The Core by Peter V. Brett
“It is as I feared,” Amanvah said. “Mistress, I must cut the child free.”
Wonda immediately interposed herself. “Not a chance.”
Darsy rose, the large woman towering over tiny Amanvah. “Not if you were the last Gatherer in the world.”
“Leesha vah Erny am’Paper am’Hollow,” Amanvah said. “By Everam and my hope of Heaven, I swear to you, the only chance you have to survive this night is for me to cut you.”
Wonda had her knife in hand now, and Leesha knew how fast the woman could use it.
But then Amanvah did something Leesha could never in a thousand years have imagined. She dropped to her knees, putting her hands on the floor and pressing her forehead between them.
“By the blood we share, mistress. Please. Ala needs you. Sharak Ka needs you. You must believe me.”
“Blood you share?” Darsy asked. “What in the Core…?”
“Do it,” Leesha growled as the thrashing continued.
“You can’t mean…” Darsy began.
“I can and I do, Darsy Cutter,” Leesha snapped. “She’s better with the knife than you and you know it. Swallow your pride and assist.”
Darsy scowled, but she nodded as Amanvah produced stones from her hora pouch. “I will put you both to sleep…”
Leesha shook her head. “Calm the child, but I’m staying awake.”
“There is no time to take herbs for the pain,” Amanvah said.
“Then get me something to bite on,” Leesha said.
Amanvah’s eyes crinkled as she smiled behind her veil. She nodded. “Your honor is boundless, daughter of Erny. Pain is only wind. Bend as the palm, and let it blow over you.”
—
The child’s cries filled the room, the babe wrapped in swaddling and thrust into Wonda’s arms while Amanvah and Darsy finished their work. Darsy was suturing the wound as Amanvah prepared hora magic to speed the healing.
Wonda stood stiff as any new father, terrified she might squeeze the child too hard and crush it. She looked down at the tiny olive-skinned face, and Leesha knew the young woman would die to keep the baby safe.
Leesha’s arms twitched, wanting to reach out, but she needed to remain still until the work was done. For the moment, it was almost enough to know the child was healthy and safe.
Almost.
“What is it?” Leesha asked.
Wonda’s head snapped up like an apprentice caught daydreaming. “Mistress?”
“My child,” Leesha begged. “Is it a boy or a girl?” So much rode on the question. A male greenland heir to Ahmann Jardir might provoke outright war with Krasia, but a daughter would be no less a target. That the Krasians would come for the child was never in doubt, no matter what Amanvah swore. But when they came—now or over a decade hence—hinged on Wonda’s next words.
Wonda cradled the babe in one arm as she opened the swaddling. “It’s a b…” She frowned, looking closer.
At last she looked up, face twisted. “Core if I know, mistress. Ent no Gatherer.”
Leesha stared at her, incredulous. “You don’t need to be a Gatherer, Wonda, to know what parts a boy has and what parts a girl.”
“That’s just it, mistress.” Wonda looked terrified.
“Babe’s got both.”
CHAPTER 2
OLIVE
334 AR
For perhaps the first time in her life, words failed Leesha. She stared openmouthed, mind racing as the child’s screams rang through the room.
A babe born with both sets of parts was not unheard of. There were documented cases in her books of old world science, but it was another thing to find it in a live child.
Her child.
Tarisa peeked over Wonda’s shoulder and gasped, turning away.
Leesha reached out. “Let me see.”
Darsy caught her arm, pulling it back to the table. “Leesha Paper, you move again ’fore we’re done and I’m strapping you down.”
A shout came from the doorway, and Leesha looked up into a nightmare: one of Wonda’s guards stumbling back to keep out of the path of a very angry Elona Paper.
“Ay, Bekka!” Wonda cried. “Said no one was to get in!”
“Sorry, Won!” Bekka cried. “She pinched my pap and shoved by!”
“I’ll pinch more than that, you try to keep me away from my daughter,” Elona warned. “Why wasn’t I…”
The words caught in her throat as Wonda turned and Elona caught sight of the child in her arms. She ran to it, arms reaching, but Wonda deftly sidestepped. The glare Elona threw her would frighten a coreling, but Wonda bared her teeth right back.
