“I want to thank you, Eve,” Minerva continued. “Since my man and my son were taken from me, I have given to others. All my life, I gave, so that I wouldna feel the empty place in my own heart, so that I wouldna collapse in on myself. I promised Ronan that I would live our love, and I am satisfied that I have done so.
“I am home,” Minerva said in a wondrous whisper. “My son knows me. And he is loved. Soon, I will be free.” She looked about the snowflakes again. “Love him, Eve. Love them all. You and I, we traveled here together, each of us seemingly alone in the world. Nae so, though.” She thumped her breast gently.“For each hurt you feel, I give you threefold love to heal. For each loss, a new treasure, for each tear, two smiles.”
She paused. “Love them all,” she repeated quietly, “in my stead. I gave them to you the night I left this earth—do you remember? The blood on your lip?” Minerva nodded. “It will pain you for a great while, but…love them. Each one is a gift.”
Then Minerva suddenly turned her head and seemed to look right past where Evelyn imagined herself to be. The old witch’s eyes were full of soft, ripe love and she smiled.
“Ah, there’s my lad. Farewell, Eve.Fare. Well.”
Evelyn came into her body in the midst of a blood-boiling scream. Her body was wild with pain, afire with it, and Conall’s face was clear in her mind. She heard herself scream his name.
She wanted him, needed him. Oh, God how she needed him. She was so frightened and hurt so badly, to the ends of her soul it seemed…
The pain wanted to recede but was then thrown back upon her in a crushing blow so that another throat-ripping scream burst from her.
Then a cool, thin palm stroked her forehead and for an instant, Evelyn thought Minerva’s pointed face hovered over hers. But ’twas the son, not the mother.
“Hallow, missus,” Duncan said gently. “I’m here to aid you. Now, heed me. Heed me—Eve, can you hear me?”
Evelyn managed to nod before twisting her head away for another scream. She wanted to die.
“You there, woman.” Duncan’s voice faded as he spoke over his shoulder. “Get up behind her, under her. Bend her up.”
White-hot terror sizzled through Evelyn’s brain. “Nay!” she shrieked. “Do not move me!”
But she could already feel her shoulders lifting, heaving her over a cliff of unimaginable pain as Duncan appeared before her half-blind eyes once again.
“We must, missus—quickly.” He knelt between Evelyn’s legs, placed a hand upon her belly. “Come on, now, Eve, let us both bring forth your bairn. Help me!”
“Nay!” She squealed as the most violent spasm overtook her, yanking her breath from her. She wanted to arch her back, straighten her legs, but the woman behind her and Duncan at her heels pressed her together like a limber, green spring limb.
“For the love of God, Eve, bear down! Now!”
Evelyn pushed. And for one blinding, paralyzing instant, the universe paused as her body yielded. She felt tremendous pressure and then a void; a gush of her lifeblood leaving her in a rush, then shouting voices crashed through the concentrated silence.
The woman beneath her shoulders skittered backward to lay Eve down and Duncan was hoisting a small, limp, hairless mass of wet, red flesh by its ankles onto her sunken belly.
“Stop the blood, stop the blood,” he commanded as he scrambled to Evelyn’s side. He grabbed each of her limp arms in turn and brought them around the still-warm body of the baby lying on its side. “Hold him, missus. Hold yer son.”
Oh, ’twas a boy. And he was not moving, his eyes closed, no rising of the little ribs bumping beneath thin, raw skin. Between her legs two women worked with huge wads of linen, water and herbs, but their ministrations were unfelt.
“Duncan?” Evelyn cried.“Duncan!”
“Hold on to him,” Duncan repeated. Then he pushed a finger into the tiny, slack mouth and bent low to blow a harsh breath onto the baby’s face, once, twice, three times. He jiggled the slender back, patted him firmly. “Come on, laddie!” he shouted.
Evelyn gave a wordless scream of fear as the reddened skin began to fade to lavender.
Then the little chest hitched, an impossibly small arm jerked, and a watery-sounding mew bubbled at plump, bluish lips.
Evelyn had no logical reason for her actions, but at the feeble cry, she pulled the baby from Duncan’s reach, high on her chest to beneath her chin, and shook him.
“Baby!” she sobbed. “Hear your mama! Breathe for Mama!”
The mew came again, then a rattling, gasping cough, and finally a weak, high-pitched wail, reedy and knotted.
Duncan’s laughter burst from him triumphantly and he scrambled higher to Evelyn’s side, kissed her forehead and that of the crying babe.
“You did it, missus!” he rejoiced and wrapped his arms about them both. “You did it!”
