*Isla*
Mystica has put an oxygen mask of some sort over Sydney’s mouth and nose and asked her to breathe deeply. She also gave her something else, something that will make her go to sleep soon. I hold her hand and force myself to smile at her, but as the other woman’s eyes grow heavy and flicker closed, I can’t help but wonder if she will ever open them again.
I have all the faith in the world in Mystica. She saved my life, and she’s treated my injuries more than once. But that doesn’t mean she can save everyone in every situation.
Mystica and her nurses begin working quickly as soon as Sydney is out, and I no longer feel the need to sit next to her and calmly hold her hand, especially when I see the sharp instrument that Mystica is about to use to cut her open.
We have a similar thought at the same time as Mystica says, “Isla, dear, you can let go.”
Can I, though?
I haven’t known Sydney long, and I’m not even sure that I like the girl, but I do feel awful for what is happening to her.
Especially if the gut feeling I have is correct and she doesn’t ever open her eyes again.
I pry her fingers away from my hand and then get up from my chair, moving it over out of the way so that the nurses can work, and back toward the door.
I want to step out. I want to open the door, turn around, and run away, fleeing down the hallway as fast as I can go so that I don’t have to witness what is about to happen here.
So that I don’t have to think about what is about to happen here.
I can pretend, can’t I? I can pretend that I never met Sydney? That she never came into my room to ask my advice… to try to steal my man… to see if I could help her become a breeder.
None of that sounded too good on her part, but she is young, pregnant, scared, and had been taken advantage of. I can’t hold that against her.
And I can’t hold it against her baby.
If Sydney doesn’t pull through, this baby will be born an orphan. His or her father is already dead, and the baby’s mom is looking paler and paler by the moment.
When Mystica makes her first cut, blood squirts out a bit, and I have to cover my mouth. Once again, I hear alarms sounding in my head.
“What are you doing, Isla? Turn around and run! No one would fault you! Why are you here?” I ask myself, but I have no answers.
It feels like Sydney will know. That she will somehow see me abandoning her, leaving her here all alone to go through this journey through the valley of darkness, when she’d wanted me to stay with her. Even though her eyes are closed and she is under some sort of medication to make her feel no pain and be completely unaware of her surroundings, I feel like she would see me running away from her.
And haunt me for the rest of my life.
But that isn’t why I am not leaving the room. I am more afraid of letting myself down than I am in disappointing Sydney. If I leave, what will that say about me? That I can’t handle the tough situations in life? That doesn’t seem like me.
It certainly doesn’t sound like something an alleged descendant of the Moon Goddess would do.
The Moon Goddess….
As the deity’s name entered my mind, I catch Mystica’s eyes. “Do you think… I can do anything to help?” I asked her as she was doing her best to get to the baby.
“You can pray,” she says. “But dear… don’t think that you have the power to change what the Moon Goddess has already set in motion.”
I look at her, my brow furrowing, not sure I understand what Mystica is saying to me. I’m also not sure she has time to explain right now as I hear a ripping, splashing sound, and then she tugs a purple squirmy blob out of Sydney’s abdomen. It’s wet and covered in some kind of white slimy looking stuff.
I realize as the nurse hastily takes the object from Mystica that it’s a baby.
It’s small and not crying at all. In fact, I think it was more waving around from Mystica’s movement than actually squirming.
The nurse sets the baby down on a cart one of them brought in earlier, and two of them immediately start doing something to the child while Mystica is still working on Sydney.
“Why isn’t the baby crying?” I ask.
No one answers me because they don’t have time. Mystica is shouting things to another nurse, asking for items that the nurse is handing her. What was once a bit of blood has become a lot more, and it’s not just coming from Sydney’s abdomen either.
It’s coming from beneath her legs. It’s coming from… where the baby was meant to come out.
Mystica is no longer attempting to sew up the slice in Sydney’s abdomen. Instead, she’s doing something between the girl’s legs, trying to make the bleeding stop, but more and more keeps pouring out.
I had thought I would never see as much blood as I had the time that Zabrina sliced that maid’s throat and came down the hallway dripping from the crimson substance.
But I was wrong.
Tears fill my eyes and I have trouble seeing what’s happening in front of me. Sydney is bleeding to death, and even though Mystica and the other nurse are trying to save her, I don’t think they’re going to be able to.
