeah, probably not a great example.” Claire nodded. “I’ll have to talk to Jim, sit down and think.”

“Good, you’re thinking. Now lets get back before Jim panics.”

“Panics?”

“He’s thinking about becoming a father. They always panic. Let me tell you about Javier when he heard I was pregnant…”