Epilogue

Six weeks after delivery.

I caught Nikita before he fell face-first into the cold grass. My son and the ground had a very close relationship; he always wanted to run after his brothers, but he still wasn’t fast enough and his anxiety was working against him. He was very small and his legs were very short.

But he was no longer the smallest. In the crook of my left arm, Alexei yawned and continued sleeping while I lifted Nikita to his feet and let him go. The shaking had not disturbed the baby. My youngest son was not like the others: he accepted my presence from day one, when with everyone else I had to wait agonizingly for long weeks until they got used to my smell and allowed me to hold them.

I was really enjoying it, of course.

Among my people, the idea of “baptism” does not exist, but since I had a Catholic mother-in-law, some appearances had to be kept up. Elizabeth Miller doesn’t know anything about us, and it wasn’t in the plans to let her know, but we