Chapter Text
Diaval frowned in deep concentration, scooping up another finger’s-worth of wet sand and slapping it on to the wood carving in his other hand. He worked it in carefully, using a scrap of linen to protect his fingers from the stray splinters that he was trying to wear away, then brushed it off with a clean cloth and sat back to assess his work. His keen fingertips made their way across the surface of his carving with meticulous attention, searching for any rough patches or sharp spots which might prove a danger to curious little hands.
There were none. Diaval smiled and turned the carving over in his hands, admiring it from every angle. Painstakingly fashioned from a fallen cherry branch over weeks with only a bronze bladed whittling-knife – his own, procured by a rather confused Percival as a personal favour – the end result bore more than a passing likeness to the original subject. Close enough that the nature of it was clear from a mere glance.
Considering that he had only taken to the art half a year earlier, and only then with a singular purpose in mind, Diaval had managed to acquire quite a knack for wood carving.
Well, eventually. Nobody else needed to know that this particular sculpture was his third attempt.
It was fortunate, really, that Maleficent’s gift of magic had not given him the power to heal his wounds on that fateful summer’s day alone. The ability to self-heal had remained with him, saving him from endless lectures on personal safety – the many times that he had accidentally sliced his own fingers with his whittling-knife had gone undetected by his mate, for they had healed, amid hissed curses, almost instantaneously. He was scrupulously careful to wash off the blood before he returned to their nest, and Maleficent was none the wiser.
Probably.
To Diaval’s disappointment, however, his newfound magical ability had not afforded him the power to shapeshift on his own. Like the Dark Fey, he now possessed certain chlorokinetic abilities, and was especially adept at coaxing trees and shrubs into fruiting. He had also noticed a certain capacity for extending his healing power as Maleficent could – she had promised to help him to hone it, for the Moors would certainly benefit from another with such capabilities – but he still relied upon her to transition him between his many forms on the occasions that he wished himself different.
He did not spend as much time as a raven now, though. The lure of a form akin to that of his love, with wings to soar in the heavens and lips to kiss her both thoroughly and frequently was all too enticing, and so he spent most of his days – and nights – in his Dark Fey shape. It was only when a sense of nostalgia overtook him that he asked for the form of his birth, and even then, only for a time.
Diaval turned his face skyward, squinting in the bright spring sunlight. It was late morning, as best that he could tell. He had finished his gift just in time.
Best that he find Maleficent. They were expected at Ulstead Castle at midday, and she could be just about anywhere in the Moors.
He had arisen early that morning, just as the birds had begun to welcome the new day, shivering at the chill which still clung to the air from the waning night. Maleficent had barely stirred as Diaval crept from their nest, curling her wing over her face in response to the loss of his body heat and murmuring, “’S’till dark, silly bird,” from beneath her feathers. She had probably been asleep again before he had taken off, heading for the sandy mouth of the river to complete his gift.
Diaval wrapped his carving in the cleaner of his two cloths – he would have to find something a bit less grotty to present it in, but that was a problem for later – and spread his ebony wings as widely as they would go.
Magnificent, and his. He would never tire of the thrill of them.
He closed his eyes as the ground fell away, revelling in the cool rush of air against his sharp cheeks. The treetops rustled in his downdraft, a tiny applause that he had only gained the privilege of hearing after his own death and resurrection as a greater being; the wings of a raven could cause no such ripple about themselves, small as they were.
The sky above was an endless expanse of vivid blue, dotted with clouds of bright white down which cast soft shadows upon the lush canopy below. Diaval grinned at his own shadow, racing along the treetops like the soul of his raven self – larger than life, and far grander in his own mind than he had ever truly been, but somehow preparing him for the path that his life had taken nonetheless.
He skimmed the foliage with the tips of his primaries as he turned to the east, heading for the Timeless Forest. Maleficent had spent much of the past week there, regrowing sections of the forest following a particularly nasty blizzard which had struck toward the end of the winter. Most of the Moors had managed to emerge unscathed, including their nest, though it was perched high on a cliff overlooking the Fairy Mound, (in truth, neither of them had noticed the severity of the blizzard at the time, preoccupied with certain nest-warming endeavours as they were), but the Timeless Forest had been severely damaged. As it was, as the name suggested, the oldest and most mysterious part of the Moors, the Dark Fey had devoted considerable time and attention to restoring it. No doubt Diaval would find his mate there, healing a shrub or repairing a tree.
