#betemorne posted a headcanon that gave me this idea

[midwinter-fox]

Son

While travelling through Velen, a place Dettlaff detested for its gassy swamps and excess necrophages, what he expected least of all was how many children were without families. War came with many horrid aftermaths, but so see how many homes had been torn apart brought him only aching.

"Liefje, why are we here? This place is filled with only misery and broken homes." They traveled by horseback only for the fact that Leonore was incapable of handling the speed with which he could travel while carrying her. It always brought about dizzying bouts of illness, so he had purchased a deep chestnut steed to ride alongside her beloved mare, Lola. Now, though, he wished he could make short work of their trip so he didn't have to bear witness to all of the destitution.

"To visit my family, love. They live in Novigrad, but they don't have the funds to come see me instead. Besides, I'd like to introduce you to each other. My grandmother might not approve of you immediately, but I know my sister and her children will adore you when we visit them after Gramma."

"Why would your grandmother disapprove..?"

"She's simply distrusting of men. Just call her 'grandma' and let her talk your ear off. It's the quickest way to her heart."

"Odd," he muttered, but she did not hear him over the clattering of hooves on cobblestone.

It was late when they approached the city, so there weren't so many people out in the streets, but Novigrad was a large city, and thus would always be busy. While there were no crowds, the occasional drunkard would stumble in front of either of their horses, making them have to maneuver around them, much to his irritation. He was decent when it came to riding, but he did it so infrequently that he had to try to relearn before setting off on their journey. Leonore, however, could very well be the Goddess of Equines with how skillfully she wove her steed through groups of people without bumping into a one. Admiration for his lover blossomed inside him, or it would if he could only keep up without having to tug the reins every few feet.

They entered the city through the Portside Gate, but had to travel all the way through the city to get to The Bits. Why they were given such unappealing names when there was also Glory Gate or even St. Gregory's Square was beyond the vampire's comprehension. Upon seeing the district in which Leonore's family resided, he immediately understood; the buildings were decrepit, the streets were filthy, and the homeless were everywhere. They couldn't ride more than a few paces without someone begging them for coin. As kind as he was despite appearance, Dettlaff only had so much to give and needed it for the journey back to Leonore's home in Brugge.

She rode on, not paying the misfortuned any mind whilst simultaneously managing to practically remain unnoticed. Yet, they asked him for his money when his mate was the first to stride past them. When he finally managed to catch up (though not before reluctantly parting with more crowns than he wished to), he inquired as to why this was.

"It's because you're a foreigner," she explained, "and usually foreigners mean plenty of money. Just politely decline and tell them you've not nearly as much money as they seem to think. I've gone through this before, too - they'll understand."

With that, she was off again, riding ahead as she searched for the derelict house her family called home. Left alone again, he sighed and watched her as she focused on trying to remember where her grandmother lived. There wasn't much else to look at other than her retreating form until something caught his attention. It was laughter, then a shrill cry, like someone was hurt and others watched in amusement. As loathe as he was to be there any longer than he needed to be, something in him brought him to a screeching halt. With a firm tug of the reins, he brought his horse to a stop and dismounted.

The chestnut stallion was secured to a post, and he inwardly hoped no one would steal his steed whilst his back was turned. His ears were tuned to the sound of the faint cries and notably childish laughter, but he did his best to also keep some of his focus on his unattended horse.

Down an alley, he found three dirty children standing around a crate - one crouched over it while the other two were blocking its contents from Dettlaff's view. As soon as he got too close, the children took notice of him and ran, no doubt leery of strangers thanks to living for so long on the streets. Part of him wanted to stop them, maybe even inquire after their parents and why they played in dark alleys unsupervised, but the soft cries brought his attention to the crate.

His heart stopped when he saw the tiny, dark-blue hands waving angrily from inside the wooden box, face red and voice raw from screaming. The infant laid in its own filth, a rag haphazardly draped across its malnourished body - perhaps a sign of remorse moreso than an attempt to keep it warm. Impulse took him, leading him to kneel beside the crate and lift the weak babe from the makeshift bed. It was barely big enough for him to need both hands to hold it. There were no clothes on its body, not even a cloth for its waste; the vampire felt the utmost pity and despair at seeing the baby boy discarded like this.

With the rag being the only thing to use, Dettlaff at the very least wrapped it around the child's lower half to prevent him from making even more of a mess of himself then proceeded to swaddle him in the trailing tail of his overcoat. Anger and distress welled up in him as he watched the baby go from starved and desperate screams to pained whimpers, the comfort of finally having something to warm him being the first sign of relief in who knew how long.

