The Damnation Affair

She halted, staring at the exact spot where Jack Gabriel had stood. He hadn’t looked surprised or ruffled in the least. Come to think of it, he hadn’t looked ruffled since she’d met him. Such phlegm might be maddening, but it was also strangely consoling. If he said he was going to bring help, then help he would bring, and as soon as possible too.

Cat climbed the stairs on trembling legs. Clammy and damp—she should find more appropriate attire before Mr. Gabriel returned.

Li Ang’s next groan spiraled into a scream, and Cat put aside the shaking…and ran.

Chapter 13

Ma Ripp was a mean-faced hag with hard claws and a widow’s sour black weeds. But inside the birthing room she was efficient and strangely gentle. She took one look at the schoolmarm’s preparations and barked, “Good enough. Sheriff, more water. You there, girl, set her higher on them pillows.” One yellow-nailed finger jabbed at the marm, whose big dark eyes and pale cheeks threatened to turn Gabe inside out.

The poor girl looked scared to death. Li Ang was propped on pillows on what had to be the marm’s bed, her knees up and her hair sticking to her cheeks in jet-black streaks. Miss Barrowe had folded the comforter under her knees, and there was another divot on the bed—where, no doubt, Miss Barrowe had sat, holding Li Ang’s hand as the birthing pangs ripped through the Chinoise girl.

“What’s your mancy?” Ma Ripp finished, checking Li Ang’s fragile wrist for her pulse.

Li Ang moaned, cursing in Chinoisie, and Miss Barrowe flinched. But her answer came, clear as a bell. “My Practicality? It’s in Light, ma’am.”

Ripp nodded once, her iron-gray hair braided tightly and looped about her large head. “Well, not entirely useless. Can you charm ice?”

To her credit, the marm didn’t quail further. “Yes, of course.”

Ripp handed her a small, battered tin cup. “Dip some water, there, and charm little bits of ice. Enough for her to suck on. Sheriff, get moving. This is woman’s business.”

Gabe retreated, but not before he caught Miss Barrowe’s gaze. She stared at him for a long bright moment, and his insides knotted up again. Her cheeks were incredibly pale, and every time Li Ang sobbed for breath, she flinched in sympathy. Her hair was pulled back into a simple braid, still dripping, and she had managed to insert herself into a dress, though the buttons were askew and she had pulled the damp wrapper back on over it.

I’m here, he wanted to say. Don’t you worry.

She averted her gaze, hurriedly, and dipped the tin cup in a basin of water. Mancy sparked, and Gabe found himself in the hall, his breathing hitching oddly.

The doors were locked, and Li Ang was as safe as he could make her. That was the bargain, and he intended to see it through. He should warn the marm about this, though. There were dangers hanging around the Chinoise girl that would only get deeper once she birthed.

He just hadn’t thought it would come so soon.

More water was set to boil with numb fingers; he had to try twice to get the right charm to settle into the kettle. The marm was using a powerful but volatile mancy, and it almost singed him, too.

He wasn’t surprised.

Footsteps overhead. He closed his eyes and listened. At least his early training still held, and his ears were plenty sharp.

“Are you quite sure?” The marm, anxious.

“Walkin’s best at this stage.” Ripp, a good deal gentler. “That’s it, girl. Good, good.”

“Her legs.” Miss Barrowe gasped. “And did you see…Ma’am—”

“Shh. We’ve enough to do now.”

Of course she would notice the scars on Li Ang’s legs. There were more on the Chinoise girl’s back—welt and rope and burn, a crazyquilt of suffering, barbaric lines of ink forced under bleeding skin too. Gabe breathed out, slowly, through his open mouth. They wouldn’t come into this part of Damnation after her. Not comfortably, at least—the Chinois stayed on their own side, and once the railroad got close enough they’d camp out to provide labor for its iron stitchery.

If word got out the baby was born, though…

Gabe, this is a hell of a tangle.

Li Ang couldn’t explain much of where she’d come from, but he’d done some quiet digging. At least, as quiet as he could, being a tall-ass roundeye wandering around in the Chinois part of Damnation. He supposed he should be grateful the marm hadn’t taken it into her head to explore that shadow-half of town. They had their own chartermage, too, a disgusting piece of dried leather with a white beard and clawlike nails.

Who just happened to be Li Ang’s husband. Or, to be precise, Li Ang was one of his wives. The only one to bear him a child to term, if what he’d heard was right.

Gabe was thinking the Chinois didn’t hold with divorce.

Ripp kept talking, soothing and low. Li Ang cried out again, but softly, like a bird. Maybe it helped to have other womenfolk with her.

Whereas he was useless. He should be out riding the circuit, too. But Russ could handle it on his lonesome this once.

Jack stared at the black kettle and kept his hand away from his gun. It looked to be a long night.

* * *

“Push!” Ma Ripp barked.

“Oh, for God’s sake,” the marm snapped. “She’s Chinoise; she can’t understand you!”

Jack tried to make himself as small as possible against the hall wall. Inside the bedroom, Li Ang’s cries had taken on a despairing note. It was almost touching, to hear Miss Barrowe taking up Ma Ripp on Li Ang’s behalf.

“Instead of shouting at her—ow!”

“That’s it!” Ripp crooned. “Squeeze her hands! Almost there, duckums. I can see the head.”

“Oh dear…” Suddenly the marm seemed not quite so crisp. “Is that supposed to happen?”

Li Ang’s voice spiraled up into a scream, and she cursed both of them roundly. At least, so it sounded. The harsh, foreign syllables broke, agony and triumph mingling, and Gabe flinched.

“Oh…” Miss Barrowe. “Oh, my God.”

“That’s it! That’s a good girl! Now! Now!”

Li Ang screamed again. A wet tearing sound, a gushing. Slapping, and Ma Ripp’s muttered mancy. Popping, cracking, fizzing—and Miss Barrowe, softly now.

“Hush, dearie…oh, hush, all’s well, yes, hold my hand…Oh, my. My goodness. My heavens.”

She doesn’t know what to say. I reckon I wouldn’t, either.

Then, a thin protesting wail, gathering in force. “A boy,” Ma Ripp announced dryly. “Breathin’ now, thank the Almighty. And just as fine as can be. Missy, turn loose of her and wash this little ’un.”

“I’ve never—”

“That don’t matter. Hold his head, so. Just sponge him—that’s right. Wrap him up good, I laid the swaddling right there. You had a doll once, dintcha? Just like a doll.”

Li Ang cursed again, raggedly. Or at least, it sounded like a foul imprecation, with an edge of beseeching.

“Oh, yes, I’m bringing him. Just a moment.” Miss Barrowe, half to weeping. “He’s so small. Oh my goodness. Oh—he’s leaking, I do believe he’s… oh, good Lord.” There was a spray and a pattering, and the baby howled with indignation.

“Healthy little cuss,” Ma Ripp observed. “Use the fresh swaddlin’, there. Sometimes they pee. Now comes another bit of a mess. Bleeding, too. Ho, Sheriff! Needing another pair of hands!”

What, me? But he was already palming the door open.