Ra-khir closed the door. “Healers,” he promised softly to the hallway. “I’ll see to it.” Swiftly, he headed toward the queen’s quarters. His honor taught him never to bother royalty after dark, but he knew Matrinka would never forgive him if he allowed the baby to arrive without her assistance. He knew because she had made it abundantly clear with threats. And he knew that she alone could keep the Pudarians away. At least we no longer have to worry about the prince. The image of Leondis wringing his hands, hovering over Kevral and the baby like a properly concerned father stabbed his heart like a blade.
As Ra-khir hurried through Béarn’s hallways, he thought of Leondis’ last words as he left the castle for home: “Only fitting that you should attend mine as I did yours.” At the time, it had made no sense to the Knight of Erythane; other concerns had superseded it. Now, he understood. The prince had stood by Kevral while she birthed the twins. And, now, Ra-khir would oversee the birth of Pudar’s heir.
Pudar’s heir. Ra-khir’s hands drooped open, without the strength to bunch. He sought the inner strength the next several hours would demand. Weakened by childbirth, physically and emotionally vulnerable, Kevral would desperately need him at a time when he wrestled his own grief. The baby belonged to Pudar. He had no choice but to harden his heart to the tiny, helpless infant who had grown inside his wife, would be left with only the memories of its fluttering against him at night.
Béarnian guards in the hallway came rigidly to attention at the sight of Ra-khir, though he wore hurriedly donned, off-duty attire and his hair lay in sleep’s disarray. One left the doors of the royal quarters to approach him with a greeting. “What can we do for you, Sir Ra-khir?”
“Please let Her Ladyship know Kevral’s baby is on the way.” Ra-khir ran a hand through the red tangles, suddenly self-conscious about his appearance. Knights properly remained dignified and in control at all times, not just during procedures and maneuvers.
“Thank you, sir.” The guard headed back to his fellows. After a brief exchange beyond the range of Ra-khir’s hearing, two entered the queen’s chambers, the door clicking closed behind them. A moment later, they emerged, and another round of quiet discussion ensued.
Ra-khir shifted from foot to foot. Though the whole affair had taken moments, the delay felt interminable. He belonged at Kevral’s side.
The guard approached Ra-khir again. “Sir, she says she’ll meet you at your room.”
Ra-khir resisted the urge to catapult himself back through the corridors to Kevral, relievedly leaving everything in the queen’s hands. “What would she like me to do?”
The guard smiled. Apparently, Matrinka had anticipated the question. “She told us to tell you to just go. She’ll handle everything, sir.”
Ra-khir gave up a crooked grin in return. “Thank you.” He would present Matrinka with a more enthusiastic show of gratitude when she arrived. His mind still refused to function normally, and though he knew much needed doing, he could think of nothing but holding Kevral’s hand. Turning in a smooth motion befitting a march, he headed back down the corridor.
As during his trip there, Ra-khir noticed nothing of the magnificent murals, torch brackets, and tapestries that covered Béarn’s walls. His concern for Kevral, the baby, and the situation unfocused his thoughts and interrupted all the streams of his consciousness. Nothing made sense but to dutifully follow the paths he had already determined as right. He plunged through the door to his quarters. The blankets balled in wadded disarray on the floor. Kevral lay on the center of the bed, her head balanced on both pillows, her legs drawn to her abdomen. The Béarnian-made nightshirt covered her, bulge and all. Tinged brown, a puddle stained the sheets, the bulk of it on her side of the bed.
Ra-khir pursed his lips, taking in the situation. He saw no reason for Kevral to remain in the damp spot left by the breaking of her water. “Can you get up?”
Kevral nodded. “I taught a class with stronger pains than this.”
Ra-khir cringed at the memory of General Markanyin’s description. More than one Pudarian soldier had witnessed Kevral’s collapse after she had bullied through active labor with force of will and Renshai mind techniques. When the pain finally overcame her control, it had built to a crescendo that nearly killed her. “Let’s do it the regular way this time, all right?”
“All right,” Kevral agreed, rolling from the ticking. “Why did you want me up?”
“I’m changing the bed.” Ra-khir headed toward the chest that housed the clean linens. “No reason for you to be wet or to have a baby on dirty sheets.”
