“I don’t know,” Tristen said.
“The bird could make himself of some use,” Emuin said peevishly. But of Owl, for the last hour and more, there was no sign.
Now they watched by candlelight, a cluster of men banished from the vicinity of the bedchamber as too noisy and too much disturbance to Lady Tarien’s pain, but neither Tristen nor Emuin wished to leave Cook and Gran Sedlyn to watch alone, considering the lady’s abilities and ties to her sister. Tarien seemed intent on the child’s good health, seemed not to share her sister’s insistence on a birth tonight, but had seemed rather to be struggling to keep the babe’s own time… until she slept, which they all took for a hopeful sign.
But even the iron latch and the iron door below were not utterly trustworthy barriers against her sister, particularly as ordinary men watched it. There were wishes and wards and barriers… but that link had had years to work, and it was strong. Orien’s will stretched toward her sister, and urged the babe to restlessness.
Yet the hours slipped away, measured by arcane instruments and the patience of Orien’s warders. At the very mid of the night Emuin reasoned she would cease to trouble Tarien, for that marked the start of another day, as some reckoned.
But they were not out of the darkness, nor out of Orien’s hopes. The efforts kept up, as the arm rose and Paisi turned the glass for midnight.
More moments passed.
“Before dawn would seem to be close enough,” Emuin said glumly, “she hasn’t given up.”
“Perhaps she doesn’t know it’s midnight.”
“One congratulates a man on his birth. We are now, by the stars, at yours.”
He had wondered would his life continue past the anniversary of his Summoning. And indeed it had, now, and he sat, substantial, beside another fireside, knowing so much more, and in circumstances he could never have imagined a year ago.
Orien continued her assault.
“Bid the lady in the guardroom know it’s midnight,” Emuin said sharply, and Paisi sped down to the soldiers.
Paisi was gone a time. There was no point at which the efforts ceased—but there was one at which they grew more fierce, furiously, wildly angry.
“Unreasonable woman,” Emuin said. “Disagreeable, unreasonable woman.”
Paisi returned at a run, out of breath, wide-eyed with fright and concerned with what seemed at his very heels. But he had been safe, as the guards were safe, below: Tristen had not been unaware the while of anything that went on in the fortress, and he directed Paisi to a warm spot by the fire until the boy could warm the chill from his bones.
So they sat, their small group of men: Uwen, who knew something of births, and master Emuin, who knew little, and the guards, who had heard much and knew only slightly more, Tristen thought, than he did. Paisi, the youngest, seemed to know most of all of them.
Once more the cup spilled and the glass turned. Twice.
But the third time the sand began to run, something happened in the gray place, and it was no longer stable as it had been. Tarien woke, and the babe woke with her, and a moment later a muted scream came from inside the bedroom.
They all glanced that way, as alarm filled the unseen space, then vanished in Orien’s sudden leap of satisfaction, her assault on the wards. But the assault failed and she fell back again.
“Two hours till dawn,” Emuin said with a heavy breath. “Two hours.”
Another hour approached. Paisi hurried back to the bedroom, not the first such errand, and was gone a space, and came back tight-lipped.
“Gran says as the babby’s comin’ now an’ ‘e ain’t waitin’.”
Tristen drew in a breath and paid attention such as he could spare. The gray place had become slate gray cloud, shot through with red like fire—Orien’s doing, her wishing grown greater with her fear of failure and loss.
Emuin reversed the glass the third time.
And now the gray space began to show a more and less of pain, as it had been at the beginning. When the pain was more, conversation would become difficult and distracted. Tristen left the table and wandered the border by the windows, with an occasional glance to Emuin’s glass and the water clock.
A cry rent the peace, and he could bear no more of it: he left their vigil for that in the bedchamber, where Tarien lay propped on pillows—not the beautiful creature now, but an unhappy and desperate one, caught between their will and her sister’s, back and forth, back and forth, until now she looked at him in the gray space, with eyes dark as the cloud that boiled about them. She began to drift away—pulled, not her own doing—and reached out her hand as if she were sinking, drowning and taking another presence with her.
He seized the outstretched hand, and held it, and wished the pain away, and the life within her safe, while the winds howled and the life in her ebbed. She had strayed right to the Edge, and that darkness half-swallowed her, at times less, at times more. He held on.
—Come this way, he begged her. Come with me.
—My sister, she said repeatedly, my sister.
For another voice called her, and another self was there, within the darkness… at least one more was there, and perhaps others. It seemed to Tristen he heard Heryn’s voice, full of anger and demands, and he felt Tarien cower. Her hold on his hand slipped and slipped again.
And then the Wind came, sweeping the others away, and whispered, most gently, mostly kindly:
—Let me be born. Woman, let me be.
And the cramping pains struck, fierce and strong, carried on Orien’s wish, driven by the Wind.
—Here, my lord, he is yours… Or ten’s voice rang strong and clear. Orien’s will drove Tarien’s body, and Orien’s presence, stronger than ever she had been in the gray place, swallowed Tarien’s will like the Edge itself.
“No!” Tarien cried out as she slipped, and in the World, her nails bit deeply into Tristen’s hand. He knelt by her bed and wished the pain away, seeking her presence in the gray world, feeling her sever that connection to Orien strand by strand as it pulled her toward the edge.
Rejecting her sister, preserving the life within her… she slipped and he felt her nails pierce his hand.
“It’s coming!” the midwife said. “It’s comin’, ain’t no question now, m’lady. It must come.”
Emuin leaned into the doorway. “A handful of sand, a handful of sand, woman—wait that long! It’s too early!”
—My lord, here’s your vessel!
Tarien screamed, vehement as Orien at her worst, beside herself with pain and lashing out at her sister. —You’ll not have him!
Orien vanished. Still the child came.
“Wizardry, woman!” Emuin shouted, and wished with a force that might stop a river in its course. “You wanted wizardry! Use it now! Orien wants your son. Your sister wants him for a vessel for her master! Is that your wish? Is it? Save his life, woman, bold back!”
“It’s comin’, it’s coming,” Gran Sedlyn said.
“I can’t!” Tarien screamed, and the baby’s drive for the world of Men would not be denied again.
The Edge was all the gray space now, and Tristen held fast, unwilling to relinquish his grip. On Tarien his hold was firm… but the presence within her flowed out, whirled away into the dark, and flew out of reach.
“Stillbirth,” the midwife said.
“Damn!” he heard Emuin say.
And again in the gray space, and with telling force: Damn!