The Stars Are Legion(75)

“THERE ARE TWO THINGS THAT MATTER TO THE LEGION: TOO MANY PEOPLE. AND NOT ENOUGH.”

—LORD MOKSHI, ANNALS OF THE LEGION





28


JAYD


The cycles pass, one bleeding into another, as my belly grows and the thing inside of me comes to life. It’s such a strange feeling, to know that there is a potential bit of life growing inside of you, to both fear for it and hope for it all at once. Life here in the Legion seems especially precious. This thing, this life, most of all. If it dies before I bear it . . . then Rasida will surely recycle me. And then what will become of us all? When I took this womb from Zan, she admitted she had never borne anything in it to term. She did not need more life on the Mokshi. She could hardly save the lives she already had to care for.

And I certainly didn’t help her in that.

When I go into labor, finally, it is Sabita who takes my hands while the girls run off to find Rasida. I had wanted to get more done before now. I had wanted to find out where Rasida was hiding her own womb. But my body has betrayed me. I’ve been sick and exhausted, and now I am here, writhing in pain while I birth the very thing I was brokered to the Bhavajas for.

I have never given birth before, not in all these many rotations of treatments, but I have attended so many births, I think I know what I’m in for.

I’m wrong.

My whole body seizes up as if attached to a series of wiry strings. Every muscle contracts, my body cramps up, and I can do nothing but howl.

Sabita rubs my back and legs. I yell at her only once, because I soon lose the energy for it.

Rasida and her mother arrive. I am shocked to see Nashatra here because I thought her maimed or dead or recycled.

“I expected a first birth to take longer,” Nashatra says. She is clean and well kept, only slightly stooped. Her silver hair is knotted into a rope that circles her head. She puts her leathery hands on mine, and I am in so much shock and pain I don’t think to sign at her and ask what’s going on.

Behind her comes a two-headed woman with three legs and three arms, and as the four eyes roll at me, I suspect these are the Bhavaja witches.

“Not ours! Not ours!” the witches say, and Rasida hisses at them to be quiet and help me.

“The worlds are dying because we won’t share resources,” Rasida says. “The only reason we’re alive now is because we are willing to merge with others to become stronger.”

The witches push and prod at me while Sabita continues her shushing. I follow the heave of her breath until we are breathing together, snorting through the pain that comes in endless waves.

I don’t notice what the witches are doing. I am aware only of my own pain. It is while I huff and pant and squeeze here on the bed that I wonder again why Rasida has gone through all this with me. She could have given my womb to Sabita or the girls. Someone she had more control over.

But as Rasida looms over me, I am reminded that she wants me more than what I carry. She wants to have a Katazyrna under her heel. Maybe even a Katazyrna who loves her, because she has taken away everything else I could possibly love.

Lord of War be merciful, I despise her. I despise her and she is all I have.

“Here it is,” the witches say, and I squeeze Sabita’s hand and wail, and it’s as if my body splits in two. It’s as if I can see myself and the whole room; I’m floating far away, contained only by the world’s gravity.

Another heave, and the thing is out.

I come back to myself.

The witches hold my offspring aloft. I am still shuddering as they hand the gift of my womb over to Rasida. I hear a mewling cry.

Rasida takes the thing into her arms and cradles it. From here, the child appears to have the expected number of limbs, but I can’t be sure. Let it be perfect.

Rasida’s mother takes the child from Rasida and inspects it, as if it is some prized piece of the ship, and I suppose it is.

Finally, she nods and hands it back to Rasida. “It’s a perfect child,” her mother says. “Just what they promised.”

I am exhausted, still trembling. Sabita pulls a blanket up over me and rubs my cramping legs. I don’t have the strength to tell her to go away.

“Can I see it?” I say.

Rasida considers me a moment. She sits beside me. She does not hand me the child but holds it up near my face. It is very small, purplish and still covered in afterbirth. The child makes a little moue with its mouth, its tiny fists held tight, and I cannot help but feel a squeeze of love for this thing I carried all this time, this thing I made with Zan’s help.

Zan’s child. Not mine.

I caress the infant’s cheek. Oh Zan, I have failed you. I don’t have the arm. I don’t have the world. I only have this child, this child doomed to die here, trapped in a dying world.

Rasida rests next to me with the child in her arms and coos at it. She tickles its little lips with her fingers. “It will be hungry,” she says. “I have a nurse for her. You can rest.”

“Yes,” I say. “Rest.”

Rasida leans over me. Her face is beaming, beatific. “You have achieved a lovely thing,” she says. “We will celebrate when you are well. Soon, you and I will be back on Katazyrna. You’ll like that, won’t you? Being among the flesh where you were birthed? We will build a whole new world, love, a whole new society.”