ELENA – THE GREEN REACH FORTRESS, 12 WEEKS LATER
It's been twelve weeks.Rythar is pleased with the swell of my belly, which means he keeps a hand on it whenever I let him. There's more traffic when I walk the fortress now, warriors finding reasons to be in whatever corridor I'm in, curious about a thing none of them has seen. Drenz has opinions about how often a pregnant female ought to rest. It's all very sweet, in its way.
Rythar and I are watching from the main terrace of the fortress as the Concord Council delivers a pregnancy monitoring pod. Sounds ominous, but Xythean medicine is usually luxurious by my standards. I’m just not sure how they’ll handle pregnancy. I keep thinking about Dr. Patel.
She'd know what to do with a human pregnancy better than anyone on Xytheos, right?
“I'd trade a lot to have Dr. Patel’s hands on me instead of a Xythean machine I've never seen,” I whisper nervously to Rythar.
He doesn't take it as the insult I half expect. He just knows I’m worried. "You think we can't care for you," he says.
"I think no one here has ever done this before. I’m the one with the most training in it, and I’m the one carrying the baby. That's a reason to worry," I point out.
"You are the first." Drenz says it from the doorway, where he's been pretending not to hover, in the careful way he says most things to me. "But you are not a mystery to the Stone. It remade your body to carry this. It would not rebuild you for this and leave no way to tend you." His confidence in the Stone is unshaken. Mine is not. I try to keep that to myself, but Rythar sees what’s in my look.
"The Stone knows," Rythar says, watching the courtyard. "Its records go far back in time. Back when there were more humans."
“I guess we’ll find out,” I say, eyeing the enormous pod they’re setting up next to the fortress.
The pod is plain white on the outside. I wonder if it will be anything like the “bridal spa” pod I went through before the Claiming Ceremony. That day feels like a long time ago.
The warriors finish and step back. Rythar holds out his hand.
I take it and let him walk me down off the terrace, across the courtyard, to the white pod’s door. Last time I stepped into a Xythean pod, it measured me for a mate.
Look at how that worked out.
Rythar ducks through ahead of me, too big for the doorway, and turns to make sure I clear it. He doesn't let go of my hand until I'm all the way inside and the door closes behind us.
The door seals, and the biome goes away. Most of the jungle scent is gone from the air, but the citrus stays. The quiet is total. The air sits at the perfect temperature. It’s a peaceful place.
“Sit here,” Rythar says, motioning to a padded bench.
I do, and he kneels and takes off my jungle slippers. He smiles at me, showing more white teeth than he usually does. “I think you will like this.”
He stands and looks around as he kicks off his own shoes.
My feet sink into the soft floor. It’s strange to see Rythar in this minimalist luxury style, bare feet on carpet rather than stone.
There's a low, wide berth in the center. I sit on the edge and it shifts under me. My left hip has been aching off and on lately. The berth finds it, rises against the joint, and the ache just stops. Then my lower back, and every ache I’ve ever had falls away.
“You like it?” Rythar asks. He sits on a large, plush chair, easing back. It’s the only thing in here that’s sized for a Xythean male. Everything else is sized for me.
“It’s nice. Especially since you made the healing pool so cold,” I say. “That was so mean.”
“Hot water is not recommended for pregnant women,” he says. “I will keep telling you every time you complain about this.”
I sigh. He’s probably right. It wasn’t an issue on New Terra. Pregnancy was entirely managed in a medical ward. There were no baths. And we never expected to have bathtubs on whatever world we landed on.
A panel glows at my side. I reach for it and warmth heats my spine. Something works the knots below my shoulder blades loose, one at a time. The light dims to late afternoon gold. My favorite type of light.
I pick my head up and look at Rythar. "This is too much."
Rythar smiles. "It's correct."
He waits while the pod works through me. By the time it finishes I'm boneless.
Then the light above me shifts. I start to get up?—