His mate. Months had passed since that terrible day which saw the Warlock defeated and poor Vætki lost, and yet Diaval still found it wonderfully astonishing that from the ashes had arisen the greatest and happiest time of his life.
Though they had burned for each other, having spent years quelling their yearnings for the sake of fear or oblivion, they had not come to mating immediately. Diaval was far too inexperienced and overwhelmed by being allowed to touch her after so many years of burying his desires, and Maleficent had both recognised that, and respected it. She had her own reasons for taking the new direction of their relationship slowly and carefully, after all, shaking off the last remnants of Stefan’s memory and her own misgivings about her deservedness of love for her own self. For a while following the defeat of the Warlock, they had been content to merely explore, learning how best to please each other without any expectation of something more.
It had not remained that way, of course. After several weeks of increasingly passionate discovery, Maleficent, already straddling his lap and arching her throat to his heated kisses, had reached behind him to drag her fingertips in tight circles between his wings. The transcendent ecstasy at such a simple touch had left him a boneless, gasping mess, and all the more so when he recalled how many times he had accidentally stimulated her in the same way. She had smiled at him in that sultry, fanged way of hers, and he could hold back no longer. He had kissed her desperately, laying her back among the soft moss and feathers of their nest, and gave in to his need. She had held him to her, one hand tangled in his hair, whispering her desire into his ear as she took him, groaning, into her body. One at last, they traversed that final distance together, joining in flesh as they had already united in their souls.
It was not how ravens did it, but instincts were a wonderful thing.
And ravens were missing out, in Diaval’s opinion. Maleficent had laughed at him when he had voiced such an opinion, of course, and he had been quite affronted there beneath her, right up until the moment that she squeezed her inner muscles around him and stole his words entirely.
He was, on reflection, probably the happiest raven on Earth. Maybe in all the stars, too, if ravens could be found in such places.
Diaval skirted the meandering perimeter of the Timeless Forest, bright black eyes roving about in search of his mate. They looked different now – enigmatic Dark Fey eyes, flecked with gold which sparkled like stars in an endless night – but they were still ever drawn to the magnetic beauty of his love, wherever she roamed.
Unfortunately for Diaval, on this particular morning, Maleficent had not roamed to the Timeless Forest as he had expected. She was generally not difficult to find when she wanted to be found – or rather, did not mind being found – for her kin seemed to gravitate toward her as planets might a star, but he saw no such behaviour in the Dark Fey who had made their way to the Timeless Forest that morning.
He spied Shrike, hanging almost upside down from either side of a damaged tree branch as she gently coaxed the near-severed end to knit with the trunk. Cursing audibly as she struggled to maintain a grip on the tree, she did not notice Diaval flying overhead, even though he circled back four times in order to work out precisely what she was doing there, dangling like a brightly coloured bat woman. She had recovered fully from the injuries sustained during the battle with the Warlock, and had quickly returned to henpecking a willing and besotted Percival. The captain of the Ulsteadan guard had quietly confided in Diaval that he intended to ask Shrike to marry him, just as soon as he figured out how the Dark Fey went about such a thing. To the best of Diaval’s knowledge, Percival had not yet worked up the courage, and he quietly suspected that Shrike would simply take it in hand once she felt that it was time to take the next step, irrespective of Percival’s grand plans involving rings and romantic gestures.
Further on to the east he spotted Udo, who was teaching his niece and nephew how to regrow the leaves of a sapling with his characteristically unflappable patience. Eira was the very picture of concentration, a model student, and her efforts with the top of the sapling were encouraging. She would be doing the work of an adult Fey within another season, and with great solemnity. Udo’s pride in her radiated in his smile and the gentle encouragement of his words, inaudible to Diaval but clearly appreciated by the girl, who ducked her head and returned her uncle’s smile shyly.
Rhew, on the other hand, drew no such praise. Now six years old, but no less an unholy terror, the boy was using his underdeveloped magic to encourage the leaves to grow in unnatural patterns according to his personal whims. He had created a series of spirals along the length of the branch nearest to him; pretty, certainly, but clearly unnatural.
