Birth: A Novella Read online

  Now, with Dominic and Roger, I feel such a mix of pleasure and pain, joy and loss, hope and dread, it’s sickening, like the sexual advances of the ungifted I had attracted on Terra and couldn’t accept or respond to. Dominic is oblivious—or is he? Never has he shut me out of his lovemaking with a man if I wanted to share it; never has he done anything deliberately to cause me distress. My lord husband, I say, pleading as in our own lovemaking. Please, my lord husband. I don’t know what to ask, and there is no response from him. I’m panting and heaving, caught up in passion despite the discomfort, locked in a communion that I can’t sever, even if I wanted to.

  ***

  Our journey to the city was slow and torturous. Dominic fretted at the pace, pushing ahead, waiting impatiently for me to catch up, only remembering to worry about the child when I tried to trot or canter. Not that I could. I bounced around in the saddle until I was sore and exhausted, and when we were forced to stop for the night at the same travelers’ shelter we had been trapped in during the spring thaw, where the child had been conceived, I thought I would rather die than set foot in it. “Can’t we—”

  “What, Amalie?” Dominic broke in, furious at the distasteful situation that he could neither change nor control. “Freeze to death because of your delicate sensibilities? Sleep in the stable? Ride all night? Even if we could do it the horses can’t.”

  “Oh, the horses!” I said. “The precious horses. The gods forbid we should inconvenience the horses.” Dominic turned away—I could hear him thinking, No point in arguing with her when she gets like that—and he and Ranulf led the horses into the stable. Katrina was already inside the hut, her hand over nose and mouth, but she tried to smile when I entered. “It’s not so bad, my lady,” she said. “We won’t notice the smell in a little while. You’ll see.”

  At least she didn’t know the story of the shelter. The same fetid blanket was lying neatly folded on the same stained mattress that was no doubt stuffed with the same moldy straw. The same dented kettle and cauldron hung by the hearth, and the same wooden trenchers, a trail of ants leading to and from their greasy edges, were stacked on the rough wooden table.

  Dominic and Ranulf and the guards ducked in at the low door. Stefan followed reluctantly. He knew, I could tell, was looking warily from me to Dominic, wondering, despite his own experience with the telepathic weapon, if the setting itself were enough to make us reenact the wild scene he must have picked up from Dominic’s uncensored memories. Dominic caught Stefan’s wrist, yanked him close and kissed his mouth. Don’t worry, he thought to him. I’m all yours tonight.

  Katrina and I shared the bed, the men on the floor, as we had arranged it last time. Dominic wrapped himself and Stefan in one blanket and they giggled and whispered much of the night, trying to make love silently, fooling nobody. Not that anyone cared. It was too cold to sleep, and bedbugs swarmed all over Katrina and me; someone else had stayed here in the intervening months after all. I brought out my prism-handled dagger, cursing the original settlers who had recreated Terra’s entire insect biodiversity all too faithfully, and tried to use the heat from the embers of the dying fire to electrocute the bugs, succeeding only in setting the bedding ablaze. After we had poured water on it, most of the men gave up pretending to sleep and lit a new fire in the hearth.

  “Almost cock crow,” one of the guards said.

  “My cock may never crow again unless he’s thawed out,” his friend replied, rubbing himself hopefully.

  “Don’t look at me,” the first one said. “I’m so cold I’m shitting brown icicles.”

  I caught the men ogling Katrina and glared at them, holding up my dagger’s prism in a significant way. They lowered their eyes and their voices at that, but we were none of us in a good mood when we resumed our journey an hour later. Except Stefan. For some reason he was singing all the way to Eclipsia City, a silly riddle-ballad full of double entendres, until Dominic told him to put a lid on it. He was smiling when he said it, and Stefan smiled back, still singing, but softer, more of a hum.

  ***

  Dominic is riding Roger, not so gentle anymore, really barebacking, the long strokes, in and out, the pace accelerating. I feel no pain from the men. They’re in the deep communion of sex between the gifted: fulfillment of longing on Dominic’s part; curiosity satisfied on Roger’s, realization of what has been only imagined before. Roger is sobbing, or perhaps he’s whimpering with pleasure. Funny how you can’t tell by the sound. From Dominic a rhythmic grunting, a desire so intense it had obsessed him. With the object attained at last, he is more excited by the idea than by the body and flesh he’s possessing at this moment.

