“Serbak,” Mother whimpered. “Oh, it hurts.”
Father returned his attention to Mother. He nuzzled her face and spoke to her softly as he moved behind her and rubbed the base of her spine roughly with his thumbs. Mother told him the most painful spot, and he kneaded it until the contraction passed.
“Oh, each birth is more and more painful,” Mother scowled. “Shouldn’t it get easier after birthing so many young? Maybe I have offended Thanas greatly, and he punishes me with extra pain.”
“Hush now.” Father leaned down and kissed Mother’s bare neck. “Thanas is not to blame. I am.”
Mother grunted in agreement. “I should have never let you touch me.”
“Which time?” Father asked, amused. “There have been thousands.”
“Oh, be quiet. Insufferable male.”
The words had barely left her mouth before her pain returned. This continued for a couple of intervals, but as the minutes ticked by slowly, I could sense the change in her body.
“Her surges are closer together, Father,” I commented. “I’ve been counting, and she doesn’t have very long between them. She needs to be checked.”
He nodded in agreement and looked at Mother, who turned to face him. She pressed her face to his chest and moaned as she swayed her hips from side to side to relieve her discomfort.
“I’ve sent for Eena and Neeba now that she is at the ending stage of birthing,” Kol murmured to me. “Neeba was promoted to Royal Healer a few moon cycles ago since his father passed into the Beyond to be with Thanas. The poor male was attacked by that pack of borak causing problems in the outer sectors by the Endless Forest.”
I nodded, not offended in the least.
I had never been my mother’s birthing healer. Even though birthing a young one was perfectly natural, I did not want to be up close and personal with my mother’s private parts as she delivered my new brother if I didn’t have to be. It amused her when I told her this, but she understood. I would relieve her of her pain, but another healer would aid with the actual birthing. This was the agreement we all came to because Mother desperately wanted me to be a part of her birthing process.
I was the only prince who Thanas blessed with the lissa of a healer.
Eena and Neeba, the new Royal Healer, showed up not long after Kol called for them. My brother and I sat down on the cushioned seating provided across the room so we were out of the way. Eena had shooed us out of Mother’s space the second she entered the room.
She had everything that Mother would need brought in—steaming hot water, objects to cut the young’s cord of life, clean linens in different sizes, and body cloths for drying. She even brought in yogi reeds that she began to burn down to ash. As the reeds burned, the chamber would fill with a pleasant scent known to help the body relax.
This was Mother’s sixteenth young one. I didn’t expect her labouring to continue for very long, and I was right.
Not half an interval after Eena and Neeba showed up, Mother’s pain was constant, and she began to snarl for pain relief. The second she asked for it, Father growled my name. I was up from my seat and on the floor behind my mother in an instant. I placed my hand on her upper back, closed my eyes, and focused my lissa.
It was tricky, very tricky because Mother’s pain receptors were all zinging bright blue. I felt a deep appreciation for my mother once I saw how much pain she was in. I had healed many broken bones, sealed dozens of open wounds, and even re-attached partially severed limbs, but I had never seen so many pain receptors ignite with light at one time.
As a healer, birthing a child was the worst pain I had ever seen. I understood at that moment why Thanas gave the task of life-bearing to females over males. It was obvious that males would die from the pain and go extinct.
I extinguished the light of as many pain receptors as I could without overdoing it. I was worried I would make a mistake, and I could not afford that. Not when the female giving birth was my mother, and the young was my sibling. I felt perspiration coat my forehead, but a cool cloth was quickly tapped over my face and behind my neck. My senses told me it was Eena watching over me like she was supposed do with the Royal Healer.
“Good, Ezah. Keep going, my son.” I heard Father’s voice. “How is my little offspring?”
I hadn’t checked on my sibling yet, so I momentarily switched my lissa to the young and undid all of my work on my mother’s pain receptors. Mother screamed as the full force of her contractions surged back to claim her. Once I had a reading that the young’s heart was beating normal, I quickly got back to work extinguishing as many of the blue lights as I could. Moments later, the pain Mother felt was bearable for her. Enough that she could get through her contractions with just her breathing.