Free Ice Ice Babies by Ruby Dixon Page B

to play , Sha-sha,” Esha says, grabbing one of Asha’s dark braids and yanking on it. “Go play with me!”
    At Esha’s loud declaration, Anna whines in her basket, and I move to the babies to soothe them before they can wake up and start crying. I stroke Anna’s little blue cheek and hum gently, and then do the same for Elsa. The babies calm down again and settle back to sleep, and by the time I turn around, Asha is gone, along with little Esha.
    “Come sit again,” Maylak murmurs. “I will speak to your khui for a while longer. We must make sure your kits have enough to eat.”
    I sit down again, but I’m still thinking about Asha. It’s strange that she showed up. “Are you and Asha good friends?” I ask, unable to keep my curiosity to myself. She never comes to hang out with the humans by the fire, and I thought it was because she didn’t like us.
    “She is my father’s sister’s daughter,” Maylak says, rubbing my back once more.
    I mentally go through the family tree before I realize she means they’re cousins. “Oh.”
    “Asha is helping me with Esha while I am heavy with this kit and very tired. She watches my little one so I can sleep and preserve my strength. The healing tires me this close to birth, and there is always more healing to be done.”
    I immediately feel guilty. “Oh, Maylak—“
    “That does not mean I will not do it,” she chides. “It just means that I grow tired. I am the only healer in the tribe. It is my duty.” She strokes my back a little harder, and then adds, “We will just not tell Kashrem about this.”
    I laugh. “He doesn’t approve?”
    “If it were up to him, I would spend all day in my furs, waiting for the kit to be born.” I hear soft amusement in her voice. “He does not like that I tire myself on others and fusses almost as much as Esha.”
    I grin at the thought, picturing quiet, mild Kashrem fussing at his mate. Doesn’t seem like him at all. “It’s good that Asha’s helping you out, then.”
    Maylak makes a noise of agreement. “She volunteers. She loves being around kits. They make her sad heart happy.”
    I feel another little stab of guilt, thinking. It’s baby-central around the humans but Asha never comes to hang out. Georgie, Liz, Kira, Megan, Stacy, Ariana - heck, almost everyone has a new baby. I have two. “That is surprising to me. She never comes to see mine or any of the other human women. Does she not like us?”
    Maylak hesitates. Her hands pause on my back, and then she begins her gentle rubbing motions again. I can feel the tingle of the khui’s magic moving through my body, and my breasts are beginning to feel tingly. That’s good. That means my milk is returning already. “She is lonely,” Maylak says in a low voice. “She does not fit in anywhere. She has no kit. She does not love her mate. She does not feel welcome with the humans who are all so close to each other. So she stays in her cave and keeps to herself.”
    Did I feel guilty before? Because I feel a whole truckload of guilt right about now. I think back to a flurry of encounters, of days spent laughing and chatting by the fire…with my human friends. Maylak is always busy with her family or with healing, and the older women in the tribe, Sevvah and Kemli, have people in and out of their caves constantly. Farli joins the humans when she’s not busy with her own tasks and Asha….well, Asha is never around. I thought it was because she hated us, and Kira has mentioned that Asha has tried to hit on Aehako when she was around, so it’s fair that Kira doesn’t like her.
    But…wow. I try to picture myself in Asha’s shoes, imagining a gaggle of alien women showing up and the men of the tribe going crazy over them. I imagine all these women getting pregnant and having children while my own died not long after childbirth. I imagine having to share a cave with a person I don’t like simply because we resonated. And my soul shrivels a little at the thought.