I almost feel like she’s already gone.
And the baby… isn’t breathing.
One of the nurses shouts, “Mystica! We need another pair of hands!”
“I can’t right now!” the healer shouts back.
Without thinking, I hurry over. Still crying a bit, I ask, “What can I do?”
“Hold her like this,” the nurse instructs me, and I quickly do as she asks as she and the other nurse do something to try and clear the baby’s airway.
She feels too cold to me. She is so still. And her heart…. I can’t hear it.
She’s just a tiny thing… with dark hair and a beautiful, sweet little face. Her eyes are closed, scrunched, and her little hands are fisted but otherwise limp.
My tears are streaming faster now. I try to keep it together. I can see that the nurses are worried, but they’re not crying like I am. I wonder if they’ve seen other babies pass away. I want to pull my hand away from the little body to swipe at my eyes, but I can’t let go of the little body.
Splashes from my tears drip onto her little face, wetting her eyes and sliding down her nose as if the baby is crying, too.
“I don’t think we’re going to get a pulse,” one of the nurses, an older woman with streaks of gray through her dark hair, says, looking at the younger one standing next to me.
Her words only make my tears fall faster. They continue to splash down the baby’s face, coating her lips, and landing on her chest.
And then… as the nurses set their tools aside, giving up, there is a loud gasp and an inhale of air before the loudest, highest-pitched, sweetest sound I’ve ever heard hits my ears.
The baby is crying! She’s crying and wiggling and turning bright red! And she is mad as hell, and it makes me laugh because I’m so thankful that the Moon Goddess has spared this little life.
“Holy–” the older nurse says, her eyes wide. “How did that happen?”
“I don’t know,” the younger one says. “But let’s make sure we keep her crying so she can clear those lungs.”
The younger nurse picks the baby up, wrapping her in a towel as she rubs her little body, keeping the newborn screeching. I don’t understand exactly why they are doing that, but it’s not my concern. I’m just so thankful that Sydney’s daughter is still alive.
I have a feeling she will make it.
And then I turn around.
Mystica has blood all over her. It coats her arms up to her elbows, and is splashed all over the apron she has on over her clothes. I’m sure it’s soaked through and stained the floral fabric of the full-length dress she wears.
She’s not hurrying anymore, though. A defeated look sits on her face. I am confused as I move toward her. “Wh-why aren’t you… sewing her up?” Sydney’s abdomen is still open.
Mystica shakes her head. “I’m sorry, dear, but there was nothing I could do. The baby was stuck in the birth canal. Even though she’s not a big child, the mother’s pelvis was too narrow. By the time we realized she wasn’t going to be able to come out… the damage had been done. I’ll need to examine the placenta, but I believe there was a problem with the placenta as well. That would explain all of the bleeding.”
I don’t know what she’s talking about. I haven’t read any books about pregnancy yet because, even though I’m a breeder, I’m not pregnant. Not that I know of anyway.
Looking at Sydney makes me want to never be pregnant….
My eyes go to the baby. She’s not screaming anymore, and the nurses have her cleaned up. She is wearing a diaper and they are dressing her in a little yellow onesie.
Seeing her makes me want a child, but seeing Sydney makes me want to grab the needle Mystica was using and sew myself up….
“Is the baby’s father somewhere in the castle?” the older nurse asks Mystica.
She shakes her head. “No, he’s deceased. This baby is an orphan.”
My mouth drops open like I want to say something, but no words come out.
The nurse says, “We have several families that will be willing to take her. We’ll just have to find the right one.”
“Yes, she’ll be well taken care of,” Mystica says. “But then… I believe the Moon Goddess might’ve had a different plan for this child.”
“What do you mean?” It’s the younger nurse who speaks up now.
“Well,” Mystica says, “she was stillborn. The child was dead. For several minutes as the two of you worked on her, she was already gone.”
“Yes, but we brought her back,” the older nurse says, and I remember how she had given up on the baby just before she started to breathe.
“No,” Mystica says. “The two of you did a fine job, as you have been trained to do. But it was not your efforts that allowed the child to suck air into her lungs.”
“It wasn’t?” the younger nurse asks, her forehead creased.
Mystica shakes her head. “No, it wasn’t.” Then her eyes turn to me, and she adds, “It was you.”