For a moment Brica faced her, and Regina thought she saw a spark of defiance in her daughter’s eyes. But Brica was heavily pregnant, worn out by fifteen years of pregnancies — and besides, she had been defeated by Regina long ago. Her shoulders slumped, she led a weeping Agrippina away.
Regina felt a twinge of guilt. Why did it have to be like this? Why did she have to inflict so much pain on her children? … “Because it is for the best,” she muttered. “Even if they cannot see it.”
The group broke up, avoiding Regina. Only Ambrosius was left watching her, his eyes wide.
Later, in her office, they drank watered wine. Ambrosius was cautious, watchful.
She smiled, tired. “You think I am a mad old woman.”
“I understand nothing of what I have seen here,” he said honestly. “Would you really turn her out if she got pregnant?”
“Agrippina has spent almost all her life in the Crypt. What lies outside, the disorder, the chaos — even the weather — rightly terrifies her. But it would be for the best.”
“She is your granddaughter,” he said hotly. “How can you say such an exile would be the best for her?”
“Not for her,” Regina said. “The best for those who follow. The best for the Order … It is hard for me to understand, too,” she said bluntly. “I follow my instincts — make my decisions — and then try to understand why I do what I do, where is the rightness.
“But consider this.” She poured a glass of wine. “We are safe in here, and we are bound by family ties. In fact we are so crammed in that it is only family ties that keep us from murdering each other. But with time family ties weaken. How can I keep that from happening?
“Imagine this wine is the blood of my daughter — blood that is mine, mixed with that of a buffoon called Amator — he does not matter. Brica gives birth.” She poured some of the wine into a second glass, and mixed it with water. “Here is Agrippina — half the blood of Brica, half of her father — and so only a quarter mine. But if Agrippina were to have a child—” She poured the mixture into another glass, diluting it further. “Agrippina’s blood is mixed with the father’s, and so is only an eighth mine.” She sat back and sighed. “My granddaughter’s blood is closer to mine than is my great-granddaughter’s. And so I want more granddaughters. Do you see?”
“Yes, but I don’t—”
“We can’t leave this Crypt,” she snapped. “We have no arms, no warriors to protect us. And though we are expanding our space, our numbers expand faster. We can’t support too many babies at once — we don’t have the room. Now—” She pushed forward the glasses. “Suppose I have to choose between a baby of Agrippina’s, or another baby of Brica’s. Brica’s baby would be closer to my blood, which would bind us more tightly together — and, if Agrippina were to support her mother, might actually have a better chance of living to adulthood. Which should I choose?”
He nodded slowly. “Yes, I see your logic — sisters matter more than daughters — it is better for Agrippina to support more sisters than to have her own children. But it is an insane logic, Regina.”
“Insane?”
“It is better for you, perhaps, if you accept this hot logic of the blood, even better for your Order — but not for Agrippina. ”
She shrugged. “If Agrippina doesn’t accept it, she can leave.”
He said gently, “You are like no woman I ever encountered. Like no mother, certainly. And yet you endure; I can’t deny that.” He strode and began pacing around the room, fingering the hilt of the dagger at his belt. “But I must get out of here,” he said. “The airlessness — the closeness — forgive me, madam.”
She smiled, and rose to show him out.
Chapter 31
The changes in her body seemed to come terribly quickly. She passed water almost hourly. Her breasts swelled and became sensitive. She tried to maintain her normal life — her classes, her after-hours work in the scrinium — but if she had stuck out from the crowd before, now it was by a mile.
She sat with Pina in a refectory. “Before they ignored me. Now they stare the whole time.”
Pina grinned. “They’re just responding to you. A very basic human reaction. You glow, Lucia. You can’t help it.”
“Do you think they envy me?” She looked at her friend. “Do you?”
Pina’s expression became complex. “I don’t know. I will never have what you have. I can’t imagine how it feels.”
“A part of you wants it, though,” Lucia said bluntly. “A part of you wants to be a mother, as all women were mothers, in primitive times.”
“But what we have here is better. Sisters matter more than daughters. ”
“Of course,” Lucia said mechanically. “But I’ll tell you what, if anybody does envy me, they can watch me throwing up in the mornings.”
Pina laughed. “Well, you can’t go on working in the scrinium.”
“No. I distract everybody.”
“Shall I speak to Rosa? You ought to continue your schooling. But perhaps they will find you an apartment down with the matres.”
“Wonderful. Order my false teeth and smelly cardigan now …”
The day after that, her morning nausea was worse than ever. Soon she felt so exhausted that she had to give up her classes as well as her work.
By the sixth week, as Pina had suggested, she was moved to a small room on the third story, in the deep downbelow.
It was dark, the walls coated with rich flocked wallpaper and the floor thickly carpeted, and it was cluttered with ancient-looking furniture. It was an old lady’s room, she thought miserably. But she had it to herself, and though she often missed the presence of others, the susurrus of hundreds of girls breathing all around her in the night, it was a haven of peace.
Her body’s changes proceeded at their own frightening pace, and the weight in her belly grew daily. From the eighth week a doctor attended her twice a day. She was called Patrizia; she might have been forty, but she was slim, composed, ageless.
Patrizia pressed Lucia’s gums, which had become spongy. “Good,” she said. “That’s normal. The effect of pregnancy hormones.”
“My heart is rattling,” Lucia said. “Though I feel sleepy all the time, it keeps me awake.”
“It’s having to work twice as hard. Your uterus needs twice as much blood as usual, your kidneys a quarter more—”
“I am always breathless. I pant — puff, puff, puff.”
“The fetus is pressing on your diaphragm. You are breathing more rapidly and more deeply to increase your supply of oxygen.”
“I can feel my ribs spreading. My hips are so sore I can barely walk. I get pins and needles in my hands and cramps in my feet. I either have constipation or diarrhea. I am a martyr to piles. My veins make my legs look like blue cheese—”
Patrizia laughed. “All this is normal!”
“Yesterday I felt the baby kick.”
Patrizia, for once, hesitated. “Perhaps you did.”
“But this is my eighth week. I am still in my first trimester!”
Patrizia looked down on her. “Somebody has been reading too much.”
“Actually, I have been looking up the Internet from my cell phone.” And from that she had learned the startling fact that among contadino women a pregnancy would last nine months, and you would not expect to have more than one child a year …
“There is nothing for you to learn on the Internet. Child, we have been delivering babies here for the best part of two thousand years — our way, and successfully.” She placed her hand on Lucia’s forehead. “You must trust us.”