It would be interesting to see what became of Rhew in the coming years. He was disinclined to fall into step with the more conventional Dark Fey, but his ideas were already novel and fascinating. He would prove either a wonderful asset or a great antagonist. Only time would tell, really.
Diaval wheeled around to the north, skimming low over the little creeks which fed the River and waving to the flower fairies who were busily pollinating clusters of sweet-smelling alyssum, a carpet of white and purple that stretched for miles in every direction. The scent of springtime teased his nostrils with promises of sunshine and warmth, of ripening fruit and blooming flowers, of new beginnings and the comforting embrace of steadfast love.
The tree canopy thinned as Diaval approached the Pool of Jewels, which lay below him as still as glass. The innumerable gemstones below the water sparkled in the dazzling sunlight, reflecting it upward toward him. Coloured light played across the darkness of his wings with such startling clarity that for a moment, Diaval might have mistaken himself for a Jungle Fey. He laughed aloud, twirling in the air in pure joy; if there were gods to be believed in, he was truly thankful to them for allowing him such pleasure, such delight in his existence. There was little more in life that he could hope for or dream of, for he knew the true happiness of utter contentment.
He slowed as he reached the far west of the Pool of Jewels, the point at which the Moors abutted the kingdom of Perceforest. A gently wandering creek ignored the distinction between the two realms, splitting the shrubbery as it wended lazily across the landscape from the lush woodland on one side to the cleared meadow on the other. There existed little difference between the border in that moment and the boundary that a young Stefan had once carefully traversed in a quest to steal the gems which gleamed so enticingly beneath the clear, quiet water. Perhaps the scrub was a little denser, the trees a tad taller, but it could have been fifty years in the past or fifty years hence as easily as the present day.
Diaval had not even been hatched then – nor, indeed, had either of his parents. His grandparents had been the ravens circling above as Maleficent and Stefan grew, oblivious to the significance of the scenes below them or how they would someday change the course of their grandson’s life.
What indeed might they think, if only they could see him now? A different creature entirely, one with words and hands and wings which dwarfed their own, mated to the greatest of his adopted kind and a respected and beloved being in his own right? Friend to man and beast alike – including, Diaval realised with a smile, a certain beast who was almost hidden in the long grass below him.
He alighted in the overgrown lea on the Perceforest side of the border. The grass tickled his bare feet as he made his way to a small apple copse by the burbling creek, his smile growing wider with each step, until he finally stopped a few feet from a small brown horse who was methodically munching away at the fallen winter fruit between the trees. He had put on weight, Diaval realised – in all the months that he had known him, the boy finally looked healthy.
“Hello Ekkert.” Diaval said at last, crooking his lips into an affectionate grin.
The horse snorted, raising his nose briefly in welcome before diving into the apples again.
“How are you farin’? Plenty of apples to be eatin’, of course, but are the humans leavin’ you be?”
Ekkert looked up again and nodded. His umber mane flopped about his eyes and he tried to blow it out of the way, but only succeeded in spraying apple chunks all over Diaval’s tunic.
Diaval rolled his eyes and brushed the coarse hair out of Ekkert’s. It had been some time since the boy had begged Maleficent to change him; his tears cried out, but his grief as raw as the day that his sister had died. She had been reluctant, at first, but on realising that the lad had little else to hold him to the human world and no real way forward, she had granted him his request on a trial basis. All that Ekkert had to do to regain his human form was to find her and let her know as much.
That had been eight months past. Somehow, Diaval felt that the boy, much like himself, would not opt to wear his human shape again.
He took Ekkert’s muzzle in his hands and looked into the horse’s eyes. Familiar eyes. They were still the same deep brown as they had been in his human form, and just as knowing. Diaval wondered just how much those eyes truly saw.
“There’s a celebration at Ulstead Castle today. It’s Wilfred’s first birthday. The wee terror – he’s already toddlin’ about on those sturdy little legs and gettin’ into all manner of mischief.” Diaval said. He smiled indulgently at the thought of his beloved grandson, whom he maintained was every bit as precocious and magnificent as his mother had been, in spite of Maleficent’s insistence that his adoration of the pair of them somewhat altered his perception of reality. “I’m sure that he and Aurora would love to see you, if you want to go.”
