When he drew back from her, he wondered in a husky voice, “Why does the forbidden always add that edge of sweetness?”
“It’s true. But I don’t know why.” She leaned her head on his chest and asked mischievously, “Does it mean that now that you have a right to me, I am less sweet?”
He laughed. “No.”
For a time they were silent together and content. The boat rocked as the rowers battled the current. Malta gazed out the small window. Behind them, the river stretched gleaming, its gray turned to silver in the lingering sunlight. Tillamon leaned on the railing, lost in thought. The wind stirred her hair. From behind she could have been any young woman, lost in her dreams. But what did she dream of? What did the future offer her? What would it offer Malta’s child, if she or he were similarly changed?
“You sigh. Again. Are you uncomfortable?” Reyn set a gentle hand on her belly. She put both her hands over his. This was the time, much as she dreaded it.
“We have some hard questions to discuss, my love. Things I did not and do not want to talk about. But we must.” She took a deep breath and then quickly, like tearing a bandage from a wound, told him of the midwife’s demands that they make decisions.
He recoiled from her, his face full of horror. Anger swiftly replaced the horror. “How can she speak of such things to you? How dare she?”
“Reyn!” The anger in his eyes was both reassuring and frightening. “She has to ask these questions. With my other pregnancies, well, they did not last long, did they? I think she knew they would come to nothing. But now we have felt the child move, and with each passing day we are closer to a birth. And these are the decisions that all parents in the Rain Wilds or Bingtown must face. Harsh as they seem, they are decisions that have been faced by generations of Rain Wild folk. So.” Malta took a steady breath. “What should I tell her?”
Reyn was breathing as hard as if he faced a fight. “Tell her? Tell her that I care nothing for custom or decorum! Tell her that I will be by your bedside for every moment, and that the instant our child is born, he will be safe in my arms. Should Sa take his life from us, then I will mourn. But if anyone else threatens him, in any way, I will kill them. That is what you can tell her. No. That is what I will tell the meddling old hag!”
He stood up abruptly and paced a quick turn around the small cabin before coming to a standstill, staring bleakly out the window at the passing trees. “Did you doubt that I would protect our child?” he asked her quietly. There was hurt in his eyes when he turned to her. “Or is this . . .” He hesitated. “Is this not what you want? If our child is born changed, do you wish to, to set him aside? To . . .” His words tapered away to silence.
Malta was shocked. The silence grew longer, and the hurt on Reyn’s face grew deeper. “I did not think I had a choice,” she said at last. Tears filled her eyes but did not spill. “It is done, even in Bingtown. Seldom does anyone speak of it. When I was little, I would see a pregnant woman, and then she would be apart from us for a time, and sometimes she came back with a child and sometimes not. I don’t even remember when I first understood that some babies were not kept. It was just something all girls knew, growing up. When women do talk about it, most say it is for the best, that it happens quickly, before the mother can come to know the child and love it. But—” She set both hands to her belly and felt the child turn restlessly inside her, as if he knew they were deciding his fate. “But I already know this child. I already love him. Or her. I do not think I will care if he has a scaled brow when he is born, or if his nails are black. Or hers.” She tried for a smile and failed as the tears suddenly spilled down her face. “Reyn, I have been so frightened. One night, I dreamed that when the pains came, I ran off into the forest alone to have our baby, to keep her safe. And when I woke, I wondered if I might not do just that. And I had to wonder what you would think of me if I did, if I brought back a changed child and refused to give it up. Or what your mother would think.”
She sniffed, and Reyn was at her side. She found a handkerchief and wiped at her wet eyes. “I saw some of the dragon keepers. They were just children. And almost every one of them was marked so heavily that I knew they must have been born changed. Their parents kept them. They grew, they lived. Perhaps they could not marry or have children of their own, but I looked at them and thought, ‘Their lives are not useless. Their parents were right to keep them, no matter what their neighbors may have said.’ But now I look at how unhappy Tillamon is. I see how she is stared at, and I know that sometimes ignorant people say things aloud to her. She stays at home almost always now, not even venturing down to the markets. She seldom visits her friends. She was not born changed. And she has never done anything to deserve a punishment. But punished she is.”
