Seven Stones to Stand or Fall (Outlander)(50)

Touch him, said a soft voice inside her head. Comfort him.

All right, she said, taking a deep breath. She had no idea how to comfort anyone, but she bathed him, as gently as she could, and coaxed him to take a few spoonsful of porridge. Then she settled him in his bed, straightening his nightshirt and the thin blanket over him.

“Thank you, Sister,” he said, and, taking her hand, kissed it. “Thank you for your sweet touch.”

She went back to the postulants’ dormitory that evening feeling thoughtful, but with a strange sense of being on the verge of discovering something important.



That night

RAKOCZY LAY WITH his head on Madeleine’s bosom, eyes closed, breathing the scent of her body, feeling the whole of her between his palms, a slowly pulsing entity of light. She was a gentle gold, traced with veins of incandescent blue, her heart deep as lapis beneath his ear, a living stone. And, deep inside, her red womb, open, soft. Refuge and succor. Promise.

Mélisande had shown him the rudiments of sexual magic, and he’d read about it with great interest in some of the older alchemical texts. He’d never tried it with a whore, though—and, in fact, hadn’t been trying to do it this time. And yet it had happened. Was happening. He could see the miracle unfolding slowly before him, under his hands.

How odd, he thought dreamily, watching the tiny traces of green energy spread upward through her womb, slowly but inexorably. He’d thought it happened instantly, that a man’s seed found its root in the woman and there you were. But that wasn’t what was happening at all. There were two types of seed, he now saw. She had one; he felt it plainly, a brilliant speck of light, glowing like a fierce, tiny sun. His own—the tiny green animalcula—were being drawn toward it, bent on immolation.

“Happy, chéri?” she whispered, stroking his hair. “Did you have a good time?”

“Most happy, sweetheart.” He wished she wouldn’t talk, but an unexpected sense of tenderness toward her made him sit up and smile at her. She also began to sit up, reaching for the clean rag and douching syringe, and he put a hand on her shoulder, urging her to lie back down.

“Don’t douche this time, ma belle,” he said. “A favor to me.”

“But—” She was confused; usually he was insistent upon cleanliness. “Do you want me to get with child?” For he had stopped her using the wine-soaked sponge beforehand, too.

“Yes, of course,” he said, surprised. “Did Madame Fabienne not tell you?”

Her mouth dropped open.

“She did not. What—why, for God’s sake?” In agitation, she squirmed free of his restraining hand and swung her legs out of bed, reaching for her wrapper. “You aren’t—what do you mean to do with it?”

“Do with it?” he said, blinking. “What do you mean, do with it?”

She had the wrapper on, pulled crookedly round her shoulders, and had backed up against the wall, hands plastered against her stomach, regarding him with open fear.

“You’re a magicien; everyone knows that. You take newborn children and use their blood in your spells!”

“What?” he said, rather stupidly. He reached for his breeches but changed his mind. He got up and went to her instead, putting his hands on her shoulders.

“No,” he said, bending down to look her in the eye. “No, I do no such thing. Never.” He used all the force of sincerity he could summon, pushing it into her, and felt her waver a little, still fearful but less certain. He smiled at her.

“Who told you I was a magicien, for heaven’s sake? I am a philosophe, chérie—an inquirer into the mysteries of nature, no more. And I can swear to you, by my hope of heaven”—this being more or less nonexistent, but why quibble?—“that I have never, not once, used anything more than the water of a man-child in any of my investigations.”

“What, little boys’ piss?” she said, diverted. He let his hands relax but kept them on her shoulders.

“Certainly. It’s the purest water one can find. Collecting it is something of a chore, mind you”—she smiled at that; good—“but the process does not the slightest harm to the infant, who will eject the water whether anyone has a use for it or not.”

“Oh.” She was beginning to relax a little, but her hands were still pressed protectively over her belly, as though she felt the imminent child already. Not yet, he thought, pulling her against him and feeling his way gently into her body. But soon! He wondered if he should remain with her until it happened; the idea of feeling it as it happened inside her—to be an intimate witness to the creation of life itself! But there was no telling how long it might take. From the progress of his animalcula, it could be a day, even two.

Magic, indeed.

Why do men never think of that? he wondered. Most men—himself included—regarded the engendering of babies as necessity, in the case of inheritance, or nuisance, but this…But then, most men would never know what he now knew or see what he had seen.

Madeleine had begun to relax against him, her hands at last leaving her belly. He kissed her, with a real feeling of affection.

“It will be beautiful,” he whispered to her. “And once you are well and truly with child, I will buy your contract from Fabienne and take you away. I will buy you a house.”