There was no time to try to find who dared leave an infant to die of hunger and cold in a filthy alley - Dettlaff ran back to his horse and mounted carefully. The jostling further upset the babe cradled protectively in his arms, but he couldn't do much to appease him when he was trying to ride with such precious cargo. Leonore had ridden so far ahead of him, he had to use his keen senses to try to find her. Her scent was very specific - rose, sugar, and lavender; it wasn't long before he'd caught up to her, this time in too much of a rush to care about whether his horse knocked into anyone along the way.

Her grandmother's home was, though barely, one of the nicer homes in the district. Lola was tied up outside with a pail of water set beside her as a makeshift trough. Before his horse could even make a full stop, he was dismounting and striding purposefully to the door, baby boy still trying to scream with a hoarse and weak voice. Whatever conversation was happening inside, it stopped abruptly as soon as he pushed open the door with his shoulder.

"Dettlaff?? Where have you been? Why the hell do you have a baby?!"

Leonore was on her feet and rushing to his side, but he refused to let her take the child from him, no matter that she was his mate.

"I am keeping him warm. He needs food and a bath - please, I will explain when he is cared for."

An elderly woman who was once sitting on a wooden chair off to one side of the room was standing and quickly hobbling to an adjacent room without a word. Leonore urged him to follow, so he did, but he did not expect for the old lady to be so speedy about fetching a rag and a jug of goat's milk. The cloth, though not the cleanest, was soaked in the milk then the corner pressed lightly to the babe's lips. Immediately, it latched on and began suckling. Relief flooded everyone in the room.

"Thank you," Dettlaff sighed, content now that he was able to feed the poor child. "I found him in a crate. A group of children appeared to have been attempting to play with him, but they fled when I arrived. He was barely covered in this and completely bare beneath it. I.. I could not leave him to die."

The two women exchanged a look, both cracking smiles that he was ignorant to - his focus was on the infant and ensuring it fed well.

"Gramma, do you still have the baby clothes my nieces wore?"

"Mhm, gimme a moment," the wizened woman uttered, and though she appeared feeble, she had a spring in her step that said she didn't feel nearly as old as she looked. Before too long, she had a box of clothes set before them.

While the women sifted through the children's clothing, Dettlaff couldn't seem to keep his eyes off of the baby he held. Dark, feathery soft hair covered his head in a thin layer, though whether it was black or a dark brown, it was too short to tell. His eyes never opened long enough for the vampire to tell what color they might be. The child was small, thin, and pale, all a direct result of malnourishment, but Dettlaff was pleased to see that holding him so close was making the blue in his small fingers and toes recede.

"Dettlaff? We're going to heat up some water to bathe it--"

"Him."

"Right, I'm sorry. We're going to draw him a bath. Will you be alright waiting?"

"Yes, but please, be quick. He is covered in filth." Though there was concern in his tone, Dettlaff was so preoccupied with feeding that he hadn't noticed the elderly woman approaching him from the side.

"Ya've got some nasty-lookin' claws on ya. Make sure t'keep those clean. Babies like clingin' n' suckin' on fingers." She reached forward and gently pressed a frail finger to the child's hand, and Dettlaff watched in silent awe as it closed around her finger as though on instinct.

"I will keep that in mind. Thank you." Granted, it was something he already knew, but the old lady was just trying to help. "I've never held an infant before today, but I will do my utmost to be careful."

"Never held a babe? Well, ya seem t'be doin' just fine. I've held plenty, so gimme a holler if ya need help."

"I will. Thank you, oma." His speech gave the woman pause, but she seemed to think twice about saying anything in favor of leaving to assist with making up a bath.

The baby continued to suckle on the milk-soaked rag for nearly half an hour, but when he was finally finished, he opened his mouth to begin crying anew. This time his screams were piercing, agitating the vampire's sensitive hearing and making him flinch. Now, he was at a loss of what to do. He only panicked for but a moment before Leonore came rushing in.

"Here, please allow me," she said over the harsh wails, and this time he let her take the child with no resistance. Carefully, she situated the baby at her shoulder and began patting his cloth-covered rear and humming softly; it was like she'd done this a hundred times before. Soon, there was an audible belch from the tiny body, then silence once again.

"You need to burp him after being fed or he'll get a tummy ache." Leonore handed him the baby once again, but now he was suddenly unsure of himself.

"How did you do that..?"

"You just put him up on your shoulder like this," she helped by rearranging the now fussing infant so that he was in the proper position in Dettlaff's hands, "then just firmly pat his back. Sometimes it helps to pat the rear, too. I've done this for my nieces, so I sort of know what I'm doing."

"This is the first time I've so much as touched an infant. I will need help," Dettlaff admitted.

"It's fine. Just be patient. I've found that if you pay close enough attention, you'll begin to hear a difference in cries. His hungry cry will sound very different compared to his hurt cry or his sleepy cry."

"I did not know this, thank you. Is the bath ready, liefje?"

