The morning was still and warm. You sat on the balcony, coffee in hand, overlooking the quiet sprawl of your grassy fields, the breeze gently tousling your hair. The sun had just begun to rise, casting long shadows across the land you’d spent years protecting.

For six months, Nisha—your cobra-bodied guardian and longtime companion—had kept to her room. No knocks, no conversations, just silence behind a locked door. You hadn’t pressed her. She had her reasons.

Then, today, the door creaked open.

You heard the sound of scales brushing over wood before you saw her: tall, graceful, her fangs dulled from disuse, eyes tired but alert. And her belly—full, unmistakably pregnant—shifted with her breath.

She stepped out into the morning light, the wind catching her dark cloak, and stopped a few feet from you. For a while, neither of you spoke. Then, in a voice you hadn’t heard in months—low, tired, but strangely calm—she finally broke the silence.

“…I need to tell you something.”