“It’s all right,” Leesha said, and Wonda relented, reluctantly letting Elona take the child.
There were tears in her mother’s eyes. “Skin like the father, but those eyes are yours.” Elona pulled back the blanket. “Is it a boy or a…”
She froze, illuminated in the wardlight as Amanvah activated her healing magic.
The rush of power was like air to a drowning person. It jolted through Leesha’s torso, repairing the damage and filling her with new strength. When the light died down, she began to rise.
“Now, don’t go…” Darsy began.
Leesha ignored her. “Wonda, help me to the bed, please.”
Wonda picked her up effortlessly, carrying her to the great feathered bed. Leesha reached out, and Elona slid the baby into her arms. It looked up at her with bright blue eyes, and Leesha fell in love so utterly it shook her.
Wonda Cutter’s not the only one who would die for you, darling. Pity human and demon alike, if they try to come between us.
She kissed the beautiful, perfect face and freed the child from its swaddling, laying it skin-to-skin on her chest, sharing her warmth. The child began to root, and Leesha massaged her breast, readying it as the babe reached the nipple. The little mouth opened wide, and she pulled it in quickly to ensure a tight latch.
How many mothers had she guided through this milestone? How many newborns had she brought to the pap? It was nothing compared with experiencing it firsthand, seeing her perfect child begin to suckle. She gasped at the force of its pull.
“Everything all right?” Darsy asked.
Leesha nodded. “So strong.” She felt herself express, and knew she could endure any pain to feed her child. So many times in recent months, she had feared desperately for the child’s life, but now it was here. Alive. Safe. She wept for the joy of it.
Tarisa appeared with a damp cloth, blotting away the tears and sweat. “Every mother cries at first latch, my lady.”
Her sobs were a needed relief, but there were too many unanswered questions for Leesha to succumb for long. When her breathing calmed, she let Tarisa clear her eyes one last time and drew back the swaddling.
Wonda hadn’t been wrong. At first glance the child was a healthy boy, with fully formed penis and testicles. It was only when Leesha lifted the scrotum that she could see the perfectly formed vagina beneath.
She breathed, pulling back and beginning a full examination. The baby was large, too large to have passed through her birth canal without damage to her and risk to the child. Amanvah had been right. The surgery saved both their lives.
It was strong, too, and hungry. By all accounts, the baby was perfectly healthy, with no other distinct feature to mark it boy or girl.
She slipped on her warded spectacles, inspecting deeper. The child’s aura was bright—brighter than any Leesha had seen short of Arlen and Renna Bales. It was strong, and…joyful. The child took as much emotional pleasure in nursing as she. Tears welled in Leesha’s eyes again, and she had to brush them away before she could continue her examination.
A glance down confirmed her initial diagnosis. Male and female organs, both healthy and functional.
She gave Wonda a nod. “Both.”
“How in the Core’s that even possible?” Elona asked.
“I’ve read about it,” Leesha said, “though I’ve never witnessed it. It means there
“It’s my fault,” she gasped.
“How’s that?” Darsy asked.
“The magic.” Leesha felt like the walls of the great chamber were closing in on her. “I’ve been using so much. Starting when Inevera and I fought the mind demon that first night after Ahmann and I…” Her face stretched as the full horror of it dawned on her.
“I fused them.”
“Demonshit,” Elona said. “Ent no way to know that. Said yourself you seen it in books.”
“Ent every day I agree with Elona, mistress,” Darsy said, “but your mum has the right of this. Ent no reason to think magic had anything to do with it.”
“It did,” Leesha insisted. “I felt it happen.”
“What if it did?” Wonda demanded. “Should yu’ve let yurself get et by a demon, instead?”
“Of course not,” Leesha said.
“No point laying blame when you’ve a fever to fight, Bruna used to say,” Darsy said. “Everyone’s got perfect vision—”
“—when they’re looking back,” Leesha finished.
