Free Brood of Bones by A.E. Marling Page A

afraid I don’t move too fast anymore.”
    “I mean have you felt your baby move?”
    “Oh.” Her lashes flickered over large, beautiful brown eyes. “I’m not sure.”
    With little insulation in the form of physical bulk, she should have felt each kick as a stab. She should have been sure. My fears dragged my gaze away from hers.
    I doubted that so slight a girl could give birth safely, certainly not with a labor shorter than twenty-four hours; I imagined her ordeal, a lifetime of agony compressed into a day of blood and strain, and then I saw her final contraction producing not a pink, healthy child but a thing of bones, a god’s cruel trick, an unchild.
    It could not be. I promised myself it would not be, and I felt a current of excitement and a deep sense of meaning that made me think I was exactly where I was meant to be, nestled in the pattern designed by the Fate Weaver. The goddess had guided me here to save this girl from grief.
    Regretfully, said goddess had yet to provide any clue as to how I could help her and the other thousands. If I but knew how a letter might reach the Fate Weaver’s cavern palace at the center of the world, then I would have written a stern complaint.

 

     
    Faliti stomped into the room. “She shouldn’t be like this. If she’d been stronger, she wouldn’t be this way.”
    I eyed Faliti’s own motherly belly. “All the women in Morimound are pregnant.”
    “My daughter has no right to be. Alyla could’ve dodged it, if she had the will to do anything in her life except spread her legs for some alley boy.”
    Alyla hid her face behind her hands and sobbed. I felt I should comfort her, although I did not quite know how. My gloved hand glittered as I laid it on her knee, and I wondered if a gentle squeeze would be a suitable demonstration of affection. When I tried it, the fleshless knee jabbed my fingers.
    I said, “Priest Abwar has proclaimed these pregnancies as godsent.”
    “God or alley boy, she could’ve said ‘no’ to one less than the other. I tried to build something out of her, but the Fate Weaver spins some thick and others thin.”
    I, of all people, knew that.
    “Are you still having nausea, my child?” I spoke the address without thinking, and the words tasted bitter on my tongue. She was no child of mine.
    Alyla glanced at her true mother then looked down.
    “No, she isn’t,” Faliti said. “She has trouble seeing.”
    “Blurred vision is common from increased—”
    “You’ve been at it again, you disgusting girl.” Faliti pointed at the wall behind the bed, where the bricks had cracked and chipped. She brushed clay flakes from Alyla’s shift and sheet. “And here are the crumbs. What are you, some mud-eating pig?”
    She slapped Alyla then pinched her cheeks to pry open her jaw.
    “Spit it out, girl. Out with the brick you’ve eaten, or I’ll throttle it out.”
    I noticed a chunk of clay between two of Alyla’s teeth, and her tongue was yellow. “This is also common.” Disturbingly so, given the uncommon thing I feared was inside her.
    “Eat no more of our house or it’ll crumble, as poorly built as it is. You have shamed us in front of my important guest. Do you see her, Alyla? See the gemstones strewn about her? I knew her when she was poor and stupid, and now I bet she earns more in a year than your father will in his whole life.”
    When Alyla tried to meet my gaze, her eyes lost themselves among the mazes of copper and silver thread embroidered in my gowns.
    Faliti said, “Say something to the enchantress. Prove you may be dumb, but you can at least speak.”
    Alyla’s spindly fingers gripped her belly as if she felt the need to cling to something. “You honor the roof of... of our home, and we in-invite you to live here as our guest.”
    Faliti cuffed the back of her head, ruffling her dark hair over her eyes. “Why would you say that? The enchantress owns the largest mansion in Morimound and would never want to stay in this