Anthony McCoy was a hard man to overlook.
Even if you stripped away the gold-threaded cloak, the rank sigils, the aura that made lesser magi's knees shake, there would still be the sheer presence of him. Nearly two meters tall, all muscle without bulk, built like a man forged for battle and then given just enough grace to pass for noble company. Blonde hair fell in loose strands over his forehead, catching the light as if each lock had been spun from sunlight. His eyes—steel-blue and steady—carried the same weight as a drawn sword.
In Rick's old world, someone would have mistaken him for an actor, or maybe a god stepping down from a stage. In this world, there was no mistake. He was the thing myths bent themselves around: a demigod, a war commander who had faced down the fire of elder wyrms and walked away with only a cut along his jaw to remember it by. Husband to Francisca, the most formidable woman the continent had ever feared or admired.
At the moment, though, all that weight and power had been reduced to something small, almost laughable. He was pacing.
The maternity wing's marble floors glowed faintly under the lampstones, the faint silver veins in the stone pulsing in time with the enchantments buried deep in the foundation. Every click of his golden boots landed soft and dull, smothered by wards designed to dampen mana surges—because childbirth, in a mana-rich body, could be… unpredictable.
He had counted thirteen steps from one end of the corridor to the other. Then he had counted again. And again.
It wasn't the walking that wore on him—it was the stopping. Whenever he stopped, the thoughts rushed in. He should be in there. He should see. He could see, if he chose. All it would take was one flicker of divine sight, one thread of mana sent through the wall…
No. He clenched his jaw.
Francisca had made herself clear. She didn't want him there "in that state." Weak, she had called it. Which was absurd—Francisca's version of weak could still tear the spine out of a stone golem—but Anthony had learned the truth behind her words years ago. Pride wasn't a thin shield for her; it was her second skin. She would rather face an army alone than let her husband watch her grimace in pain.
And then there were her eyes. That rare, impossible constitution that made even his divinity stumble when he looked directly into them. She could strip the intent from a man's mana, unravel the emotional thread behind a thought before it left his lips. If he so much as peeked into that room uninvited, she'd feel it—not just see it, but feel it like a blade sliding between her ribs.
So he paced instead.
The hallway's air was clean in a way that felt unnatural, scrubbed of every trace of dust or scent. Somewhere further down the wing, a nurse whispered an incantation over a bowl of steaming herbs; the words blurred into the hum of the mana wards. Anthony ignored it.
Wait here, she'd said. And don't do anything stupid.
As if standing out here, counting his own steps, wasn't already stupid enough.
He flexed his hands, feeling the prickle of magic along his skin. Breathe in. Out.
And then—
A sound. A small, precise click.
The latch on the delivery chamber's door.
Before the thought had even formed, his body was already moving. He was no longer in the hallway but inside the room, passing through three layers of spellwork that would have sent a mortal sprawling.
And there she was.
Francisca sat upright against rune-etched cushions, her shoulders square despite the dampness along her temples. No wasted movement, no slouch. Her breathing was slow, steady—controlled. In her arms lay a bundle wrapped in soft cloth, no larger than a loaf of bread, yet somehow heavy enough to tilt the entire axis of his world.
A boy.
Silver-white hair crowned the tiny head, catching the lamplight in an almost luminous halo. The baby's skin was pale but warm-toned, the faintest blush in his cheeks. His little fingers had curled themselves into the edge of Francisca's cloak and held fast with the quiet stubbornness Anthony already recognized.
"A boy…" Anthony's voice came out softer than he meant, a little unsteady.
Francisca met his gaze, her own eyes sharper than any blade he'd wielded—but now softened with something else. Something gentler, though she'd never name it.
"Look at him with your mana sense," she said, lifting her hand to weave a dome of transparent energy over them. The air within shimmered, the barrier settling into place like a veil.
Anthony closed his eyes and reached out—not with his hands, but with the divine current that lived in his blood.
There it was. A core. Small, impossibly small, but solid. Not the fragile flicker of untamed mana every child carried, but a true core—formed, anchored, already drawing in the energy of the world.
He opened his eyes sharply. "Impossible…"
Every being waited until twelve. That was the law of the body, the rhythm of the soul. Before that, the vessel was unstable; shaping a core too early was like pouring molten metal into an uncarved mold—it warped, cracked, ruined the vessel entirely. Even the children of gods obeyed the same clock.
But this boy—his boy—had done it in minutes.
"I felt it as soon as he breathed," Francisca murmured. "The mana entered him… and the core was there."
Anthony's chest ached with a pride so fierce it almost hurt. "He's… perfect."
Francisca's lips curved faintly. "He's a miracle."
For a moment, nothing else existed. The dome held the warmth between them, the world outside reduced to nothing but faint memory.
Then—
A knock at the outer chamber door.
---
Evane stood in the waiting room, her gloved hand still on the latch. The space was empty.
"Sir Anthony?" she called.
No answer.
She exhaled through her nose, a sound equal parts annoyance and fondness. "Of course," she muttered. "Demigod."
In three strides, she was at the delivery chamber. She knocked once, out of habit more than need, and stepped inside.
The sight rooted her to the spot.
Francisca sat tall, the child against her chest, a calm radiating from her that Evane had never seen—not in battle, not in court. Beside her, Anthony sat on a silver-gilded chair that might as well have been a throne. He wasn't the commander now. He wasn't the weapon. He was just… a father, watching the tiny life he had helped create.
Evane swallowed and stepped forward.
Anthony's gaze shifted to her, and some of that softness vanished, replaced by the gravity she knew well. "Evane," he said, "what we discuss here will never leave this room. You may swear upon my divinity, or you may leave and never bear the burden."
She didn't hesitate. "I, Evane, swear upon Sir Anthony McCoy's divinity to guard the secrecy of what is said here."
He inclined his head. "Good."
Francisca raised an eyebrow, her lips parting as if to say something—likely to remind Anthony she had already explained this to him.
"Stop," Anthony cut in quickly, one hand raised. A flicker of panic crossed his face before he masked it again.
Evane blinked, unsure whether to be amused.
Anthony turned back to her. Then, slowly, he told her. About the core. The way it pulsed with natural absorption, the divine calm that had kept the boy quiet even under Francisca's aura.
Evane listened, at first with the cool, distant poise she had cultivated over years. Then she reached out with her own senses—cautious, precise. And felt it.
The truth.
Her composure cracked. For years she had believed herself a prodigy, the exception to the world's rules. She had built her pride on that foundation. And here was a newborn who made her life's greatest achievement look like a child's trick.
She fell silent, her mind caught between awe and disbelief. Anthony didn't rush her.
---
When she finally looked up again, the air around her felt clearer somehow. She understood. This was why they had called her. Why the oath mattered.
Francisca's voice softened. "War is coming. My husband and I will be at the front. We entrust him to you—his safety, his training, his life."
She looked down at the baby. "His name is Rick."
Evane breathed it once, quietly. Rick. Simple. Ordinary. But not the boy who bore it.
Francisca eased him into a cradle of moonwood lined with enchanted starcloth. Anthony stepped forward, bent to press a kiss to the tiny forehead, and drew from his coat a sigil—the McCoy crest. Within its lines shimmered a single drop of divine blood.
Evane's eyes widened.
He pressed it to Rick's chest. The essence sank in without a ripple, the baby's breathing never breaking rhythm.
Then, without ceremony, Anthony and Francisca turned. They gave their son one last look. And then, with the quiet ripple of space-time parting, they were gone—vanished into the war that waited for them.
Leaving behind a miracle.
A child named Rick McCoy.