Page 76 of Thus with a Kiss I Die

“Here!” she bellowed back.

He cut a swath through the dwindling mob, targeting each flagellant and taking him down with a well-wielded staff and sword. Not the sword he’d started out with, either. As he drew near, it was clear that of all of us, he’d suffered the most damage—and probably had inflicted the most.

He looked us over. “If you need help, say so and I’ll carry you, but let us flee now before the flagellants regroup.” He lowered his voice. “And before the vultures swoop in.” The people who would come to dispatch any of the living and pick over the bodies, he meant.

We pulled up our hoods and huddled in our capes. Tommaso led the way, weapons in hand. Nurse supported me. Lysander followed behind, sword out.

When we passed the body of Baal, Nurse tried to get me to turn my head, but I insisted. I stopped and looked at him.

Not a demon. Not a messiah. Those open, empty eyes stared at the stars, and I saw that he was nothing but a man.

“The Fallen will feast on his liver,” Lysander said.

“I hope it doesn’t choke them.” Tommaso obviously hoped the opposite.

“He’s burning in hell.” Nurse pronounced his eternal sentence.

“Yes.” I turned away. “Hurry. Mamma needs me.”

CHAPTER42

Even before the footman opened the door, I heard Mamma scream. I pushed Nurse away and, holding my gut, I sprinted up the stairs. Nurse followed and we found Mamma on her back, struggling to produce the babe.

I had attended the last three births, fetched towels and water, murmured support and encouragement. I wasn’t Friar Laurence or a midwife, experienced in childbirth, but I’d listened and learned, and I understood if the child would not come, we had to use every advantage our world could give us.

Nurse wet a cloth I thought she’d bathe Mamma’s face, but she wiped mine gently, yet the pain reminded me I had been slapped hard enough to cause damage, and I didn’t want to frighten my mother. I wiped my hands, too, then grasped my mamma’s face in both my hands and turned her to see me. “Mamma. Mamma, we must get you on your knees.”

So wrapped was she in the labors of birth, she didn’t seem to see me, but keened with the pain that gripped her. “I can’t. I can’t.” Sweat stained her brow and dribbled off her chin.

“You can.” I glared at Nurse, who stood bleeding, sobbing, and wringing her apron in her hands. “We’ll help you. Come, Mamma, on your knees. Grip the bedpost. Hold on and scream when you need to. Together we’ll bring my brother forth!”

I spared a thought to my siblings. I knew they had gathered in the chapel, praying to God for their mother and, as an aside, the baby she would bear. But mostly for Juliet, who held our family together—so kind, so stern, so our mother in every sense.

Nurse and I helped Mamma to her knees and put her hands on the bedpost, and she screamed again as the downward pressure carried the child toward the world of today.

Nurse massaged her belly.

Fluid gushed between her legs.

I saw a head start to emerge and cupped my hands to catch him.

He slid out by the spasms of her belly and the downward motion of the force that led us to earth.

He was perfect. Beautiful. A boy in all his parts. Screaming his indignation at this exposure into the world of man.

I heard my siblings cheering. I wept to hold his tiny form, alive, breathing, happy it had been so easy.

I handed my brother, the son of my house, to Nurse, who held ties and scissors and made swift work of the umbilical cord, then wrapped him and returned him to me.

“Mamma! Mamma! He’s here and you’re—”

She was still screaming. Mamma was still screaming.

Why? Why? I didn’t know enough. I held the babe up to her face. “He’s here!”

Papà burst into the room, a projectile of male vigor that melted before her pain and compulsion. “One more,” he said to her, and his tone pleaded and cajoled.

What was he talking about?