The Dragon Prince

by Patty Jansen

  Well, thanks for that. Johanna felt even sicker. The child inside protested with a volley of kicks in he stomach.

  Greetje started crying again, so Helena abandoned her tea.

  If Johanna had thought that the agony couldn’t get worse, she’d been wrong. The pains came quickly, one after another. Greetje screamed so much that she grew hoarse. Helena made her drink water, but she threw up almost immediately, all over herself. She hadn’t eaten for more than a day, and most of it was stringy yellowish slime. When Helena tried to wipe it off, she screamed obscenities such as Johanna had never heard a woman use, certainly not one who was married to a man of the church. She managed to get herself out of the chair and stood in the room stark naked, bruised, her hideously swollen stomach out of proportion with the rest of her body, crisscrossed by bright red stretch marks. She yelled that she wanted it to end and she didn’t want to die. The tears were running down her cheeks.

  Helena ordered her, “Then stop crying and start pushing. You’re ready.”

  “I can’t.”

  “You have to.”

  “I can’t! It hurts.”

  Helena grabbed both her shoulders and pushed her down on the chair.

  Greetje protested. “Ow, you’re squeezing me.”

  “Then listen.” Helena’s voice was intense. “You’re going to push like you’ve got to shit, and it’s a really, really hard and big one, and you can’t get it out. It’s stuck down there, but you’ve been sitting on it for a few days and it hurts so much that it can’t wait any longer. It’s going to take a long time and it will hurt, but you push, and push until you’re red in the face and your eyes go red. You push because if you don’t shit, you die.”

  “Ew. How crude.”

  “That’s what birth is like. It’s crude. It’s hard. It’s messy. It’s painful. If you don’t do it, you die. So you push your guts out! Come on. Close your eyes and when the pain comes, push, push, push!”

  Greetje closed her eyes, and when the pain came, she pushed, first carefully.

  Helena kept shouting, “Harder! Like you have to shit. And you have to get that shit out of there.”

  Greetje went red in the face.

  And again and again. She held her breath while pushing, going red in the face, and then let it out with an explosive sigh.

  Again, and again and again.

  Not making much progress.

  Johanna now grew aware of how hungry she was. She eyed the remains of the cake, but decided against it and drank some cold tea. And coughed it back up.

  Nellie gave her a concerned look. “Are you all right, Mistress Johanna?”

  “I think so.” She hoped so. The child was kicking her in the ribs. It almost hurt.

  It was so, so agonising to watch, and it took so long, and Greetje’s strength wilted to the point where she could not push anymore. She didn’t even cry anymore, but drifted off between pains.

  Helena cast Johanna a worried look. “She’s ready but the child is big and sitting high and she’s exhausted. I think her body is giving her a rest before giving it one more try.”

  There was a really morbid undertone in her voice. One more try was going to be the last try.

  All of a sudden, it was too hot, too stuffy, too scary in the room. Johanna had to get out of there. She slipped out into the corridor.

  The light outside hurt her eyes. It was now afternoon and golden sunlight slanted in through the windows.

  She briefly went to the kitchen to get something to eat. The cooks were already preparing the evening meal, and the kitchen smelled of hearty soup. She forced herself drink some tea and walked around aimlessly, feeling sick and sweaty and afraid. If she didn’t eat so much, then would her child be smaller?

  When she came back into the room, Greetje’s pains had started again. She trembled all over and was crying. “I can’t do it, I can’t, I can’t. It’s my punishment from the Triune, for being dishonest to my husband.”

  “That’s rubbish!” Johanna was surprised at how angry she got. “I’m going to tell your husband that he’s going to stop preaching that rubbish about not being good enough and taking up arms against the enemy as redemption.”

  Helena instructed Johanna and Nellie to each hold up Greetje between them. “I hope a change in position will make the child fall into place. It’s still sitting too high. She needs all the help she can get.”

