“What for? I told you, Population Control raises babies, donators don’t.”
“No,” he said flatly. “It will not be done this way. It will be done as it is meant to be done. You will carry my child inside you. You will bear it. You will be its mother.”
“Are you nuts? I’m supposed to be the first Kystrani in centuries to bear a child? I’m not dumb, you know. The reason we stopped doing it that way was not just because it’s dangerous, it also hurts like hell.”
“So you took away a little pain, but you also took away a child’s right to know its parents’ love.”
What she had always felt the lack of, love, any kind of love. Tedra sat down, feeling suddenly confused. “I—I need to think about this, Challen.”
“This you may do, certainly, but the matter is decided.” He drew her gently back into his arms to hold her before he told her, “You already carry my child,chemar.”
Chapter Forty-two
Challen was exploring the ship. That ought to keep him busy for hours, or so Tedra hoped, and keep Martha busy, too. They’d Transferred up together. He’d have it no other way. Sometimes she got the feeling the barbarian didn’t trust her. Maybe he had good reason.
Tedra locked herself in Medical and stared at the meditech unit, which would give her the answers she needed—no, not answers, just one. She’d already figured outhowshe might have got pregnant, but not the technicalities of it. Like so many other things she was learning she’d always taken for granted, birth control was just one more. On an automated world, however, such things weren’t left to chance. Birth control was administered toeveryonewhether they wanted it or not. It was in the food, in everything Kystrani consumed. But Tedra hadn’t been eating Kystrani food lately, not since she’d met up with the barbarian. And if she was supposed to have been taking some other sort of precaution while she was off ship, that must have been a subject her World Discovery class hadn’t got to before she changed careers.
She could be pregnant. Challen was certain that she was. And he based his belief on the fact that he’d stopped taking birth control, too. Talk about your double whammy. But she’d found out a lot of new things in the past few days since he’d dropped that bomb on her. Barbarians’ birth control was in theirdhayawine, something only warriors drank, so only warriors controlled it. But there was a reason behind that, since once a warrior chose the mother for his children, they were hooked up for life, andthatwas the meaning behind those words that had sounded so formal to her when he told her his life was hers. They were formal. Challen had married her barbarian-style, and she hadn’t even known it!
She could be pregnant. She likely was. The meditech would tell her for sure. But she was afraid to get in, afraid to know, because then shewouldhave a decision to make, one the barbarian didn’t know she could make, one she didn’t want to make. Stars, there was no decision to it. She couldn’t go through something as barbaric as giving birth. It was terrifying even contemplating it. Women died. But that was then, centuries ago, a common-sense voice reminded her. Would it be so dangerous now, with the modern advances in the past two hundred years, with a meditech on hand? But there was still the pain. Why should she go through that when Challen didn’t even love her—yet? But she loved him. And he wanted her to have his baby.Hisbaby.
She got into the unit before she lost her nerve, pressing Gen. Ex. before closing herself in. It didn’t even take a half minute before the lid was opening again, her health stats coming across the screen at its base. But she couldn’t look yet. She’d have a printout delivered to her quarters later, when she wasn’t so paranoid about it.
“You might as well look now, kiddo.” Martha’s voice came in over the intercom, making Tedra grab for her heart. “It’s not a word we see every day. I’m surprised I even have it in my data banks, it’s so obsolete.”
“Am I supposed to be a mind reader to know what you’re going around the block about?”
“No, I’m the mind reader around here. You’re the Sec 1 who got herself pregnant. So are you going to have the seedling transferred to a proper container?”
Tedra crossed the room to glare at the viewer on the intercom. “Actually, it’s in its proper container. Tubing is an artificial means we’ve come to accept as the norm, but I’ve been reminded itisartificial.”
“And none of that answered my question. Kystrani don’t bear babies.”
“Sha-Ka’ani do,” Tedra retorted
“Ah, that’s right, and you’re going to be a Sha-Ka’ani, aren’t you? In fact, you already are, if I can believe everything that barbarian of yours has been telling me. By the way, he just mutilated one of our adjustichairs. He sat down in it, felt it adjusting to his great girth, and thought it was very much alive. He’d hacked it to pieces before I could tell him it was only doing its job.”
“Oh, stop.” Tedra began giggling. “He didn’t do any such thing.”
“He did. Of course, he was properly apologetic afterward, but that didn’t save the poor chair. You should have seen his face, kiddo, when that thing started moving under his backside. I’ve never seen anyone move so fast as he did coming out of that chair.”
Tedra had to hold her sides, she was laughing so hard. “We’re going to have a problem, then, when I take him to bed tonight. It’s going to do alotof adjusting to accommodate his size.”
“And will you be doing some accommodating for his son?” Martha asked.
Tedra sobered, staring at the viewer in wonder. She hadn’t realized she could learnwhatit was.
“The unit listed its sex? It’s a boy?”
“Makes it harder, doesn’t it?”
“No.” Tedra grinned. “I’d already decided to keep it. It’ll just be nice knowing something the big guy doesn’t know for a change, if I can keep a secret that long. Stars, how longdoesit take, anyway, to have a baby?”
Martha got a chance to use her exasperated voice. “Honestly, you’d think I’m supposed to know everything.”
Chapter Forty-three
Tedra was still grinning later when she entered her quarters. She’d located Challen, teased him about killing the furniture, then left him looking disgruntled, yet bewildered that she should know about that when she hadn’t been there. She supposed she ought to warn him that Martha was a busybody who had eyes and ears in every room.
