The Fecund's Melancholy Daughter - Brent Hayward [61]
Cadman tried to keep up, following several paces behind. He did not speak much at the best of times and this morning he held his face downcast, like a kholic. He had long ago given up. He was certain how this visit to Bedenham House would end. Cadman and Tina fought several times about this attitude: once he’d actually tried to convince her not to get “too attached” to the baby, which was such a ludicrous and hateful thing to say to a young mother that it made Tina sick and she could never look at Cadman’s face the same way again, ever. He had concerns about resources. Resources they didn’t have. Food and coin, and the space it would take to raise a child. Fucking resources!
How could he believe that if elements of black choler were found in the veins of their son, and the child was taken away to be raised as a ward of the city (becoming a lost soul, just like the wounded boy she’d seen), that it would be merciful for them as a couple? Cadman had even said they could try again for another in a year or so. A second boy, maybe, when they had more money, more food, more room—
Cadman (decided Tina, biting her lip) was an imbecile.
No good could come from having a child taken away.
Behind her husband followed the elderly neighbour, whose name she could never recall and perhaps had never known. His presence was in lieu of a close friend. All Tina’s friends had been conveniently busy this morning. Even the ratty old neighbour only cooperated in hopes of a promised pint, and who knew where they would get the coin to buy it when this was finally over.
Tina stood directly before the south entrance, the baby asleep on her shoulder. A palatinate officer within, wearing the long red robes of his position and holding a lantern, saw her and beckoned.
The chamberlain and his men knew how many babies had been born in Nowy Solum over the past month; they knew how many had survived. If Tina had not brought her son here before dusk, officers would have come during the night.
Again she considered fleeing, taking her chances with monsters and dead gods and who knew what else lurked in the unending wastelands outside the city.
She had never been outside the walls.
Bedenham House was exceeding dim and smelled of oil and camphor. There were four large fireplaces, burning low, one either side of each door, each end. Along the west wall was arranged a line of small cots from entrance to exit, perhaps twenty in all. The palatinate who led her inside without a word, swinging his lantern all the while, made his way to one of these cots and gestured for her to place the baby down.
The boy, of course, woke immediately, staring blankly up at the wooden ceiling. Her hands shook. The officer did not even look at her son but instead watched her face, searching it, his expression impassive, as if seeking something in her features that could betray aspects of her child’s biology.
Then the officer motioned abruptly with one hand toward the bench; she took her place, like all good citizens would.
Glancing outside, she saw Cadman standing with the neighbour, who grinned in at her. Cadman faced away, watching (she imagined) Horse Market, where barkers shouted and women shopped and children played with their friends or walked with their parents and life went on for all those lucky ones.
She turned away.
Deeper in Bedenham House, another mother—a woman she had not previously noticed—waited in the shadows on another bench. She tried to wave but the woman was not looking her way.
Tina’s son did not fall asleep for a long time. The officer waited quietly by the cot, like a predator, a slight smile on his face, swinging his lantern so that scented smoke rose up to the gables. Tina listened to the quiet sounds her baby made and knew he was hungry and scared and tired.
“Please,” she whispered, watching the palatinate as he, in turn, stared straight ahead. No. He was not like a predator, more like a statue,