  Johanna and Nellie heaved Greetje off the chair. She was very slight and not heavy, even with the added weight of the child. Her arm on Johanna’s shoulder was clammy and her muscles trembled. Helena instructed Johanna and Nellie to keep a good hold on her while she placed one of Greetje’s feet on the back of the birthing chair and the other the arm rest of the other chair so that her knees were bent, her legs spread wide and Johanna and Nellie held her entire weight. When a pain came, Johanna could feel all of Greetje’s body tense up. She’d push, she’d let out a loud uhhhh, uhhhhh, uhhhh like a mortally injured animal.

  The pains rolled on relentlessly. There was almost no rest between them. Johanna felt deeply ill.

  She was afraid and with each pain she became more terrified. She had to hold on tightly to Greetje’s arm because she was drenched with sweat.

  She pushed, screamed, panted, howled, swore, pleaded.

  This had now lasted for the best part of the day and Johanna could feel Greetje’s strength ebbing. It was not going to happen.

  Johanna was doing none of the hard work, but even she was starting to feel tired with the effort of holding onto Greetje’s sweat-drenched shoulder.

  Helena showed no sign of giving up. In fact she was starting to encourage Greetje again. She shouted at her when she let her head hang for too long. And Greetje pushed and swore and howled.

  Helena dropped to her knees. Both she and Greetje were screaming. Helena at Greetje, Greetje out of pain. Nellie started yelling, too, “Come on, come on!”

  Johanna hoped that this was over soon, because she was going to throw up.

  Finally, finally, something happened. A little head emerged, covered in wet hair. Helena helped ease out the child from between Greetje’s legs. From her position, Johanna couldn’t see it very well, but the face was all scrunched up. The body was pale and waxy and looked like something dead that had been in the water for too long. When the child was free, a gush of blood and mess came out.

  There was a moment of intense silence. Helena’s hands holding the child were covered in blood. Was it too late? Had it taken too long? Johanna couldn’t help but think of the child’s skull in the box. Her vision wavered.

  Then the little mouth opened and uttered a weak cry.

  “Oh, by the Triune,” Nellie called out in relief.

  Johanna and Nellie lowered Greetje onto a towel on the bed. She was shivering and crying. “It was so terrible. I’ll never, never do that again.”

  Her legs were covered in bruises and slick with blood. Her belly was floppy, the skin wrinkled. Her chest was covered in red blotches and her eyes were shot through with blood.

  “Calm down, it’s over,” Nellie said. She dipped a washcloth into the boiled water which had long since gone cold, and started washing the muck off Greetje’s lower body. Then she dressed Greetje in a clean nightshirt and tucked her in bed. By this time, Greetje’s eyelids were drooping.

  Johanna shivered. Her dress had gotten wet with birth fluids and felt disgusting and cold around her ankles.

  Helena had wrapped the child in a cloth which made it stop crying. “Hey, hey, it’s over. Look. It’s a little boy.”

  She put the child into Greetje’s arms, but Greetje was barely conscious and didn’t even have the strength to hold it. Or to smile. Her eyes were half open, unfocused. Her face was more grey than pink. Her hair still wet and stringy from sweat. Her cheek was still blue from the bruising. The birth had lasted more than a full day and Greetje was utterly spent. She didn’t want a boy. She didn’t want anything at all.

  It was not a happy occasion.


  There was much cleaning up to do in the room, and Johanna helped Helena and Nellie. Nellie took the child to the next room, giving the boy a tender look. He was quiet. His face was red and swollen, his head bumpy and eyes gummed shut. He was ugly, to be honest, nothing like the cute little ones that Johanna had seen whenever she visited friends. He had suffered as much in the process as his mother had.

  There was no cot, so Nellie had made a bed in one of Loesie’s baskets. “I think I might ask a wet nurse to come for today,” Nellie said. She stroked the boy’s head.

  For the thousandth time that day, Johanna wondered why she had ever wanted to have a child.

  “That was not particularly pretty,” Helena said, coming into the door.

