Page 141 of When the Sky Breaks

He hadn’t left my side for a minute—just brought water for me and a cushion for Sorcha’s head, a warmer blanket for the baby, then sat on one of our dining room benches and talked, low and quiet and calm, until the midwife arrived.

I would have thanked Da for speaking up if I could have found the words. But I couldn’t form a coherent thought, much less speak a full sentence aloud. I’d spent the last three hours there on the floor, legs stretched out, body angry from holding Sorcha through her labor. I had our baby cradled in one arm and the other hand on Sorcha’s forehead. I hadn’t managed a single word since she fainted, but internally? I was begging them both to survive. The baby was tiny, and while she was mewling, couldn’t seem to get enough air for a proper cry. She was so cold too, shivering from the moment she’d been born, with her pulse—visible through thin skin at her throat—fluttery and uneven.

“Babe that young won’t survive no matter what I do,” the old woman said, “so I’ll take my payment and go help cases that aren’t on their way to the grave.”

“We have to go,” Da said the moment the midwife left us, getting up and taking my shoulders.

“I’m not going to leave her, Da,” I insisted, unmoving.

“Neal. That babe is going to die. And if I know your wife? And I’ve known her longer than you have. The one thing she will not forgive is if you don’t get your daughter baptized. So choose a name. Come with me. Let Ansel clean Sorcha up and get her in bed while we’re gone. Alright, son?”

I glanced down at Sorcha, unconscious and bloody on the wood-plank floor. Then I bent and kissed her forehead.

“You hold on for me,” I said softly. “Don’t leave me like this, love. Not after everything.”

And then I steadied our daughter in my arms, let Da help me up, and followed him out into the mist of dawn.

The priest wasn’t even awake when we arrived at the church on the far coast of the island. The sun had just barely crept over the horizon as we walked. But Da banged on the door until someone answered, yelling about an emergency.

The priest stumbled down still in his bedclothes. He looked us over, eyes resting on the tiny bundle clutched up against my chest, and then immediately invited us in.

“What are you going to call her?” Da asked softly as the priest led us through the darkened church to the baptismal font.

“Lucy,” I replied. “Sorcha would want her named for a saint. Especially considering . . .”

I trailed off, tears catching in my throat.

This couldn’t be happening. I’d fought so hard for them. We’d done everything right. Gotten her somewhere safe and cold. Worked around Iksura’s maniacal refusal of Inner Court healers. Everything.

But the baby in my arms was dying.

And my wife might well be too.

“Lucy it is then,” Da said, winding an arm around my shoulders and pulling me close.

I didn’t cry. Not yet. Not here.

“Lucy Rose,” I added. “For Ma.”

“That’s my boy.” Da’s voice broke. “She’d be so proud of you doing this for your girls.”

I nodded, not trusting words, and looked down at Lucy, still stirring in my arms. Her eyes didn’t want to open. She still hadn’t cried. I knew we were on borrowed time already.

“We came ten thousand miles so you could be born somewhere safe. We loved you so much, for more than a year, before we even got to meet you,” I murmured. “Please don’t leave us.”

Halfway home, on the path along the seashore, I felt Lucy stop breathing. I told myself I’d be stoic, brave, get home to Sorcha in case she’d woken. But I couldn’t.

The moment I felt the tiny body go still in my arms my gait faltered, knees went stiff, and I found myself sitting on the damp turf looking back and forth between the sun cresting over the rooftops of town and the too-quiet bundle in my arms.

Da stopped and sat down beside me.

“You need me to carry her home for you?” he offered.

I just shook my head.

I didn’t want to put her down. I wasn’t ready to give her up yet.

“She wasn’t even supposed to be born yet, Da,” I said. “How is it that she already died?”