They never acted like there was anything to it, but a short time after the wedding I noticed that Maze and Alay were awake long after midnight out on the balcony, and the next day Alay was even quieter than usual, looking like she was doing some hard thinking. And she was weirdly awkward with Maze, which naturally made me curious.
Maze didn’t schedule himself or Alay to be my bodyguard for nearly a month, but when he did, it was both of them together again. Sen was going through a bad patch, so I was distracted during the evening, and the most I thought was that Alay looked a bit stressed and I wondered if I’d upset her because she almost looked like she wished she wasn’t there.
Quite late in the night, though, when I’d gotten up to fetch Sen – who had woken from her latest nightmare and was just lying there all wrecked – I noticed that Alay was in Maze’s room. Terrible timing for me – when Sen’s in such a bad state, I have to concentrate myself on totally supportive thoughts and just try and project safety to her – it’s the only thing that seems to help. So I couldn’t let myself obsess over it nearly as much as I wanted to.
When Kaoren woke me in the morning I instantly checked where Maze and Alay were, but Maze had gone for a walk down by the lakeshore, and Alay was back in her own room, asleep. Maze seemed totally normal – maybe a little thoughtful – when he came back for breakfast, and when Alay came out and didn’t even look at him I was starting to think maybe they’d just been discussing missions or something. In the middle of the night. Really close together.
But then Sen (who was still very tired and subdued) suddenly brightened magnificently, and hopped off her chair so she could fling her arms around Alay (at thigh-level) and pronounce in ecstatic tones: "Baby!"
She’d used the English word, since it’s something I sometimes call her when she’s very upset, and Alay just looked confused. Maze knew the word though, and his eyes went rather wide, then he gave Alay one of his super-special smiles and obligingly translated. I think for a moment Alay was on the verge of just running away, but then she stroked Sen’s head and looked at Kaoren, asking: "Can she really tell?"
Kaoren (who I think thought the whole thing super-funny, but was good about not showing it) nodded. "Pregnancies are very clear almost immediately from conception. Congratulations."
Alay looked hugely conflicted and put on the spot, but then bent down and hugged Sen and said "Thank you," and then she and Maze went down to the pool to talk (we’ve put a couple of benches in nooks down at the pool, and they seem to always attract couples, even though it’s icy-cold outside these days). Sen took the opportunity to point out to me and Kaoren that here was proof that there was no need to wait until after a wedding to have babies and I had no more excuses (so much fun watching Siame’s face whenever Sen starts insisting that Kaoren and I have babies NOW!). Kaoren then gave Sen – and the rest of us by proxy – a careful lecture about letting people make their own announcements, and respecting their privacy as much as possible, and Siame (very nicely) volunteered to take the kids off to school to clear them away.
Kaoren and I then had a brief exchange of "What the hell?" since neither of us saw this coming (which says something given Kaoren’s Sights). We moved on to a fun discussion about him being able to know when I get pregnant before I do, and the invasive aspects of my powers, and of Sight talents, and why I never use my visualisation abilities to find out for sure what’s going on – and whether Lira is likely to. But then he had to head out to meet his squad for an Ena mission.
Alay eventually came back without Maze, and I think was very glad that it was only me there stacking the dishwasher. I smiled at her and said: "Congratulations, too. Do you want me to pretend Sen didn’t say that?"
I think she was kind of tempted, but instead shook her head and said: "That would be pointless."
I figured that Alay probably wanted some thinking time, since she wasn’t exactly looking happy, and asked her to work out with me since I couldn’t go out in the canoe (it’s way too cold – will probably start snowing soon). I don’t like working out much at all, but it’s a useful preoccupation if you just want something to do and not talk. Of course, Alay could have been having plenty of lively discussions with people over the interface, but I kind of doubted it. She almost seemed like she didn’t want to be pregnant, even though she would have had to have had the medics take away her contraception. And have had sex with Maze.
Of course I was boiling over with curiosity, and only managed to do a half-assed routine swapping from machine to machine, having to put all my energy into not gaping at Alay. Wasted effort, since Alay didn’t even notice that I was managing one repetition a minute.
"Do you want a boy or a girl?" I finally asked, unable to keep my mouth shut any longer.
Alay blinked – I think she’d forgotten I was there – then said: "A girl. But…either."
"You’ll make great parents. Sen loves playing with you."
"Sen loves playing with everyone," Alay said, amused, and then shook her head. "You must have no hope of keeping any secrets, with three Sight Sight talents in the house."
"Trying not to have secrets to keep," I said with a shrug. "I’m not sure Kaoren could be with me if I did. He sometimes even picks up when I’m planning birthday presents, and gets stressed about it. Sight Sight might conveniently explain things usefully sometimes, but when all it does is tell him there’s something I haven’t told him, it’s really awful."
"He and Selkie are so good at not reacting to the things they must see that it’s easy to underestimate just how much Sight Sight is telling them. I won’t make that mistake again."
"Don’t forget Lira’s and my people-sense either," I said (getting all hot with embarrassment). "One of the reasons I was so happy to move away from Setari accommodation was because I just didn’t need to know so much about who was sleeping with who. It’s not a sense I can turn off, either." I paused, then added: "Are you going to get married?"
"I don’t know. I didn’t expect this to happen so quickly." She looked frustrated, then gave me a very dubious glance – I’m not a person she usually has personal conversations with. But I think she also didn’t want to talk to Zee or Mara or Ketzaren or any of the people who have known her and Maze for years. "Maze will never stop loving Helese. They completed each other in a way that makes any other person impossible for him. And I – I lost someone too, and though I did try to pretend I could recover from that, I never have. I blame your children for this."
That made me blink, but then I understood. "Maze really loves Rye, doesn’t he? But you like Sen more, I think. So you both decided you wanted children?"
"We could have adopted, of course. We might still. And we’re not on Tare any more, where it would be so difficult to gain permission to raise a child alone. But–" Her expression changed, and she shook her head. "But there’s no we, and what kind of situation is that to bring children into?"
I found a towel and wiped my face unnecessarily, thinking that Maze must be great at talking people into things, to have managed to convince Alay that they could have a marriage of convenience. It was no surprise to me that actually having sex with Maze had given Alay more doubts than the month or so she’d thought it over beforehand. I doubt anyone could get into bed with Maze and think that the situation would stay convenient.