#arnan

A few moments pass before he gets a response. He hears something being quenched and then Arnan’s quiet footsteps. He comes to the front and nods to Echo.

“Hello. Why are you here?” He asks in his gruff way.

“Nothing official,” Echo assures him, “I’m here on personal business.”

“Oh?” Arnan asks, one of his eyebrows goes up a bit.

“Uh-huh. I’m here to visit my friend and share a bit of personal news. Are you busy?”

Arnan looks back at the forge, “Not so much that I cannot take a break. What is your news? Is something wrong?”

“Oh, no, not at all, it’s good news.” Echo grins. “I want to introduce you to someone.”

Arnan’s other eyebrow goes up. “Okay. Are they waiting outside?” Arnan leans over to look out towards the front of the forge.

Echo laughs, “No.”

Echo sits and gestures for Arnan to do the same. He humors him and kneels down to rest on the reinforced stand at the front of the forge room. It doesn’t even creak under the weight of his many mechanical limbs. Echo moves the pack he was wearing on his back to his front and carefully undoes the top cover.

Arnan blinks as Echo reveals a baby, swaddled in what he now can see was a bjorn of sorts, not a pack. The baby’s hair is green, but it is not- surprisingly- a goblin child. It’s a young dwarf, with a smattering of green across its cheeks and ears. And its ears are somewhat pointed at the tips. 

The baby stirs as Echo unbundles it from the bjorn. It blinks up at Echo and gives him a sweet smile as it grabs for his ears. Echo giggles and leans in, letting the baby play with his earrings.

“This little gentleman is Bjard,” Echo says as he peppers the baby’s cheeks with kisses. “Bjard, say hello to your Uncle Arnan.”

Echo gracefully raises to his feet, even with the baby still clinging to parts of his face. He steps closer to Arnan and manages to turn enough that the baby, young Bjard, notices him.

Arnan stares down at the small dwarf babe. Bjard stares up at him, his eyes catching and reflecting the shine from Arnan’s metallic plates. He reaches out one pudgy hand towards him.

“Uncle Arnan?” Arnan asks.

“Aye,” Echo grins up at his nervous expression. “I’m not mean enough to try and make you a godfather or anything. But Uncle will suit just fine.”

Echo leans in and blows a raspberry into Bjard’s neck and cheek, causing him to squeal with laughter.

“Would you like to hold him?” Echo asks.

Arnan gives him a blank look. “...I do not wish to scare him.”

“You’re not scared of little ol’ Arnan, are you, Bjard?” Echo asks the babe. The babe babbles at him and leans further forward, his hands reaching for Arnan’s closest plating of metal. “See?”

Arnan sighs, “For a moment, then.”

Echo hands the babe over, and Arnan cradles him as best he can with his most hand-like attachment. Little Bjard seems fascinated by his metal limbs, and intent on drooling over much of them. Echo beams up at him.

“I had a dozen or so Uncles and Aunts growing up in the circus. Figures that my son will have about the same, if not more.” Echo muses.

Arnan blinks down at him.

“Your s- your son?”

“Aye,” Echo grins.

“Your son …and your husband’s son?”

“Aye,” Echo is still grinning.

“I am holding the son of the king of the mountain,” Arnan states, his panic rising. “You just handed me the prince?!”

“Aye,” Echo reaches up and brushes at the babe’s hair, “And you’re doing marvelous. He really seems to love how shiny you are.”

“Echo!” Arnan knows he’s being too loud, and now Bjard is giving him a slightly concerned look.

Echo takes pity on him and takes the babe back out of his arms. Bjard nestles in against Echo like it’s second nature to him, but his eyes are still tracking Arnan’s metal limbs.

“I trust you,” Echo tells him bluntly. “And Barnabas does too. He knows I came here to introduce you two. All of Bjard’s other Uncles and Aunts have already gotten to meet him.”

Arnan glares down at him. “I did not even know you had had a child.”

“Yeah, Barnabas wants to hold off on announcing him properly and publicly until his naming day. Which is… his fifth birthday?” Echo scrunches up his face, “Yeah, fifth birthday. It’s a royal tradition of some sort.”

Arnan sits there and thinks about that. It is a lot to process. Bjard reaches for him again and Echo steps closer so that he can still hold the babe while he runs his hands up and down Arnan’s metal plating.

“You want me to be an Uncle to a shield dwarf prince.” Arnan states outloud. He feels half mad just for putting it into words.

“Yes,” Echo tells him simply. “I think you’d make a fine Uncle. And besides, he may well become the ruler of this mountain someday. Should he not grow up feeling a kinship to those that live here?”

“Should he feel a kinship towards those that are monsters to nearly everyone else?”

“He’s part goblin, Arnan,” Echo tells him with a harsh tone, “There are many who would call him a monster for that.”

Arnan looks down at the small dwarf, who is smiling and babbling as he traces odd shapes along the metal plating of his limbs. Even when he had raised his voice earlier, the babe had not once looked at him with fear.

“Perhaps,” Arnan says very, very quietly, “I could give this Uncle thing a try.”