A/N: Much of the more technical detail in this chapter and the next is based on my own experience and that of one of my close friends. In case anyone's wondering if stuff like this really happens, yes, it does.

BaBaKaNuSh-13 – thank you so much! You made my day :). Daine and Numair are the only characters of someone else's that I feel like I can write semi-well – I'm not sure why – and I was actually really nervous about that interaction. So I'm glad it turned out to be believable.

music nerd – nope, I haven't. I've had them on order from the library for ages, but no joy as yet. I have, however, read the beginning excerpt from TC that's posted on TP's web site, and have gathered, ahem, certain things about the books elsewhere.

Drop Your Oboe – (love your pen name, by the way!) Don't worry!

Disclaimer: In case the last chapter didn't disclaim sufficiently, I don't own any of these characters, Tamora Pierce does.


2: Labour of Love

"Grandma! Grandda!" Little Sarralyn's gleeful shrieks are as music to the ears of her grandparents, who (confined as they are to the Divine Realms except for brief visits during the great holidays) see far less of her than they would like. Daine can never work out how her mother does it – why little Sarra, usually so shy with strangers and even with well-known acquaintances when she hasn't seen them for weeks, is invariably so eager to greet Sarra (the elder) and Weiryn when they arrive for one of their infrequent visits. But so it is, and at the moment she is very grateful for the fact. It pains her to leave her daughter long in the royal nursery, but to give her the necessary attention while following Alanna's latest orders – to lift nothing heavier than a fork or spoon, and to stay abed or lying on a sofa at all times except when using the privy, on pain of dire personal retribution – is impossible.

"Sarralyn! Sweetling, look how you've grown!" Daine's Ma, the Green Lady, is no one's idea of a grandmother, perpetually a radiant, honey-blonde woman of thirty. She embraces her namesake with a grandmother's love, however, and a grandmother's teary eyes. "And such a little beauty."

"Hmmph. Takes after her da a wee bit too much, if you ask me," grumbles her consort, Weiryn, god of the hunt.

"Da!" his daughter protests, from her position on one of the sitting-room couches. "You say that as though it were something terrible. And I notice you don't say it in front of him," she adds, with a wicked grin.

"What was that, Magelet?" Out of bed already, the subject of her remarks looms in the doorway, topping his father-in-law – antlers excluded – by several inches. He looks tired and rather pale, but otherwise better recovered than one might expect from his recent forays into ill-advised magical experiments.

"Nothing, love," Daine replies. "My da was just saying how much Sarralyn looks like you."

"Nonsense," says Numair. "My Sarralyn is a child of surpassing gorgeousness, and it follows, therefore, that she must take after her ma." As he says this he scoops his daughter up in his arms and tickles her, reducing her to helpless giggles.

Daine and her mother laugh, and even Weiryn looks somewhat mollified.


"Now?" Alanna exclaims.

"Well, yes," says Sarra Beneksri. "You didn't think I'd let my second grandchild be born without me, did you?"

"You did say the baby was due at Midsummer, Alanna," Daine adds. "It's your own fault if he took you at your word."

"'He,' is it?" says Alanna, with a sharp look at her friend. This is new. "Well, that's that, then, I suppose. I defer to you, Lady," she says to Sarra, with a little bow; "your experience is much more extensive than mine, I've no doubt."

There is more in this vein, but Daine doesn't hear it. "Ma, Alanna," she says finally, her voice tight, "please don't make me stay in this bed. I need to walk, or – or something. My back …" Her face contorts; she struggles visibly to relax and takes slow, deep breaths.

They turn as one woman to look at her, and then, with worried faces, at each other. She is labouring harder than either had expected, so early in the proceedings – but, so far, with very little result.

"It could be—" Sarra begins, as Alanna is moving to lay her hands on Daine's belly. Purple fire gathers around her fingers, and she nods briefly. "Still face up," she says. "No wonder."

"Stop – talking about me – as if I'm – not here," Daine gasps. "I don't like it."

She has a sudden, horrible vision of the scene from Numair's dream, and shudders. "If something's wrong – just tell me what it is. And – let me up. Don't make me beg."

"All right," says Alanna, rather surprisingly.


"It isn't stopping," Daine moans. She is on her feet, leaning wearily forward with her arms braced against the windowsill. "Why isn't it stopping?"