Kevral laughed, climbing back into place before Ra-khir could reach the chest. “The wetness and dirt have only just begun, my love. It gets pretty bloody from here.”
“Bloody?” Ra-khir repeated.
“Bloody.” Kevral confirmed. “Haven’t you ever seen a baby born?” She cringed, clutching her abdomen.
Ra-khir swooped to Kevral’s side, dragging one hand from her nightshirt to hold. He could feel the muscles beneath it knotting. “Are you all right?” He rolled his eyes at his own stupidity. “Sorry. You’re having a baby.”
“I’m fine,” Kevral finally managed. “Contractions close and deep. It won’t be long.”
Ra-khir stared. He had no siblings, no young cousins. He had once seen a calf born but never a human. “I thought it took hours, sometimes days.”
“Often.” Kevral tightened her fingers around Ra-khir’s. “But sometimes no time at all. I’ve heard of women who went to the privy to relieve a few stomach cramps and had their babies there.”
Renshai, maybe. Ra-khir had always heard childbirth was a tremendously painful procedure. Kevral handled it as gracefully as all physical discomfort, and he wondered if she focused on the process of birthing to avoid thinking about the end result. One moment, they would sit as two people, three the next, then two again as the Pudarians bundled their child away for his new and better life.
“Easy, Ra-khir.” Kevral wriggled her fingers. “I’m the one who’s supposed to do the crushing”.
Ra-khir loosened his hold on Kevral’s hand, watching her fingers regain their rosy hue. “Sorry.”
Then, as if to prove her comment, Kevral winched her grip so tight it smashed Ra-khir’s hand. A flash of pain crossed her features. Drawing her knees toward her head, she spread her legs. “Ra-khir, my love,” she said through clenched teeth. “You’re going to have to deliver this baby.”
“What! I can’t . . . I’ve never even seen . . .” Then, realizing protestations would not change the timing of the baby’s arrival, Ra-khir worked his fingers free and headed toward the foot of the bed. He hoped the right maneuvers would come to him, as they obviously did to Kevral. But as he arrived to a trickle of fluid and a film of blood, he found himself disoriented and light-headed. People have been birthing babies forever. Yet his mind naturally corrected itself. Not people. Women.
A knock sounded through the room.
Gods be praised. In his rush for assistance, Ra-khir nearly shouted for the other to enter without identification. “Who is it?”
“It’s me, Ra-khir.” Matrinka’s voice wafted through the panel. “And others. May we come in?”
“Please.” Ra-khir rose. Suddenly protective of Kevral’s privacy, he blocked the very area the healers needed to see.
The door opened to admit Matrinka, a female elf, and a human healer whose name escaped Ra-khir for the moment. Mior skittered past Matrinka’s attempts to bar her with a foot as the queen shoved the door closed. The cat leaped onto the bed, curling near Kevral’s face.
“I’m glad you’re here. The baby’s coming now.”
Matrinka glanced at Kevral for confirmation, frowning at the calico. Mior shifted position slightly, deliberately keeping her face from her mistress’ view.
“I have to push,” Kevral said, panting from the strain of another contraction.
Matrinka stepped toward the knight. “I think we can use you better at the other end.” She flic
ked her chin toward Kevral’s head.
“Huh?” Recognizing Matrinka’s polite request to move him, Ra-khir felt like an idiot. He scrambled to Kevral’s side as the healers moved in to attend the delivery. The other Béarnide, who Ra-khir now recalled went by the name Lysantha, snatched up the bunched blanket, spreading it over Kevral’s knees to create a cave beneath which they worked.
“Don’t push yet,” Matrinka called, her voice muffled by the blanket. “You’re not quite ready.”
How does she know that? To Ra-khir it seemed like magic, and he appreciated Matrinka’s arrival more than she would ever know. He would have just stood there and hoped he caught the baby. Using his sleeve, he wiped sweat from Kevral’s brow and cringed with her at the next contraction. He wriggled a hand through her clamped fingers.
“Sorry about the cat hair.” Matrinka looked over the blanket to address Kevral. “I couldn’t keep her out.”
“That’s fine,” Kevral returned, the cramp apparently finished. “I like having her here.”
Matrinka rolled her eyes, surely in response to something smug from Mior. She disappeared back under the blanket.
