Part 29 (2/2)
”He is your son. Not your enemy.”
Roca grunted.
Dehya regarded her steadily. ”Kurj voted the way he did to protect all the babies whose lives the Traders will destroy if they conquer us.”
”How can you defend him?” Roca demanded. ”You voted against the invasion.”
”A mother should not hate her son.”
Roca lifted her hand, then dropped it in frustration. ”I could never hate Kurj. That's what makes this so wrong. I hate the things he does, but I will always love him.”
”You and he must come to terms with this.”
”I don't know if we can this time.” Her memories of Kurj as a boy eased into her thoughts. ”But still, he is my firstborn, my golden child.”
Dehya sighed. ”Now you have two.”
Roca heard the longing in her sister's voice. ”Are you and Seth still trying?”
”Not anymore.” Dehya walked with her to the couch. ”We tried for decades with the best doctors we could find. But finally-well, it just hurt too much to keep failing.” As they sat on the couch, she said, ”I am happy for you, more than I can say. But-ai, Roca, I envy you, too. Sometimes I long for a child so much, I am breaking inside.”
”I'm sorry,” Roca murmured. Although she had sensed Dehya wanted a family, she hadn't realized how deeply it hurt her sister that it had never happened. Dehya had married an Allied military officer, William Seth Rockworth, in an arranged marriage, part of an Allied-Skolian treaty.
”Ah, well.” Dehya tried to smile. ”I have nephews.”
”Don't give up yet,” Roca said. ”It wasn't easy for Tokaba and I to have Kurj. We went to many clinics. The doctors said I could never get pregnant, not unless we were willing to have the child's DNA altered so it wouldn't be a psion.”
Dehya sat up straighter. ”That is what they told Seth and me! Ruby genes have too many lethal recessives. The combinations that made our family may be the only ones that produce a viable fetus.
Artificial methods never worked for us, not even cloning.” She shook her head. ”Why can't we figure out why Ruby children survive only if they gestate in the mother? It is an injustice.”
Roca remembered the difficult time when she and Tokaba had struggled to accept that they would never have a child of their own. Even manipulating their DNA to delete the genes of a psion might have failed, given the difficulties. Nor did she think they could have made such a decision. It would have been like taking away the child's sight.
She spoke in a low voice. ”When we found out I was pregnant with Kurj, it was a miracle.”
”I can imagine.” Dehya's face gentled. ”Father thinks Eldrin is beautiful.”
”Very beautiful.” Roca smiled. ”Not that I'm biased.”
Dehya laughed. ”Not at all.”
”Perhaps Eldri and I managed better because his people have been separate from ours for thousands of years. Apparently we don't carry many of the same recessives.” She thought of her difficult pregnancy.
”It was easier for me to carry Kurj, though, probably because he is more like us.”
”What does your husband's DNA show?”
It gratified Roca that her sister referred to Eldri as her husband, a reference most of the family avoided.
”I don't know. Kurj hasn't given me the results yet.”
”Ah, Roca.” Dehya obviously understood what she left unspoken. ”He will come to accept his stepfather.”
”I hope so.” But Roca knew it would never happen.
Dehya was watching her closely. ”You hurt.”
”I miss Eldri.” Softly she added, ”And it tears me apart that he can't see his son.”
”Why can't he come here?”
”Kurj.” Roca put a world of anger into that one word.
”He threatened you?”
”Not me. Eldri.”
Dehya stared at her. ”This is wrong.”
Roca made an effort not to grit her teeth. ”Tell Kurj that.”
”I will.”
Roca laid her hand on her sister's arm. ”No, don't. I will deal with it. I don't want you caught in the emotional shrapnel from this.”
”I would like to help.”
”Support me in the a.s.sembly when I speak of Eldri.”
Dehya didn't hesitate. ”All right.”
”I am glad you voted against the invasion.”
She spoke awkwardly. ”Kurj has asked for my help on it.”
”You said no of course.”
”Actually, I agreed.”
Roca went rigid. ”How could you agree?”
”And if I don't?” Dehya pushed back tendrils of hair curling around her face. ”ISC wants me to improve the EI security on their s.h.i.+ps. It could save lives. If that is within my capability, I must do it, regardless of how I feel about the invasion.”
”I admire your integrity,” Roca said dryly. ”I doubt I could do the same.”
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