The sun is high overhead; small birds line the tree-branches under the window and perch anxiously on the sill.

"What isn't stopping, love?" her mother asks, wiping Daine's damp forehead and smoothing her hair.

"The pains. They're supposed to come and go, remember?" she is almost too exhausted for annoyance – but not quite. "Not go on and on for half an hour. But at least—" she tries for a smile, and produces a ghastly parody – "at least I've had lots of time to get used to it."

Nobody answers her, which is infuriating. "Ma! Alanna! I know something's wrong. Just tell me." Her voice breaks; she becomes aware of tears on her cheeks, but can't be sure whether physical or mental agony is responsible. "If the baby – or if I'm going to die – tell me soon – I want to say goodbye to—"

"Bright Goddess, Daine, you're not going to die!" Alanna has grabbed her by the shoulders and hauled her upright to glare at her with those odd violet eyes.

Two-leggers, sounds a voice in Daine's mind. You all think you're going to die when you're foaling. It's enough to send a Person mad.

"Go away, Cloud." She is so confused and exhausted that she says it aloud. "I've done this before, remember? This is worse."

"The baby's facing the wrong way, Daine," Alanna says, more gently this time. "I did tell you that, remember? Her head is pressing up against your spine, and that's what makes the pain so steady."

"His," Daine insists. "His head. No, you didn't tell me."

Even more surprisingly, Alanna doesn't argue. "I'm telling you now."


Numair has handed his daughter over to Eleni Cooper, summoned by Alanna hours ago, the better to fret and pace in solitude. He does not like the sounds he hears; but he has been told very firmly by his mother-in-law that he will be called if he is wanted and is not to step over the threshold otherwise. Even Numair Salmalín does not lightly disobey the orders of a goddess.

He is uneasy, and growing more so with every hour that passes. Try as he may, he cannot believe Daine's reassurances. Their daughter's birth was swift and uneventful, despite the oddities of the pregnancy that preceded it; no frightening dreams plagued him then, and he cannot dismiss the importance of his current recurring nightmare.

"How goes it?" The voice at his shoulder startles him so that he jumps and cracks his head against a sconce.

"Steady on, lad," says George Cooper, taking the mage's arm and helping him to a convenient chair. "I've brought ye a bite to eat."

Numair looks blankly from his friend to the cloth-wrapped offering of bread and cheese George has put in his hands. George sighs and shakes his head. "I can see I ought to've come by earlier," he says. "Ye're in a bad way. Come along, now, have a bite. It'll do ye good."

"I don't know if I can," Numair says. "I'll only throw it up again, I think. Perhaps – some water?"

"Right y'are." George produces a canteen, which Numair holds to his lips with shaking fingers. George's hands steady his own. She did this for me, in our first battle together, he remembers, drinking gratefully. Daine, my magelet, what I wouldn't give to be able to help you now!


It is after sunset on Midsummer's Day. The Royal Palace is quiet; many of its denizens are still sleeping off the revelry of the night before, or are going about their business silently, with aching heads, vowing (untruthfully) never to repeat it.

In the palace nursery, a little girl with blue-grey eyes and glossy black hair is plied with toys and marvellous tales to distract her from the long absence of her parents.

In another wing, in an otherwise deserted corridor, a tall mage paces back and forth before a solid oaken door that bears two brass nameplates: Numair Salmalín and Veralidaine Sarrasri Salmalín. He is exhausted; he appears to remain upright and in motion entirely through an act of will. From time to time he pauses to look longingly at the door.

Just as the first stars appear in the sky, a woman screams.


Numair wrenches the door open – which takes some time, as Alanna has spelled it against precisely this sort of effort – and crosses the sitting-room in two long strides. The door to the bedchamber is open, and another step would take him through it.

Instead he stops on the threshold, frozen in horror.

It is the scene from his nightmare made vividly, horribly real. There is Daine, lying pale and still amid bedsheets splashed with blood. There is Alanna, arms red to the elbows, turning to him a face whose expression he cannot read. Daine's mother is there, which is not quite right; but the babe in her arms is as still and silent as his father dreamed him.

Numair's ears fill with a strange sound – a rushing, thudding, buzzing sound – so loud and insistent that he fails to hear the ordinary, unalarmed sounds of the birds outside the window. As the darkness rushes up to meet him, some small part of him wonders, Is this how it feels to die?