  “Is she asleep?” Johanna asked.

  “Yes. She’ll need bed rest for ten days. I’ll come back this evening to make sure he’s feeding properly. After all this, I’m exhausted, too.”

  “This is not how it normally goes?” Johanna felt somewhat relieved.

  “I was about to think that we were losing her when she finally managed to push the child out. She is small. The child was big. It happens. I’d be dishonest if I said it will be easier for you. It may. It may not.”

  Johanna felt ill.

  She knew that each time a woman became with child, she was tempting fate. It was not for nothing that Master Deim had made her sign documents that made Johan Delacoeur the regent in case something happened to her. The risk was so great. Her own mother had died while with child.

  She decided: she would have this one child as heir for Roald—she didn’t care whether or not the child was his—and then she’d find herbs that women in Florisheim were said to use to stop having children. Maybe, too, Roald would lose interest. That would be great. No more horse riding while having something big stuck up her private parts.

  At any rate, she’d seen enough of this childbirth business to last her a lifetime.

  Chapter 17

  * * *

  IN JOHANNA’S DREAMS, she lay on her back with her legs in the air. Nellie was screaming, but Johanna was puzzled why. Helena sat on the couch knitting a huge sock, saying that she wouldn’t do anything if there wasn’t any tea. Roald was in the room, too, and he was saying that he couldn’t possibly look at her with all these people in the room.

  Johanna knew she was supposed to feel a lot of pain, but she didn’t. Still, she knew she was expected to scream, so she did. She woke up with a shock, her heart thudding and her stomach tight. Her mouth felt dry. She hadn’t really screamed, had she?

  Sunlight flooded the room and Roald was gone from the bed.

  Johanna rolled out of the bed and opened the door to the hallway.

  Nellie just happened to be walking past. “Oh, there you are.”

  “You didn’t come to wake me.”

  “I did, but you were fast asleep so I thought I’d let you rest.”

  Johanna didn’t feel rested. In fact, she felt more tired than she had going to bed. “How is Greetje?”

  “Still sore and tired, but the boy is feeding well.”

  “Has anyone told the shepherd about the birth?”

  “A guard went out this morning.”

  “Where is Roald?”

  “In the garden.”

  Everything was under control. Not even a dead body could keep Roald out of the garden for long.

  Johanna went into the dressing room, followed by Nellie.

  Nellie told her about how she had the baskets ready to go out to the LaFontaine and Nieland families.

  She put a basket on the dressing table. From inside, she took a little woollen blanket, a tiny singlet with the letters ML embroidered on it, and three napkins.

  “What is ML?”

  “Josefina LaFontaine’s little one is called Marie. I’m sorry for taking these things from your cupboard, but I can make some new ones before the child comes.”

  Johanna nodded. She was in awe of all the things Nellie did. “Do you ever sleep, Nellie?”

  “Not as much as you do at the moment. But you need it, so don’t worry about me, Mistress Johanna.”

  Nellie didn’t even understand why Johanna was asking. “I also got the wood you asked for,” she continued while doing Johanna’s hair. “I’ve put it in your study on the desk. To be perfectly honest: I didn’t get it, but I asked one of the groundsmen because he wouldn’t look so much out of place in those warehouses.”

  “There’s no need for you to get into trouble about this, Nellie.”

  “What trouble? He was glad to help. People support you more than you give them credit for.”

  Did they support her as mother of the heir to the throne or as someone who could help fix this broken town? That was the big question.

  “Don’t look at me like that, Mistress Johanna.”

  “Like what?”

  “You don’t believe what I said. I can see that in your eyes.”

  “It’s not so much that, Nellie, it’s that I think they want me to be a quiet little queen who wears pretty dresses and holds tea parties.”

  “I don’t think they want that at all.”

  “But you want it.”

  “Mistress Johanna, whatever makes you think that?”

  Nellie’s eyes were wide.