"It is. It's why I came in here, that and to help get him calmed back down." She then led him into the adjacent room, a kitchen, and guided him to the bath.

Her grandmother stood with a handful of rags of varying degrees of cleanliness.

"Take your pick. Whatever ya don't use can be for diapering."

"Thank you, oma," he responded politely as he took one of the cloths and dipped it into the warm water.

While Dettlaff busied himself with tenderly cleaning away the dirt and refuse from the baby's body, Leonore left to grab something with which to clothe him. In the meantime, Leonore's grandmother stood and watched.

"I ain't well-versed in anything but Common, son. You'll have t'tell me what 'oma' means."

"It is Nazairi for grandma. I will call you something else if it bothers you." He only looked up when the old woman laughed, her aged eyes turned up in a wrinkled smile.

"Son, if it bugged me, ya'd know. I'm pleased t'see my grandbaby found someone with a good head on 'is shoulders. And a natural-born father t'boot."

The old woman's words made his heart soar. There were many times he'd let himself imagine having a family with his beloved, but the prospect of a vampiric child being born to a human woman wasn't a promising one. Such a pregnancy could kill her more surely than one with a mortal child, and that was if it was even possible. It was no secret that he yearned for his own children, but he'd much rather protect his mate than put her in such imminent danger, even if it meant she bore him no children.

"I've entertained the thought of having offspring," he stated simply.

"Well then get on it. Ya ain't gonna be young forever, and I'd like t'see some handsome great-grandbabies from my favorite 'fore I finally kick the bucket." Her crass way of speaking was a bit abrasive to him, but his stomach still twisted into knots just thinking about his lover's tummy swollen with his babe.

For a moment, he let himself imagine the now cleaned infant in his hands having Leonore's hazel eyes or even his own striking blue ones. It was a poor idea on his part, for it only left him getting even more attached to the small child. He was so small, so much so that the vampire feared he may slip between his fingers, though the very idea was absurd. The more he gazed at the weak little thing, the more his chest began to ache.

"What.. What will become of him..?" asked the vampire apprehensively, his voice low and full of concern.

"That," the crone replied, "is up t’you. Now, if you're done bathin' 'im, get some clothes on the poor thing. He'll freeze otherwise."

Dettlaff nodded briefly before returning to the other room, a dry rag in his hand now to properly clothe the baby. Leonore had laid out a number of little linen gowns to keep him warm, but she had to wait for her lover to return so she could see what size would fit the best. Nothing they had would fit very well with how tiny he was, but they made do with the smallest one they had. More fussing from the infant ensued, but once finally bundled up, the older woman instructed them both on how to properly swaddle him in a blanket. As soon as he was wrapped up, arms and legs secured in a cotton cocoon, the baby fell asleep. Pleased that he was finally resting, Dettlaff gently cradled and rocked the infant.

"Will you name him..?" Leonore asked tentatively, unsure if the man was even contemplating keeping the child or if he was going to try finding him a suitable home.

"Should I..?" It seemed even Dettlaff was unsure of what he'd planned to do. It was purely instinct and the desire to protect that drove him to bring the babe with him. He didn't think he'd actually be keeping him, but who else would he go to? "Are we to raise him..? I admit, I did not think this through."

"Well, I see no harm in doing so, though it’ll be a huge responsibility. If he was abandoned, I'd like nothing more than to ensure he has a good home. He’ll probably die otherwise. Besides, you've told me time and again how you want kids." There was only kindness and warmth in her gaze, and Dettlaff could not love this woman more than he did in that moment.

"And you would have me name him?" When she nodded, he paused in thought. It was another minute or so before he came to a decision. "Ezra."

"Ezra? You're certain?"

"I am. His name is Ezra."

"Any surname? I'm unsure of how the Nazairi go about that, but I know you go by 'van der Eretein.'"

"It signifies my place of origin. The Eretein valley in Nazair is where I once made my home. If I gave him a surname, it would best be 'van der Steeg' or 'van der Stad.'"

"What do they mean?"

"Steeg is alley. Stad is city."

"I'd rather call him Ezra of the city rather than of the alley."

"Ezra van der Stad," Dettlaff uttered to himself, then again with more confidence to test the sound of it. "Is this alright by you, liefje?"

"I like it," she smiled, then looked back at her grandmother for approval. The elder, standing silently to the side as she watched the unfolding scene, nodded. "It's settled. I'll see about gathering some extra clothing and the like to take home with us for him."

Mindlessly, Dettlaff nodded. He was in a state of euphoria. Though it was not how he'd intended for it to be, he now had a son, and he would do all in his power to give him all of the love and care he deserved.

"Ik hou van jou, mijn zoon," he whispered as he pressed his lips to the infant's forehead. The babe slept peacefully, blissfully unaware that he was now held and coddled by the man who would be his father.