Ekkert bumped him in the stomach with his nose, which Diaval took as affirmation. It was far easier to speak horse when he actually was one, but he and the lad generally managed a reasonable degree of communication most of the time regardless.
“Good. I’ll see you at the castle, then. Midday. Aurora tells me that there will be pie.”
Ekkert gave an excited whinny and stomped his front hoof into a particularly slushy apple. He bowed his head to Diaval and turned toward the south, in the direction of Ulstead. He took off into a steady trot, but within moments he was unable to contain himself, breaking into a joyful gallop.
Perhaps one could have wings without having wings at all, for Ekkert had found his own way of flying.
Diaval took to the air once more and followed the lad, turning back toward the Moors in the hope of finally finding his mate.
Toward the Ulstead border, he saw Borra lying in a patch of soft clover, his eyes closed and an expression of serenity playing across his face. In his arms, curled into his chest, lay Corax.
It was a new sort of thing, but one that he and Maleficent were quietly watching with a considerable amount of hope. They had found, in the face of the almost-mating that never should have happened, a new depth to their relationships. Maleficent and Borra had remained friends, and were far closer now than they would ever have been had they actually mated. They had a comfortable rapport, now, with the air clear. Diaval, on the other hand, was delighted to finally consider Borra a true friend. (Indeed, he was often something of an enabler and frequently a terrible influence, but they did have fun, at least until Maleficent invariably discovered their shenanigans.)
Over the previous winter, though, Borra had been seen spending more and more time with Corax, and neither Maleficent nor Diaval had ever seen the Desert Fey more content. It was the first sweet blooming of love, but it was proving to be something quite special indeed.
Borra opened his eyes as Diaval flew overhead and tilted his hand upward in a lazy sort of wave. “Off to Ulstead?” he called.
“Once I find Maleficent. Will we see you there?”
“Count on it. Little fellow must be missing his Uncle Borra.”
Diaval laughed. “No doubt. Who else is game enough to risk his grandmother’s wrath by takin’ him all the way into the bloody clouds?”
Borra wiggled his index finger in Diaval’s direction and grinned. “See you there, raven.”
Funny, really, how that had turned into a term of endearment.
Diaval flew on, glancing upward to check the position of the sun again. If he didn’t find Maleficent soon, he might just have to go on to Ulstead without her, and hope that she turned up eventually.
Could she be sulking? He couldn’t think of anything which she might have been sulking about, but that hardly meant anything when it came to Maleficent. Love had failed to make her any less mercurial, though Diaval could hardly complain. Her capriciousness was one of the things that he secretly adored about her, as much as it drove him to the knife’s edge of sanity at times.
Come to think of it, she had been rather grumpy in the past week or so, though she had vehemently denied being bothered by anything. It was an obvious lie, but Diaval knew better than to push her. She would tell him what was bothering her when she felt like it, and not a moment before.
He tilted his head skyward again, squinting at the bright reflection of the clouds. Was she up there above them, basking in the gentle spring headwinds?
Diaval spread his wings to their fullest span and began to ascend. He quickly found a thermal column and let it carry him upward, spiralling in the delicious warmth of the rising air. His wingtips brushed cool vapour as he reached the level of the clouds and swiftly soared above them, coming to a hover amidst the higher, more insubstantial wisps.
There, soaking up the warmth of the sun with an expression of utter serenity upon her face, was Maleficent.
Diaval’s heart fairly leapt within his chest at the sight of his beloved. He would never tire of gazing upon her, nor, he suspected, would he ever quite believe his good fortune at having won her love. His life was almost too perfect; a preposterous dream held within a desperate wish, too wonderful to truly exist – but exist it did.
Her eyes were closed, and the gentle breeze which stirred the clouds tugged lightly at her unrestrained locks. With wings spread out either side of her, she could have been an angel as easily as the most beautiful of the Forest Fey, albeit an unusually coloured one. Legends may have begun with her, ballads written for her, fairy stories of old made timeless in their retelling, speaking of the Phoenix of the Dark Fey, the last of her line and the greatest of them all. She could have been at the heart of everything long forgotten and yet to come.
His fierce, magnificent mate; every bit the picture of wild, mystical beauty… but for her questionable choice of attire. Again.
