LITMIR.BIZ

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      “I didn’t want you to worry. And I guess I thought if I didn’t admit something was wrong, nothing would be wrong.”

      His grunt said he thought I was a moron.

      “I will need to examine you, Rhea.” Carolan’s voice was soothing.

      “Ok-k-kay…” My voice shook.

      “ClanFintan, I will call for you when I have completed my examination.” Now Carolan was the general giving orders as if he expected to be obeyed.

      “I prefer to stay with Rhea.” My husband sounded stubborn.

      Before I could chime in, Carolan spoke with the quiet surety of experience. “It would be better for her if she had some privacy. Trust me, my friend.” His hand grasped the centaur’s muscular shoulder and their eyes locked.

      ClanFintan broke their gaze first. Abruptly, he leaned down and kissed me on my damp forehead. “I will be just outside. Call if you have need of me.” His exit was quick.

      I tried to smile bravely at Carolan. “Thanks. I love him, but this whole thing is very awkward for me, and, well, you were right about my need for privacy.”

      He returned my smile as he sat next to me, making the huge down-filled mattress fluff up.

      “This is an interesting sleeping arrangement you have here.” His gesture took in the enormous mattress that rested directly on the floor of my spacious bedchamber.

      “Being married to someone who is part horse demands some creative solutions to things you wouldn’t otherwise think about. I mean, really, how the heck does a horse comfortably fit into a traditional bed? And I, the Beloved of Epona, certainly need more than a pile of sawdust or a bale of straw.” I patted the mattress. “This works for us.”

      “Alanna says you have a unique name for it.”

      “A marshmallow.” I grinned. “It’s named after a sweet, sticky mound of white fluff from my old world that can be eaten as a dessert.” Carolan, Alanna and ClanFintan knew my true identity. Sometimes it was a relief to be able to relax and make references to my prior life without worrying about betraying myself. Relaxation, I suddenly realized, must have been Carolan’s reason for getting me to chatter. Being on the receiving end of his much renowned bedside manner was a new and not totally unpleasant experience.

      “So, now that I’m not hyperventilating anymore, what’s next?”

      “Nothing too horrible,” he reassured me. “Just some questions first, then I will examine you.” The confidence in his voice soothed my puke-frazzled nerves. “Tell me how long you have been feeling ill.”

      I started to reply with a quip, but he held up his hand, cutting off my words.

      “You must be honest, Rhea. If you are not totally truthful, I will have a difficult time being of any aid to you.”

      I sighed. “Almost three weeks, or, as Alanna would say, three seven-days. It’s just been so obvious for the past two weeks that I couldn’t hide it from her.” I shared a pretended long-suffering look with him. “You know how nosy she is.”

      He rolled his eyes as he began feeling the glands in my neck. “You need not tell me how tenacious she can be when it comes to the welfare of those she loves.” He began taking my pulse. “How long have you been purging yourself?”

      “Purging?” I was confused. Bulimia had never interested me. I’ve always been strictly an “eat everything in sight and work out like a fiend” girl when it came to weight management.

      “Relieving yourself of what you’ve eaten. Vomiting,” he clarified.

      “Well, I certainly haven’t been doing it on purpose.”

      “Of course you have not!” He paused in his examination, giving me a shocked look.

      For an instant a sarcastic remark rose to my lips, then I reminded myself that he wasn’t pretending to be shocked at what my twenty-first century peers would consider a norm. I know it sounds hard to believe, but sometimes I forget I’m no longer in a world where beauty is defined by anorexic, strung-out models with boob jobs.

      “Right, well, I’ve been actually vomiting for a little over a week, but I’ve been feeling like I could puke any second for almost three weeks.” Before he could get confused I added in a teacherly, informative voice, “To puke is to vomit.”

      “To puke,” he pondered as he opened a huge leather bag that seemed to always be with him. “That is an interesting term.”

      We smiled at each other.

      “Have you had any other symptoms besides your stomach upset?” He asked.

      “Well,” I said hesitantly, “I’ve been feeling kind of weird and depressed and jumpy.” I figured that about covered everything from my emotions being all out of whack to the possible hallucinations last night.

      He patted my arm reassuringly as he pulled out of the bag a long, funnel-like object that seemed to be made of construction paper. “Please sit up and breathe deeply,” he said, and I complied as he used the funnel as a sort of crude stethoscope.

      He appeared okay with what he heard, because he put the funnel-scope away and continued with the examination, gently probing, prodding and looking all over (and within) my body as he questioned me. He asked me everything from what kinds of flowers my maidens had been cutting for the daily arrangements that filled my bedchamber with fragrance, to how often I’d been pooping.

      Finally, he finished. Patting my nervously folded hands, he began, “I am very certain you—”

      “Have a brain tumor!” My stomach rolled in revolt and I felt my palms dampening.

      Carolan chucked. “You have no tumor, Rhea, but you certainly have something within your body now that was not there just a few months ago.” His eyes sparkled, and I wanted to choke him until they bulged out of his face.

      “A friggin aneurysm. I knew it. Somehow I was exposed to something radioactive when Rhiannon the Bitch traded places with me.” I fell back on the pile of pillows, trying unsuccessfully to stop my eyes from filling with tears.

      “By the Goddess, Rhea, will you not listen!” Carolan’s voice was frustrated but definitely tinged with humor. “You are not dying. You are not ill. You are, quite simply and blessedly, pregnant.”

      “I’m…I’m…I’m…”

      “I estimate you will give birth mid-spring.”

      “A baby?” I realized I sounded like a dolt, but my mind had literally become mush.

      “That would certainly be my experienced diagnosis.” He smiled as he collected odds and ends and fed them back into the mouth of his doctor’s bag. “A girl,” he added.

      “A girl? How do you know?” My hands unclasped themselves and crept down to cup my deceptively normal-looking abdomen.

      “The firstborn of Epona’s Chosen is always a girl child. It is a gift from your Goddess to you and your people.”

      I felt stunned. Sure, I had missed a period, but I hadn’t given it much thought. I’d chalked it up to stress. A new world in a different dimension where mythology lives. Becoming Goddess Incarnate. Battling demonic hordes. Stufflike that was bound to throw off anyone’s system a little, to say the least. I noticed that Carolan suddenly seemed in a big rush to leave.

      “What’s your hurry?” I sounded on the verge of a crying jag, which, at least, now made sense. Hormones.

      “Alanna will want to announce the wonderful news to the people. The celebration will continue all night!” I blanched and he laughed. “No, you will not be required to attend, but there will be many toasts to your health and the health of your child.” He turned to face me one last time before he opened the door. “Congratulation, Rhea. Let me be the first of many to

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