  Because every time I want to do something that’s different, wear a different dress or create a fuss, challenge the church or whatever, you tell me not to.

  But she let it rest. Nellie did support her a lot.

  Johanna went to the kitchen for breakfast. The cook brought her porridge with cream and jam, and for the first time in days, she felt well enough to eat all of it.

  She then went to her office where Nellie had left two little boxes. As instructed, Nellie had put a little note with each. One box contained wood chips from the sawmill, the other another twig from a broom from the warehouse where Li Han’s ship lay moored.

  The wood chips showed her the same young men, including Auguste, hanging around while one of their mates was working at a bench chipping away at a block of wood.

  He put his hammer and chisel down. “Finished.”

  He showed his mates what he had been making, but Johanna couldn’t see that from the position on the floor where the wood chips had been.

  The other young men appeared impressed. “You roll the paint on like this.” He dipped the wood block into a paint-soaked cloth and stamped the block onto someone’s arm.

  Auguste yelled, “Hey!”

  He held out his arm. The stamp had left a black shape of a dragon. “Hey man, what are you doing?” He rubbed at the spot but the ink didn’t come off. “Look at it. I’m supposed to go out to dinner tonight.”

  “Do you think it’s good enough?” one of his mates asked.

  Another said, “If it stays on his arm, it has to be. He’s the most slippery bastard in the entire kingdom.”

  His mates laughed, but one remained serious. “I don’t know. It’s definitely similar, but this one lacks in workmanship, so that when all the bags stand next to each other, he will be able to tell the difference right away.”

  “Are you criticising my whittling skills now?”

  “I say it’s good enough. We only want the stuff to pass the harbour master’s inspection. It will be good enough for that.”

  His mates all agreed.

  Johanna withdrew her hand from the wood chip. Well, that was interesting. She rose from the chair and went to the guard station. The guards were unfamiliar with her wood magic, so she had to talk in general terms. She made up that Nellie had heard rumours when running an errand to get something from Father’s office. She also couldn’t give the names of the louts, but Auguste’s group of friends would probably yield those names when they asked around.

  The guard frowned at her. “Some kind of illegal importing racket?”

  “That’s the rumour. And they’ve falsified Li Han’s stamp to make it look like whatever they’re bringing in is coming in under his name.”

/>   “That’s disturbing. Any idea what sort of goods they might try to smuggle?”

  Johanna shook her head. “I don’t even know how much of this rumour is true.”

  “But we will surely check it out.” His expression cleared. “Oh. By the way, someone brought this for you.” He grabbed something off the shelf in the guard station and held it out to her.

  As soon as Johanna saw the rolled up parchment with the white ribbon, she knew what it was about: she had completely forgotten about yesterday’s meeting with Li Fai.

  Oh by the Triune.

  She took the message into her office where she broke the seal and pulled the ribbon with trembling hands. She unrolled the parchment.

  It said,

  I hope this finds you well. I have been informed of your condition and assume that this was the reason that I didn’t see you at your father’s office. I remain interested in meeting you. If you are well enough, please let me know a new time.

  Johanna cringed all the way through reading this. How could she have forgotten about this? This was important. How dumb could she get?

  What to do now?

  Johanna pulled out a piece of parchment and her pen, and wrote,

  Please accept my apologies. I will explain when I see you two hours after midday today at the same place.

  She rolled up and sealed the parchment and went to the guard station to have it delivered.

  Chapter 18

  * * *

  AFTER THE MIDDAY meal, Johanna told Nellie that she wanted to go out.

  Nellie had just taken delivery of the first of the dresses that Mistress Dina had made for Johanna. This particular one was dark blue. Being made of velvet, it was also warmer, which was a problem, because the day was sunny and bright, more summer than spring.

  Father stood at the door to his quarters when she left. “That dress looks even more ‘proper’ than the grey one.”

  “Does it?”

  The sleeves were equally long, the neckline equally high and the top equally shape-less.

  “I take it you’re going out?” Father said.