"All right," he says, and kisses her. "What d'you want to name it? Do you want to hang out with the Golden Coven more so there's babysitters?"

"Gonna be close to Henry's age, and if Rosalie gets her way, close to Henry's next little sibling's age. It'll grow past any wolf pups it meets but there's those around too," Nathan says. "Coven's full of people who'd look after a little half-vampire for a while. They make easy babies, they don't cry much, diapers are not called for, etcetera."

"Then sure," she says. "We can follow 'em around for a while."

"You got it, babe," says Nathan. "Names?"

"No idea," she laughs. "Your favourites still the same as last time?"

"Among Manx names, yeah, I could pick some from elsewhere in the world if desired."

"Nah, I think it's cute to give the munchkin a name from the same place as you," she says. "Unless they don't like it."

"All right. D'you remember my shortlist?"

"Mmm... there was an Ascon on there?" she hazards.

"Yes, that was one of the boys' names. Ascon, Kerron, Payl. Aedyt, Jony, Myghin."

"They're all cute," she reaffirms.

"You want me to pick a pair? Or you wanna have a look at the kid when it's born and see if it looks more like a Kerron or a Payl, or whatever?"

"Hmm... oh, if you leave it up to me, I'll end up waiting until the kid's old enough to have an opinion," she laughs. "So if you want something to call 'em besides 'Munchkin' before then, you better pick it yourself."

"Well, it might not actually take that long for an opinion to happen," Nathan says. "We could do that. But then I would expect a name like 'Superman' - or possibly 'Dracula'. I bet that's what you get when you let a week-old half-vampire name himself is a child insisting that his name is Dracula. Let's forestall that. I like Kerron and Aedyt."

Nathan addresses her midsection. "Your name," he tells it, "is not Dracula, and I will not take responsibility for explaining why everyone you knew in your childhood calls you that when you are trying to go by Kerron or Aedyt again and asking a cute wolf to sit next to you at the Ultra Olympics."

"I love you," he tells her comfortably.

After the Joker has been pregnant for twenty days, Nathan announces, "This is the best time to give Bella her day's notice and move back in with the capital. I believe they're in Jaipur yet."

"All righty," she says, and dresses and teleports them.

Nathan finds his room in this capital site, shows her to it, and brainphones Bella, who refers them to Rosalie, who makes them an appointment for delivery the subsequent day.

The Joker decides to celebrate with cuddles. Munchkin is breaking the occasional rib by now, but they only stay broken for fractions of a second at a time, so it's not a big inconvenience.

"You're having the easiest half-vampire pregnancy of all time," Nathan tells her. "I wonder why today was best anyway. You'd be fine for days yet as far as I can guess. Tired of being gravid?"