  No, Amalie, he says, do not think I am ungrateful. This body and this flesh are most satisfying. Thank you, my love, for your offering.

  He has not lost his rhythm while he converses with me; he comes, wild and violent, pounding roughly into Roger until the young man moans, and the two of them topple over into the hay. Roger is crying now, no mistake, and Dominic holds him, kissing, murmuring words into his face, petting and soothing him, all the time that his hand moves lower, toward Roger’s cock.

  Roger pushes him away. “You’re insatiable!” he says. “It’s not enough to rape me—you want to make me like it.”

  “Yes,” Dominic says, “I do. It’s better when we both have pleasure. And I don’t recall any rape.”

  “No,” Roger says. “You wouldn’t.”

  ***

  When we arrived at ‘Graven Fortress after three days of hell, it was to find the Aranyi apartments closed and locked, the furniture covered, the servants dispersed to their homes. Dominic had taken out his dagger, bending the light from a torch in a wall sconce into his eyes, retracting the large bolt with a disdainful flick of the wrist. He shrugged, turning to me. “You didn’t tell them we were coming, did you, Amalie?”

  “Why would I?” I said, shrugging in return. “You’re the one who decided.”

  Dominic sighed. “It’s the wife who makes the domestic arrangements.”

  “However did you manage,” I said, “all the time you were unmarried?”

  “A hell of a lot better than this.”

  “Fine,” I said. “Then manage now.” I turned around and marched out, my heart pounding, tears in my eyes. I could barely find the stairs, much less the entrance, but I figured once I was away from Dominic’s dispiriting influence and I could gather my wits I would be able to orient myself through my gift, my crypta. I would make my way to the Terran Sector, I decided. Get supper at a take-out place, a bed for the night near the airport. In the morning, I would—what would I do in the morning?

  “In the morning,” Dominic said, “you can think of a suitable punishment for a brute of a husband. But please, spend the night with me.”

  It was simple enough, after all, to have supper sent in from the communal kitchen—we were not the first unexpected visitors to arrive hungry and tired at this central accommodation for ‘Graven. Katrina and Stefan made up the beds in the Margrave’s bedroom and the wife’s room. In the morning, Ranulf promised, he’d track down the major domo and the cook. Footmen and maids, he added, were easy to come by, if it was Aranyi that wanted them.

  Dominic was eager to spend that first night apologizing, but the journey had exhausted me, and my moment of extreme anger and subsequent despair had taken what little energy was left. I fell asleep as Dominic was kissing me, and woke alone, late in the morning, to be greeted by Katrina. “I really am pregnant,” she said, tears in her eyes but a bright smile on her face. “I just threw up my breakfast.”

  ***

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Dominic says.

  Roger rolls on his side, stares into Dominic’s glowering face. “Sex and rape are the same to you,” he says. “If there’s no force involved you can’t get it up.”

  “Helios give me patience,” Dominic says. “Spare me the Terran bullshit. And how exactly did I force you in here and compel you to allow your precious Zichmni cock to
be sucked?”

  “I was curious, I confess,” Roger says. “But admit it, Dominic; you can’t lie in communion. The way you rode me just now—gods, that was rough! I suppose I should have expected it, but I thought– these past years– you seemed—” It’s difficult for him to express his intimate feelings. No matter that they’ve just shared the ultimate intimacy. For men, words are always the roughest sex of all. “You haven’t changed. You still get off on hurting people.”

  Dominic stretches his hand toward Roger. “That’s nonsense,” he says, but softly, doubtfully. “I was as gentle with you as with a virgin.” There’s guilt at the back of his mind, confusion. He’s telling the truth, as far as he knows, but he’s more aware now, after the fact, of the discomfort I felt, the strange combination of physical sensations he and Roger experienced, doesn’t understand why. He tries a playful tone. “And don’t tell me you’ve never been fucked, because I know for a fact—”

  Roger laughs. “You would know, wouldn’t you? But that proves my point. You hurt me, deliberately, and it’s the only way you enjoy it.”