Diaval sighed.
“I’m certain we concluded that bird skull accessories weren’t exactly celebratory.” he commented by way of greeting.
Maleficent opened her eyes and stared at him for a long, uncomfortable moment, her gaze penetrating through him like a rapier. His breath quickened, eyes widening in trepidation at having misread her mood. The last thing he needed was conflict on such a special day.
Then she smiled, displaying every one of her fangs. “Good morning.”
Diaval relaxed, allowing his lips to quirk up into a mischievous grin. “’S barely still mornin’. We’re due at the castle any time now. I’ve been all over the Moors lookin’ for you.”
“You are the one who disappeared at the break of dawn.” she retorted.
“I had somethin’ to finish. But it’s done now, just in time.”
She eyed the cloth bundle, still clenched in his left hand. “What is it?”
“It’s a gift. For Wilfred.” Diaval carefully unwrapped the carving and shyly held it out to her. Maleficent took it from him and turned it over slowly, examining it from every angle, before looking up at him in veiled admiration.
“A raven. A wooden raven.”
“To go with his wyvern.” Diaval replied softly. “He won’t see me in that shape so much as he’s growin’ up now. I wanted to make it for him.”
“You made this?”
He grinned proudly. “I did.”
Maleficent smirked, though Diaval could tell that she was impressed. “I had no idea that you were such an artist. Perhaps I should have you whittle a door-knocker for our nest. And a door.”
“A present for your birthday.” he countered cheekily. She handed him back the carved raven and he rewrapped it with the care befitting the treasure that it was.
“You don’t know when my birthday is.”
Diaval may have exaggerated the affronted expression on his face just a tad as he replied in the most wounded tone that he could possibly muster, “Course I know when your birthday is! What sort of mate do you take me for?”
She raised her eyebrows and said nothing.
“It’s the vernal equinox,” Diaval continued, “Which, now that I think on it, is next week. I’d better get on if I’m goin’ to be makin’ both a door and a knocker to go with it. And a door frame, actually, because there’s no sense in a door without a frame to hold it in place.”
Maleficent ignored his prattling and fixed him with a questioning look. “How do you know when my birthday is? You’ve never said anything before.”
“I have my ways. And you never noticed all the little presents in your nest? Never wondered why they were there?”
She did not reply, but the subtle softening of her expression told him that she had. After a moment, she commented wistfully, “I don’t know when yours is. Your birthday.”
Diaval could only shrug apologetically, though he had barely given a thought as to the reciprocity of the situation. He had simply been content in quietly celebrating the anniversary of her birth – arguably one of the greatest days in history, as far as he was concerned, for it gave the world Maleficent – without considering that she did not share his secret. She had never spoken of her own birthday, nor had she ever asked about his.
“In fairness, neither do I.” he said ruefully, “Ravens don’t really do birthdays, we just watch the seasons. I’ve just sort of borrowed yours for the past twenty years or so, actually, and thought myself a year older then. Easier to remember that way. And I like the idea of sharin’ it with you.”
“Well,” Maleficent replied as a meaningful glint appeared in her eyes, “Perhaps this year we can celebrate together.”
Diaval grinned and waggled his brows at her suggestively. He moved close enough to thread his arms around her waist, allowing the warm updraft upon which she glided to hold them both aloft. “Perhaps we can,” he murmured, leaning in to brush his lips against hers, “I can think of a few ways that we could do that.”
“Insatiable creature.” she whispered into his kiss, “I should have known that you would prove inexhaustibly lecherous.”
“I’ve not heard you complainin’.”
“Nor will you.” she replied, pulling him close and kissing him in a manner which he knew was to forestall any further discussion on the matter.
He wouldn't have dared to argue with her anyway, not with her as irascible as she had been lately, but Maleficent did not need to know that. Oh no, she could kiss him distracted all day if she liked. All day long and well into the evening as well, if she felt it necessary. Diaval was not complaining at all.
He was just considering the logistics of getting back to their nest in the shortest possible time to continue being distracted even more thoroughly when Maleficent broke the kiss and smiled regretfully at his flushed face.
“I suppose we shall have to show our faces at the castle.” she murmured, carefully dragging a fingertip along his jaw to rest on his swollen lips.
