Kensei Jon's Arc

Chapter 20 of 49

They did not leave for the dyer that week. Jeon-min woke sick two mornings in a row. The first day, he blamed old bread. The second day, he sat on the edge of the new bed with his head down and did not stand. Kensei knelt in front of him. "You're pale." "I'm fine." "You said that yesterday, then you ran outside." Jeon-min pressed a hand to his own stomach. He frowned, the way he frowned at a stitch that would not lie flat. "It's not the bread," he said. "I've had bad bread. This is different." A cat slipped in through the gap under the door. It was a strange one, orange and white and black, with markings like fish scales running down its side. It had come around since they moved in, fed by no one they knew. It jumped onto the quilt and settled against Jeon-min's leg. He did not push it off. His hand rested on its back while he thought. "Count the days," Jeon-min said. Not to Kensei. To himself. "What days?" Jeon-min looked up. His face had changed. "The bed," he said. "The night we built the bed." Kensei did not follow. "What about it?" "After that night. I'm late." Jeon-min said the number of days out loud. Then he said it again, slower, as if hearing it twice would make it wrong. "I'm never late." Kensei still did not understand. Then he did. His mouth went dry. "You think you're—" "Pregnant." Jeon-min said the word flat, the way he said a price. But his hand tightened in the cat's fur. "I think I might be pregnant." Neither of them moved. The cat purred against Jeon-min's leg, loud in the quiet room. Kensei's mind ran back over everything he knew, and none of it had a place for this. They had planned a shop. They had planned a journey east. They had not planned this. "That can't—" Kensei started, then stopped. He had learned in this city that things he was sure of could still be true. "How do we know?" "A midwife knows." Jeon-min stood. The sickness had passed enough to let him. "There's one two doors from the thread seller. I've seen her sign." They went together, through the market, past the stalls. Kensei held the door for him. The midwife pressed her hands to Jeon-min's belly, asked her questions, counted on her own fingers. Then she nodded once and told them plain. Jeon-min was carrying a child. They walked home slow. Kensei did not know what to say, so he said the true thing. "We can't go east now." "No." Jeon-min stopped in the street. He looked at Kensei, and for once he did not say the fact flat. His voice caught. "We're going to have a child. Here. In this city." Kensei took his hand in front of everyone and held it. The pattern would have to wait. Something else was coming first.