Victor Rosevale's Arc

Chapter 14 of 18

Seraphina waited until Victor sat before she spoke. She kept her hands folded on the table. She did not soften it. She told him the baby was turned in a way that could go wrong late, and that Sable would need quiet weeks near the end, and a midwife within a shout of the door. She said it was fixable if he was careful. Then she looked at him a long moment and said one more thing. "You are going to be no use to her if you fall over first." Victor blinked. "I am fine." "You are gray under the eyes. Your hands shook when you sat down." Seraphina's voice stayed even. "I have seen fathers work themselves sick before the child is born. Then the mother nurses two patients. Do not be that man." Sable watched him from the bench. She did not speak. She let the elf's words land. "I am saving," Victor said. "I have to." "Save slower," Seraphina said. "Sleep. Eat a full meal. Sit down in your own house for one evening." She picked up her satchel. "That is my instruction. Treat it like the rest." She left. The door shut. The house was quiet except for the fire. Sable stood. She crossed to him and took the tin from the shelf where he thought she had not seen it. She set it on the table between them. "She is right," Sable said. "I have three more shifts this week." "Drop one." "Sable." "Drop one." She sat on the bench beside him. She put her hand flat on his chest. "I did not almost die in a river so you could work yourself into the ground in a kitchen. Drop one shift. Eat with me tomorrow. Sleep past dawn once." He looked at her hand. He looked at the tin. The coins inside had a weight he could feel from here. He thought of the midwife's warning, of Sable needing him steady at the end. "One shift," he said. "One to start." "All right." She leaned in and kissed him. It was not the quick kind. She held his face and kissed him slow, and he felt the tight thing in his shoulders let go for the first time in weeks. When she pulled back she kept her forehead against his. "Good," she said.