Oh yes. Wilfred’s birthday celebration. Diaval had somehow managed to briefly forget about that, what with Maleficent’s tongue in his mouth and the sharp press of her talons into his rear and all.
“We… we could be late?” he replied hopefully. A quick roll in the nest wouldn’t cause too great a delay, surely?
Maleficent shook her head. “Ingrith is vying for grandmotherly superiority now that she is human again, and that simply cannot be borne.” She wore the expression of someone who had smelled something rather unpleasant.
Diaval snorted. It would not matter how many ways in which their lives intertwined, there was no way in which his mate would ever allow herself more than a passing tolerance of the Ulsteadan queen. “Ah, she’s finally realised the importance of family. It’s like a fairy tale endin’.”
“Only the fairy tales in which she embodies the villainous troll.” Maleficent muttered. She curled her lip upward to emphasise her displeasure at the mere thought of her precious grandson favouring the likes of Ingrith over her, as though that were a situation which had even the slightest possibility of occurring. If nothing else, Maleficent had a distinct, if occasionally ferocious, maternal quality to her personality which came to the fore around Wilfred, whereas Ingrith was about as grandmotherly as a leopard slug. Diaval was firmly convinced that Maleficent had absolutely nothing to worry about.
“Oh, cheer up. Nobody’ll ever really like Ingrith, even if she starts handin’ out sweetcakes and singin’ happy little nursery songs. Now come on, don’t start sulkin’. We get to spend the day with Aurora and Wilfred! Couldn’t be better!”
A raised eyebrow and a churlish, “Hmm” were the only responses that he received, unusual enough to Diaval that he could not help but confront her on them, despite his earlier resolve to let her be.
“All right, what’s the matter? You’re never ambivalent about seein’ the little ones, even when Ingrith is hangin’ about like the stench of an unwashed peasant. Come to think on it, you’ve been stewin’ like pease porridge for days. Somethin’ is botherin’ you.”
Maleficent clenched her jaw and very deliberately did not meet his gaze. She appeared to be debating with herself as to whether to answer him or ignore his question entirely. Perhaps it was worse than Diaval had thought, although just what was on her mind was still frustratingly unclear.
Finally, his mate looked him in the eye and sighed in a resigned sort of way, as though he had been the one berating her into responding instead of her own mind.
“Aurora is pregnant again.” she said.
Diaval blinked in surprise, hesitating for only a moment before a broad grin lit up his face. Were he to be honest with himself, it had crossed his mind more than once that Maleficent’s moodiness might actually prove a cause for a celebration; although the truth of the matter was not quite what he had imagined, he found himself thrilled nonetheless.
“A wee baby? That’s wonderful! Isn’t that wonderful, Maleficent?”
“Wonderful? How do you figure, you silly bird?”
“Another little grandchild to love! That’s wonderful, isn’t it? And our Wilfred, a big brother! He’s goin’ to be such a good big brother, he’s so gentle with that horrible Arabella’s kittens, and human babies aren’t all that different to kittens, really. Less hair, I s’pose, but they sound very much the same-”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, stop babbling, Diaval. Honestly, no sooner does the Beastie have one baby than that avaricious husband of hers is busying himself making another on her; utterly typical of humans and their complete inability to control their baser desires.” she hissed.
Diaval raised an eyebrow at her. “Now, you can’t really say that,” he replied carefully, “Especially considerin’ what we did just last night.”
“It is hardly the same.”
“Twice.”
“A completely different scenario.”
“And three times the night before that.” he reminded her.
“Apples and pears.”
“Speakin’ of which,” Diaval said, deftly swiping back control of the conversation before it could degenerate into a time-wasting squabble, “I’m starvin’. We should go to the castle. And congratulate Aurora and Phillip on their new little one, not rail at them for doin’ what all mated couples do. Includin’ us. Especially us.”
“Perhaps you should wait until Aurora figures it out herself before offering your well wishes, Diaval.” Maleficent replied, “I doubt that she knows with any certainty yet.”
He frowned. “You didn’t wait with Wilfred. Droppin’ hints the mornin’ after their weddin’ like an all-seein’ soothsayer.”
“How remarkably rude of you to draw such an unpleasant comparison. And it was only a little hint. I didn’t tell them everything.”