Ra-khir stroked away blonde hairs clinging to Kevral’s cheeks and forehead. He wished he could do more, his appreciation for Matrinka growing in bounds at that moment. Kevral groaned, admitting a pain she would surely rather have hid. Her nails gouged the side of his smallest finger. “I . . . really . . . have to . . . push.”
The elf responded this time. “Go ahead, Lady. It’s time.”
Kevral shoved her chin against her chest and pushed with the power of a warrior, making no sound as she did so. Then she flopped back onto the pillows, releasing a gasp of breath. She opened blue eyes with a wet glaze of pain.
Ra-khir clasped both hands around hers, desperately wishing he could take the pain onto himself.
“Relax,” Matrinka commanded. She rose again to look directly at Kevral. “A couple more like that, and it’ll be over.” She turned her soft brown gaze to Ra-khir, the look rife with sympathy. She swallowed, addressing a difficult subject. “Kevral, when the baby’s born, do you want to know. . .?”
“It’s a boy,” Kevral replied, her voice weak but without a trace of uncertainty. She grunted. “Another one.”
Matrinka dipped below the blanket, without questioning Kevral’s assertion. “Push.”
The door creaked open. Six Pudarians, three male, stood in the doorway. Attention on pushing, Kevral did not notice them, but Ra-khir knew a sudden rush of irritation. First, they had not knocked, a simple courtesy. Second, they had no right to look upon his wife’s undignified position. What are they doing here? he wanted to hiss, stopped by honor. Instead, he waited until Kevral’s grip lessened and she settled back to the bed before easing his hand free. Before he could step between the newcomers and his wife, one of the women forced her way beside Matrinka and the elfin healer. “I’m the midwife supposed to birth this baby. Why wasn’t I called sooner?”
Kevral’s eyes snapped open at the Pudarian voice. “Get away from me,” she said, her voice containing an edge that made warriors wary. Mior rose, back arched, expelling a high-pitched growl. “Only Her Ladyship and my husband may touch me down there.”
“It’s my job,” the midwife insisted. “I’ve touched thousands of women ‘down there.’ You have nothing unusual or special.”
“I have . . .” Kevral broke into a pant, fighting another contraction and the natural need to push. Sweat spangled her bangs. “. . . the heir . . . to Pudar’s . . . throne . . . down there. And . . . he’ll stay . . . there . . . until you . . . back away.” Her voice gained strength as the wave of pain passed.
The midwife opened her mouth, but Matrinka interrupted. “You were called immediately. The baby came early. Now, do as Kevral said, or I’ll have you bodily dragged from the room.”
A look of strangled outrage filled the midwife’s face. She jerked her attention to Matrinka. Ra-khir watched scarlet rage drain into blanched shock as she recognized the queen of Béarn crouched between Kevral’s legs, hands sticky with blood, amniotic fluid, and vernix.
“Your Ladyship.” The midwife backed away and curtsied simultaneously, an awkward gesture. “I—I didn’t know.”
Kevral gasped.
“I’m here,” Matrinka said gently. “Push, Kevral.”
Ra-khir planted himself between the healers and the Pudarians, preferring to face the visitors yet too fascinated by the proceedings to do so. Once he dismissed the blood and fluid, he concentrated on the head squeezing through an exit that seemed far too small. He watched in fascination as the top of a pale scalp appeared, sparse yellow hair matted with dark fluid. “Push, Kevral,” he repeated, his voice too low for her to hear.
Then, suddenly, the head slithered from the birth canal, then stopped, wedged at the shoulders.
“Is he out?” Kevral asked dizzily.
“Just the head,” Ra-khir called back before anyone else could answer. “Just the beautiful, beautiful head.” Excitement battered down the sorrow, and he found tears of joy in his eyes. Has to be a girl. Yet he knew Kevral’s claim had an irrefutable basis.
The baby gurgled, then blasted out a strong cry.
“Healthy, thank the gods,” a Pudarian whispered.
“Don’t push now,” Matrinka instructed. She pulled the head upward until a shoulder popped free, then maneuvered the baby toward the floor. “Now, one more small push.”