“I read the same books you did,” Darsy went on. “There’s notes on how to treat this.”
“Treat it, how?” Elona asked. “Some herb is going to close its slit or make its pecker dry up and fall off?”
“Course not.” Darsy shrugged as she stared at the child. “We just…pick one. A girl that handsome could easily pass for a boy.”
“And a boy that pretty could pass for a girl,” Elona countered. “That don’t treat anything.”
“Ay,” Darsy nodded to the operating table where Amanvah still worked, “but that combined with a few snips and stitches…”
“Wonda,” Leesha said.
“Ay, mistress?” Wonda said.
“If anyone other than me ever tries to perform surgery on this child, you are to shoot them,” Leesha said.
Wonda crossed her arms. “Ay, mistress.”
Darsy held up her hands. “I only…!”
Leesha whisked her fingers. “I know you mean no harm, Darsy, but that practice was barbaric. We will not be pursuing surgical options any further unless the child’s health is in danger. Am I clear?”
“Ay, mistress,” Darsy said. “But folk are going to ask if it’s a boy or girl. What do we tell them?”
Leesha looked to Elona. “Don’t look at me,” her mother said. “I know better than any that we don’t get a say in these things. Creator wills as the Creator will.”
“Well said, wife of Erny,” Amanvah said. She had come last from the operating table, hands still red with birthing blood. She raised them to Leesha. “Now is the time, mistress. There is no casting stronger than the moment of birth.”
Leesha considered. Letting Amanvah cast her alagai hora in the mixed blood and fluid of the birth would open her vision to the futures of Leesha and the child both. Even if she was fully forthcoming—something dama’ting were not known for—there would be too much for her to convey in words. She would always have secrets, secrets that Leesha might desperately need.
But Amanvah’s concern for the child, her half sibling, was written in gold through her aura. She was desperate to throw for the child’s protection.
“There are conditions,” Leesha said. “And they are not negotiable.”
Amanvah bowed. “Anything.”
Leesha raised an eyebrow. “You will speak your prayers in Thesan.”
“Of course,” Amanvah said.
“You will share everything you see with me, and me alone,” Leesha went on.
“Ay, I want to see!” Elona said, but Leesha kept her eyes on Amanvah.
“Yes, mistress,” Amanvah said.
“Forever,” Leesha said. “If I have a question twenty years from now about what you saw, you will reply fully and without hesitation.”
“I swear it by Everam,” Amanvah said.
“You will leave the dice in place until we can make a copy of the throw for me to keep.”
Amanvah paused at this. No outsider was allowed to study the dama’ting alagai hora, lest they attempt to carve their own. Inevera would have Amanvah’s head if she acquiesced to this request.
But after a moment, the priestess nodded. “I have dice of clay we can cement in place.”
“And you will teach me to read them,” Leesha said.
The room fell silent. Even the other women, unschooled in Krasian custom, could sense the audacity of the request.
Amanvah’s eyes narrowed. “Yes.”
“What did you see, when you cast the bones for the child in Angiers?” Leesha asked.
“The first thing my mother ever taught me to look for,” Amanvah said.
—
Leesha set warded klats around the antique royal heirloom that had been used as an operating table. The wards activated, barring sound from both directions as she and Amanvah bent over the operating table, studying the glowing dice.
Amanvah pointed one of her long, painted nails at a prominent symbol. “Ka.” The Krasian word for “one” or “first.”
She pointed to another. “Dama.” Priest.
A third. “Sharum.” Warrior.
“First…priest…warrior…” Leesha blinked as her breath caught. “Shar’Dama Ka?”
Amanvah nodded.
“Dama means ‘priest,’ ” Leesha said. “Does that mean the child is male?”
Amanvah shook her head. “Not necessarily. ‘First Warrior Cleric’ is a better translation. The words are neutral, that they might call either gender in Hannu Pash.”
“So my child is the Deliverer?” Leesha asked incredulously.
“It isn’t that simple,” Amanvah said. “You must understand this, mistress. The dice tell us our potentials, but most are never reached.” She pointed to another symbol. “Irrajesh.”