“What more was there to tell them?”
“That they could expect a son?”
He stared at her in undisguised surprise. “You knew that too? Even so early?”
“Of course.” Maleficent replied, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world to know the basic details of a child mere hours after their conception. Now that he considered it, though, he would not have been especially astonished had she confessed to also knowing that Wilfred would turn out to be shockingly blonde. She was the Phoenix of the Dark Fey, after all. There probably were limits to her abilities, but Diaval doubted that she had discovered them all yet.
Diaval narrowed his eyes at her conspiratorially and whispered, “What about this time?”
“I know this time too.” Maleficent replied obtusely, though she bared her fangs at him in amusement.
He rolled his eyes and waved his hand about in a ‘well?’ sort of gesture. “Grandson or granddaughter?”
“Does it matter?”
“I swear that you thrive on bein’ inscrutable.” Diaval grumbled. It took every ounce of his willpower to keep from sticking his tongue out at her.
“I would never deny such a thing.”
“Nor would I expect you to, it bein’ the truth and all.”
“Rude.”
“That’s me. Diaval the rude raven. So is Aurora’s little one a lad or a lass, then?”
“You’ll harass me into eternity over this, won’t you?” Maleficent sighed.
“Never doubt it. A bird’s got to have somethin’ good to look forward to, after all, even when life is already as close to perfect as it can get.”
He looked up at her then, finding a gentle smile and eyes full of affectionate warmth. There was something unreadable in them, beyond the exasperated resignation which any fool or bird could see, and he stared at her for a moment longer than was strictly necessary.
“You wanted it to be me.”
Perhaps there were no limits to her powers, if she could reach into his heart so easily and extract a desire that he had not yet fully realised himself. To lay it so plainly before him, without pretext or preamble, shocked Diaval into silence for several reverberant beats of his heart, but before he had found the words to answer her he had felt the truth of it within his soul.
He could not burden her with that sort of expectation, though, and it could not have been called such a thing in any case. Though the echoes of his dreams sang sweet melodies of his little bird, the tiny being whose presence would bring him happiness beyond reckoning, he could not – he would not – create presumption where such a thing had no right to exist.
Instead, Diaval shrugged and feigned a nonchalance which he did not entirely feel. “Plenty of time for that.”
“Am I wrong?”
No, my love, but I will not have you believing that there could be any greater gift in my life than you, and you alone.
“I suppose not, but as I said, there’s no hurry, is there? Anyway,” Diaval winked cheekily, “I’m sure you’d tell me somethin’ that important straight away, instead of sulkin’ and stewin’ on it for days like you have been.”
Maleficent canted an eyebrow and said nothing.
“You would, wouldn’t you?” he said. There was something in her expression which made him feel as a rodent might in the face of a descending hawk; fearful at the intensity of his plight, but somehow still hopeful of a miraculous escape into the undergrowth. Well, he reflected, it was probably rather stupid of him to call attention to her sulking. True or not, pointing it out was seldom well-received.
“You would think so, wouldn’t you?” she teased, apparently relishing his unfolding terror. Oh gods above, he was really afraid now.
Afraid, and yet his heart had quickened for an entirely different reason.
“Maleficent? You… you would tell me straight away, wouldn’t you?”
The corners of her mouth twitched upward as she angled her wings to move away from him, but still she said nothing.
Diaval’s eyebrow almost hit his hairline.
“Maleficent? No…” Diaval asked softly, his eyes narrowing then widening almost comically as comprehension dawned. A grin slowly spread across his face. “Really? Really?”
She leaned backward to catch a column of hot air, widening the distance between them and turning in the direction of Ulstead Castle. “Come along, Diaval, we have a grand celebration to attend.”
“Wait a minute, you can’t just up and leave now! You haven’t answered me!”
“We are going to be late.” she called back to him from over her shoulder. Was she was laughing at him? Shaking his head, he took off after her, beating his wings to close the distance even as she pulled away in a burst of speed.
A chase, then. A joyful game which they could now play together in a way which they had never known before. He would follow her forever, to the end of eternity and to all which lay beyond.
And when he caught up with her – for he would, eventually, though it would only be because she allowed him to – he would ask her once again.
Just to be sure.