  “Not deliberately.” Dominic is humble, apologetic. “Truly, Roger.”

  “Lord Roger, to you.” The intentional humiliation. Face stern, no smile to mitigate it.

  Dominic groans, then laughs and complies. “My lord,” he says. “I wanted us to have pleasure. Both of us. And it gives me no pleasure if Ama—” He clamps his lips shut over the betrayal he was about to utter.

  Apollo protect me! Even though he suspected it earlier, Roger is at first shocked beyond words, can only think the pious phrase to himself. “Your lady wife! You would force her to participate in your filthy—”

  “Filthy?” Dominic looks at Roger, sprawled in the hay, his breeches lowered to his knees. “That’s a peculiar choice of word for a man in your position.” He finds his sword belt, unbuckled but never far from reach, draws the blade. “And you will leave my lady wife out of your thoughts and your words,” he says. “My lord.”

  Roger has found his own sword, is unfazed by Dominic’s belligerence. “Why don’t you leave her out?” he says.

  The men rise to their knees, tugging at their breeches, and I’m convulsed with pain. We all feel it, the men doubling over, clutching their stomachs—Dominic, who has not broken the connection between us, and Roger, who has still, despite everything, retained the communion of the aftereffects of love.

  Dominic! I call him, unable to suppress the cry for help. He is my lord husband, and when I am in distress it is to him I turn, no matter how we have hurt each other recently, or who is with him. Oh, Dominic, help me!

  ***

  The days and the weeks that followed were more of the same: failures, accusations, apologies and no real forgiveness. Dominic had missed the opening of ‘Graven Assembly as he feared. Not just the ceremonies and the ritual, but the crucial scheduling of the coming sessions’ debates. He had no opportunity now to decide what issues would be on the table; he could only participate in the discussions that had been officially added to the calendar. His mood was like Terran summer—oppressive, sultry and threatening. Even Stefan began to have a scared look half the time.

  At the ‘Graven Military Academy things were better, although not much. Dominic had no hope of being appointed Commandant at this late date. But when it was learned that he was, after all, available to be Weapons Instructor, the old man who had been drafted to fill in retired with relief. For the first week or so, until Dominic calmed down, the infirmary was filled with cadets suffering from bruised ribs and flesh wounds. But Dominic didn’t kill any, and that was something.

  It was the barrack-room jokes that made him livid with rage: about the vir man who in middle age discovers what a cunt is for and tries to make up for lost time; and the married man with the male companion, who finds a warm body and a place to dip his wick on either side whenever he turns over, and so can never get out of bed. Since no one used Dominic’s name or even hinted that it was a ‘Graven lord being spoken of, he could not take offense at coarse words that were not overtly directed at him, or at me or Stefan.

  At night, when Dominic came in for supper, I would look for Stefan, forgetting that he must stay in barracks. A second-year cadet has more privileges than in his first year, but if he were to be singled out now as the lover of Major Aranyi, sleeping in a bed instead of a cot, in a room with a fire instead of a drafty dormitory, he might as well give up hope of living until Midwinter, much less of receiving his commission.

  I had expected to continue some, at least, of the pleasant life we had led in Aranyi, but Dominic didn’t talk much, and I gave up trying after so many rebuffs. He was angry about the way thing had turned out, and had no desire to share it with me, no good news of making the decisive argument in assembly or of progress in training the new cadets.

  It was such an old story. We had studied it in school, how things were before equality. People had written novels about it, then treatises and tracts, then histories, but I had not expected to live it myself. A man and woman marry. She has no job, does not or cannot share her husband’s work and interests. She is dependent on him; he loses respect for her. They grow apart.

