Harry Turtledove - Jaws of Darkness

He kissed her. Even as he did, though, something else struck him. “You’d better renew your spell, too, while you’ve got the chance. No telling how long you’ll keep looking Forthwegian. We need to be back to the flat before you go back to looking like your regular self.”

“You’re right,” she said, and did just that. Her looks didn’t change, but she would keep on looking a lot like his sister for a while longer. Long enough? Maybe I’ll have her renew it again before we get home, if I see a chance, Ealstan told himself. Vanai’s thoughts were running along a different ley line: “I’ll have to get a new bottle of hair dye. No point to dyeing it-no way, either-when I was caught there.”

Ealstan shook his head. “No, you won’t. There’s still plenty left at home. I didn’t throw it away-I thought you’d be back.”Ihoped you’d be back was closer to the truth, but he said it the way he wanted to.

Vanai kissed him for it. That made it worthwhile, and more than worthwhile. She took his hand. “Come on. Let’s go.”

Eggs were still bursting all over Eoforwic. Ealstan said, “Now that I’ve got you back, I want the Unkerlanters to go away and leave us alone. Before, all I wanted them to do was knock Eoforwic topsy-turvy.”

“So did I,” Vanai said as they went out onto the street once more. She grinned at him. “I wanted to get back to the flat by myself and be there waiting when you walked in. You spoiled my surprise.” The grin disappeared. “You almost frightened me to death, too.”

“I’m sorry,” Ealstan said. “I’m so sorry. But looking like one of the redheads was the only way I could find to get into the Kaunian district.” He drew himself up. “It worked, too.”

Vanai couldn’t argue with that, and she didn’t try. The Unkerlanter dragons did fly away. After the eggs stopped falling, people started coming back out onto the streets. No one looked twice at Ealstan and Vanai; the only thing in the least out of the ordinary about them was her pregnancy.

They stopped in a tavern for a glass of wine to celebrate, though they didn’t say why they were celebrating. When Vanai asked if she could use the pot, the fellow behind the bar just nodded and pointed to the right door. “My wife was always running back and forth when she was expecting, too,” he said.

“Thank you.” Vanai closed the door behind her. When she came out, she nodded to Ealstan. The spell would last a while longer.

It lasted long enough for them to climb the stairs to the flat. Ealstan made Vanai hold the splintery bannister with one hand and his own hand with the other. “I’m not made of glass, you know,” she said tartly.

“We’ve come this far,” he said. “I don’t want anything-anything-to go wrong now. Is that all right?” Vanai made a face at him, but she didn’t say anything more, so he supposed he’d won his point.

He opened the door to the flat. He stood aside to let Vanai go in ahead of him. He closed the door. He barred it. He turned back to Vanai. “I love you,” he said.

They held each other for a long time. Then Vanai said, “Thank you,” and squeezed him harder than ever. “There were… times when I didn’t think I would ever see you again.”

Ealstan knew what that had to mean. Vanai trembled against him. He felt like trembling, too. He stroked her hair. “You’re safe here,” he said.

“Don’t be silly,” she answered. “I’m a Kaunian. I’m not safe anywhere. How are you going to bring a midwife here when the baby comes? I’m liable to start looking like what I am right in the middle of labor.”

He hadn’t thought of that. “Somehow or other, we’ll manage,” he said.

“We’ll manage without a midwife, is what we’ll do,” Vanai said.

“I suppose so.” Ealstan kept his reservations to himself. If anything looked as if it was going wrong, he vowed he would get a midwife and think about everything else later. He had a good deal of silver. He could bribe her, enough to keep her quiet for a little while, and then move before she brought the redheads down on Vanai and him and the baby.

Vanai said, “We can worry about that when the time comes.” She smiled at him. “I know what you’re thinking now.”

That wasn’t thought. That was automatic bodily response to holding the woman he loved in his arms. “Should you, so close to your time?” he asked.

“Once won’t hurt,” she answered. “And if you think I haven’t missed you, too, you’d better think again.” She pulled the tunic off over her head.

Her body startled him. Because she’d been locked away in the Kaunian quarter, he hadn’t been able to watch it change day by day. He hadn’t realized just how much her belly bulged. And… “Is your navel supposed to stick out like that?” Ealstan reach out a gentle, cautious finger to touch it.

“I don’t know,” Vanai answered. “All I know is that it does.” When Ealstan pulled off his own tunic and drawers, she laughed. “I’m not the only one sticking out, either.”

“I know I’m supposed to,” Ealstan said, an odd mix of dignity and eagerness in his voice. He led her back to the bedchamber.

Because of her bulging belly, they fumbled a bit before finding a way that suited them both. She lay on her back, a pillow under her bottom. He poised himself on his knees between her legs. “Oh,” she said softly as he went into her.

“I love you,” he said, which meant about the same thing. Slowly and carefully, he began to move. The posture made it easy for him to tease her with a fingertip at the same time. His pleasure built. By her sighs, Vanai’s did, too. Then, all at once, he laughed in surprise and lost his rhythm. Vanai made a noise wordless but indignant. “I’m sorry,” he told her. “Your magic just wore off. I didn’t expect it to.”

“Oh,” she said, this time thoughtfully. “All right.” They resumed.

Not much later, it was a great deal better than all right. When Vanai gasped and quivered, her belly went tight and hard for a little while.

Ealstan laughed again when her flesh rippled from the inside out. “I can really see the baby move now,” he said.

“I can really feel it,” Vanai said. “We made things crowded in there for a little while.”

“It will be all right. Everything will be all right.” For the first time since coming home to an empty flat, Ealstan dared believe that, too.

“How are you feeling this morning, my sweet?”ColonelLurcanio asked at the breakfast table.

Krasta found his solicitude cloying. He’s worried because he thinks it’s his brat in there, she thought. She thought it was Lurcanio’s, too, but she knew she had reason to be uncertain, where the Algarvian officer had only a nasty, suspicious mind making him doubt. But she had to answer him. Straight-out defiance didn’t work; she’d found that out a good many times, always to her dismay. “I’m.. . fairly well,” she said.

“Good,” Lurcanio said briskly. “Food staying down better?” His manner declared that he’d been through this business a good many times, and was somewhere between amused and annoyed at having to go through it again.

“So far,” Krasta said. “So far today, anyhow.” Her voice turned petulant as she went on, “I don’t know why they call it morning sickness. It can happen any time, and it’s always disgusting when it does.” Her stomach quivered nervously at the mere thought of being sick again.

ColonelLurcaniolaughed. Of course he’s laughing, Krasta thought. He’s a man. He never has to worry about things like this. The only thing he’s got to do with babies is having fun while they start. Oblivious-or at least indifferent- to what was going through her mind, Lurcanio said, “I’m afraid I must tell you good-bye for some little while. I have business to attend to down in the south.”