The Lotus Ascension

Evernight Publishing

www.evernightpublishing.com

Copyright© 2013 Adonis Devereux

 
ISBN:
978-1-77130-242-5

Cover
Artist: Sour Cherry Designs

Editor:
Marie Medina

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

WARNING:
The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is
illegal.
 
No part of this book may be
used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission,
except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

This
is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any
resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or
dead, is entirely coincidental.

DEDICATION

To JMJ

THE LOTUS ASCENSION

The Lotus Trilogy, 3

Adonis Devereux

Copyright
© 2013

Prologue

The only place
Konas could look was out the window. Ajalira was screaming behind him, and he
could feel the grinding of her teeth. Her anguish filled the room; her sorrow
bled into every corner. Night fast approached, and though Konas usually enjoyed
twilight and the quick winking of the unveiled stars, he looked upon the
darkening world in disquiet. Ausir were not used to this, and he wished he were
anywhere else.

“
How long?”
Kamen asked.

The midwife doubled
her grip on Ajalira's sweaty forearm and shook her head.
“Any
time now.
Hard to say.”

“
It's too soon.”

Konas glanced
back just long enough to catch Kamen's wild, worried look.

“
Don't you worry about that, Lord
Itenu.
”
The midwife tied her grey dreadlocks back in a linen kerchief. Konas imagined
her a
warrior slipping on her hauberk. This old woman was
preparing for battle. She looked over at one of the younger midwives standing
ready. “Bring the birthing chair.”

A groan slipped
through Konas's drawn lips, and he leaned forward, bracing his weight on his
hands as they clutched the stony seal of the portal. He had tried to avoid
this, but Kamen had insisted. It was the Sunjaa way. A child was going to be
born into the highest noble family of the Sunjaa, and he needed witnesses.
Besides, they were a very open people, something Konas was still not quite used
to, though he took full advantage of it in his own way. Back home in the
Silbrios, women would never walk around in translucent linen robes, practically
exposing themselves. Back home, he would never have been invited to the birth
of any child save his own.

The sun
set,
and Ajalira's screams welcomed the night. Another day's
heat would dissipate into the coldness of the purple sky.

A slave scurried
past, and Konas collared him.
“Wine.”
He pitied
Ajalira her suffering, but there was nothing he could do about it, and judging
by the helpless, panicked look on Kamen's face, there was little the husband
could do, either.

The slave bowed
and scampered away.

If the baby was
a boy, the Itenu house would have its heir. Arinport would rejoice with Kamen.
If Ajalira bore a daughter, then Konas would have to write to his brother at
once. He would have to tell the Ausir King that his future bride had been born.
He knew Kamen was hoping for a boy.

The slave
returned and thrust a cup of beer into his hands. Konas had asked for wine. He
shrugged and lifted the beverage to his lips. Sunjaa loved their beer, and they
brewed the best he had ever tasted.

An elaborate
wrestling match unfolded before Konas's eyes. A young midwife brought the
U-shaped birthing chair and placed its four legs into small corresponding
grooves in the floor. She gave it a shake, and it did not move. With a
convinced nod, she rose and beckoned to the elder midwife. Kamen, holding one
of Ajalira's arms, and the head midwife, holding the other, dragged the
laboring mother toward the chair, but Ajalira cried out and nearly collapsed.

“
What's wrong? What's wrong?” Kamen nearly lost his grip on his
wife's sweaty skin. “We must let her rest.”

The old
midwife's eyes flashed. “We must get her to that chair.” She pointed.

“
It's too soon, isn't it?”

“
Soon or not, this baby's coming.” She snapped her fingers at yet
another young midwife, and that one ran up and took Ajalira by the ankles, and
though the proud Tamari kicked, the servant did not relax her grasp. The three
of them hauled Ajalira to her chair. “Now, dear,” the old woman continued,
“sit, but do not lean forward.”

Ajalira's face
turned crimson and purple as she struggled with a breathless push.

“
Don't push yet. Sit!” The midwife firmly yet gently thrust Ajalira
down. “Now, slowly, lean back.” She glanced up at Kamen. “You, go around and
kneel behind her. Let her rest against your chest.”

Kamen did as
instructed, and Ajalira reached up over her shoulder to take his hand. With his
other hand, he stroked her golden horns and whispered something in her ear.
Konas, though his hearing was keen as any Ausir's, did not hear what was said
either because Ajalira was groaning or because he did not really wish to know.
It was enough that he was present for something he considered a very private
affair.

Ajalira breathed
in through her nose and out through her mouth.
A respite.
Konas drained his cup. A midwife wiped Ajalira's forehead and untangled her
hair from her horns. A slave gave Kamen a drink of water. The old midwife came
around and looked between Ajalira's spread legs. Ajalira had her back to Konas,
so the Ausir could only imagine what was going on down there.

Kamen was right.
The baby was not expected for another month. Perhaps it was nothing more than
the unpredictability of mating human and Ausir. Who could tell what was going
to happen or what the baby was going to look like? How many half-Ausir were
there in the world? No more than a handful—and Konas had
never
seen a half-blood. He imagined any would be hideous. Humans and Ausir were so
incongruous, their features so dissimilar that he surmised they would not blend
well. Any offspring from such an unequal yoking would be, at best, awkward
children.

Ajalira's
breathing
quickened,
and clean exhales gave way to
grunts, and grunts morphed into wails. Kamen whispered to her again, and this
time Konas caught the words.

“
Not you without me,
nor
I without you.”

Strange words to say to a woman in the agonies of childbirth.

The elder
midwife piled up soft linens on the floor between Ajalira's spread legs.
Something poured and dripped.

“
Her water's broken.” The midwife swept away the damp linens and
replaced them with fresh ones. “We'll see your little darling very soon now,
dear.”

Her calm smile
was completely unsuited to the occasion—as Konas saw it—but her words seemed to
ease Ajalira for just a moment. Ajalira's shoulders
relaxed,
and she craned her neck to see Kamen.

“
My love, my life.”

Kamen kissed her
nose, and the pains came again. Ajalira sat forward and groaned. Long groans
interrupted quick pants, and this process repeated three times until there were
no pants, only groans—and then just one long groan into which Ajalira clearly
poured every last drop of her strength.

Konas had never
witnessed childbirth before. He had no idea a woman could be so strong, so
durable, so determined, for, to him, the act seemed more a test of will than a
test of pain. He mentally saluted Ajalira for her courage, and for the first
time that evening, he was not sorry he was there. To say he was growing
comfortable would be a stretch, but he began to find the whole experience
fascinating.

“
Push, push, push,” the old midwife said firmly over Ajalira's
growling scream. Her eyes lit up, and her mouth opened in pleasant expectation.
Without looking at the young midwife at her elbow, she instructed her
subordinate to go ring the bell. The young one did so with alacrity.

The door opened,
and a priestess of Elendrie and a priestess of Chiel walked into the room. The
former was clad like a temple harlot, in a shimmering, translucent shift. She
wore no undergarments, and Konas was sure he had seen her at one of his orgies.
She carried a sheaf of wheat in her left hand, and upon both wrists she wore
bracelets of braided straw. Her painted face was beautiful and exotic, her
cheeks and forehead gold, her eyes black. The Chiel priestess could not have
been more different. She wore a long, blue gown the color of the summer sky,
belted with a white sash.
Around her neck hung a small pouch.
She, too, was beautiful, but her looks did not invoke desire in Konas. The
latter walked in the former's perfumed wake, but Konas could still detect the
Chiel priestess's scent of healing herbs.

Fertility and
Life had come. They stood before the anguished mother and chanted their
comfortless words.