  Many nights Dominic didn’t come home until the small hours, or at all. He went to taverns after work with the other officers, took supper there and continued on to dance halls or brothels. “They all do it, married or not,” he said. “It’s the way of soldiers.” When he did come home I would be asleep, or nearly, in my own room, not stretched out invitingly in a silk negligee, or seductively naked under the fur spread in the Margrave’s bedroom, as he was accustomed to at Aranyi, when we were in constant light communion and knew each other’s moods. After a couple of nights like that he stopped looking for me, and he would bring home a boy from the dance hall. I didn’t share their communion. There was no communion. Just Dominic and an ungifted boy fucking in the dark in the room next door.

  ***

  Amalie! Dominic answers my cry, throwing down his sword without bothering to sheathe it or looking to see if Roger is about to attack. He runs to his horse, only remembering to pull up his breeches when he stumbles. But Roger has felt it too, and the men know what it is before I do. Both of them fathers, they have experienced contractions, are wondering why they didn’t recognize it earlier: not rape or rough sex, but my labor beginning on schedule, almost to the day.

  Roger laughs with relief. “By Isis and Astarte! I’ve never been so grateful for a labor pain.”

  Dominic doesn’t turn around, won’t acknowledge the attempt at apology. He’s mounted his horse, spurring the surprised animal out the door, through the snowdrifts to the castle’s rear courtyard and the kitchen entrance.

  Roger follows slowly. He’s cold now, his energy drained after the sex, and he’s strangely depressed. When Dominic had wanted him all those years he was secretly proud to have inspired desire in this man who always seemed to take what he wanted. He knew Margrave Aranyi would have to ask him, Lord Roger Zichmni, no matter how he teased him in barracks or how he battered him in weapons training. Now that it’s done, ended so abruptly, with mistaken accusations and no words of love exchanged, it’s like a divorce or a broken engagement. He thinks miserably of Tariq, of his companion’s unwavering devotion all through Roger’s affairs with women, his begetting of natural-born children, his turning away from being exclusively vir.

  Amalie, Dominic intensifies the communion between us. My love, my lady wife. Be strong. I am with you.

  I know it, Dominic. It is the beginning of mending, more than the return to our home. I have called to him and he has answered me, is on his way to my side. I am his wife, his second self; he is my husband, my completion. We will not be separated again, I am sure of it.

  “‘Gravina Aranyi.” Tariq Sureddin is at the door to my room. “My lady, are you in trouble?”

  He’s a cool one, Tariq, Aranyi on his mother’s side, one of Dominic’s many half-sisters. He hasn’t trusted me from the start, when I invited
him and Roger to stay. He knew what I was up to, knew his lover’s mind, that Roger was intrigued, tempted. Knew that no good would come of it.

  But I like him. Tariq is Christian, with their virtues of honesty and faithfulness. He loves Roger in the way I love Dominic. They can’t be parted, no matter what happens. It’s what has given me license to orchestrate this encounter between Dominic and Roger, knowing it won’t seriously endanger the pledged love of the young men, while nevertheless causing me twinges of guilt. I’ve rationalized it to death. Dominic will take the active role with Roger that Roger usually plays with Tariq. It won’t really be adultery because it’s not something that Roger would do with his own companion.

  And Stefan Ormonde, Tariq is thinking to me now. How can you justify it to him? Or is it enough that Margrave Aranyi waited until his companion is away? To my face, out loud, Tariq is all politeness. “If there is anything I can do to help you, in the absence of your lord—”

  “No, thank you. Margrave Aranyi is coming– I mean, he’s on his way,” I say, flustered by the unintended pun. “But if you could find Magali—”

  Tariq bows to me and heads downstairs slowly, as if to ensure that he’ll meet up with Dominic and Roger in the entrance.

  I move from the chair to the bed, think about lying down. That seems worse. Another contraction begins, builds to a climax of pain. How could I have confused it with sex? Communion does weird things sometimes, and our communion has become distorted with our estrangement. I clutch my middle, small hands on an expanse of wool-and-linen-covered flesh. Even allowing for my tiny frame, the child must be enormous.

  It hits me, what we never talked about: that I’m about to give birth for the first time, to a child with peculiar genetic strains on her father’s side, miles from Terran medicine and hospitals, in the most inaccessible place on Eclipsis.