The Kwisling [The Isbjørn book 2]

Eleven

After the announcement Luce's eyes were as immobile as the rest of his face, as if news was impossible to absorb. He was frozen for maybe three whole seconds before the corners of his mouth resumed their usual softness and his eyes quit staring. For perhaps a split second, his grief in all the world around him was suspended, the surprise protecting him until it shattered like glass. One could call it shock, but it was closer to plain astonishment -an inability to compute.

Sri was pregnant. She was carrying John's baby. Her hands were folded over her stomach and Luce wondered if she had been sitting this way the entire time. Under those hands, beneath her thick jacket, beyond the thick wool layers of her shirts, inside of her was the smallest collection of cells from a single night's error that should not have been.

Luce found himself staring at Sri's stomach, unable to pull his eyes away. "When?"

"In Landers Weir, mid June."

Mid June. Sri was just over two months pregnant. Even if Luce had the guts to ask to feel the bump, there would not be much to feel. At about 10 weeks the morning sickness had caused her to lose weight more than anything.

Luce drew his hands together, clenching one hand into a fist and squeezing the hand with his other. John was going to be a father... if he survived.

"You're the first person I've told," Sri stated after a long, hard endured silence.

He drew his eyes up to meet hers. Of course he was the first person she could have told. Until the other day, Sri had been the only person in Iaran'talamh- but of course that was not what she meant.

"Daire?"

"He doesn't even know that we slept together."

What had he gotten himself into? Luce leaned back in his seat, the weight of the situation slowly crushing him.

Sri was holding her stomach still, protecting the child growing inside as if they were in any danger. "John and I never- we're friends..." The words floating out of her were clearly long thought out, an issue she had been playing through on her own since she first had a reason to suspect. "I love Daire and I would never do anything to hurt him. But being with Daire means I ca. never have my own children." It almost felt too perfect. She wondered if it was just her pregnant brain doing all it could to rationalize bringing a baby into such a harsh world. "It almost seems too perfect."

When the word arrived so did a flash of annoyance. What the hell could be perfect? John was likely dying in the next room while his bastard child swam in the womb of a maltecessor lover. Around them was a society in arms against the most aggressive force on earth. Around them was desolate winter and endless ice without a single HUMAN midwife for miles.

"Perfect?" He questioned the very meaning of the word, sure it had rotted away from its roots and sprouted into an unnatural utterance unrecognizable from it's former definition.

Her presence buzzed around him like a fly that I could not swat, that he dare not strike. She had no idea what she was getting into and yet she had the gaul to say the situation was ideal.

In that moment Luce funneled all his strength into his feet and used it to walk out of the door with his mouth shut and hands relaxed. If he spoke any more it would be in anger. Halfway down the hall, nearer to the exit where the air felt cooler. When he is steady, when is able to think clearly again, he would talk. Until then, it was just the gaping hall, the ground beneath his feet and the scent of frigid winter. The doors were his only escape. He needed space, he needed to move.

Luce turned around to face Sri again, finding she had risen too and had stopped just as he had just a few feet behind him.

"I need to clear my head."