“Death,” Leesha said.
Amanvah nodded. “See how the tip of the die points northeast. An early death is the most common of the child’s futures.”
Leesha’s jaw tightened. “Not if I have a say in it.”
“Or I,” Amanvah agreed. “By Everam and my hope of Heaven. There could be no greater crime in all Ala than to harm one who might save us all.
“Ala.” She pointed to another die, angled diagonally toward the face with irrajesh. “Even if we risk she doom the world instead.”
Leesha tried to digest the words, but they were too much. She put them aside. “What will your people do, if they learn the child is without gender?”
Amanvah bent closer, studying not just the large symbols at the center of the dice but dozens of smaller ones around the edges, as well. “The news will tear them apart. It is too dangerous to announce the child’s fate now, but without it, many will take this as a sign of Everam’s displeasure with the Hollow Tribe.”
“Giving them excuse to break the peace Ahmann and I forged,” Leesha said.
“The few who still need excuse, after the son of Jeph cast the Deliverer from a cliff.” Amanvah bent to look closer at the dice.
“See here,” she noted, pointing to a symbol facing into the cluster. “Ting.” Female. She slid her finger along the edge of the die, continuing to show how the line intersected irrajesh. “There is less convergence if you announce the child as female.”
—
The child was bathed and changed by the time Leesha and Amanvah finished. Elona dozed in a chair with the sleeping baby in her arms. Wonda stood protectively over her, while Darsy paced the room nervously. Tarisa had stripped the bloodied bed and put down fresh linens, now busying herself readying a bath.
“She,” Leesha said loudly, stepping beyond the wards of silence.
Darsy stopped in her tracks. Elona started awake. “Ay, whazzat?”
Leesha squinted into her warded spectacles, searching the auras of the women as they gathered before her. “So far as anyone outside this room is concerned, I just gave birth to a hea
“Ay, mistress,” Wonda said. “But said yurself, babe needs guards day an’ night. Sooner or later, one’ll catch an eyeful while we change the nappy.” Her aura colored with worry. “Speakin’ of which…”
Leesha laughed. “By order of the countess, you’re relieved of nappy duties, Wonda Cutter. Your talents would be wasted wiping bottoms.”
Wonda blew out a breath. “Thank the Creator.”
“I will personally read the aura of every member of the house staff and guard with access to my daughter.” Leesha looked at Tarisa. “Any who cannot be trusted will need to find employment elsewhere.”
Her maid’s aura flashed with fear, and Leesha sighed. She had known this was coming, but it made things no easier.
“We’ll tell Vika and Jizell as well,” Leesha said. “We’ll all need to watch as she develops in case her condition causes unforeseen health problems.”
“Course,” Darsy agreed.
“You tell Jizell, you’re tellin’ Mum,” Wonda warned. Jizell was Royal Gatherer to Duke Pether now, reporting directly to Duchess Araine.
Leesha met Tarisa’s eyes. “I expect she’ll find out, regardless. Better it come from me.”
“That go for her, too?” Darsy jerked a finger at Amanvah.
“It does.” Amanvah’s aura stayed cool and even. It was a fair question. “I will not lie or withhold information from my mother, but our interests align. The Damajah will have a vested concern for the safety of the child, and will be essential in keeping my brother from trying to claim or kill her.”
Elona opened her mouth, but Leesha cut off the debate. “I trust her.” She looked back at Amanvah. “Will you and Sikvah stay here with us?”
Amanvah shook her head. “Thank you, mistress, but enough rooms have been finished in my honored husband’s manse for us to move in. After so long in captivity, I wish to be under my own roof, with my own people…”
“Of course.” Leesha put a hand on Amanvah’s belly. Shocked, the woman fell silent. “But please understand that we are your people now, too. Thrice bound by blood.”
“Thrice bound,” Amanvah agreed, putting her own hand over Leesha’s in an act so intimate it would have been unthinkable just a few months ago. It was strange, how sharing pain could sometimes do what good times could not.