The baby glided fully free, accompanied by a rush of fluid. Lysantha and a large-breasted Pudarian held out blankets simultaneously. Matrinka drew the baby toward herself, oblivious to the blood this smeared across her sleeping silks. For several moments, she cradled the infant before placing it into Lysantha’s arms. The Béarnide carefully folded edges of cloth over the infant while Matrinka tied and cut the cord. “It is a boy,” she announced, then pointed Lysantha toward Ra-khir as she waited for the afterbirth.
Startled, Ra-khir accepted the package without comment. The baby smelled of blood and Kevral, a mix he found surprisingly pleasant. He stared at the tiny hands, the pursed lips; and blue eyes beneath partially opened lids. Long lashes curled in surprisingly dark semicircles for one so blond. He hugged the baby close, barely feeling its impression through the folds of the blanket.
A Pudarian male cleared his throat. “Forgive the questioning, Your Ladyship. But is there purpose to delivering the future prince of Pudar to an Erythanian who bears no relation to the boy?”
Ra-khir clutched the bundle closer, worried to crush it. He tried to ignore the comment, to fight the dull certainty telling him he held his second son. The Pudarian’s words became more nonsensical than offensive.
Matrinka feigned engrossment with the afterbirth.
Ra-khir drifted to Kevral’s side. “Do you want to hold him?”
The midwife made a horrified sound. “No! Please, I mean only the best for her when I say don’t do that. If she holds him, it will only make his loss that much harder.”
Kevral reached for the baby with genuine need. It was not just defiance that fueled her desire, and Ra-khir trusted Matrinka’s judgment over the Pudarian’s. He settled the blankets into her arms. A serene smile bowed Kevral’s lips, and she stroked the baby with a finger, touching him all over as if to memorize the feel as well as the look.
“A cruelty,” the midwife muttered, unable to directly condemn the queen whose decision had placed the infant into the arms of those who must relinquish it.
Lysantha brought the washing bucket, and Matrinka deposited the afterbirth into it. “We’ll need another, with soap and water to clean her. And fresh sheets and blankets.”
Matrinka’s two helpers scurried to obey, while the Pudarians fidgeted with obvious discomfort. Finally, one man stepped from the group and bowed to the queen. “Your Ladyship, it’s our job to take the baby. If you plan to deny us, we cannot fight you. But we must report back to King Cymion.”
“I don’t plan to deny anything.” Matrinka f
reed the sheet from the edges of the ticking and used the slack to mop up blood. “You’ll get the baby after his first parents say their good-byes.”
“He’ll need his first feeding soon,” the large-breasted Pudarian, apparently the wet nurse, said.
Matrinka looked at Kevral, then smiled. “He’s getting it.”
Ra-khir watched Kevral’s response to Matrinka’s words. She shifted the blankets and worked a breast free of her nightshirt. Suddenly, it bothered him beyond bearing that these Pudarians were arguing over his wife’s exposed body. No longer helpless or muddled, he planted himself in front of them. “Get out.” He jabbed a finger toward the door.
All three women edged backward. One of the men took a threatening half-step toward him. “You can’t order us—”
“I can,” Ra-khir said. “And I did. Pudar will have a lifetime with their prince. We have our son only for today. You’ll get him in the morning, no sooner. No later.” He took a deliberate full step at the other man. “Now, get out.”
The man stiffened, as if he might begin a battle Ra-khir had every intention of finishing.
“I got a good look at the baby,” the midwife said. “They can’t switch him for another without my knowledge.” It was a warning disguised as information. “Let’s go.”
The Pudarians turned away, the one in front of Ra-khir last of all. “First thing in the morning,” he said gruffly, “the prince travels to Pudar.” Without awaiting a reply, they funneled from the room, closing the door behind them.
Ra-khir stared at the panel even after its closing, feeling a rage he never realized he harbored ebb into cold desperation. His pulse hammered in his throat. The whole world would watch this man grow to adulthood, projecting their hopes and dreams upon the future ruler of the West’s largest city. Yet, to Ra-khir, he would remain always frozen in time, the innocent infant that filled his arms and heart for only the day his boldness had won him.
“Thank you,” Kevral said.
When Matrinka and her assistants gave no response, Ra-khir turned his gaze to Kevral. She looked tired and radiant at once, and the last of his anger fled before a rush of love. For her and for the new infant. “You’re welcome,” he responded, refusing to cheapen her gratitude by belittling the actions he had taken. “I love you.”
The Children of Wrath Page 61