Harek's hand tightens once around mine.
Chapter nineteen
Jen
"Activation," Thaw repeats. Slow. "Of what?"
Harek's mouth works for the word.
"Not — miscarriage. Not — period. Not — wound." He doesn't touch the blood. His hand hovers an inch above the sheet, the long fingers careful, the brand on his throat catching the morning light. "Body — changing. Blood — first. Like — sweat, when a fever breaks. Body pushing — what was in — out."
"Pushing what out."
"The old."
"You are saying the blood is —"
"The body shedding the old. To make room."
Thaw looks at the sheet, then at me, then back. He has gone the color of a man who is putting two things together that he does not want to put together — the chart in the folder, theprojected: full viability, stable,and the blood on the sheet that is dark and hot and oxidizing cotton.
"Is she —"
Harek shakes his head. "Not — that. Not what they wanted."
"Then what."
"What she is. Coming up."
I am standing by a bed full of my own blood and three men are talking about me like I am a process, and the part of my brain that should be in shock is not in shock. It is curious. Every cell in my body is in agreement with what Harek just said. The patch under my skin is humming so loud I can almost hear it. The bonds are full. The hollow where Fen will go is full. The heat in my pelvis is not pregnancy, was never pregnancy, was always this — the body becoming whatever it has been building toward since the rash appeared.
I look at my hands.
The nails are darker than they were yesterday. The black has moved down almost to the cuticle. The point at the corner of my index finger is sharper.
I lift the sheet a fraction. There is more blood than I thought. Not period-volume — more — and the smell coming off it is wrong: hot iron, cracked stone, and something underneath that registers as mine in a way nothing from my own body ever has.
"Harek."
"Yes."
"How long does this take?"
"Don't know."
"Hours? Days?"
"Don't know."
"What do I do."
He looks at me.
"Let it," he says. "Body knows. Don't fight."
Dean is back. I don’t know when he left. He is holding a glass of water and more towels. The black handheld radio at his belt is new.
"Jen."
